Create a Nerdy Niche with Aether Objects - Interview 19

Welcome to Nerdpreneur where we have fun conversations with people making money from their nerdy passion. I'm joined as always by my co host Frank. Hello. And today we have a very special guest, Anthony from Aether Objects. Welcome to Nerpreneur. Thank you for having me. So Anthony, what is your nerdy passion? I was going to jump right in. My nerdy passion is making or hand making polyhedral dice for tabletop role playing games. That's awesome.

And when you say hand making out of what, what are you making? Carving those plastics or. Mine are made out of. Mine are made out of resin. So resin cast dice versus acrylic or glass metal. Other. Other makers do things like that. Mine are resin. Well, I've never made a dice before but I have bought a lot of them, let's put it that way.

I feel like the market for dice has grown in the last little while, especially with the avid of all of the people playing Dungeons and Dragons and even the image of the D2 20 is now just found all over the place. When did you get into this business and when did you start making dice? So I got into this just what would have been March 2022 and. Yep. And then I launched on your one year. That's awesome.

Well, that's. That was just like when I got started, when I actually launched the business and made it open to the public. That was in October. So in that sense, I'm about six months into it, but yeah, yeah, no, we get that. I mean, for us, it was very much the same. It was, okay, let's make sure that we've got our bases covered, get the name here and there and the handles and the website. And then it was like, okay, now we are ready to launch.

I feel like that's something a lot of entrepreneurs can relate to, that it starts well before most people are aware that it started. It started costing me money a year ago and then it didn't start making me money until six months ago. So, yeah, yeah. Did you learn how to do like make your own dice in order to launch the business or did you already. Was this already a hobby beforehand that you turned into a business? No, I jumped into this saying, I'm

going to learn how to do this. So, I mean, I come from an art and design background. I'm an artist, so this was just a medium that I hadn't yet explored. And I spent a lot of time researching resins and plastics and then also jumping into. There's a plethora of dice making resources online from YouTube video series, Discord servers and websites.

So I kind of pieced it together through that and studied as much as I could and research as much as I could and just began making them and then failed at that for a couple of months until I had a viable learning. You were learning? Yes. Failing forward. Right. I had high standards, so I had received handmade dice before. And when you and I just looked at them, I was like, I could do better than that. I could, I could do better than that. And I wanted to do better than that.

And I enjoy making them. So that's very cool. That. That struggle of constantly learning and humbly learning is so painful sometimes. Is there something through that struggle that you felt like, hey, you know, we come out the other side and we're like, wow, now have this nugget of wisdom. Is there something that came out of the first year of the business? I mean, going into this, I mean, I was fully confident that I would figure out how to make dice. And then my goal, it was just,

I set a very high bar. I just said, I want to make the best handmade dice in the world by my standards. And then. And then I have to focus on the more important part, which was how to be an entrepreneur. So how to how to market these, how to sell these, how to get people to see these, advertise. And that was the learning process for me. So making dice was step one. And then now connecting to the community and kind of, you know, having something to say once you're there is step two.

So I'm curious, what did you learn in that dice making process that made it made a real difference to the quality? Because you mentioned, like, I could do better than a lot of these. Yeah. What did you learn in the process of making dice that ups the quality? I mean, I came into looking at these as artworks, as like little miniature sculptures.

So in that sense, like, these all have to be the exact level of, like, meticulous that I would want, because that's not reasonable when you're trying to produce something at scale and smaller. But yeah, I think what's different than when you order them, if you get something that's. That's factory made or mass produced is that's coming from a person. So it's coming from a specific dice maker artist, versus coming from, you know, a machine. And looking at the dice I had and just kind of having.

Doing like an audit of all the dice that I've collected or, you know, dice makers, dice, machine, dice, and then trying to figure out, like, what of these is appealing to me and why, like, how do I relate? Yeah, I can definitely see that on your website. Yeah. Just looking at them like you. It's not like just typical polymer dice.

And I want to. Because we're an auditory podcast and a lot of people may be listening to this, I want to encourage them to go check out the actual website and see, these are not the same as what you might just see at a hobby store where it's just sort of like, you know, a red or a green or a blue, whatever. These have, like, really a ton of detail. They look really nice up close. And I mean, there's some made out of carbon fiber in here as well. It's not just one type of material. You know,

they're a little bigger, too. Like, if you hold them up in your hand, like, they're larger than the typical D20, I think. Right? Yeah, that's the. That's a chunk style. The. The largest. Oh, the chunk 20. Right. And I've got, you know, there's the typical size, which is the standard size. It's. I measure that against chess X or something that's typical in scale. And then you've got the chunks that go from 32 millimeter 64,

which is about the Size of a baseball. So. So if you're playing a barbarian, it's like raw, right? I like it. Yeah. For gaming, I mean, D20s are just used more than your other dice in the set. So I like having that larger chunk that kind of augments the other two or three sets that I'm playing with. Yeah, they're super nice and I would encourage everyone to go check them out. And so they can buy individual D20s, these chunky size ones. They can also buy a full seven piece set, which is kind of.

Which is cool too. So if you wanted to have D4s and all the way up to D20s, you have that. And one thing I just remember looking at your FAQs I thought was funny was how you did warn people about D D4s on the floor. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You don't want to, you don't want to step on the D4s and you lose them because you know they're already painful. But when you get to handmade dice or something with a sharp edge, it is just all that more painful, you know? And I bet sanding these too, you know,

they go right in your nail bed. So they are, they are little torture devices. So you're sanding these down yourself, like everything's handmade, balancing out, like. Yeah. Wow. How long does it take for you to typically complete a D and D set? It really depends. I mean, there's so many steps. I mean, you could say a year, but just from the learning and the making. But basically you can break down making dice starting off with your masters. So you start off by creating the masters.

And for that it's a 3D printer, so a resin 3D printer that generates the prototype that you'll start with. And then you go from that, and then you create tincure molds which are using a special type of silicone that works with 3D printed dice or 3D printed objects. And then from there you cast those with resin, take those out, and then sand those, polish those, and then make silicone with platinum cure silicone molds.

And then from there you can mass produce them from those molds and then make more as needed. But once you've got it, you know, an individual set isn't really that time consuming. It's mainly the time it takes for the resin to cure. And then from there, once they pop out, it's polishing them, sanding, sanding the, the tops of them, polishing them, and then painting. And painting is where it all just takes forever. That's the podcast right there. Like the podcast is the painting, the sets.

Well, is that where all the colors come from? Is that what you mean by painting? Like painting, Sorry, the painting. Like, I guess in the dice making world they'll call it inking, but that's putting the numbers on. Oh, so. So putting the numbers into the dice and then you'd have to clean them up again after that. And then I don't really do.

