caffeinated

Yes. Thanks!

From what I was told, the merc chick will be available in wider distribution later as well.

There is also Apoxie-clay, which is much firmer than Apoxie-sculpt and dries to an even more rock like hardness.

It is not a physical model. They admitted to putting the render on a shopped photo as a joke. This is no indication of what the final production model will look like.

Death Marshals and Silurid Slaves are also in the Editor's Choice nominations. I'm pretty happy to have the Jeremiah Kraye and Cankerworm figures I sculpted nominated to that as well. As far as the point of these things polls and whether they are just popularity contests or not isn't really important. Anything that makes others aware of products they may have missed is a good thing for the hobby as a whole. There are other pieces nominated that I hadn't seen before and I'm glad to have seen them. And really, it is nice to see things I've worked on are appreciated.

I'm OK with remakes. If they look awful, I won't see them. Some remakes have been great: Dawn of the Dead, The Thing, Batman Begins, Charlie & the Chocolate Factory. Some of these are different takes on an existing story which is just more accurate. Hopefully that is the case with some on that list. I Am Legend was even less like the original story than the old Last Man on Earth Vincent Price film. Huge disappointment for me. Sequels or continued universe stories can be good. Hopefully that is the case with The Thing mentioned in the article. The trailer for Tron 2.0 looks cool and has Jeff Bridges in it. Lasseter from Pixar is directing supposedly so my hopes are up. Battle Royale was OK, but nowhere near as good as the original novel or especially the manga which was adapted by Kieth Giffen. Some films are doomed to fail though. Escape from NY? not much to improve on and Doomsday was a pretty close re-imagining so why?

I have 2 cats, 2 rabbits, a degu, and a pond in my yard full of various types of fish and a turtle. We always end up with strays.

Don't forget you can add bases from Wyrd if you liked them to the terrain & accessory category.

Hey tang22, I'm not disagreeing with you about what others have done. I understand what's gone wrong before and agree with you it doesn't always hold. There are other reasons why the quality may have dropped: Rushed production, not enough research done, loss in the sculptor's morale, anything really. I can't answer for them as I never worked with them. I'm just trying to point out that they haven't made any compromise or stipulations to the sculpting at PP at this stage so they are not starting a step down yet.

I'm not sure of the specifics, I just know that they aren't using GW's method as I don't have those limitations in sculpting. The injection process is just getting the material into the mold. Its the mold and plastic type that is important. Undercuts are alleviated by the type of plastic used and the complexity of the mold itself. Instead of a 2 part mold, they can use 3 or more parts or inserts to get more angles. Some plastics can be pulled from a mold when they are softer & cure harder after. Will all of this work? I don't know. I know a lot of companies have claimed to be doing revolutionary work & research when they haven't done anything of the sort, but I've seen the amount of work that PP is putting into it. My point is that PP is putting effort into making as good a product as they can. They've been doing this work for at least a year now and don't even have a release planned until next year. If it doesn't hold up to the quality they want, they have lots of time to push back until they get it right. Flat out, metal production is just easier to get right at this point. But remember that its been refined in this industry for over 20 years to get where it is. Some manufacturers still don't know what they are doing. Hopefully the plastic quality will not take so long.

Disagree with what? GW uses different sculptors and different techniques to produce what they do which was my example. You are also talking about figures that have been pre-assembled & thickly painted. A completely altering process that furthers the disconnect of control. There is only a need to make pieces slightly larger. I've sculpted hundreds of pieces for plastics and hundreds for metal. With plastics you actually have more freedom unless you are using styrene as GW does which completely stops the usage of any undercuts. This is not the method PP plans on using.

