Recreating real life buildings - scale

[ukaskew]

I'm currently working on a motorsport MOC and have hit a bit of stumbling block. I've built about 20 race cars no problem, as to start me off I had a few current City cars which pointed me in the right direction. But now I'm onto the paddock structure, and I don't really know where to start.

Is there some kind of magic formula to working out what size things need to be? I'm building it to current City 'spec' and style, but I quickly realised using minifigs as an indicator just doesn't work. So I then put the fixed size objects in place, such as doors and windows, just to get a rough idea of how big it would need to be, and it's going to be huge based on that. I'm a little confused, I also have Apple Tree House, which has appropriate sized doors etc for minifigs, but the garage is tiny and wouldn't fit any current cars. I appreciate that's Creator and therefore a little different, but it appears to be in proportion yet is much smaller than if I started to plot out a house build myself.

As you can tell, I'm very new to this!

[Brickdoctor]

Well the thing is that if you're going with stock sets, they're in System Scale, which basically means that TLG uses an approximate scale to make things work out for them as far as the requirements for the set are concerned. (price point, piece count, playability, etc.) If you want to use this scale, you just have to eyeball it. Very basically, small things get bigger and really big things get smaller.

If you want true minifig-scale, you should choose your own scale somewhere between 1:30 and 1:40 based on what works for you and build from scratch.

[bricklayer]

Hey,

Here is the formula:

Real object height(in inches) ÷ Scale value(always std at 48inches) = Size of scale model

So a house thats 24 feet high = 288 inches.

Using the formula above:

288÷48=6

Relative to the the minifig, your house would have to be 6 inches high.

Assuming the average height of a man is 6 feet,it would take 4 men on top of eachother to make 24 feet.

The minifig is 1.5 inches(so 1.5x4 is 6 inches)or 4 minifigs on top of eachother.

I got this from the book:

The Unofficial LEGO Builder's Guide

[Aanchir]

Hey,

Here is the formula:

Real object height(in inches) ÷ Scale value(always std at 48inches) = Size of scale model

So a house thats 24 feet high = 288 inches.

Using the formula above:

288÷48=6

Relative to the the minifig, your house would have to be 6 inches high.

Assuming the average height of a man is 6 feet,it would take 4 men on top of eachother to make 24 feet.

The minifig is 1.5 inches(so 1.5x4 is 6 inches)or 4 minifigs on top of eachother.

I got this from the book:

The Unofficial LEGO Builder's Guide

The problem with this formula, however, is that at this scale it would be hard to make buildings and vehicles with interiors that can accommodate minifigures. Realistically, a scale anywhere between 1:24 and 1:48 could be accepted as "minifig scale", and for significantly large vehicles like trains and passenger planes the scale can be even more extreme. The fact is, there is no specific standard, and it's perfectly acceptable to use a different "minifig scale" for all your models so long as they end up at a size you consider acceptable.

[Ralph_S]

The problem with this formula, however, is that at this scale it would be hard to make buildings and vehicles with interiors that can accommodate minifigures. Realistically, a scale anywhere between 1:24 and 1:48 could be accepted as "minifig scale", and for significantly large vehicles like trains and passenger planes the scale can be even more extreme. The fact is, there is no specific standard, and it's perfectly acceptable to use a different "minifig scale" for all your models so long as they end up at a size you consider acceptable.

There's a wide range of scales that might be acceptable, (as has been discussed on EB ad nauseam) depending on what you do, but 1/24 will look ridiculous. I think 1/30 is still too big. In fact, I tend to think of 1/40 as the upper limit of the scale.

If you build your cars relatively large and want to build the paddock on the same scale, you'll indeed end up with a very large building. The solution may be to use a degree of selective compression. It's what builders of the Miniland sections in the LEGOLand parks do as well. They scale cars and figures to 1/20, but deform most of the buildings slightly. The ground floor may have the right height for 1/20, but the top floors will be lower, for instance, and the whole building will be narrower than it technically should be.

It's also what members of the Brickish Association, including myself, did for a large city display we had in 2009. The cars were all scaled 1/45 and the heights of the buildings were large enough for minifigs, but most of the buildings had a much smaller floor area than their real-word equivalents would have when also scaled to 1/45.

Cheers,

Ralph

[Aanchir]

There's a wide range of scales that might be acceptable, (as has been discussed on EB ad nauseam) depending on what you do, but 1/24 will look ridiculous. I think 1/30 is still too big. In fact, I tend to think of 1/40 as the upper limit of the scale.

If you build your cars relatively large and want to build the paddock on the same scale, you'll indeed end up with a very large building. The solution may be to use a degree of selective compression. It's what builders of the Miniland sections in the LEGOLand parks do as well. They scale cars and figures to 1/20, but deform most of the buildings slightly. The ground floor may have the right height for 1/20, but the top floors will be lower, for instance, and the whole building will be narrower than it technically should be.

It's also what members of the Brickish Association, including myself, did for a large city display we had in 2009. The cars were all scaled 1/45 and the heights of the buildings were large enough for minifigs, but most of the buildings had a much smaller floor area than their real-word equivalents would have when also scaled to 1/45.

Cheers,

Ralph

I agree that 1:24 is highly ridiculous for most models. There's really never any point of using it for anything as large as a vehicle or building. But for smaller objects-- for instance, an armchair or desk-- it can be what's necessary for the object to look appropriate relative to a minifigure. Needless to say, you wouldn't want to furnish a house completely with 1:24 furniture or you'd be forced to use the same exaggerated scale for the house itself. For this reason, it's generally a requirement that you simplify a model which you intend to build "to scale" rather than scaling all the contents down as precisely as possible.

Similarly ridiculous scales are needed for excessively large subjects. For instance, many spacecraft and large aircraft may need to be built at a scale smaller than 1:100 in order to look appropriate. I discovered this while trying to build a mobile launch platform or shuttle carrier aircraft for the Shuttle Adventure set.

For personal road vehicles, I tend to favor 1:36 scale (as always, I have to point out that since I was brought up on imperial measure rather than metric, it's easier for me to use numbers based on the number 12 than numbers based on the number 10). This allows an SUV to be around 7 studs wide (the size of the vehicle in set 7635 4WD with Horse Trailer) and, if built cunningly, fit four passengers. However, just as in official sets, I use different scales for different subject matter.

[lightningtiger]

Minifig scale builds can be tough, the balance must be made between trying to copy real world to scale and what Lego will allow you to build.

For me vehicles, go the wheel base size of a real vehicle and using a Lego chassis to scale - 6 wide cars and 8 wide trucks.

It's also up to the designer/builder how he or her creation shall look !

Brick On !

[gotoAndLego]

Build the paddocks to fit the cars width-wise, and then just do the height to what ever feels right to you.

[Fallenangel]

The "minifigure scales" I prefer are:

Fig = 6 feet tall

1 stud = 1 foot

3 studs = 1 meter

From Dave Eaton's LEGO Scale Converter. But as everyone else has mentioned, it really is quite arbitrary. I lean toward the latter two of the scales I listed since they're independent of minifigures (because minifigures defy proportionality - with the latter two, minifigures look about the right size next to them, though they're not perfectly to scale or compatible). Take minifigures out of the equation and everything should be a little simpler.

It may also help to know that a 1x1 plate measures 8mm to a side.