I'll do lots of sets at once so that I can have a day where I'm doing all the painting and I'll just kind of go through, do all the D20s and then work down from there. So I also love how you actually have like a dice collectors display because even the concept of collecting dice is. I don't know that that's intuitive to people. Right. Like, a lot of people just think dice are for playing games or to, you know, make my character with. Right.

But I think there's definitely an aspect of like, well, if I had a bunch of little awesome dice in various displays that looked cool, okay, now I can have a dice collection. Right. And I just love how you're actually, I feel like you're putting that into the market. The fact that you could put out this thing that looks almost like, I don't know what it's called, but the collector's display, saying it like balance. It looks like a balancing tool of some sort of how, you know,

it's a balanced dice. Like, it's just a very cool thing to put it in. Caliper. That's the right word for it. It just looks very cool. And because of that, now I'm like, I kind of want that, you know, what dice would I put in there? Right? And maybe, oh, and if you have other ones, how many more could I actually put in that? So I, I guess, I don't know if I have a question. I just want to comment that I think that's really cool from a collector's standpoint.

And, and that's how I kind of approach it too, because I, when I started with dice and I went to Pax Unplugged for the very first time and I was looking at dice and I was shopping for dice and I, I never owned any.

And I knew I wanted them because when I was playing D and D for the first time and then being given somebody else's dice, it started to kind of feel like gym class when you forget your clothes and you have to wear the stuff in the box, you know, And I was like, I don't want other people's dice. I want my dice. Like, and I don't want just my dice. I want my character's dice, you know? Yeah. And so I tapped you untapped. A gym memory that I totally forgot.

And now I'm so with myself, I. Just think of like the champion sweatshirts and like some cutoff left in there. I'm like, I have to wear these because I didn't bring my clothes. But yeah, that's how it felt. I didn't want somebody else's dice. Now, even if they were really gorgeous, I wanted my own. And I headed over. At the time it was die hard dice. And when they asked me what I was looking for, I said I wanted a set of dice that look like they wouldn't be out

of place in Picard's ready room. And I said, that's how we're going to start. And then they showed me these metal dice that I really like and they're beautiful. And they were my first set of dice and they're extremely heavy. I never play with them because they dent tables, they are metal. But they were gorgeous. And they were, you know, these silver dice. And I love them. I remember what we were just pivoting. So the stands. Yeah. So then the display,

and that's where it comes next. Like, I want to showcase them. I wanted to have them go like sculptures and I wanted them to be presented when you're not playing with them, not put into like a tackle box and then put in your closet. So that's the first of many that, that stand that's there. I have a few other stands that are like that. Those are manufactured stands. I don't make those. I have others that I do make, which are these resin stands that.

And then I have, deeper in the pipeline, I have these light up stands that, you know, backlight the dice and make them glow. Yeah, that's a great idea. See, like, I am not a dice goblin. I mean, I have probably like six sets, which is more than enough. And I haven't purchased any new ones in years. But now you've really opened up something in my mind as a dice collector, like a beautiful dice displaying it like, now that's, that's tapping into something different.

There's a natural progression in the industry too, because nerds already have this reverence for their dice. Right. Like the game itself holds dice in reverence because it's the perfect fair arbiter of what happens in Dungeons and Dragons and many other tabletop RPGs. And it only makes sense that if this dice you know, happens to be the dice that just rolls a crit hit when you need it in that exact moment to kill the lich and win the whole game.

That it gets its own display and have its own place in which to live as a memory. Like, I don't know. That makes a lot of sense to me. People do say, like, I have this lucky dice. I have this lucky. Well, now they have a place to put it. So you've got golfers who do that with their hole in one. You know, they'll mask their hole in one on the wall. And I've seen in photos. I don't remember where I've seen this. Probably somewhere online, Facebook or something, where people when they're.

When their character dies. So if they've lost their character, they take the mini and they mount it on their little dice box, you know, and then they put that up as a little memorial and it's kind of like the dice, the character together and. Yeah, I really like that there's special. Yeah, that's great. I haven't seen that. I mean, I don't know. You need. Maybe it's people that have much more grueling dms that just. Yeah, I'm way too nice to my players.

Yeah. Yeah. Always a moment for resurrection somewhere. Yeah. It turns into a side quest to bring them back. Yeah, It's a challenge. So I'm curious if you. Well, it sounds to me like you make dice for yourself. Like, you really enjoy this as a designer and an artist, right? Yeah. Like, where does that come from? Have you always been a designer? Did you just go to school or discover that somewhere? Where does that passion come from? Yeah, I mean, I'm an artist.

I studied fine arts, BFA in painting, though I very rarely paint. And then I have a master's in new artistic strategies. My practice in art making is more digital. So today's world, if you say digital artists, people would think like, NFTs or procreate or something, but for me, that would have meant new media art or net art, where I had my career and do have my career, and then from there. So as a professional artist, you know, making things.

And then I was a professor for over a decade teaching graphic design. So I've taught a lot of people how to do things. And then I really missed making things. And that's something that. During the pandemic, I really. I wanted to go back to my practice to making artwork. But also I was really interested in seeing if I could have a viable career path where I'm Producing something that's commercial as opposed to something for exhibition.

So I'm curious, like, do you get commissions and do you do commissions for people with dice? I do. So. So what you see on the website are one offs, sometimes series I things that I'm putting into production that are always available and then I do commissions for people that would want something custom.

So it's sometimes it's along the lines of things I've already made, you know, specific colors and then other times it's in entirely themed around something like, I don't know, a reunion of a DND party that's been playing for decades or something. So that does happen. And that stuff I'm not, I don't have those showcased on the site, but I do have some that will be there as examples of the kind of commissions that I do. Like if we wanted to put together a special nerd. Yeah,

an NP1 or something like that. If we've got the mold and then for our, you know, high level patrons or something, that'd be kind of cool. And then from there it's like there's like the setup cost and then it's just always available because that's already something that exists and then the molds are already in production. Exactly. But yeah, there's more like involved in fun things. So if, you know, I've got one that I'm doing that's, you know, I don't know if you familiar with this line.

I had a series of dice that I did that were embedded with cassette tape. So it's cassettes. Oh. That have been disassembled. You can see them on the design vault on the site. They were very. They took a lot of time to make them and they had a high failure rate for me, you know, like I didn't like seeing a single bubble of air inside of them. And if you've got a whole, you know, spaghetti mess of cassette tape inside of a die, there's. It's. It traps air. So those were a labor of love.

