Star Wars Advent Calendar: Day 22
Posted by CapnRex101,
LEGO Star Wars Advent Calendars typically focus upon festive items during the last couple of days. I am accordingly expecting to discover a seasonal minifigure or model today.
Find out after the break...
75056 Star Wars Advent Calendar from 2014 was the last that came with a miniature Moisture Vaporator, although this model features an unusual green colour scheme and a trans-yellow light on top. It therefore resembles a Christmas tree which is a fun idea but the execution is unconvincing. A few different shades of green are used and these do not mix very well.
The model does feature some interesting elements though, including bright green 3L bars, sand green 1x1 clips and a lime green 1x1 brick with studs on every side. Furthermore, it captures the shape of the original Moisture Vaporators quite effectively. Most of them only feature three chiller bars but variants with four do exist within the Star Wars universe.
Overall - 2.5 - I like the idea of a Christmas-themed Moisture Vaporator but the resultant model is rather dull. It looks good beside Luke's Landspeeder from day one though!
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20 comments on this article
Unusual! Love it.
Why four shades of green?? Who thought that was a good idea? They should’ve used maybe two shades at most
nice idea, but not the best execution
Crazy the varying opinions...
I think this one is a very creative and a wonderful addition. I love the color scheme. Well done LEGO!
Yeah, I.. yeah.
Now this is what I call abstract art.
one of my favorites! i like the different greens, it adds to the "old beat-up tech" feel of Star Wars
An unusual model, all I need now is a glass of blue milk!
In my opinion this is a very creative idea and it looks pretty good to me! I personally would give it a 4.5, although that is just my opinion.
This was one of my favorite models of the calendar. Now I won’t be able to un-see all the different shades of green used though.
I thought it was kinda cool it definitely resembles what I would imagine a Star Wars Xmas tree to be.
I actually don't mind the different shades of green at all. I kinda like this model
While this year's models have been very good, the Christmas themed ones have been rather lacklustre, especially when compared to 75056!
I think it's pretty creative, and honestly I don't see much problem with the varied shades of green — in fact, in your photo I hardly would've noticed how many there were if you hadn't pointed out, since all but the mostly covered up Bright Yellowish Green blend together fairly smoothly.
As for why there are so many shades of green, I see a few possible reasons:
• First, it requires no recolors. The clips, bars, and Travis brick don't currently come in any other shades of green, so the only way to reduce the number of colors without new recolors would be to change all the Dark Green (Classic Green) parts to Sand Green and/or Bright Yellowish Green (Lime).
• Second, varied colors might help make the instructions for a model like this (with studs on five sides) more readable on the small surface inside the front flap. LEGO often uses varied colors for adjacent parts in instructions for other sets like buildable figures to make it clearer where one part ends and the next begins.
• And third, mottled colors are pretty normal for the Star Wars universe's "used future" aesthetic, so even the moisture vaporator from the 2014 version used pretty varied colors to represent the normal Tatooine paint scheme. So even if you were to create a Christmas card depicting a Christmas tree patterned moisture vaporator in a more realistic/film accurate style, it would probably have varying shades of green for the different components.
@Aanchir:
Saved me from having to dig up all that info myself, because that's exactly what I was thinking regarding what parts are available in what colors without having to burn a new element slot.
But you did miss one other possible reason for multicolored designs. Set designers like to build in Easter eggs. One that isn't always super obvious is when the builder likes to incorporate the colors of their homeland's flag. It's very doubtful that had anything to do with this particular build (I can't recall any nations with camouflaged flags), but it certainly does explain some of the weird color choices you see over the years, especially if you know who designed the set and where they came from.
@Purple Dave:
I've never heard of the "hide your country's flag's colours" easter eggs, but it sounds cool – can you share any examples?
I love this model! the colours are awesome!
As one example of an Easter egg, The Creator Mini contains a Queensland (Australia) number plate to reflect the designer's state of origin.
@Legomus: There’s a Portuguese flag hidden inside the Helicarrier set!
@Legomus:
I honestly can't remember any examples of sets (the presentation was back in June, and the presenter was burning through the examples at a brisk pace). I believe the builder who was being used as an example is from Norway, however, so red/white/blue would be the colors he'd work with (though they'd work equally well for the US, UK, France, and probably several other countries).