2020...man i feel old now. Sadly, I’m not sure how much traffic this sub-forum gets these days. Many things have transitioned over to Facebook and discord now, which kind of makes me sad, because it isn’t nearly as easy to keep track of conversations, projects, pics, etc on those platforms, at least for me.
Another thing that is changing is the slow and steady transition to 3D printing. So many hobby posts involve 3D printed miniatures, it is eventually going to be the way forward for sculptors wanting to direct sell their creations. For my part, I have considered starting to sell the stl’s for my older 6mm scifi products, since practically speaking I don’t sell very many physical copies as it is.
The business is in general doing well this year, the best since 2016. I expect this is due to the impact of the pandemic and the larger amount of captive time at home most everyone has found themselves with.
This year my goal was to run at least 2 KS’s, as well as to sort of clean my plate of all the outstanding projects that have had sculpted models done for a long time. So how am I doing? On the release front, I have gotten off to a pretty good start, pushing out microwasteland and dregs releases, along with some Dieselpunk. By the end of the year I intend to finish releasing 3 complete armies for the dieselpunk line, 90% of which have been sculpted for months. Succeed or not, I think some of the factions will provide something really novel for the 6mm community. Expect some more Dieselpunk in about 5 weeks or so.
The 3mm fantasy is a new project, and new projects are something I told myself I would not start until some existing projects were done and out the door. But, I have a passion for it, the sculptor is motivated and talented, so I have decided to forge ahead. I do have grand plans for the range, though whether sales actually justify those plans remains to be seen. So far they are performing better than any of my other new releases this year.
6mm Fantasy. Always my bread and butter. The Kingdom of light is 100% sculpted, and I have about 70% of it out for mastering, but unfortunately, the pandemic hit and the moldmaker I sent them to is a large shop, and sowere forced to shut down. I have no real idea what this does to the timeline for them, but I imagine I won’t have molds in hand for literally 2-3 months, which is a bummer. In the meantime, Martin Baker is nearly done sculpting the Elven Kingdom line. In the end, I made the hard decision to shelve the CAD sculpted line, as they were just to different aesthetically from the rest of the 6mm fantasy armies.
Not sure when the elves will be released, given the delays with the KoL. One option would be to send them to one of the casting houses, instead of me casting them myself. When I cast them myself, I have to send them to certain moldmakers, which rate the job as a low priority, and so it can take months to get molds back, instead of the typical 4-6 weeks if I am doing contract casting. Undecided on this at the moment.
6mm Historicals. Actually, a lot going on here. I have the Bronze Age line totally sculpted, at least the first couple of waves. Unfortunately, some of the models were damaged in mastering, and had to be repaired b the sculptor, and so must be re-molded also. I really intended these to be released via KS…but I am unsure now if I will just say the heck with it and go straight to retail and hope for the best. They represent a large suck on resources, so not getting some halfway decent return is not really an option, hence my thoughts on a KS.
Besides that, I am currently working with a new sculptor on some CAD ancient Chinese. It is taking some time to work through the anatomical aspects to get to a place where we are both happy with them, delays with the postal service in getting 3D prints back being the main culprit. I am starting with the Warring States period, but will expand to other periods if it proves to be popular. And of course, there are some crossover potentials with the fantasy line.
6mm Scifi…I have a number of irons in the fire. I commissioned one sculptor to do a grav tank force with similar organization to my existing New Terra line, light tanks all the way up to 120mm long behemoths. Unfortunately that sculptor has been hit with a bit if creativity block, and so only the basic vehicles have been done after many months…but I think he will eventually find his muse.
I have a couple of sets worth of Javelin’s 3mm scifi designs upscaled to 6mm ready to rock, not to mention additional 3mm scifi armies. For these, it is just a matter of finding a lull in the release schedule. 6mm scifi and to a greater extent 3mm scifi have not been selling that great for me, and so I have been delaying sinking the money down for moldmaking.
Fantasy naval game definitely still lives. Work continues on the art for the rulebook, when we eventually settle on the rules situation. Some concepts are going to be revised and a bit of re-sculpting is going to be done for a couple designs. I did intend for the Orc Fleet to be another KS this year, but I have not gotten my act together to paint the ships, or to send them to be painted. The project has slowed for a lot of reasons, but lately, the sheer number of folks doing free 3d-printable proxies of original Man’o’War designs has me questioning the viability of this as a commercial enterprise, it took the wind out of my sails if you will
Trying to rough out the release schedule for the rest of the year is pretty difficult. I would say something like:
June – 5 x Dieselpunk Insect Nomad codes
July – 3mm fantasy dwarves
August – Remainign Dieselpunk Insect Nomad codes
September through December…this is where things get a bit iffy. For sure at least one 6mm fantasy army will be released, as well as at least 1 more 3mm fantasy army, if not 2. Possibly also a KS for the Bronze Age will be sandwiched in there somewhere and some Dieselpunk Orcs. Honestly though, the release schedule is fairly packed, so things will start to depend on sales.
So yeah, lots of stuff, lots of stuff in progress, as usual. The year may be almost half over, but I am committed to really push out some of these lingering projects in the back half. If anyone has questions about the business or specific releases, feel free to post away!
