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Entrevista com o Hippotam |
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Written by pedroagnelo
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Sábado, 24 Novembro 2007 |
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Today we bring you an interview with Polish AFOL Hippotam, the man behind the blog Klocki among many other things. Thanks again Hippotam!
Hello Hippotam!
Hello Pedro!
Let's talk a bit about yourself first: who are you? What do you do, where do you come f rom?
My real name is Marcin Danielak. I’m 33, married, with children. I live in nice city of Kraków, Poland. I work in IT, as a quality director in R&D center of a French-Polish company.
How did you first made contact with LEGO? Do you remember your first LEGO set?
I played with LEGO when I was a kid. It were late 70s. f rom the first sets, I remember 456 Spirit of St. Louis, 192 Policemen and 696 Bus Stop. But my golden LEGO days came few years later, with 918 Space Transport and 6950 Mobile Rocket Transport? I also had one of the first Technic sets – 853.
What is your favourite LEGO theme and what do you enjoy building the most?
I love System themes, mostly Castle and Space, but in fact I have some building ideas for almost any theme, like Western, Steampunk or Adventurers. They’re all so cool!
Did you go through a dark age? (and why?)
Yes, my dark age lasted for almost 20 years! I abandoned LEGO when I was around 12 and got my first computer. I was lucky that my Mom stored my bricks and I was able to recover them when I was 32. Thanks again Mom (if you are reading this)!
What attracts you most about LEGO so that you chose it as your hobby?
I think LEGO offers unique mixture of art, storytelling, collecting and model building. Each of these could be a separate hobby, but LEGO has it all. It means you can build a detailed model of real world objects. Or create your own worlds and stories limited only by your imagination. And when you are a little tired with building, you can take a break and go hunting for rare bricks or sets to expand your collection. Or sort... Yes, sorting is also fun. It makes me calm.
Could you tell us something about the AFOL community in Poland?
Judging f rom the number of LUGPOL registered users, there is about 400 active AFOLs in Poland, with different age and interests.
We’re probably quite similar to other communities, so maybe I will name few things unique to Polish one. First, we got a great local contest Brick Transport Tycoon hosted by my friend Nexus. Second, we got great annual exhibit at Kielce hosted by Toys Museum, organized by Maciej Drwięga. Third – we got some ‘hot’ names (often featured on cult LEGO blogs) that speak for themselves. You probably heard about Misterzumbi’s tractors, Jerac’s spaceships and V1’s motors just to name few. Fourth – we got very active group of “technicians” breaking their trial trucks into pieces out in the fields. And, last but not least – this year we got this great challenge between Polish and Portuguese communities about Classic Castle Contest V. And Port wine...
How did you come across the 0937 Community?
Some other day I found Rupi’s “Examination” while browsing Brickshelf. I blogged it and few days later I noticed a lot of folks visited my blog f rom a strange address: forum0937.miniancora.com. So I went there to check who are these people and that’s how I found your community. BTW, it took me quite long to figure out what that number means...
Anyway, you were so friendly that I visit often and publish all my creations on Forum0937. And I got visit f rom Manel. It’s great!
Where do you go for inspiration for your MOCs? And who do you have under the “Bookmarks” tab?
There is a lot of builders who’s work I admire. Dan Jassim is probably the one who brought me back f rom dark ages. Nelson Yrizarry showed me the importance of detail and humor. Creation of Takeshi Itou and Jojo Koehler made me a Castler. Recently, I build some Space creations and that’s mostly Jerac’s fault...
But most often my inspiration does not come f rom other’s creations. I rather try to imagine the model in my head first, and then I often check how others solved the construction problems. I like to build things that was never existed before.
Could you tell us which is your favourite creation of all time? (self or not) Why?
No, it’s impossible to pick one. It’s like asking about a favourite song – there are just too many of great ones.
But if you are asking about my own creations, a favourite is always the last, so it is HCV Armadillo. But I think my best work so far is Operation Lethal Duck.
Of course I couldn’t end this without asking you about Klocki, could you tell us something about it? (reasons to it’s creation, objectives, etc, this bit is up to you)
I started Klocki with several objectives in mind. First – to reach for non-AFOLs and infect them with LEGO virus. These people do not visit community forums so they don’t even know that they are in their dark age. I believe Klocki can take credit for bringing some great builders back to the hobby, for example Crises.
Second – there is a lot of great LEGO-related news, creations and ideas popping out every day – same are overlooked even by fans. Someone had to feature them. This is still a goal – currently, my free time allows me to feature only one f rom ten interesting stories I read or hear each day. I have great help f rom Nexus and Sariel, but still a lot of interesting things are not blogged – there are just too many of them.
Third – I wanted to promote our hobby, which is very rare in Poland and still often treated as “childish”. We got some successes here – a major one is a huge response with “Klocki z czuba” contest organized together with leading Polish portal.
So please, visit Klocki, its both Polish and English. I am working on my Portuguese, but it takes time...
Discussion over at Fórum 0937: http://forum0937.miniancora.com/index.php?topic=2550 Link to Klocki: http://klocki.blox.pl/html |
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