Subject:
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Inferior colour rendering in this year's instructions
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.general
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Date:
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Fri, 17 Jan 2003 21:34:04 GMT
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Viewed:
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542 times
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While at LEGOLAND Windsor last year on 'business' I picked up a copy of the
internal employee newspaper 'LEGO Life'. In it was an article about a new
CAD system being introduced to create instruction diagrams, called 3D
Vision.
This year all the instructions have been produced using this software, by
the looks of things, because the main visible difference is the shading and
top-left light source that 'illuminates' the models and thus creates
different shades on each face of the bricks. (excuse my non-technical CAD
terms, I am no expert)
Now, I don't know if it's just me, but it seems to be a retrograde step. On
several occasions I have had difficulty telling the difference between white
and light grey and between black and dark grey.
For example, on step 6 of Orient Adventurers set 7412 (the yeti set), the
1x2 thin wall looks identical in colour to me [1] to the two 1x4 tiles. The
tiles are grey and the 1x2 thin wall is in fact white, but because of the
lighting of their faces they look the same colour. Luckily there is no
ambiguity in this set because there is only one of those pieces in it, but
in other sets this may not be the case, and I'm sure kids could get
confused.
Another problem is the rendering of the transparent colours. In steps 30/31
of the AT-TE, the fluorescent yellow/green looks like regular transparent
green, even more so on step 21 of Jabba's palace where the transparent green
frog looks identical to it's container which is fluorescent yellow/green.
While making the top cannon on the AT-TE, page 34, I thought I had a grey
1x1 round missing until I looked at the instruction cover and realised that
one of them was actually transparent white (clear). [BTW, has anyone else
noticed that in that photo, the legs are mounted two studs lower than in the
instructions? But, that's another topic...]
The benefits this software brings to the artist are apparently considerable,
so I guess we're stuck with it. Yet another subtle example of LEGO quality
deteriorating...
Has anyone else experienced or noticed this problem?
Huw
[1] I work under halogen lights, so I don't think my local lighting is an
issue.
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Message has 5 Replies:
 | | Re: Inferior colour rendering in this year's instructions
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| (...) I've noticed that it tends to be particularly bad on slopes. If the sloped side is facing the light source (upper right, IIRC) then it is rendered about five shades too light. Rounded pieces tend to look really weird, too. In my opinion they (...) (22 years ago, 17-Jan-03, to lugnet.general)
| | | Re: Inferior colour rendering in this year's instructions
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| (...) I've had the same problem-I do NOT like the new color-confusion 'art' at all. I was trained in architecture in college & also took many art courses & did art on my own (& still do); A VERY important concept is to make one's ideas easily read, (...) (22 years ago, 17-Jan-03, to lugnet.general)
| | | Re: Inferior colour rendering in this year's instructions
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| (...) I had this identical problem, so it's not just you. Certain colors are *horribly* rendered, such as the orange in the Star Wars mini sets (check out the pod racers-- the orange in Sebulba's racer is way off). It doesn't always lead directly to (...) (22 years ago, 18-Jan-03, to lugnet.general)
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