As part of growing our group and local community, we started the Meet a Member initiative on newfoundlug.ca, to feature the people who make up our local LEGO community.  This initiative is 100% voluntary. Each month, we will interview a member of NewfoundLUG to find out how LEGO makes them tick, their passion for the hobby, and other fun facts about their LEGO journey.

This month’s featured member is: Jason Denief!

NewfoundLUG: What is your first LEGO memory?

Jason Denief: My first memory of LEGO was in about 1983 playing with the Crusader Knight minifigures. Remembering those early sets is bittersweet as most of my childhood Lego was passed onto cousins.

NewfoundLUG: Did you have a dark age (a time in your life where you weren’t using LEGO) and if so, what caused you to emerge from it?

JD: After some of my Lego had been given away around my teenage years, I stopped actively collecting. It was never completely out of view as I would occasionally bring my Lego out and play with it.

What reintroduced me to the hobby is after a hand injury at work I experienced around 2015. I was unable to continue with my other hobbies and activities, and Lego was a great outlet that provided both dexterity-improving motions and a pass time.

NewfoundLUG: Which set or theme has been most influential upon you, as a LEGO fan?

JD: The Modulars and Architecture sets appealed to me the most due to the fine building and design techniques used to create obscure angles, shapes, etc. My next step with Modulars is to make one myself at a similar scale and quality as an official set.

When Technic started to get more refined (into the 2000s), it appealed to me much more as well, and is what I’m currently immediately interested in collecting.

NewfoundLUG: What is your favorite part of the hobby?

JD: What began as a reclusive thing has now spun into an interactive medium where I’ve met lots of great people and learned lots from other members.

NewfoundLUG: How do you store your LEGO?

JD: Most of the Lego I own is in the form of assembled sets I have displayed on a variety of shelves and bookcases. Most of my sets are displayed by their theme with their respective figures. Outside of my assembled stuff, my bulk collection is sorted via color.

NewfoundLUG: Do you build MOCs? If so, of what?

JD: Yes I build MOCs. There is no real rhyme or reason to what MOCs I design; I may want to build a tree and make an attempt at a tree MOC. There might be a set I don’t want to buy or can’t afford, and I will make an attempt at building it myself.

NewfoundLUG: Do you have a favorite part?

JD: I was going to say a SNOT brick due to its versatility but there are multiple pieces like the SNOT brick that do achieve the same thing. Turntable pieces, and 2×2 Jumper Plates, also efficiently capture non-angled and non-square shapes.

NewfoundLUG: What theme would you like LEGO to produce?

JD: I would have liked Lego to make a Rick and Morty theme when it was more relevant a couple years ago. I would also have liked Lego to flesh out the Adventure Time theme they did a couple small sets of, especially the Treehouse which had been an Ideas set.

NewfoundLUG: What’s your favorite thing about being a member of a local LEGO club like NewfoundLUG?

JD: My favorite aspect of being part of a registered LUG is inspiring, and being inspired, by other local members with a shared common interest in a great hobby.

NewfoundLUG: As the unofficial photographer of the NewfoundLUG, you have significant experience with high quality photography and Lego. Why do the two hobbies work so well together?

JD: Generally, the hobbies don’t overlap, the enjoyment comes with making it work. With a macro-lens, I can achieve a view from a minifigure scale, and provide a point of view of what it could be like to be there at that level. With clean, close-up shots such as these, more is appreciated and more can be seen. The more you look, the more you see, and the cleaner the images, the more to enjoy.

NewfoundLUG: Anything else you’d like to add?

JD: Lego has been medicine for hard times, which is no more evident than at our Blocks on the Rock event and the reception it received. I hope more members enjoying the hobby in recluse come out of the woodwork and become social like I did!