I loved making them. But there are custom ones that I'm doing. So there are ones that are like oversized dice that are specific albums that have the album art cut up into it or pieces of the CD inside of it or the cassette might be the actual cassette. Things like that. That's really cool. Yeah. Then I love customization like that, like hyper customization. Super fun. Like projects that you don't get bored making because they're so involved. It's problem solving.

I want to go back because you mentioned earlier There was the learning how to make the dice portion of your journey and then there's also the learning how to do the entrepreneur side of your journey, which you also mentioned was the more important part. I'm curious, could you dive into when did you like, what are the first things you did to really get this thing to turn into a business versus just being a hobby where you make dice? I mean this wasn't my first entrepreneurial venture.

I had done many things throughout my twenties that I, you know, it. I'd get really good at the, the process but not at the selling. So I started in web design and charging almost nothing and making really well coded, you know, gorgeous front end, beautifully coded websites that I sold for, you know, pennies and then would just spend months developing and then barely surviving because I didn't understand the business portion of it. So I learned through a lot of failure in that side of things.

So when I'm leaving my teaching job, so having a job that is a very standardized schedule of when your free time is and when it's when you're working in the classroom and you know, your health insurance is paid for and your paychecks are coming in very regularly, that gets very comfortable and it's confusing to leave that. And I was very aware of what, you know, bad habits I was in beforehand trying to, even trying to survive off freelance work.

So I also do freelance work and you know, animations, things like that for newspapers, magazines, online digital stuff. And if you're paying attention to just making the work, then you're not necessarily going to be recruiting new clients and

having a constant source of income. So yeah, I kind of had to off board from teaching and then took my baby steps into learning how to run a business and just read a lot and asked a million questions and messaged a million people to try to get an understanding of what's what. And yeah, it's scary. It's very, very different than having a 9 to 5 or in my sense, I guess it would have been like a September to May, which was teaching.

What was that transition like between the job and you kind of moving into your own projects? Very confusing. So I started acquiring things while I still had an income. You know, I'm acquiring all the tools and you know, it's a very expensive business to start up it. I knew going into it that if you're a hobbyist you spend one amount and if you're doing this professionally, it's another.

And that like with the desire to expand even bigger in mass production, I do want to be able to also have dice that I can design and have produced. That there has to be. That I have to do it correctly, that I want to be able to make the things I'm making by hand. And in order to sustain that, I'm going to have to have aspirations that are bigger because I'm going to hit a wall of what I can physically produce each day. And I didn't want to not be able to continue

making these because of that. So, yeah, I started hoarding my money and then spending every penny of my spending money that I budgeted for myself each month on dice, making supplies and, you know, learning how to do things and experimenting with different resins and different materials until I was at the point where I could start producing. And then I would see. I'm like, okay, can I produce five of these? Can I produce a set of 10 of these? Like, what are. Where are the walls?

And it was an extremely confusing thing because once I stopped teaching, I had to switch out of that mode where making dice was the thing I did outside of work. And then I'd be doing this, and then, you know, I'd be like, okay, I'm spending three hours on social media doing promotion now. I'm, you know, while that. While I'm casting, I'm doing this. I'm researching other dice I want to design. And then I start to feel like, oh, no, you shouldn't be doing this.

You should be going back to work. You spent too much time doing this. I'm like, no, no, this. This is my work. You know, this is. This is what I'm supposed to be doing. And it was very hard to let go and have, like, that carte blanche. Like, no, making these dice is the thing you're supposed to be doing. That's okay. Reading these marketing books, you know, that's what you're supposed

to be doing right now. It's okay. And, yeah, research was huge into this, and that comes from, like, the academic background, but I love research. Like, I'm very passionate about the topics I'm passionate about. And I loved researching this and then having a component to it which was, like, viability. Like, this is a commercial product. It's different than an artwork. I have to continue to produce it, and it has to provide an income. So the business side of things, I. I knew.

I knew very little about. And that's where I had, you know, once I was still teaching while I was learning how to do this. And then once teaching ended, then it was like, all right, business. Business Business. Let's professionalize this. What were some of the best books that made the difference for you as an entrepreneur? You mentioned a couple times now, reading a lot. I'd love to get a couple book recommendations from you. I can get them. I don't,

I don't have anything memorized. Um, I have a pile of them. I'm ridiculous actually. It's, it helps me go to sleep at night. It's just like having a pile of books next to me because I fall asleep reading them. And then you have like bizarre marketing dreams or something. You know, like there's, there are the fun ones that are more like blogs or you know, blogs or podcast ass book. You've got like Seth code and people like this. But then, yeah, specific ones. I focused on the niche.

Like I really wanted to say, okay, it's an art and you know, or a craft based business a little bit different than somebody who's trying to scale up and get, you know, like angel investors and things like that. I'm trying to make a craft profession and what are the walls with that? So I mirrored books. You'd find that like, like woodworking if you're doing like fine jewelry and things like this. So I looked for comparative industries and then read from those.

So a lot of was actually jewelry making, woodworking and then arts, specific entrepreneurial books. And I would just, I mean, I know nothing from, you know, I, about any of this industry and that like marketing is its entire industry to itself. So some of those books are really too broad or sometimes are too focused on, on being a marketer, marketing person for a company, which is a little bit different than if you're running it on your own.

So a lot of returns as well. But I can, I can put together a list. I can just go and grab that pile from the bedroom and then bring. Maybe we'll put that in the show notes for people and see if we can throw that out for people. Did you, did you ever read the book Launch by Jeff Walker? I'm just curious. No, I don't know. It's a good one. If anyone's looking for a book, just that is like I'm a solopreneur trying to figure out how to do this on my own.

From the pure marketing side. It's a really, really good one. And one of the best books on like launching something, whether it be a physical product, an online product or anything else. Actually it's a, it's a good one to read and it's not hard to read either. Yeah, yeah. So that's my little plug for. For a book specific. Yeah, there's.

I think there's so much about being an entrepreneur that is that learning side of it, though, that I. And I don't think a lot of people talk about that is that when you're willing to step out of that moment of like, okay, I'm no longer working for someone where I have a specific task and I just have to stick within those parameters, you're really going out and being the person who has to do everything from, you know, making the product, from scaling it to production to, like, as we said,

everything you have to do the marketing. This means your skill sets that you don't have become dreadfully apparent really quickly. And you have. You have to spend time as an entrepreneur, growing yourself and doing that. And it's. I think it's great that you acknowledge that the guilt that can come from that too. It's like, well, I'm only. I'm just sitting here reading a book or I'm just doing this research and I'm just, you know, listening to this podcast.

