Water is one of the most creative, yet challenging, mediums for LEGO photography. Splashes and bubbles can really give full scope to an artist's imagination, but it is very fleeting and you have to be ready to get the perfect shot. With the surprising number of forms of water—from bubbles to dew to splashes and rain—you can create so many spectacular and refreshing scenes with LEGO minifigures.

Let’s Dive In!

Here’s a colorful DIY swimming pool that you can recreate for your characters’ summer fun. Let's combine LEGO building and fun water effects to figure out how to best make bubbles!

Building the Location

It's worth it to note that the brick-built location is the core of the scene, so we need to create a full-scale setup in the right proportions for LEGO minifigures. We are going to shoot both the surface and the underwater parts of a pool as if we could see it through an invisible window. Thankfully LEGO is mostly waterproof, but if you are planning on underwater photography, know that you have to really rely on the clutch of the bricks as all the trapped air will want to rise and potentially cause buoyancy.

The “floating” swimmers should be placed on the boundary line between two parts of the setup, half will be in the water and half above. Just connect the minifigures to the pool using any trans-clear parts and then put each character in a realistic pose using different angles. You can see below how I secretly posed these expressive figures.

Swimming in an Aquarium

Some good news: You don't need a waterproof camera for this kind of photography! Moreover, you won’t even get wet. All you need is a clear container that can hold both water and your scene that you can take a picture through. In this case, I used a small aquarium (fish tank for my international friends). The LEGO build was placed into a small fish tank filled with water right up to the boundary line of your swimming pool—making the posed figures feel like they are floating. Then I put a paper background behind the aquarium to complete the scene, though you could use a digital one as well.

Making Fun Splashes and Bubbles

For our final effect, it's time to play with the water and make your LEGO swimmers dive! You need to use a straw that reaches the bottom of the aquarium (I connected several), and then place the end of it near the brick-built scene. I then blew into it in order to create the big splashes on the surface, making it look like the boy just jumped into the pool. (You may need an assistant's help or need to use timer settings on your camera since you’ll need to close up and blowing bubbles.)

I found that to get great shots of beautiful bubbles mid-blow you need to use the flash on your camera. It makes them less blurred, and it's possible to catch very interesting shapes of the bubbles while they are moving up to the water surface. No flash makes the photos a bit more blurry as the camera needs a longer time to capture the image without a flash. Make sure that you get multiple photos with and without so when the flash is reflected in the photo, you can easily edit it out later.

Summer Has Arrived

And that is the final photo with three minifigures enjoying the pool! Please be aware that after blowing bubbles, some will stick to the side of the build—don’t worry about those because they actually add to the underwater look! You really can’t tell the difference between the bubbles you blow and those little ones that are attached to the scene.

I hope you enjoyed this fun experience, and that you get some time to create a spectacular vacation for your own LEGO minifigures!

Have you ever taken underwater photos? Have you ever made bubbles in the pool? Please leave your thoughts in the comment section below!

Do you want to help BrickNerd continue publishing articles like this one? Become a top patron like Charlie Stephens, Marc & Liz Puleo, Paige Mueller, Rob Klingberg from Brickstuff, John & Joshua Hanlon from Beyond the Brick, Megan Lum, and Andy Price to show your support, get early access, exclusive swag and more.