UCS Jango Fett’s Starship is a prime example of LEGO maths in action
LEGO Star Wars 75409 Jango Fett’s Starship is a lesson in the kind of LEGO maths calculations that go into sets with lots of recolours or new parts.
Speaking to LEGO Fan Media in a roundtable, LEGO Senior Designer Jackson Hughes touched on the considerations that went into the new parts and recolours for the UCS set a few times. Considering the unique silhouette and colour scheme of the set, it took more than you might think.
“One thing I can say that went into that calculus is that, from the beginning, getting the shaping of the hull really accurate was a big priority,” said Jackson. “Because it’s such an irregular shape, there are many places where there’s only one piece that can do the job.
“This ship is in fairly rare colours of dark blue and sand green, so we spent a lot of colour changes. We had over 20 colour changes in the model to make it happen and make it really come together nicely.”
As LEGO designers have explained before, they have a certain number of frames that they can use for new parts and recolours.
“We can’t make everything decorated. We can’t change every brick into every colour,” LEGO Ideas Design Manager Jordan Scott said in an interview with The Verge. “Otherwise, the portfolio would just explode in complexity, so we have teams that manage the complexity level.
“If I have five products or 10 products coming out, I need to allocate where those frames go.”
It’s LEGO maths like this that means certain sacrifices need to be made in sets. While both fans and designers would often like to include every detail and wildest dream, it’s just not possible without having an unwieldy portfolio and skyrocketing prices.
In the case of 75409 Jango Fett’s Starship, Jackson told LEGO Fan Media that he got to do ‘pretty much everything’ he had on his wishlist for the UCS build.
“With this model, I was able to do pretty much everything that I thought was necessary and great for the model,” he said. “We got the seismic charge, we got the colour scheme right – I’m really happy with how it turned out.
“We pushed it with the frames we used on this one a little bit, so it was overall a really good experience and we ended up with a nice product.”
The only possible area where Jackson seems to have had to make a sacrifice is in Boba’s legs. When asked why the young bounty hunter’s legs aren’t printed with boots like the hobbit minifigures, he said that ‘in the grand calculus, some things just don’t make the cut,’ highlighting that the cost of the recolours and new rangefinder for Jango meant that it was single colour legs only for Boba.
All in all, however, getting the colour scheme right and the details on the key minifigure is surely the right way to go for a set of this scale. This is a prime example of LEGO designer maths in action – and the numbers are certainly adding up for 75409 Jango Fett’s Starship.
75409 Jango Fett’s Starship is due to launch for LEGO Insiders on May 1 and for everyone else on May 4, priced at £259.99 / $299.99 / €299.99. You can find out everything you need to know about the LEGO Star Wars set in our in-depth review here and see it compared to its 2015 predecessor here.
To stay up to date with all the latest LEGO Star Wars promotions and deals for Star Wars Day, check out our detailed May the Fourth page here. We’ll be keeping it updated with all the best Star Wars deals over the next few weeks.
Support the work that Brick Fanatics does by buying your LEGO sets using our affiliate links. Thank you!