But all of those things as an entrepreneur are actually part of your work day to be the best, to be able to do a lot of the things that you need to do as an entrepreneur. And that's a smart investment. Yeah. It's hard to know where, like, you know, I can dump more time and energy into making more dice, but right now I need to also make. Make sure that I'm dumping the time and energy that I need to. Into the business itself. And knowing what you don't know is really difficult.

And knowing where to spend your money versus your time is. That's like, that's always the fork in the road. Do I dump more money into this or do I dump more time into this? And a lot of those books will say, you know, that's. That's where the. Make it a break. It is knowing when to spend money to save time and when to spend time to save, you know, save money, whatever. That. That's actually really good point. I haven't thought

about that in a long time. But, yeah, knowing where to spend your money to save time. You mentioned something about the unknown unknowns, and I feel like that is, you know, in risk assessment, you know, world. That is, you know, super. The big boogeyman, really. Yeah. You know, there's the known unknowns, there's the unknown knowns, and there's the known knowns, and then there's the unknown unknowns and T shirt quote. Yeah, right. Yeah. Now I'm imagining a die that just says unknown all over it.

But that would be a cool art piece, actually. That's. That's the nerdpreneur die. Yeah. Step into the unknown. That's great. I love it. You're. You're. You've mentioned a bit about, you know, the way that you spend your time in your day and kind of you feel like you should be focusing on different things. Yeah. At this point, have you come up with a rough schedule of how a day should go? Or maybe you break it down by your week? I. Yeah, I do. So, I mean, it is a little bit by.

I don't know if I'd even. One thing that, at least for me, has kind of dissolved is the structure of the week, the way that it used to be, where I had the days where I would prep for classes or, you know, the days that I'd be working on certain things and then kind of pivot to other others throughout the week. When I started, I was like, okay, I'll make Wednesdays social media days, and I'll make Thursdays

casting days and Fridays painting days. Um, but that didn't work because I liked getting into the flow of certain things and then giving myself permission to spend a little bit longer. Um, but I did. I did think about that. I know you had asked that, you know, on that. That possible crap, and I can't remember. I had, like, a really good way of phrasing it, how I spend my time,

but it was basically carte blanche. Like, it's okay that I trust myself enough to say, if I'm doing this right now, that I'm allowed to do that. And I'll have quotas, like, kind of quotas. Like, I want to be at this point in two weeks. How you get there? Let's work backwards. Like, I know that, you know, I have a big fair coming up in two weeks. I need to have this product line ready, and I need to have this much of it, and I need to have the booth ready.

How I get there, it might be that I spend three days focusing on the displays, and then, you know, while I'm doing that, I'll make some prototypes, but I focus on the destination and kind of work backwards and figure out how to build a bridge there. So my day to day is different each week. Probably then I'm not in that rhythm of making it identical. At least not yet. Do you find, like.

Yeah, yeah. Do you find that the production side, I'm kind of curious what your ratio or percentage of Production work to business work is. At the beginning, it was 100% production, and then now it is. It's like shrinking more and more, which is good because I'm streamlining things. I learned how to produce

things in ways that I can. You know, a lot of dice makers, especially handmade dice makers, will produce and then sell and what they've made and then go back and produce and then maybe once a month sell or every couple of weeks sell. And I changed from doing that. There are lines where I do that, and that'll happen when I'm working in person, especially at fairs. But for things that are online, I have a certain catalog that I rotate through. I said, these are available right now, and then

I'll move some of them out of production. And it helps because then I can see. Well, people are ordering a real lot of. For instance, cathedral dye and carbon fiber. Like, those come through all the time. So I start to. I produce more than are being ordered so that I have them ready, which then frees me up to be able to spend more time developing new things and then focusing on marketing or research. So that I'd say the production is getting smaller because I'm able to do more at once.

And then it kind of anticipate orders in that way. That's perfect. That sounds ideal. Well, launching your Christmas helped that, like, I was able to kind of see, like, you know, Christmas is like the market. You know, I launched in October, so it was like October, November, December. People were ordering their Christmas presents, and I had to, like, get into that very quickly. Like, how do I. How do I make sure I have enough of these? Because I was like, I'll make.

When I get an order in, I'll be like, I can't get 14 different dye and then try to make 14 different die in a day. I need to make sure that I produce one and then four extras, you know, so that I have them ready to go when the next order comes in. And that helped a lot. And, you know, that sort of a B testing with the website, like, put things up, take them down, you know, anything that hadn't sold, you can play with numbers on.

It won't lower prices of something that already has sold, but it helped me to, you know, kind of understand where I exist in the market and who, you know, to learn from your collectors, too. I email them and ask them lots of questions. It's something very valuable, is to communicate with people. And that's what I was asking is if you've got an email list as well. That you've been building

to have that sort of interaction. Because, because my impression is that every time you take away or put a product back on, that's another reason to contact your list to be able to have them, hey, reengage, check this out. New product, light coming out or this one is back. All of that stuff is so important to maintaining a relationship with your customers, right? I knew to maintain, I knew to build it. I have not been maintaining it. I have not been sending out regularly.

I listened to your podcast Monkey DM and that was so helpful to understand what the benefits of it are. And then I'm reading these, I'm like, I don't want, like there is a point where I don't want to send mass emails. I can break it down and send individual ones. I can customize them and I want to do that because there are people who have ordered and I want to be able to write to them.

So there can be a general, you know, mass blast that goes out, but with, you know, you know, it can be with the help of like ChatGPT or something that I can start to customize these things and, and really make them more personal, you know, with my, with my specific collectors. Because it's the same, you know, it's the same with our world. It's, you know, I'm not sending out like, hey,

look at this new work I made. I, you know, you can contact individual collectors and say like, this is coming out. I want you to be aware of this. Do you have any input? Do you have any, you know, color choices or something you'd like? And then until I'm scaled to the point where that's maybe tier based or something, you know, like where I can't do that because of the amount of emails, I should start there. And that's, that's what I'm, I'm prepping for.

And that's the reason to maintain that list at the moment. Well, it's almost like being able to have people opt into being on your, like, you know, your, your ether, your ether collectors list, right? And so then they get, by being on that list, they get first crack at anything new or they.

