Introduction

Our interview this time is with the first place winner of the Journey Through Time Solo Edition Contest, LimeeFox for his entry Military History!

In interveiwing Limeefox, we gained some insight on what it takes to win a solo edition contest on PMC - and well, the process isn't all cupcakes and candy. It's about 50 hours of work, overcoming situations out of one's control, and determination like none other. So grab a snack, sit tight, and continue reading to learn more about LimeeFox and the hurdles he faced while building Military History! (Pssst, there's some fun facts at the end, too!)

A Short Journey Through LimeeFox's Time

A creative person by nature, LimeeFox was elated when his father told him 6 years ago about the game Minecraft. Was it true? Could he really craft anything he wanted in Minecraft? Well, it turns out you can't make green ketchup, BUT you can create most anything else.

In his blog (which placed him as a finalist in the “What Makes You a Minecrafter” Blog Contest), Fox Life Block by Block – My Story, he outlines his discovery of Minecraft chapter-by-chapter (or block by block, heh) from his press of the “W” key and Space Bar, to learning the real “Minecraft” game, to his first server and in game friends. It was in the moment his friend showed him how to use the right click of a mouse to place a block, that the world of building and architecture opened up for him.



Now a veteran Minecraft-er, he's a member of EpicQuestz build team which has been aiming to recreate Middle-Earth in Minecraft. He's even achieved “Artist” rank on EpicQuestz (highest rank achievable) and has been leading Edhellond project for 1 year! LimeeFox is also a part of thecommunity of EmpireWar, a Lord of The Rings PvP server where you besiege or defend locations from J.R.R Tolkien's Middle-Earth. More details can be found on their website or PMC page.

Put the lime in the....?

Put the lime in the coconut! If you don't get the reference, listen to this song so we're all on the same page! Ahem...anyways. All of us have a story behind our IGN. So what's LimeeFox's? Why are there 2 "e"s?

“I first had the name of FoxVlad, for liking foxes. Later, when Mojang implemented the ability to change your IGN, I changed to LimeFox, because I watched alot of LemonFox's videos with their Minecraft builds and got inspired. Besides the fact, I actually preferred having a “Lime” in my in game name, I also got much better at building. Later, I wanted to try a new IGN (ImFoxs) and as soon as I could change IGN again, I switched to Drostik, but then I released that I liked LimeFox more, but when I tried to switch back to it, it was taken... Funny, right? Anyways that's how I'm now LimeeFox with two "e"

Lesson learned. Keep your original IGN or else someone will steal it while your experimenting with other IGN's, and you'll end up having to add an extra vowel!

Becoming a Planet Minecraft-er

LimeeFox is in the 4 year club! He joined in February of 2014. Back when he decided to become a member of PMC, his aspirations were to become popular and famous. Now, however, his goal is to expand his submission gallery and to have something to be proud of in this virtual world. With 48 current submissions on PMC that range from a Theme Park map, to a medeival building bundle, to a cute poem about a Snow Golem, I think it's safe to say that he's well on the right path to achieving his goal.


Okay, so he's a skinner, a builder, and a poet. Most would be happy to be one of those!

“I enjoy working on Dwarvish or some sort of mineshaft/underground builds. My second favorite category is Terraforming along with Big scale structures (that does not count organics though). Third place is Medieval category, although there are hundreds of different styles for this category, and I even dislike some of them, but in general that's a category I have the most builds in.”

Take a peek inside of his trophy case and you'll see his hard work has been paying off, as he's been a finalist in 6 Planet Minecraft Contests! Perched above his finalist badges is his first place trophy for Journey Through Time Project Contest Solo Edition.


        ooooo pretty!

A Journey Through Time Contest: The Vision, Inspiration, Challenges, and Execution

]For LimeeFox, it was a sentence in the contest description (Concept & Originality) that inspired him to think outside the box and challenge himself to build in ways he never has before:



"It is an amazing sentence that supported my idea of doing something I haven't practiced before. I made an organic and a big scale structure only once before, over 6 months before the Contest started. This is the first challenge, build a huge project with an unusual to me technique.”

His idea for the Journey Through Time Contest was to create a map that exhibits military history in one map.

“The first thing that came me in mind is regrouping several objects or people from different history times and put them into one single map. I decided to go for military objects and units. I wanted to try organics, because I thought that it would impress not only the Judges but PMC users as-well.”

His submission includes organics like soldiers, horses and aliens as well as objects like a trench, roman catapult and barbed wire.

“When Making organics, I start off by making the body & feet using sphere brush, then the arms using
//line command. Then I use Voxel Sniper to thicken everything up and then smooth it. I color it using World Edit and do half clothing by hand other half using //line again. I build the head separately and then paste iton the body. I make no sketches, but I think I should be.”


His polished and perfected project masks the fact that for the majority of the build, he had a 3-5 hour window of time where WiFi was optimal... and it wasn't at a convenient time of day.

