Nanoblock fun!

There’s not a lot of tropical action going on down here where I live in the Land of Oz at the moment.

Tropical just happens to be the theme for Sunday Stills this week and, as you know, we are settling into Autumn/winter with nary a tropical pina colada or coloured paper umbrella in sight.

While staying with my sister last week I couldn’t help but notice all the mini nanoblock creations dotted around and two in particular caught my eye. Why?

These were tropical looking birds – one was a toucan which I promptly named Sam the Toucan for some reason, maybe a flashback to my childhood years?? And the other a colourful parrot – which I named Peggy the Parrot.

What even is a nanoblock?

You learn something new everyday, so let me share my new found knowledge with you! Apparently nanoblocks are different to Lego and were first introduced into the Japanese market in 2008 by Kawada, a toy company.

Nanoblocks are micro sized building blocks with the smallest blocks being 4mm x 4mm x 5mm. Their site claim the smaller the blocks the better the detail. So these little birds are in fact made up of very small blocks and each one would only stand at about 5cm tall! There are lots of sets you can buy to make, ranging in difficulty. Some reviews claim them to be an affordable alternative to Lego but note that it’s easier to lose pieces due to their small size! They are aimed at ages 8+ but big kids love them too!!

Nanoblocks are similar in design to a Lego brick but smaller, with the smallest brick being 4 mm × 4 mm × 5 mm. The bricks are ​¹⁄₈ the size of Kawada’s Diablock line of bricks. The underside of the bricks are different from Lego bricks because they use a dividing flange, known as the double-ridged backing system, instead of the tube system that Lego employs.

Nanobock – Wikipedia

Meet my tropical friends

With some artistic input from sister (again) – see slinky post from last week – I humbly present my tropical photos or the best I could do as the rain tumbles down outside and the temperature sits in single figures.

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The process

After carefully moving the tiny creatures down from their shelf, and trying not to break them apart, we shot inside on the kitchen bench using blue coloured cardboard, curved over, as a backdrop, or cyclorama, with my sister artistically holding a lamp in position for extra light. The other photos are shot on a shiny black tile with black cardboard as the background so that there are no edges to the photo. I tried to get low so as to have the birds on eye level, thankfully I didn’t need to get onto my stomach to shoot like I had to last week!

My sister adjusted some settings on my camera and I shot quite a few photos. I used a macro lens to shoot these and we edited them in Lightroom.

I really liked the reflection in the black tiles and tried to capture that in particular.

I do hope you like my descriptions 🙂 I’m such an amateur, but by the end of the week with my sister I was getting into the swing of it all. Massive thanks again to my sister for her helpful expertise and overall photography guru-ness. My Friday Feature post also explains some of our photography fun during the week.

For the young at heart

As with my slinky last week, it just goes to show some toys are not just for the young ones, but for the young at heart too.

You’ll be pleased to know that my sister and I didn’t exactly go ‘troppo’ during the week, but we did enjoy our time together – especially given the circumstances.

Do you have a favourite photo in my collection or are you a fan of nanoblocks? I’m afraid with my little granddaughter on the verge of crawling and everything going straight into her mouth, these would not be a good idea at all in my place, unless kept up high! I sound like a right proper grandma now, don’t I??

Let me know your thoughts in a comment below, I always enjoy hearing from you.

Have a great week ahead.

Debbie 🙂

All my Sunday Stills posts can be found here – all photos by me

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