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Crabs, umbrellas and the Kraken released: Winners of the 2017 Nanoblock Awards revealed【Video】

Richard Simmonds Dec 5, 2017
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Video shows off international competition’s amazingly intricate entries, all made from the tiny Lego-like nanoblocks.

We’ve already seen the potential that nanoblocks, the micro-sized plastic brick kits created in Japan in 2008, have with some amazing game-themed dioramas. We can now add some more fantastic builds to our list of things we wish we could make rather than the toy laser guns and spaceships that everything we try and build with Duplo, Lego or Nanoblocks eventually become, with the official announcement of the winners of the Nanoblock Awards 2017.

The Nanoblock Awards is a competition that aims to find the best original designs built using the teeny tiny pieces of plastic from all over the world with entries split into three categories: no-limit, under 200 pieces, and nanoblock+. The judges chose 33 winners and pieces deserving of special mentions out of the over 600 entries that were submitted. The categories were then further sub-divided into two more groups, “experts” officially recognised by Kawada (the company who produce nanoblocks – a list added to at each competition) and “ordinary users”.

The pieces that took Gold in the No Limit category was this Red King Crab in the experts sub-category, and for the ordinary users this awesome Kraken attack.

In the challenging under 200 pieces or fewer category, this umbrella and taiyaki sweet bean fish cake took home the gold places for the expert and ordinary users divisions respectively.

Lastly, in the nanoblock+ category where only nanoblock+ blocks could be used, this flower arrangement and electric guitar took gold.

The video also shows a number of previous winners that have since been made into actual nanoblocks kits available to buy from the nanoblock webstore, such as these fire extinguisher, natto fermented soybeans, and playboy bunny kits.

▼ This fire extinguisher, one of the winning pieces to be made into a kit now available to buy, manages to capture a sense of movement.

▼ Several of the entries made use of clear blocks to make their pieces look as if they were defying gravity.

▼ It may or may not be the first time we’ve watched a Japanese video online featuring females with pixelated body parts.

▼ The 600 entries included cityscapes, dioramas, and even usable objects like a handy bread bag-tie.

While next year’s competition entry dates haven’t yet been announced, if it’s anything like previous years applicants can start submitting around July. That’s only about eight months to think of a design that encapsulates everything that is SoraNews24 (mostly anime, cuteness, weird inventions, important social news and public service announcements) in miniature block form.

Source: YouTube/nanoblock_official channel
Images: Nanoblock Award