Everything is awesome — especially the LEGO displays in The Seattle Times’ Mariners 2019 preview, which were created by local artists Dan Parker and Michael Gilliam.
Early in the preview’s planning process, when it was clear the Mariners were focusing on a rebuild this season, doing LEGO bricks for a style was something that clicked. Parker, who has professionally created custom LEGO art pieces for more than 20 years, offered to help.
Parker and his LEGO-building friend Gilliam (who has been a Mariners season-ticket holder) have done local displays before, even at Mariners games. Among the notable pieces Parker has created:Â a 40,000-piece Statue of Liberty, a 6-foot custom Star Wars Death Star and even a functioning burial casket.
They spent several weeks planning and creating the various pieces.
Parker and Gilliam estimate the full display for this preview involved more than 7,000 LEGO pieces.
For more information on their work, go to brickabledesigns.com or follow them on Facebook.
The cover image is a photo illustration of a nearly two-foot-tall LEGO piece, photographed by the Times’ Ken Lambert at the Times’ offices in South Lake Union. The photo shoot took about two hours and included the stop-motion movements that Times illustrator Jennifer Luxton used to create the online version.
Times designer Rich Boudet created the LEGO ballplayers seen in the section. The toy figures were shot with a macro lens mounted on an iPhone XR, aided by a small LED spotlight, then modified in Photoshop to emulate MLB road uniforms.
This year’s Mariners preview was produced by the following Seattle Times staff members:
Sports editor: Paul Barrett
Section editor: Alex Iniguez
Designer: Rich Boudet
Copy editor: Scott Hanson
Photo editor: Fred Nelson
Photographers: Ken Lambert, Dean Rutz
Photo production: Colin Diltz