MILS rant

I hear you Greg and acknowledge that you are making legitimate points. I like MILS for my town buildings as it provides a natural curb when used with my brick built roads. I have no problem abandoning MILS for large expanses of grass or fields so long as we are doing something with those spaces (and not just covering flat table tops with flat baseplates). Not doing MILS on outer loop train tracks also makes sense so that we can build up the track beds (which is more realistic) using the PennLUG track standard.

I have no problem with MILS being an aspirational goal rather than an absolute “be all, end all”. We can always find ways to blend MILS and non-MILS (we’ve been doing that since we started). Happy Independence Day to all.

Dan wrote:

tan canvas

A black tablecloth would also look very nice with space themed builds.

I’m pretty sure Josh was joking, but if it’s catalyzing a legitimate discussion / reevaluation of MILS, I’m all for it. Just be civil, yinz guys (I think you have been, thus far…)

Greg’s points are well taken. I agree that I’d rather not see vast, barren expanses (of tablecloth or baseplates), unless it’s a space / desert layout where that is deliberate and adds to the effect, rather than making it look like we ran out of time. And I don’t think we should necessarily undo work that’s already MILSed. And MILS can provide for neat effects (ponds, the curbs Tim mentioned, etc.) That said, MILS is a lot of extra build time & money, and the payoff is not necessarily there in most cases.

Tim wrote:

Not doing MILS on outer loop train tracks also makes sense so that we can build up the track beds (which is more realistic) using the PennLUG track standard.

This also makes sense, but I’d say it’s not essential to use PennLUG standard either – I definitely like the look more than track just lying on the tablecloth, but (especially if we can find ways to blend smoothly) I think it’s not a problem to go MILS to PennLUG track to bare track as needed, depending on the display. We did mostly (all?) track on table at Ligonier Valley… (granted, that one isn’t our most AFOL-centric display…)

Hannah Dow wrote:

So I’m a big fan of the cohesive Lego display look and personally, I don’t like seeing a big display with the table cloth showing. It just looks like they ran out of time and/or parts. For that reason, I would place baseplates wherever there’s empty space and force ourselves to build something fun in those spaces to liven up the display. This opinion does not include the space displays with tablecloth discussion as I’m not familiar enough with displaying that theme to comment.

The other option being fewer / smaller tables… 😉

There is nothing wrong with going smaller. Smaller displays can allow for more detail. Also, nothing wrong with a smaller footprint and going vertical (a great example was our summer reading display of Castles). “Smaller” can also mean not as deep. Last year’s Greenberg display was only one table (4 baseplates) deep.

Ultimately, MILS is great IF (and I stress the “IF”) it provides enhancements through terrain changes, etc. If all it does is raise everything up 1 brick and the entire display is still flat, then there is no point. I would like to see us (as a group for displays) begin to “go vertical” – adding hills, valleys, different levels, etc. Pittsburgh certainly has impressive changes in terrain. It would be great if our displays started to have some as well (not a complaint, just an aspiration).

While in most cases the more brick, the better, I think the canvas approach for space theme makes sense. I think we would incorporate some tan baseplates for effect. The look we were thinking of compares to old Lego catalogs. Ideally we do not want to overcrowd the builds but also want to create an environment. Canvas allows us to cover area at a reasonable cost and amount of time. To brick build an entire moon (or alien) landscape isn’t exactly feasible given there are only a few people (so far) doing space MOCs.

Im not saying it wouldn’t be cool if we had a brick-built environment. It would just be a massive undertaking. Is it possible to get the LUG to support setting aside a whole bunch of take baseplates and tan brick and tiles for craters? Is it worth the time & brick to do that given that space is not always in the LUG’s displays.

Anyway those are my thoughts.

All approaches are equally viable and have pros and cons. I use both MILS (on both 36 x 36 and 48 x 48 baseplates) and non-MILS constructions. The differences seem to focus on making collaborative displays seem more cohesive and professional looking.

Yet there are too many differences in building style, individual part inventory and building sizes that we produce to impose any overall display standard, except where we intend a large, semi-permanent display.

With the differences, pros and cons in mind, MILS should only be a standard in this one case, and even then, because of the part intensive nature of MILS as the very foundation of these collaborative displays, it’s very much a LUGBRICK issue in my mind unless collaborators build their own.

Just a quick response – I disagree with the statement that MILs adds nothing if it is still just horizontal. Baseplates alone flex and create gaps that the intersections. Once they are milsed, they’re rigid and can appear seamless. Snot building also becomes an option below the “surface” to have interesting texture, like mosaic floors, brick built road incorporated on a plate, deep sewer drains along sidewalk, etc.

Josh wrote:

Snot building also becomes an option below the “surface” to have interesting texture, like mosaic floors, brick built road incorporated on a plate, deep sewer drains along sidewalk, etc.

In which case MILS is not “adding nothing”, it is adding the ability to build below the surface. Which is why I use it for my town sections; it adds depth and a layer of detail that a flat baseplate can not.

If we find that we are having sections of displays MILS’d and other are not, we could work on some “transition” sections to gradually bring the MILS’d level down to the flat baseplate level. That would look better than an abrupt transition from MILS to non-MILS.

We’ve done enough displays as a group that we have begun to make the appropriate allowances between different sections. For me, the primary attraction to using MILS is so that a collaborative display looks cohesive and it is not immediately obvious where one person’s section begins and another’s ends. So long as we can find a compromise which allows for collaborative displays, that’s what is most important – everyone being able to participate as they best wish to do so.

Pete wrote:

MILS everything.

Pete’s mom MILSes everything.

Matt Redfield wrote:

Tim’s a modern LUG prophet! (ok so the Incline was already underway…)

Was the Incline underway in July 2016? @rcgrier3406 I can not remember when Bob and Walter first started discussing it as a MOC possibility.

Of course, Bob’s Hogwarts Castle, the Incline, and a few other MOCS (like the Thames River at last year’s Pumpkin Trolley), and the PITT logo are great examples of a good alternative to MILS (and other Brick solutions) – use underlying non-Lego structures (wood, steel frames, etc.). I just saw the huge Deep Space 9 station from Brickworld and the builder spoke about how it was built around a steel frame (like the PITT logo).