Because it's all limited, right? So there's, there's like a layer that as you, as you grow to this and you start to create those people who want to come back or have bought from you multiple times, it's like, you know, you've qualified for the collectors list, right? So you get first crack. And anything else I come out with like stuff like that could be really cool to shape because you've only been doing this a year. This is amazing. You've already got so far and sounds like you've

built it a lot in the right way. The next step. I'm excited where it's going for you. It just sounds really cool. Yeah. And then it's weird because when you launch, every minute that goes by after you launch and the sale hasn't happened yet, it's just like, wow, this was for nothing. What was it like that first sale? It's got to be crazy. It was three days. It was three days and I was doing heavy promotion everywhere. You don't know where to promote yet. Um, and then it was

like all at once and it was just. It. The, the floodgates opened. I was like, okay, okay, it's okay. Like this prep and planning has paid off and I was lucky in that sense. But, you know, let's. It didn't happen. When I first started off doing web design, like I didn't know where to put my time and energy. And then it's fun because then I'll do a launch. And especially I really loved it when I'll have these like timed launches.

You know, I'm with the website because, hey, launch these products at 6:00 on Saturday. And then seeing it like 6:01, it's like sold. It's like, oh, good, good. That'll. That, that's the right way. That's the right amount. And now I've learned from, from, you know, the, the production of how to do this. Right. Because it is, it is different too. It's not mass produced. So it. I. Everything is going to be limited because I can only produce so many.

Even if someone's ordering just the same thing over and over again, I can only produce so many. And so it has that commodity value to it. And people have to act now, right? Like at 601 you should buy because there may only be 5 left, right. Legit, or there may only be 10 in total production. Right. So that intentional scarcity with a dedicated audience I could see really being cool and bringing some level of predictability to the process, you know, and it's authorized authentic.

It's not like I really hate false scarcity and a lot of, not a lot of dice makers, but there are major companies that do this when they create that false scarcity. And they're like, I'll never produce this again until next month when I release it with yellow numbers. You know, it's like, well, come on, you've just tricked people

and they don't feel good about it. And I, and I want people to know that they got something meaningful and that, you know, I, I'm obsessed with making these and I want them, you know, people who are obsessed with collecting them to get them. And. Yeah, it's a funny, weird world. That's where your artistry comes in, I think. I mean, one of the questions I've really been wanting, you know, waiting for the right time to ask,

is about how you. You very much appreciate handmade things, it seems, and so much to the point that you are making a business around that and you have and it. And your passion shines through. What is it about? And the other layer of this is that being the artist that you are, you want to make sure that other people know that this, that what they have is a piece of art in their hands and it's not just going to be returned next month in yellow.

And so what is it about handmade that you feel so passionate about? I mean, that is a larger question that falls into my arts practice as well, because, you know, especially when making digital work, it was all about having the artist's hand become visible in some way. And it, you know, I think it's one of those things that presents itself before, you know, that it's happening, it's already happening.

And that I was doing a lot of work that were based on screen recordings of me producing work, things like that. So rather than making something in Adobe, I had artworks that are based on screen recordings of me using. Using Adobe, which outside of my audience right now, I know that that might sound weird, but that was a very important work of mine that, you know, it's a very important work. It had a large museum circuit that I went on, but. And then with that, you know,

I became more interested in it. I have, like, some of the earlier viral works I did. Like, I have this microchip in my hand that's an NFC chip that I use to literally distribute my artwork using my hands to people's phone. And then with the dice, I want it to be that it's, you know, there's a world where, you know, it's like, designed by Apple, made in China, that, you know, you can design it and then have it be produced and that's still your hand and that that is valid.

And that's kind of how I feel about digital work to some degree. And then with this, it's much more craft. And I think that, yeah, that that came from, you know, that's. That's personal, that's internal. There's not a way to kind of explain that, like, why I love painting, even though, you know, a painting can only be seen by a finite number of people. And if I'm making an animated gif, it can have like a, you know, a billion viewers, like, in a month.

But with a painting, it's like, how many people can physically see this in the. In the course of its existence. And then with dice. Yeah, it's just I. There's like that arts and crafts movement kind of vibe that's happening right now as a kind of maybe backlash to some of this mass production that we have. And to have something that's personal and not disposable is important. And I didn't. You know, and there is a degree of this that also is sustainability and its intention,

and it's a lot of things. Yeah. Did you see you had a microchip in your hand that you used to distribute your art? Like, we can't go over that. Over that without asking. Yeah, you can. You get. I mean, that off the. You can always just. You can type it in my name into Google, and then you will find videos and press about it. You know, it was. It basically, it's an animated GIF that's stored on an NFC chip that is embedded in my. Between my index finger and thumb.

And then I had also used that as a kind of a curatorial space for other digital artists to send me their work. And I would commission works and put them on my chip and then distribute them. And people can tap their phone to it and then pull it up. That's. Which is the same technology that I use in my certificates now, so that when you get a certificate, it's a very similar technology, except for you're not downloading it from my hand. But that's why I'd like to put

them in the DICE a little bit safer. Okay. So we don't want people knowing that you have a chip that is authenticating your work in your hand. Well, I mean, yeah, Yeah. I mean, like, you can pull it up if you meet me, but it's just. It was also a means of saying, like, this is something that you cannot access. Even though it's digital, you cannot access it unless you are, you know, directly in front of me. So, you know, it's different than something that's like, you know,

like a QR code. Yeah, yeah, like a QR code or something like that. Totally. Right. That's what's on it right now. It's my Favicon. That's awesome. And you can pull up some of the older works too. Yeah, well, I don't know. That's just very cool to me, the idea of, you know, merging the art with the delivery of the art itself actually being interesting. Yeah. Where do you get your inspiration and ideas from? Does it just kind of pop into your head or do you do stuff to do?

Being consistently inspired, dialogue, It's. It's all through. It's. It's communication. So I'm not as interested in someone who's maybe producing work that's introspective, that's only meant for them. It's very important for me to be in dialogue with other people. And having a product is very. Is very similar to that. So, you know, you've got your collectors and you've been makers, things like that, but it's not about that. It's feedback. It's. There is a feedback that comes with it.

And I don't know, we're talking about inspiration in general, I guess. Yeah. Like. Well, the difference between you and, say, a regular dice manufacturer is you are delivering on things that are inspired to you. And that authenticity, I think, is one of the reasons why you've grown and obviously created some real success here. And I'm curious because as an artist, inspiration consistently needs to be lit. Right. Or consistently. It's like bathing.

You need to do it daily. Right. Like, it's sort of one of those things. Higher process. Yeah. And that. What are some keys for that that you have? And that is it. It is, it is feedback. And it's. It's part of. When I was doing my master's thesis on this, it's like you could produce an entire exhibition and then have an opening. And then there's this. There's. You know, it's a well known thing that after an exhibition

that an artist will become depressed. Like, they put all this time and energy into this thing and now and it's just. It happened, it's over. And even if the work is bought, it's over. And with digital work, it was the opposite because it would be constantly seen and having online shows or having work that's constantly on view. You had people looking at it

all the time and then you get feedback. So I needed that back and forth, you know, And I. I can't just make something and then just throw it into a canyon. And even if people are seeing it, I need to know that they're seeing it.