“To start off, I spent only 3 weeks building at home, and then I flew away to my grandmother, who lives in another country. I spent there all of July and half of August before returning. When I left home, only 20% of the project was done. I had my grandmother's laptop on which I installed Minecraft and a wireless mouse with no mouse-pad (which was problematic). I used my notebook as a mouse-pad, and it worked well. Issues end there? No, I don't think so xD. We spent our time there in a country house, in a forest 5 minutes by car away from the Baltic sea. The problem was the Wifi. Since I was building this project on Builder's Refuge server, I needed internet connection. The Wifi connection was just horrible, I couldn't even open any page in the browser however, the only period when the Wifi worked good enough, was in the morning until around 11 AM. This is how I got up at 6 am in the morning as many days as I could, when everyone were sleeping and open the laptop to build. But yeah, that is 3-5 hours of work in the morning and the rest of the day, Wifi was too bad.”


This wasn't the only challenge he encountered.


“It happened when I was still home, I was trying to make a structure using //generate which is that blue kind of cone formed light that is coming under the UFO. I attempted many times, getting the right size but each time failed. I got disconnected from the server because of my internet here (happens from times to times). When I came back, there still was that structure that wasn't what I needed and so I typed the //undo command and it worked weirdly. For some reason, it removed only a very few blocks from it, and then I decided to do //undo 20 a few times but then I saw that it wasn't being changed, so I flew around a bit having a doubt that I actually undid my previous actions, and indeed, a lot of the project parts were damaged and could not be fixed. By doing //redo everything got even worse. So I requested a backup from the staff team on their website, being convinced that it's going to be fixed really fast by a member of the community. I waited 2 weeks before finally restoring my plot. During this break I still created some organics on the broken plot with the idea to paste them in later when the issue would be fixed.”


...the most difficult part of Military History Project besides overcoming these obstacles? The Horse.


“The human organics were something new to me, or at least let's say I haven't done many of them, but the horse as my first animal organic. I used a little metal statue of a horse that belongs to my grandmother, and it helped me give it a horse shape. The real challenge was it's mane. I redid it at least thrice before letting it be this way. It's not great, neither is the tail. I also spent some time shaping it's feet, and still, the hoofs do not look good. The saddle is bad as-well, but for a first time Building, I'm happy of the final result!”

Whew! Issue after issue, we personally would have lost motivation. Not LimeeFox though! He persevered like the soldiers in his project, fighting any and all hurdles!

“My goal was to participate in the contest and make it to finalists. This is why I tried to keep myself motivated despite fails.”

So what's his favorite part about his project, Military History?

“Definitely the Knight & American solider with a GE M134 minigun scene and the Phalanx & Catapult."



"The Knight and American soldier scene was the exact thing that I had pictured in my head as in, the idea of having a few exhibits from totally different history periods fighting each-other or together against someone else. Sadly I had enough time to make only 1 or two of such scenes. Otherwise, for the Phalanx and Catapult scene, I'm simply proud of how the catapult turned out, since it was built off-axis. About the Phalanx, well I am interested in ancient Greece and am starting my second year in an Ancient Greek class, and am proud that this helped me. I also got inspired from Alexander movie. This is what helped me recreate the Hoplites in Minecraft”

There is a white flag with the symbol of peace surrounded by barbed wire and some pointy sticks. It is in the middle of the map, neutral and at the same time, everyone, at some point, is seeking for it.

Future Plans!

“I am currently terraforming a big team project for EpicQuestz, which I am going to lead. I will be posting a little freebuild project in a few days probably, that I build along with Enoshade and we've got helped by De_Mik and raarmaarwaar. For my own projects, well I recently tweeted a picture of a castle that I'm building. I want to call that map Curtains and Shadows, but it might take another month to complete it, not enough motivation to work on it everyday.”



His advice to you?

“I'd suggest for everyone to write down their ideas when building a map, unless they have a very detailed plan and minimap. As one of my friends said, Self doubt is creativity's worst enemy. - OnlyGod

Don't be afraid to fail, and if you do, try again, you'll 100% end up doing well! And remember that one learns from their mistakes. Experience of practice is the key to success.”

Words of the wise.

Congratulations, Limeefox on your well deserved 1st Place Win!

Connect with LimeeFox through his PMC Profile, Twitter, Enjin or through Minecraft (Minecraft IGN: LimeeFox)!


Fun Facts about LimeeFox!
LimeeFox is a HUGE fan of Lord of the Rings!I
He spends time reading about it or browsing LOTR content on the internet.

He knows Russian, French, and English languages and is currently studying German!

In his spare time, the top 3 games he plays the most (besides Minecraft) are Age of Empires III, Battlefield 1 and Battlefield 4.He plans to play more Battlefield once he replaces some outdated parts in his PC!

LimeeFox also loves playing Sid Meier's Civilization V and Caesar IV. In the past, he used to play Battlefield 1942 and Battlefield Vietnam alot but then bought a new PC.

LimeeFox's Hobbies:
Outside Minecraft, he enjoys doing video montage and also hang around at Code School.

In real life, Limeefox is a member of a Table Tennis /Ping Pong club and member of an Alpin club.
He also like drawing comics and once a year sells them in a local comic market!




LimeeFox would like to thank:
“Enoshade who helped me in the last moment by making me a Render. It is his render that I used as the thumbnail for my submission which I put it in like 30 minutes before the end. I also got the renders from Malithaa and Blovien the last day of submission period. Thanks to them for their help!”