Custom Designs for OfferZen

New custom mini brick designs that I designed for OfferZen. You can check out more of my work here. We mass produce custom designs for corporate clients all around the world =)

Project for Google Firebase

This is my project for Google Firebase. It's their mascot Sparky =D

Project for Meriton Suites

My latest project for Meriton Suites in Australia =) ... It's their logo.

My Company Is Up and Running

Hi Guys! I have just set up CHRISTAN DESIGN, a company specialising in custom nano brick design and manufacturing. You can check out the website over here and the Facebook page is over here. 

Do check it out and tell all your friends about it, okay? =D ... A PDF booklet about our services can be downloaded here. Thank you so much for your support! 

Reshooting All My nanoblock Creations

In the midst of reshooting all my nanoblock creations so that I have nice photos for my new website, portfolio and maybe a book in the future ... Hahaha ... 

Quick Tour of My Design Studio

Here's a quick tour of my office where I design all my nanoblock creations =)

nanoblock Art Piece: Flow

An art piece from me today titled "Flow" ... See the dynamics of water in action as presented in nanoblock =) ... and I would really appreciate it if you would vote for my entry in the nanoblock Award 2014-2015. 

nanoblock Disney Collection by Christopher Tan

Here is my line of Disney nanoblock designs =) ... Would you buy them if they were official products? =D

My nanoblock Name Card Holder

Here's my new nanoblock name card holder =D ... What do you think? =)

nanoblock Award 2013-2014 - Please Vote!

The annual nanoblock Award is currently in progress and there is a week left (ends Jan 13) for public voting. I have submitted over 20 of my designs and would very much appreciate it if you could vote for them =) ...

Click here and click the "Like" on the designs you would like to vote for. My designs are listed under my name "Christopher Tan Teck Hean". The first time you click "Like", you will be asked to login and fill in some form, so just follow the instructions. Thank you for taking the time to do this, your support is much appreciated =)

Getting Started With Custom Nanoblocking

Many of you have probably asked me this question - "Which set should I buy to make this?". I wish I can give a definite answer, but it is not so easy to do that for a number of reasons. 

I have a lot of blocks from many generic basic sets as well as most of the specific sets like the animals, sights to see, etc., and all the blocks are have been mixed together, so I have no idea which sets have exactly how many of what types of blocks. You can see my nanoblock toolboxes below.

Another thing to consider is that there are many ways to layout the blocks to achieve the same final design, and different layouts will use different number and types of blocks, so even if I can tell you that it will take two basic monochrome sets to make something, it is possible that it could be done with a single set if you just use the blocks a bit differently.

Also, nanoblock sets comes and goes out of production regularly, so nanoblock sets that I used may no longer be available, but there may be new nanoblock sets that contains similar colours and types of bricks. 

Now you see why it is so hard to answer that question earlier? Hahaha ...

How to Get Started

So then, what is the best way to get started with custom nanoblocking? Probably the same way I got started, which is to buy the basic nanoblock sets. There are four basic sets available as shown below. 

I would recommend getting one of each set to get started. That will give you around 4200+ blocks to play with. If you get it from Plamoya which usually has them at discount, it will cost around US$120 for all four sets (not including shipping). It is also good to get them all at once because you save on shipping. Having these four sets, you should have enough blocks to build many of my designs. 

This is a lot cheaper than starting with the small specific sets, like the animal series, which sells for around US$10 each, and usually comes with around 150 blocks. 

Now, I know spending over a hundred dollars may sound expensive, but remember, this is something you can build and rebuild over and over again. It is a hobby that will bring you many many hours of fun. 

Turning Pro

Over time, you will probably start to feel that you want more colours to play with. To do that, we turn to the smaller specific sets. Here are some examples:

• Pink blocks - Pig or Great Flamingo set
• Orange blocks - Halloween pumpkin or Space Shuttle set
• Dark Mustard Yellow blocks - Giraffe set
• Cream blocks - Alpaca Cream set

There are many others, so do browse around nanoblock stores to find new colours to add to your palette. 