So I really enjoy. I mean, I am inspired when people take pictures of the dice once they get them, like, here's the dice in the game, or they write back or I also follow a lot of other dice makers because I also enjoy seeing other people's dice and other people play with other people's. You know, it's just like, what are people into? And like, I'm into that too. Let's, let's, you know, share in this very, very strange niche world of dice collecting. So how does social media really

sit in with that? Like, it sounds to me like it's been a real benefit for you as an artist to have that direct line of communication with, with your audience through various mediums like Facebook and Instagram and Twitter and all these different places. I mean, it helped a lot. First you have to find them because you have to meet people where they are. And you know, I was spending. You know, the way that I approached artwork was very different because if I wanted people to see it,

I would go to somewhere. You know, right now it'd be to go to TikTok or something and millions of views. But with this, it was different because you can get a lot of views on TikTok, but those didn't turn into conversions. People didn't become a follower of yours. They just saw it. And that's kind of like walking by you versus standing in front of you. So I had to figure out where the dice collectors were and

where people are talking about this. And oddly, it ended up being places that I didn't expect, like Reddit and Google as opposed to TikTok or in Twitter where I would think to go and then Facebook, you know, and the smaller communities. But yeah, that's, I mean, and I love reading their messages and I love reading the, the dice discords that exist because it's such a weird thing.

I remember just writing at like 4am once and I was like, isn't it nuts that we're all here at 4am Just talking about dice? This is nuts. But, and then also, I mean I, I got into this because I married into D and D. I had not, I mean I, I was born a nerd, but I married into D and D. I had not played until I met my now husband. And that was, and we now we play as a family. Like I go to my in laws, we'll, we'll spend Christmas. We had like a four day campaign over Christmas.

Like that was one of my favorite things was posting this past holiday. I'm so jealous. Oh yeah, it's, it's nuts. It's nuts. Like I, I Posted like a picture. I was like, here's a die I made for my mother in law for Christmas that we're going to use during our campaign. It's like, like they're like, oh, you're so lucky. You know, like the whole thread in. And I am, you know, it's a, it was a very, you know, that was where it came from too.

So my father in law, our now father in law, you know, is a major dice collector and was a member of Dice Maniacs Club and, or one of the mod mins at one point and that, you know, I saw it and I understood it through when he would talk about dice because at this point I knew nothing. You know, I, I didn't even know them apart. You know, when I'm playing, when I was playing td, I'm like, which one's this again? And he printed up this little poster thing. He's like, here, here they are.

And he would talk about dice and he talked about them the same way that, you know, and I'm going to overlap worlds in a way that the arts world probably won't agree. But. Yeah, the same way that curators and collectors would talk about artworks, he would talk about the intricate, you know, artwork inside the dice that he was looking at. And he's like, oh yeah, I collect these ones because of this quality.

And like that was like that really connected something for me to say, wow, this is, this is identical and I can walk in this world without feeling like an imposter because this is similar to what I already know and I just need to learn this world. And the dice world is a very strange world, but I love it. Yeah, I didn't realize there was such a. I mean, like I said earlier, I didn't really think about collectors collecting dice and I didn't realize that it could be that detailed.

But I mean just like any collector community, it is going to, there's going to be people that go as deep down the rabbit hole as they want to. Yeah, I mean you find meaning in different places. Some people really like, like my father really likes collecting chess speckled. That's a very specific subset of a very specific brand. And then there are other people who like collecting handmade in general or Dice. Like maybe D6 collections, like maybe they're like

Warhammer fans or something. But. Yeah, and then there are those that like. Yeah, very specific makers. You know, they're, you know, if you go to like packs unplugged or something, you're going to see limited collections from certain collectors. Like Iniro might release two or three sets. Another major dice maker when I first met I, you're like, she's like, oh, do you want a free die?

When my father in law was speaking to her, I'm like, oh, I don't collect dice, I don't know anything about them, you know, And I had that one die for years. I'm just like, like sitting there and I'm like, you know, it's one of my spell counter dice. And I was just like, something's going on here. What is it? What are these synapses that are connect but let's just let it happen. You know, the pandemic changed everything. Life is short. Play with dice. I want to

throw the thought out there. First off, have you ever played Star Trek Adventures, the role playing. Okay. Role playing game? Yeah. So in it there's of course there are D20s that are used. You have two D20s that you use for each for your character.

But there's also these D6s, but they're not just numbered one through six, they have, their sides are one, a two blank blank and then a special effect symbol which might be the, you know, the classic Star Trek insignia or might be like an asterisk kind of like star or a phaser blast. And they represent essentially like a special effect. And so I'm just thinking there's an opportunity there. And I don't know what the legality would be but.

And I don't know if it's like held as under a copyright by Modiphius, but they're also small, they're a smaller fry Modiphiuses, so partnering with them is possible. That's another thing. If you want to talk about something that fuels my creativity, I love collaborating. And through the arts side of things I've learned how to do it legally, where to gain permissions and when not to gain permissions. Gotcha. Know how to defend things when you're

using it with fair use. I have, you know, I've had cease and desist letters from Nestle. I had really bad legal tanglings that I had to defend and luckily had a group of pro bono lawyers that were willing to help me. But you know, there is a world of like ask permission and then there's a world of ask forgiveness instead of permission. And knowing that is good. But the dice world, like I love communicating with people.

I've written lots of dice making makers that I love and I'm like, if you want to collaborate, I'm down, you know, and like writing like I Like your style or going around packs and I'm just telling people like this stuff's awesome. Like it's not a zero sum game. This is a very specific market. Like I want to connect with people. There's a couple of dice makers through Reddit that have contacted me that I'm super excited to connect

with as well. And yeah, and it's, you know, it's a very weird industry and to make it a profession is, you know, it's, it's confusing. But yeah, it's very important to collaborate and connect with people. And yeah, if it's Star Trek. Oh, I am so down. You know, that's, that's what I figured. That's why I specifically mentioned that one. And now I see the, that that's like the scarcity that comes in the gaming world. Like you're only as good as your table. Like I don't have a table.

Who wants to play anything but D and D? I would love a Star Trek specific table. Right now I've got a campaign where we are kind of making them fly around in a firefly type setting. So there's like a little bit of a crossover but that is as close, you know, like kind of like Wild west city hopping. It's not quite Star Trek. I would love a full on Star Trek role playing game.

