Working Lego printer adorned with minifigs

B3ta user squirrelfantasy made this wonderful Lego/felt-tip pen printer that is adorned with Lego minifigs who really make it into a whimsical masterpiece.

Lego printer: I made this! (Thanks, Francesco and everyone else who submitted this!)

I write books. My latest is a YA science fiction novel called Homeland (it's the sequel to Little Brother). More books: Rapture of the Nerds (a novel, with Charlie Stross); With a Little Help (short stories); and The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (novella and nonfic). I speak all over the place and I tweet and tumble, too.

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knutmo

you say printer, I say plotter.

Cute!
- Paul
  
  Nah, a plotter would follow vector instructions drawing solid and continuous lines in any direction on the page. This is clearly printing pixel data, raster fashion, working it’s way from one end of the paper to the other a line at a time.
Anonymous

I say marvel.
thekx

Sweet. Bring on CMYK.
Anonymous

I’m guessing that the ink is pretty cheap too….
Steve Schnier

This is amazing!

I wonder how may sheets per minute it prints?
- DarwinSurvivor
  
  Judging by the way it prints, that would depend entirely on the ammount of “black” on the page and how spread out it is.
Anonymous

Perfect printing music.
brie987

Can I use non proprietary markers? By the looks of this my sharpie bill will be expensive.
AlanJCastonguay

Great! Now I just need a 3D printer to produce Lego pieces.
Anonymous

absolutely amazing! its a great way to add charm to one of the most boring pieces in your home office! great job.
dainel

Scale it up. Replace the marker with a spray gun. You have something that prints posters up to 10 feet across. Those kinds of printers costs $100K ++. And if you use regular paint, it’s got to be cheaper than those printer inks right?
- Anonymous
  
  A group of artists did this around 1994 in France, using an SGI — they would scan some known art piece, a few square CM worth, and blow it up on a canvas, on a 3 x 3 meter frame, with a circuit controlling the paintgun. It was really cool. Haven’t seen anything similar since. It was called G.R.I.P…
dhalgren

Thank you for posting this Cory. This brought a smile to Mr. Cranky’s face (that would be me).
MelSkunk

I dunno, maybe it’s the music, but that mustache on the little minifig supervisor makes me think he keeps his hot pants for the fab gay rave scene in his locker for after work ;)
Anonymous

What a nice job! I can’t believe it’s made with LEGO blocks!
jo3lr0ck5

Can anyone say awesome? I want one!!
hammelworks

G33ks are too cool!
Anonymous

awesome
Anonymous

that. is. so. awesome.
Anonymous

Outstanding engineering! I love the little workers. This made my day, thanks for sharing!
Anonymous

Now this is the way Macgyver would print his dissertation if his printer broke the day before…
- Anonymous
  
  great
Mark Crummett

It’s about time we acknowledged these beings in our machines, The Ones Who Make Everything Work.
I rather like the idea of a crew-served printer. And they scale, too!
http://www.markcrummett.com/ghosts
Anonymous

Freaking insane!
robbersdog

A superb bit of kit! Very impressed.

The pony was a bit, well, pony though. :o)
Dewi Morgan

A wonderful thing.
estope

if this were Hp or Epson, that marker would cost a fortune to replace.
Anonymous

That is sooooooooo coooooooool!!!! Top work! :)

Do you have beautifully illustrated instructions? Just like the lego ones? How about any old instructions? I wanna build this!!!! Drivers? Parts?? Pieces????
SteveT

Neat!

I know this is off-topic, but does anyone know where that riff that starts at around 1:12 comes from? Not the chiptunes style thing, but the original rif. I know it’s very old, as am I, which is probably why I can’t remember what it’s called; and it’s bugging me!
- SteveT
  
  It’s “Fresh Garbage” by Spirit you old coot – and now you’re talking to yourself!