The Magic Portal Website

This is a website of The Magic Portal

Second Draft
The Magic Portal Website concerns itself with telling the torrid tale of the creation of the short LEGO film called The Magic Portal. It will be a dossier of behind the scenes, story, photos, storyboards, and includes the downloadable version. The Magic Portal is what you might refer to these days as a "brick film", but it predates the Internet and was originally shot frame by frame, on old fashioned 16mm film.

These pages will progressively update as I spend more time on them. At the moment, everything is more layout than spit and polish, and I'm still umming and erring on the final look.

Legalese
LEGO® is a trademark of the LEGO Group of companies which does not sponsor, authorize or endorse this site.

The Magic Portal is Copyright © 1989 by Lindsay Fleay.

Some clarifications: usage of LEGO® and LEGO
The LEGO Group is noticeably strident about how people use their logo and trademark. LEGO's years of fighting off rivals and copycats hasn't exactly put them in the most accommodating frame of mind when it comes to the world wide web. I understand they've been in constant legal litigation in one form or another ever since LEGO® was first developed. Despite the pleasant spin on LEGO's Legal Fair Play page, the paranoia and hostility surrounding their branding is palpable, one sided, and depressingly familiar from when I had to deal with them in 1989. Anyway, enough of my own paranoia! When I refer to LEGO, its in two ways:

"LEGO®" with the funky little rego symbol indicates any direct and specific reference to the LEGO® brand and its actual product and software lines, and all the elements (I think thats the right word) therein: the plastic pieces, manuals, titles, pics, etc. This is a reference to LEGO® in its official capacity, or to any serious "enthusiast" that's into the LEGO® brand.

Plain old "LEGO" on the other hand, refers to everything else concerning the subject, and the use of "LEGO" as a regular word in everyday use, both as noun (LEGO as in the stuff), name (LEGO the firm), adjective (LEGO universe, LEGO worlds), and prefix or suffix" LEGOnauts or spaceLEGO. That's spaceLEGO in the generic sense, not the old classic LEGO® Space series. LEGO released a number of space themed product lines.