Quarantine building: Bionicle MOCers' response to lockdown
Posted by Huw,
Today's guest editorial has been contributed by Jackson Reid in Australia:
With the growing quarantine restrictions and lock-downs happening all over the world, many people have found themselves confined to their homes, away from work and their studies. For me personally, my Uni has gone on a two-week break before we begin classes online to take necessary precautions for COVID-19.
However, as a LEGO fan and active builder I have found that my natural instinct to both entertain myself and keep my brain active is of course to build more figures. I run an Instagram account where I post my Bionicle creations, and ever since restrictions on our daily living have begun, I’ve been posting more as well as interacting with other Bionicle fans a great deal. I was curious to know whether my fellow creators were having a similar experience as me, and it turns out that they were. Over Instagram I interviewed several Bionicle MOCers with various followings and from different countries to get a holistic idea of how the pandemic has affected our hobby.
The Lonely Matoran has only been part of ‘Biogram’ for a little over a month, and ended up in a tricky situation after the French government announced total lockdown. Due to the lockdown, they didn’t have many of their usual pieces with them and were limited to building with Bionicle set 8549-1 Tarakava, plus a Matoran figure. But they didn’t let that stop them, and built an alternative combiner of the two Tarakava figures to make an off-road suspension vehicle with room to fit his Matoran figure. They said this experience improved their building skills, having to stretch their imagination in order to make do with the few pieces they had with them.
Bionicle Instagrammer ‘bionicleforlife’ hails from the UK, where everyone they know are staying inside or social distancing. Although they felt they have been building at about the same rate as before the virus, they’ve noticed more content from other Bionicle accounts online.
“There have been more posts, stories and live-streams in my opinion. I think it’s amazing though, it’s really nice to see people building and sharing creations - it’s also inspiring for myself and other users!”.
They’ve still made plenty of Bionicle figures during quarantine, particularly for contests and collaboration projects. They think their building skills have improved since lockdown and have grown to care for the textures of their models.
In Russia, LEGO fan Kriviach has had all their university classes move to online learning, much like myself. Usually they would be travelling 3 hours to get to uni, which has given him a few more hours each week to build Bionicle figures. They also noticed other users posting more creations and feels that his time self-isolating is improving his building skills. He’s also appreciated the memes people have made from all the quarantine MOCs.
Lastly, in the States, aspiring LEGO designer Eclipse Caller is a dedicated builder with a strong following. Even as an introvert he still has a desire to spend time with others, something which quarantine has made very difficult. At the moment, he finds himself spending about 60% of his day moccing, particularly working on unfinished creations which he now has the time to work on.
“There's still so much to experiment with my current mocs and if there's any spare time to dedicate, it's certainly now.”
One of the figures he has worked on during quarantine is the impressive angelic figure featured at the top, which has gone through a great deal of experimentation. Eclipse Caller plans on implementing some more non-Bionicle pieces to challenge himself and add some extra variety to his creations.
I had responses from several other accounts as well, and all of them had at least noticed the new flow of mocs appearing, if not helping facilitate this themselves. Although these are difficult time swhere we may have lost our jobs, had our learning disrupted, and lost our social life – these Bionicle fans are using this time as an opportunity to refine and enjoy the hobby they love, and share their creations with the rest of us! Personally, I don’t think I’ve craved to see more awesome LEGO creations as much as I do now.
What do you think of these creations? Do you have an experience with quarantine MOC-ing that you would like to share? Please drop a comment and let me know!
Thanks Jackson! If you have a LEGO-related article you'd like us up publish, get in touch!
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12 comments on this article
Those creations look amazing. As much as being isolated in quarantine is a bad thing, it seems like it does have some good things about if, after all. I'm really excited to see what else people will build in the coming weeks!
they look amazing but I only own one Bionicle set and 2 batman ones. guess I won't be taking part.
That first one looks amazing!
Yeah, the white and dark red build, at the very top of the page, looks incredible.
We've also been running Metru Build March on Instagram! We do this every year but quarantine has produced some great MOCs from people.
The aim is to build a MOC around the standard frame of the Toa Metru from 2004. People can add as much or as little detail as they want, and we've seen some really inventive ones this year. The sudden outpouring of custom designed, 3D printed masks has also meant people are trying a lot of the official characters with no official description, which is pretty cool.
Check the hashtag metrumarch to see all of them, or find us at @bioniclegenerations as this evening we'll be post the best Metru MOCs of the month!
https://www.instagram.com/bioniclegenerations/
I really like the use of the Ben Ten torso on bionicleforlife's. Those sets' parts didn't have as much texture as the previous BIONICLE parts nor as many connection points as the later HERO Factory ones so you don't see them pop up as often, especially the Omnitrix chestpiece given how specialized it is.
I must commend all those whose model is featured above. Dare I say it but I think these are works of art.
That Tarakava combiner model feels so authentic to the 2001 sets; while offering a more traditional Technic style focused on vehicles. I love it!
Another article that surprised me (after the minifig Moccing tutorial), again very welcome!
Also, this meme is too relevant for this whole situation to not share it: https://knowyourmeme.com/photos/1253435-bionicle :P
@Zordboy said:
"Yeah, the white and dark red build, at the very top of the page, looks incredible."
Maybe because it screams Jetfire?
https://youtu.be/8OEEncGeu8s
Now they need to build a purple and gray one...
These all look beautiful. I only have a few bionicle sets (even though my brothers have some Hero Factory), but I’ve mostly been repairing a few sets instead of Mocing.
In fact, I was repairing my Raid VPR when it was announced as RSotD Yesterday! Spooky!
Amazing. I've been critical of the CCBS sets, but am amazed at what can be done with them.
I think I have a few random pieces left over from the Bionicle sets of my preteen years, another set, a Hero Factory set, and a Star Wars Jyn Erso (which I bought before buying the very nice and inexpensive Disney Store 10" figure of her; I've seen them under $15 everywhere). I might see what I can make with those--I never typically mess around with CCBS.