I appreciate that at least on this forum, people have not gotten nasty as they have on other forums. There are some that take this hobby too personally, when it is only meant to be entertainment and these products are little more than toys. Of course those of us that make a living doing this have to balance our own enjoyment with the reality of paying the bills. PP have to look at other options in order to stay in business and especially when they want to make larger grander pieces. Growing into a larger company has its advantages (consistent support, variety, more players, etc.) and disadvantages (larger overhead, higher expectations from public, etc..). PP is not doing this to screw anyone over; they want to keep growing and not lay anyone off. Its a hard thing especially in this economy. Metal prices are making it very difficult for anyone in this industry to survive. Of course there is some guy who buys spoons who says he knows & researches metal prices and claims we're all lying or worse. But there is a reason we don't see big metal dragons & giants any more: the production costs are too high. Most small companies can't even afford all the molding costs required for such elaborate pieces. For those asking, molding pewter cast pieces is done with vulcanized rubber discs (which have also gone up in cost). The original sculpt is pressed between two highly heated discs to create the negative cavity. A metal master is cast directly from this and several of these are placed in a second set of disc molds to create the production pieces. Of corse this is a simplification as a lot of cutting and setup is required as opposed to just setting the figure in there. Keep in mind that electricity and gas (to run the melting pots) have also gone way up as we all are well aware. As for PP's plastics, the quality will be on par with what they've always done. If you don't like them now, this won't change your mind. The plastics won't be like GW's. The same guys sculpting their current stuff are doing the plastics in the same way they always have. As a contractor for PP, I have to say that they do always try to do the best they possibly can with all of their products. They have put a lot of research and time into this aspect and aren't making the decision lightly. Hopefully it all pays off. As for the analogy to a plastic ring, an engagement ring is inherently about the value of the materials and is an adornment. A figurine is all about the art and entertainment that goes into it not the material that goes into the mold. If sharp crisp results can be produced with cheaper materials, then I'm happy. Ideally I'd love to have my work cast in bronze for my own displays, buts its not likely to happen. If its all about the material then we should be doing them in solid gold (actually I've seen it done). And hey what is wrong with plastic rings? My girl friend loves them as well as wood stone & glass ones too. Some even have bugs set in clear resin. Its all about personal taste there.

The gnoll is a direct copy of a Parkinson painting. Unless I'm missing it, I don't see any mention of Parkinson's name on the site. That's kind of sleazy to steal his design if that is the case. Hope its not. http://www.arthistory.cc/pics/keithparkinson/32.jpg

Collectible random product won't go away. EVER. Its been a standard practice of selling this type of cheaply produced product since the beginning of plastic toy production. It started with the era of the gumball machine & still flourishes in the toy and especially the Japanese markets. Ask the small pile of "Homies" my fellow sculptors and I bought that we had laying around our studio at WK. I still have some of the cheap coin-op stuff I bought as a kid. People put more importance on the product than there really is. It is meant to be a casual toy & a quick thrill. As much as some of the people at WizKids wanted it to be, it was never part of the oft mentioned "hobby." There is nothing insidious about it over all. They are just toys. By the way, I'm not attacking anyone's opinions if that is how my comments have come off. But having been in that blind box, my perspective is different. For the record, they laid off the large set of sculpting talent (me included though I'll leave out whether I'm talented or not) and decided to go into the card realm, which bombed all around with the exception of Pirates. They had far more poorly developed games than anyone even saw (LOTR CCG, a fantasy CMG, many others). The in-house game designers (there a re a couple exceptions) really did not have the skill to pull off the massive transition of product focus and that sent a lot of money down the drain.

Actually all of your examples were after Topps bought WK. Sportsclix was the #1 mandate for buying WK. They wanted to combine their fan base with the gaming fan base. They knew sports and little else. The game variety had nothing to do with it, it was game playability. Both Sportsclix and Creepy Freaks were ruined by greatly flawed mechanics. Diversifying is a necessity for a big company. The big losses came from making deals with companies like WalMart who'd buy masses of stock, which would get large returns for full refund, much of it having been opened & pilfered. Collectible, despite anyone's personal feelings is the only way for PPP to be quickly profitable. WizKids tried non-collectible on a few ranges & there wasn't the buy through to balance out the more expensive & desirable figures. Mutant Chronicles hasn't yet proven to be a winner financially, though I hope it does work. Rackham's AT-43 is non-collectible, but has not brought them out of Ch. 11 on its own. The collectible market has a main focus shelf life of 5 years. That was the knowledge we had going in when I was at WizKids. People's collections & interests fill and wane after that. Mage Knight 2.0 failed to change that ( I think largely to overcomplication as new players were the target). Heroclix is still hanging on, but it made millions in the beginning and is a shadow of what it was. New stuff pops up all the time & I think it is still going to be a testament to proper planning, playabilty, & inventiveness if they stick around. Monsterpocalypse has done really well right off. We'll see about the rest. That said people will buy less impulse prodects when money is tight as it is now so again the aforementioned has to trump that factor.