Holga Blog

It’s not often Holgablog features any digital. We don’t have anything against it, but there’s hundreds of digital sites out there. What we do like, however, is LEGO! The Danish building blocks were a staple of most people’s childhood and are still going strong today.

I think if we had half a chance, we would all still play with lego on a regular basis.

Enter Mike Stimpson, AKA Balakov, AKA that guy that creates amazing Lego scenes and photographs them. Mike spends hours recreating famous photographs, famous events in history or original scenes, using lego, and photographs them. Some are hilarious, some are poignant, all are fantastic.

We caught up with Mike for a quick interview, and a showcase of his most famous series: Classics in Lego

>>What made you decide to start shooting toys and lego?

When I got my first decent camera my initial reaction was to take photos of anything lying around the house that I could get my hands on. It probably says a lot about the sort of things that I have lying around my house that most of my shots were of Lego and toys I quickly found that macro photography was by far the most interesting type of photography for me, and the subjects are certainly easier to photograph when your “studio” is only half a bedroom.

>>How do you choose your subjects?

The choice of subject depends on the picture I’m trying to create. I try to get as much humour into my photos as I can, so the idea for a photograph normally starts with the the choice of character. I often find myself returning to the Starwars Lego figures, especially the Stormtroopers. They’re full of character, and I enjoy putting them in unusual situations that counteract their threatening reputation.

>>Are you surprised by the reception you received on flickr (100′s of comments, and nearly 100 photos on explore)?

It always surprises my how many comments and emails I get through Flickr. Considering toy photography is fairly niche, there are still a lot of people who seems to like it. I try not to look at the stats too much, the numbers scare me.

>>I presume it takes a lot of patience, which shot took the longest to set up?

There are a couple of my recreation shots that took a few hours to set up. The recreation of Henri Cartier-Bresson’s “Behind the Gare Saint Lazare” and the recreation of “Hand of God” were both technically difficult to set up. Both involved Lego figures suspended from thread, and “Behind the Gare Saint Lazare” was made inside a tray full of water which meant things started floating away as I was taking shots!

The time consuming part of almost all of my photos is the planning. Once I have an idea, working out a way to represent it in Lego can take a while. There are some photos that I’ve had in mind for over a year, but still haven’t figured out how to do them justice in Lego.

>>Your prints are available at red bubble, which is the most popular?

Lunch Atop a skyscraper is my most popular photo on RedBubble. It’s probably the most easily recognisable of my Lego recreations, and it was the first of the series that I took.

>>Do you have any future plans for more lego recreations?

I have a short list of photos that I’d like to do, “Migrant Mother” by Dorothea Lange is one of them, but they’re all still in the planning phase. I really need Lego to make a figure with arms that bend at the elbows, that would help me a lot

Classics in Lego

Thanks Mike for the interview,and good luck with all your future lego creations.

You can find Mike’s Flickr Page here, and you can buy his prints(and cards!) here.