Recently, new types of blocks have also started appearing in the latest series of marine animal nanoblock sets. The moon jellyfish has a new “L” shaped block and also 2x2 round block. The others, like the giant squid, fiddler crab, great white shark, etc have some new blocks too that looks interesting.

Building My Designs

One thing I would like to stress when it comes to building my designs is that you do not have to do it exactly as shown in my build instructions. You can adapt it to your needs.

Most of the time, you do not need to use the same types of blocks as I do. You can use any block you have, as long as it achieves the same result. For example, instead of using one piece of 2x4 block, it’s possible you can use two pieces of 1x4 block. The only thing to be careful with is when those blocks need to hold other blocks together. 

You can also change the colours used, as long as it works. I have dark mustard yellow colour chopsticks in my nanoblock Sushi Set design, but you can always change it to brown, black, red, etc. to suit your needs. 

What if you do not have enough blocks to build my design? In some cases, you can creatively work around this. For example, if you do not have enough blocks to build the “wooden board” for my Sushi Set design, you can change it slightly to make it a smaller size “wooden board”, and you put fewer pieces of sushi on it. 

Feel free to be creative! Building in nanoblock means you can always make changes, so do not worry about making mistakes. Experiment as much as you like until you are satisfied. 

Happy nanoblocking! =)

Related Articles:

• Where To Get Generic Nanoblock Sets
• How To: Designing Nanoblock Creations

How To: Designing Nanoblock Creations

Some of my creations

The most commonly asked question I get from my blog followers are, where do you buy those generic nanoblock bricks to build your creations ? I finally answered that in an article over here. 

Now, I am moving on to the second most commonly asked question, which is, how do I design my nanoblock creations. First, lets get something out of the way. Some of you were wondering if I used any software to help me design my creations. The answer is no, I do not use any software, so, no shortcuts if that is what you're wondering ;)

Here is how I actually go about designing my nanoblock creations.

1) Pick an idea that is feasible

Yes, theoretically, pretty much anything can be build using nanoblock.  The question is :  (a) How detailed do you want it   (b) How big do you have to build the model in order to achieve the required level of detail   (c) Do you have enough bricks to actually build it. So when you choose to build something, these 3 factors have to be considered. 

2) Study the 3D structure

After deciding what to build, I would do a Google Image Search of the item I want to build. So, for example, when I wanted to build a Smurf, I search for images of Smurfs, and try to get a few pictures of Smurfs from multiple angles. That allows me to study the subject's structure in 3D, and I can visualize it in my head.

3) Decide what are the defining features

While nanoblock is relatively small, it is still quite big, making it impossible to capture every single little detail unless you build your model extremely huge. That is probably not very practical, so you have to decide what are the defining features of the model that must be captured in your design in order for it to be recognized as what you are trying to build, and what are non-essential. Don't try to capture every tiny detail.

4) Start building from the smallest significant detail

After getting a 3D mental image, I normally start building from the smallest significant detail. The reason is because this will determine the scale for the rest of the model.  Take for example, if the smallest significant detail is the eyes, and you need to have a single black block surrounded by white blocks to build an eyeball, everything else have to be scaled accordingly, since you can't build the rest of the model at a smaller scale than that. So, if a single eyeball is 3x3 blocks, two eyeballs would be 6 blocks across, you can't build your head with a width smaller than 6 blocks, or the eyes wouldn't fit.

5) Refine the design

Once I have visualized in my head on roughly how to map a 3D structure to nanoblock design, I would  more or less get what I expected when building it, but not always. There will be things that seems like it should work in your head, but when you actually build it, it does not come out how you expect it to be. So, you have to refine your design, like how a sculptor creates a sculpture. You make little tweaks here and there, until you get the shape you want. This is where the small 1x1 and 1x2 bricks comes in really handy for fine tuning your design.

That is pretty much the whole process that I go through when designing my nanoblock creations. If you want to take pictures of the build process for your creation, the easiest way to do it is actually to shoot pictures of the disassembly process, and reverse the order of photos to get the build instructions.

Thank you for reading, and I hope this helps in getting you started with creating your own nanoblock designs. Do check out my nanoblock creations over here.

Related Articles:

• Where To Get Generic Nanoblock Sets
• Getting Started With Custom Nanoblocking