the Mario Patio

[ChadTower]

I'm in the middle of a paving stone patio project in my yard.  Saturday I laid out a grey right angled path from my front door to where will be a roughly 15x10 patio made out of the same type of stones.

I mentioned to my wife today that I was tempted to put an 8 bit Mario right in the middle of it.  Surprisingly, she was all for it, so now I may have to do it.

The first thing to do, I assume, is to find a suitable 8 bit image with well defined square pixels.  Then I need to plan out how to manage colors with the paving stones.

Any and all input/questions/advice/telling me how to do or not do this is welcome.  I can get pics of the area in question and exact measurements in the next couple of days.

Something like this, perhaps, but without the other stuff...

[horseboy]

I would use this mario...

[ChadTower]

 

I was googling the same stuff at the same time.

EDIT:  that's only three colors... very possible.

[ChadTower]

Also cool, but don't see a way to get green without somehow dying the bricks:

[KenToad]

I'd say do the link and you can just paint the bricks.  I'm sure you will make the front page (and probably get dugg) if you do it.

[ChadTower]

Oh, I definitely want a Mario if I do it, but depending on size, there may be room for something else.  I would worry about how paint would hold up on paving stones that are outdoors and get walked on a lot.

[shardian]

I agree that painting would be the best way to go. You could do a new one every once in a while. Just hit it with a power washer and start over.

[ChadTower]

Not with paving stones... a power washer would wash away the paving sand between them and dislodge the stones.

[ChadTower]

Okay, if I go with this one:



12 x 16 = 192 blocks

4 colors (3 in Mario, 1 in background)

[ChadTower]

Okay... here are two pics, one of the walkway from the front door just laid down, and one of the area at the end of it where the brick patio will be.  I'll probably replace that lamp post in the process too.

[Ed_McCarron]

Hm.  Looks doable.

http://www.americanpavers.com/Shape%20Spec%20Sheet/Square%20Spec.pdf

http://www.americanpavers.com/colors.aspx

[ChadTower]

We went over to our local source for pavers and ran the numbers against the colors they have... turns out, the only pavers they have in truly distinct enough colors are 4x8 (nontumbled).  To use those I'd have to use two bricks for each pixel, making each pixel 8" by 8".  Sadly, that would make Mario 8' wide and 10'8" tall.  That's too big, it would dominate the front of our house.

My wife and I agreed that using pixels in the 4" range would be best.  That would give us a Mario 5'4" tall and 4' wide.  I haven't been able to source any 4" square pavers, though.  The local source had 6" pavers in less impressive color selection than the 4x8 stones, which would produce a lightly colored Mario of 8' tall and 6' wide.  Bigger than I want, not as much color as I'd like, so don't want to go that way.

The only way I've come up with so far would be making 4" blocks by cutting the 4x8 blocks in half.  That would give us good colors and 4" blocks.  Inconsistent edges on the cut sides would be a potential drawback and I do not want to cut 96 bricks in half (best case) at a minimum without being sure the results will be what we're looking for.

So, for now, the search continues for the right materials.

EDIT:  Ed, that vendor has some really good potential 6" stones... but all of their locations are in FL.   

[Donkey_Kong]

I see you have the necessary equipment for the job... 

[ChadTower]

I have a crew of Doozers doing half the work for me.  They work really cheap, but every time they build something, a red fuzzy thing eats it on me.  I don't get it.

[Chris G]

Are those skinny bushes in the background the area the plow guy took out?

[ChadTower]

No, those are the ones I put in when I tore out the driveway.  You can tell where it was because the stupid soil settled deeper than anticipated.  I have to tear all that lawn up, fill it, and level it.  Those bushes aren't quite as bare as they look, they just bloomed a little later than the ones on the sides.

[Chris G]

Ah, so that's the entry/exit where people used to drive through your yard?

[ChadTower]

Yep, that's where the motorcycle jackass used to cut through and go through the driveways that are still there... going to effort to go around the kids' toys in the process.

[bfauska]

I have a crew of Doozers doing half the work for me.  They work really cheap, but every time they build something, a red fuzzy thing eats it on me.  I don't get it.

I think they prefer radishes to the dozer creations, at least that's what I seem to remember them venturing into the garden for and risking there lives.

I totally loved that show.

[Donkey_Kong]

That walkway looks pretty good ChadT. Good luck with the Mario creation. 

[leapinlew]

I've got a even better idea...

First, drop one of these in every 4-6 feet in the middle of the sidewalk.



Drop one of these in each brick:


And then have a chick party on national skirt day. I'd paypal $5 for that event.

[ChadTower]

The only women around my house are my wife, mom, and my wife's relatives.   