Well, we, we do have an interview in the near future coming out with a guy, he has his own Star Trek based podcast where he, he goes through the show and chronological shows in chronological order. It's quite an undertaking. But we've been talking with him a little bit about a Star Trek Adventures kind of thing and so anyway the wheels are turning there. So point is that it took me forever to find Chris and I a group to play with strangers just for Star Trek Adventures.

And we meet like once every other week. Is it in person or online? Because I think yeah, online, that's, I'm totally down for that. Like I've, I'm. That's, that's something that's exciting is being able to play D and D online. It's, it's. I, I think it's hard to start there. But I've enjoyed DMing online. I enjoyed being a player online and then now with my, my parents in law moved out of state, we do every Friday we get online and play in D and D on, on Discord.

We're on the TV in their game room and everybody else is in person around the table. So we're like the big faces on the wall and then. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The camera there is aimed down at the. Well. If you do want to find a game out of the blue, the easiest way is going to be start playing games dot com. All right. They're they're just like, they've got the infrastructure designed and they have pro GMs that you can, you know, you can pay or you can not. Some of them will be free. But the Star

Trek Adventures community is present. Yeah. Yeah. That's awesome. Yeah. I think that any opportunity to. Yeah, yeah. To be involved with these two, you know, nerd world worlds colliding is super exciting. That's why I love disco does D and D. You know, it was. It was the two. It was the two nerd things. But, yeah, be a player in it. It's so much different. It's so much more fun. It's a great collaboration idea. I love that. Yeah, absolutely. Well, I am down. I'm 100 available.

Even if it's somebody's wedding that day, I'm available, available. Pulling up. That's the dedication. IPad in the bathroom. Be like, wedding 18. What's gonna happen? I wanted to ask one more thing about just crafting dice specifically, because I didn't re. I didn't bring it up earlier. I noticed you have wood inlay dice, and they are awesome looking. Like. I'll just say that first off, they're like the first things in my mind. I don't own a set of wood dice yet, but I've wanted them for a while

and I was just like, oh, these are nice. Nice. These look really cool. Yeah, those are super fun to make. Yeah. I'm curious. I just want to know, like, what is the process around making a wooden dice? Because you're not casting it like you are with others. Is it all just like saw sanding, like, handmade? Like, how does that work there? So there are different ways to do it.

There are different dice makers who will work in a process that is a lot like a CNC process where they're just in a 360 milling the die. So you have people that do it like that. Mine is entirely different. It's. It's. It's actually exactly the same process as I do in my other die, and it is creating panels. So those are panels. So it's not a solid core of wood. And then that way you don't have. You don't have the ends, the end grain. It's entirely the surface grain of it.

That was really fun to design and also one of the, like, hardest to get right. But with Wood, it's extremely affordable to make these mistakes and you know, as opposed to doing it with other things. But yeah, that was, that was super fun. And that's actually one of the first. The first series that I made were those. The. The Purple Heart and the. And the zebra wood and paduk. And so they're not. Yeah, the zebra wood's cool because it's like I'm rolling a barrel. Like, it's just like,

it feels perfect out of a tavern. Right. Like, it's super pretty. It's got op art vibes to it. Yeah, so are. But when you say that they're like panels, like, it's not hollow, is it? Or is it like. No, no weight or it's basically there. So when you're making dice, you can do it all at once or you could do it in a process where building it up and then build a core and then from the core then you attach to that and then cast again. So that's what it is. So along the lines, that's where you get.

The wood gets on there. And I have another series that's coming out of those where they're floating and you can tell that. So they're. They're where the wooden panels look like they are kind of like, like almost an inverse of a stained glass. Where you. Where the wood is, where the glass would be. Whatever. You'll see them when they come out. That's it. Yeah, it's fun. I'm just going to say it again. Go check out this website, everybody. It is badass. They have all sorts of stuff from abalone.

Apparently you made dice out of abalone? Yeah. That sounds crazy. It is. And they'll tell. This might turn off some people, but, like, when I'm cutting that, it smells a lot like burning teeth because it's calcium. You know, it's. I was gonna say, like, that's real bone almost, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah, it is. It's the inside of a shell. And yeah, that, that is very unforgiving, but it's fun. And that is. That is a.

That is also a very big seller. So. Yeah, I love working with the abalone and I do want to make them as a seven set. A seven piece set. But it is a lot of meticulous cutting and very small sizes. So it'd have to be a larger size. It doesn't. It doesn't translate as well even visually to the smaller scale, but it can. And there will be ones that come out. Yeah, I mean, I'm really excited to

continue to see what else you create? I mean, these designs alone are just like, oh my gosh, I could continue to look at these for a while and then if you know you're going. To continue to create intricate like. Oh yeah, yeah. And I only like the ones that I can do more than once. Like, I've got some really gorgeous prototypes that are like super special, but I can't find a way to make like five of them. And I don't want to. And I don't know, there's somehow that should make it more special, but

it actually makes it less special for me. Like, I want these to be something that I can produce enough people can have them and not just like, oh look, so and so. Got it. You know, but there's a world. Well, I will say, at least in the magic the gathering world. By the way, did you ever play? Okay, so I only, I only learned at cons. Like I literally learned in the downtime. Well, you may got into it a bit more.

You may know that in the collector world of magic the Gathering, there are people that intentionally gather the flawed cards and they will pay handsomely for cards that maybe don't have the art but show a white back. So the back of the card. And then people will pay for miscuts. You know that it's not a huge amount unless it's a valuable card that was miscut and it's not really that big of a deal.

But lots of people when they get these miscuts, they're like, hey wizards, I want like a replacement. And you where is. You really should hold on to them and sell those online. So what I'm saying is collectors as well. Yeah. So I'm just thinking about how, you know, there is that community that would be like, oh my gosh, this is a thing that was. That can't be done again. And you know, maybe there was something about it that wasn't meant to be done in the first place.

And there's like, you know, oh, the numbers upside down. Oh my gosh, there's a flaw there. That means so much more. Well, I have them all. I mean, it's ridiculous the amount of fails you get. I keep thinking, what can I make of these out of. And if you've seen right now like you've got like the udixie ball, like the giant basketball size die filled with other die. You know, like there's all sorts of things

you can do with it. Yeah, but, but, yeah, but I have my B sides or you know, my rejected line of dice. Well, yeah, hold on to those. Someone's, you know, there's people that might want those that could, that could give a decent chunk of change. Yeah, well, and I think there's so much to the idea of like this is one of the ideas we were talking about, but like the idea of an epic magic item that is kind of created for community. Right.

