The Story Behind Building Lego Cam Newton

There isn't much that Lego Master Builder Erik Varszegi can't create out of Lego bricks. He has constructed a great white shark for an aquarium in Australia and a full-size SUV for an attraction at Legoland Florida. So Varszegi was more than ready for the challenge of building the model of Cam Newton, which appears on this month's cover. "It's always exciting to learn that your work will be featured on something high profile like a magazine cover," says Varszegi. "So when a request for Cam Newton's bust came to the model shop, I was thrilled to be the master builder on the job."

[Photo gallery: Lego in sports]

The first step for Varszegi and his team was using custom Lego software to create a 3D model of Newton's head and shoulders on a computer, a process that took about three days. After the digital version was created, Varszegi made tweaks to make the bust look as realistic as possible. One major change occurred when he realized he had designed the computer model using a picture of Newton with short hair. After realizing that Newton's hair had grown longer, Verszegi had to rebuild parts of the head and hair from scratch.

[Video: Behind the Scenes At the SI Kids Cam Newton Photoshoot]

Once the design of the model was finalized, Varszegi turned over much of the construction to an assistant in the Lego Model Shop, who assembled the bricks to make the model of Newton over two days. In total, approximately 25,000 bricks were used to build the model.