[ChadTower]

Found a local place today with 4" stones... in enough colors.  The issue there is that they don't normally stock them, and unless I buy them from stock, I have to buy a whole pallet.  They have another store a half hour further that carries a much stronger selection, so I'll huddle with the wife and come up with the exact final plan for the patio as a whole, then decide if we go with 4" or 6".  6" is a much more standard size and would be easier to grab specific amounts rather than a whole pallet of each (which would be like 5x more bricks than we need).

[Ed_McCarron]

I've got a even better idea...

First, drop one of these in every 4-6 feet in the middle of the sidewalk.



 

Forget the cameras... Get a shitload of LEDs and a ledwiz and go nuts.

[ChadTower]

That's what it made me think of too... you could put in any pixel style picture you wanted.

[ChadTower]

Went outside yesterday with the wife to plan out the dimensions for the patio... bigger than anticipated, so maybe the 6" will work.  I'll see how that size fits into the scheme.  I can post some definite numbers soon.

I've been trying to work out the exact brick amounts of each color from that lego pic, keep coming back with a number other than 192, so I think I might just break out the kids' legos and put one together to see for sure.   

[horseboy]

I came up with...

45 red
54 brown
44 beige

I didn't count the background.

[ChadTower]

That's it, I was coming up 5 short on the red somehow.  I recounted (again) and have 192 now:

45 red
54 brown
44 tan
49 grey (background)
-----
192 total

[ChadTower]

The four upright bricks roughly mark off an 8' x 6' rectangle.  That would be the size of the Mario grid if I used 6" stones.  I think I can live with that in the overall size of the plan.

Of course, some of the capital has dried up, bills and such.  But I'll do as much as I can until we get some back.

[ChadTower]

Just that spot because I tore up the driveway.  The rest is good.

[DrewKaree]

Chad, if you wanna clean that off with a hose, you'll need a nozzle.

What a dump

Found one for ya

[horseboy]

What a dump

God you are suck a ---smurfing--- --cream-filled twinkie--. You make shorthair look like a genius and model citizen around here.

[danny_galaga]

great project! and the scrawny hedges at the end gave me an idea. you could make it a secret driveway! have hedges that electrically move outa the way when you want to come in or out. and since i bet you'll have that ---meecrob--- motorcyclist or some other start driving through your yard again (thats really weird) you can leave them open for a while and then once he starts doing it again,

close them!

then watch him crash into the hedges!

take video footage of course.

PROFIT!

[ChadTower]

Heh.  I think after all the effort to build this patio, if anyone parked on it, I'd have to slash their tires.   

[JackTucky]

I did a 20x20 + 4 x 10 ft wide walkway in my house in NJ with pavers.  Excavated and broke up old concrete patio myself.  Never again.

=J

[ChadTower]

I don't mind this sort of work, myself, except for the major pain in the ass disposing of anything around here.  One of the reasons I started this project was because I had a couple yards of sand from where I tore up the driveway and put in grass.  Couldn't find any way to get rid of the sand without paying $100+.

[danny_galaga]

hehe. my uncle and cousin in holland had a similar dillemma when they were excavating their own basement. fairly popular to do their but of course pretty illegal without proper planning. they were smuggling the dirt out 'great escape' style and putting a bucket or two of it in the garbage each week...

[Glaine]

I'm 1/2 impressed with how you get things actually done around your place and 1/2 disgusted that I don't...

[patrickl]

hehe. my uncle and cousin in holland had a similar dillemma when they were excavating their own basement. fairly popular to do their but of course pretty illegal without proper planning. they were smuggling the dirt out 'great escape' style and putting a bucket or two of it in the garbage each week...

Lol yeah, they always say the dutch are cheap ---daisies---.

When I moved in my previous house I came home one night and almost ran over a guy pushing a wheelbarrow across the road (in the middle of the night). Then I noticed there were two and they were my neighbours getting rid of the earth dumping it on a temporary municipal dump (it was there during the build of the neighbourhood). The dump was at least 500 meters away from their homes. They excavated 64 m3 (2260 cubic feet) of dirt that way. It took them weeks.

They did all this digging so they could put sand under their patio's. Which makes me wonder looking at the pictures. Chad, shouldn't you put some sand under it? The other path too looks like it's put on some stony foundation. Won't you get trouble with uneven floors and water standing on it?

[ChadTower]

That surface is sand.  It's 4-5" deep and was the base under the asphalt that I tore up.  It does look a little dark in that pic because it was wet (misty day).

I tried to get rid of the asphalt the cheapass way... for months and months.  I was throwing out 10-15lb of it a week with our trash and for a while was even taking small loads out and ditching them in gas station trash barrels whenever I filled up.  I hadn't even scratched the pile after doing that for nearly a year so I finally rented a dump truck and took it to a recycling depot.  The annoying part was that the recycling depot is only a quarter mile away so I paid $150 to rent a truck to move the pile 2 minutes down the street.  When I got there the guy said I could dump it free since I was a neighbor, I thought that was really cool, until after the last load I asked him how much it would have been and he said $7.50.