And so the idea of like, okay, well what kind of dice would say nerdpreneur make for their community? And there's only one. And it's like you can win this epic magic item and it can be one of those things that you do as a giveaway. For example, it could be really interesting to partner up to help help both parties grow. Well, I'll do another name drop. So one of my brother in law is in the family of the D and D players.

He's a writer for GUI Cube, he writes campaigns and I've talked to him like, hey, I would like to release special dice that go along with a magic item. Let's draw something up together. So I do have that in the pipeline. And I mean, I know we're talking about something more specific, but that is kind of where they go. What can these pair with? Like, these are little, think of little piles of wine or something. Like, what can we pair this with?

Totally. Yeah. And I mean what Chris was saying, I just want to add on it that you know, it, you know, doing something like this with you, it would be super cool because it's a chance to also find a cause that, that maybe is important to the artist yourself. And then that, that money that is raised through this raffle of this epic item is then like, you know, there's awareness and there's money going to an important cause.

Yeah. And I do, I mean like that is, that is like one of the things when I started, I don't know where I read one of the books I read saying like, you need to establish what your values are and what your, I don't know what you'd call it, like your, your on your brand or you know, your brand story or something like that. But. And I, and it was very important for me to have like, where do I stand where with AI, where do I stand with sustainability and like what type of woods am I going to use?

And like, do they come from rainforests? No. And then also in giving back, like where do I want to give back and where can I do that economically so that I can afford to keep making dice and also support causes I care about? So what I do, I donate DICE to organizations. Anybody that's a nonprofit, you can get in touch with me if you're a nonprofit that works with diversity and inclusion and gaming.

I've got a big series I'm sending out to tabletop gamers that they're going to raffle off, and then local charities here that also work with D and D and inclusivity. So it's exciting. And it's like, that's somewhere. Like, I'm not at the point where I can write $20,000 checks to the organizations that I love, but I am at the point where I can send not $20,000 worth of dice, but I can send DICE of value to places that can help to raffle them off. And that is.

That is another one of those, like, inspiration feedbacks, you know, like, that I can get energy from being able to produce things that are. That are for something. I love that. Yeah. The full circle, you know, of contributing to some group, especially if you care about it. Yeah. I like that you quote Deckard on your site about AI image generator dance. Like, I just like that because it's like. It's like replicants are like any other machine. I mean, they're either

a benefit or a hazard. Like, I was just. I. I appreciate that reference. And also that you were. You actually decided to make a stance on that too. Yeah. Human, creative, created art is. You know, I know it's all up in there legally in many ways, and there's lots of people on both sides of different arguments. But I will just say that anytime I look at an AI generated something that I'm not curious about what the human put in to get that, you know, to me, it's still about the human element.

Whenever I am looking at something like that, because I don't. The feeling I get from it is really not. It doesn't feel real because I know it was created by an AI as opposed to a person. And in some ways, I'm like, how did that person get the AI to do that? Like, that's what's interesting. Search results. Yeah. A lot of AI art is just search results. Exactly. Right. So. But yeah, it's super important in a sense. There's a whole segment of society now that's like, oh,

I'm a professional search artist. Right. There's people who are like, I'm good at making this AI to do stuff. Which is totally weird. It's a new merging industry. But that's part of what I care about. It's like, I really care about the human involvement of it. And what people have contributed, and especially in the tabletop gaming world, you've got writers and illustrators and designers, and those are not the people that you should be replacing.

That is the heart of this. So, yeah, it's very important for this because I wanted to incorporate NPC cards. That was one of my first ideas before I launched, was, like, I wanted NPC cards to be designed by different artists, and I did not want, you know, a lot of AI generated work just slapped onto something and then sent out. Has no. Has no, you know, meaning or substance to it. I wanted it to be authentic and to, you know, reinforce the brand ideals. Love that.

Before we go over to random roles, I would like to know, what is your definition of a nerd? Oh, that's tricky. See, now I keep thinking of the, like, dichotomy of nerdy versus geeky, but we're just going to get rid of that, Right? So we're just going to focus on the nerdy. Because it is. Yeah, I think it's being passionate about something, an intellectual way, but in a way that also makes other people go, you're a nerd.

So I heard someone else in one of your earlier ones, and it must have been one of the ones I passed already in your podcast that someone was talking about. Yeah, you can be a nerd about cars, you can be a nerd about chess, you can be nerd about politics. So I think it is. It's like the obsession that you'll talk about to people who didn't ask, and then they're very willing to say, you know, this. This conversation is one of the few conversations I've had about dice

that someone else has consented to. You know, so that's where it starts. It's like, you know, it's very hard to connect with it. So it gets very. Yeah. Varying responses. Yes. Yeah, yeah. Same thing with Star Trek. I mean, I already have a whole world of people that are like, let's not talk about Star Trek. I'm like, but we can relate it to everything. And then with dice, you know, and then it's kind of fun because then it's a challenge. Like. Like how?

I've heard you both talk about how to introduce just D and D to people who don't play. It's like, how do you introduce dice to people who don't play D and D? Like, this is like an extra step of, like, of separation. So, you know, I just kind of work it in that way. But I start with it's artwork, you know, it's A little sculpture. And I was very happy to produce these, even for family members over Christmas. To people who will never play D and D. You know, just. It's a beautiful object. You know,

it's a little objet D art. Like, put it in your window on the stand and, like, let the sun hit it. And don't worry what you. Your crit is. Just go for it. Yeah, I resonate with that. That's great. Well, do you have a D100 that you could roll per chance? I don't know. Who made these? Yeah. Can you actually tell us. Can you tell us a little bit about the dice that you're going to use? These are ether objects, originals. These are cold cast aluminum with a matte black. They're gorgeous.

These are my favorite, you know. These again, these are ones that go right into the cards. Ready? Room. Nice. Perfect. Yeah. The silver would fit into a Star Trek background 100%. Right next to, like, the 3D chessboard. You know, that's it, too. You know, even when I was making digital work, I always liked the idea of things that would just kind of float in space like they do in a holodeck, when they're just kind of like scrolling

through different products, you know? Okay, so do I. Do you ask something first and then I roll? No, just roll. Yeah, this isn't Divination. I've been working Astrology diet. Okay, so what is the next question? Yeah, okay, so this is more the opposite direction. I'm going to. Yeah, so you roll. We'll go off of a list and we'll take it from there. Very high roll. It is a 97. Oh, my gosh. Let's see here. I don't know if I balanced these right. Let's see. Now. That's the K. Great.

So very much off of some of the other things we've been talking about. Do you think AI is going to take over humanity? Oh, I don't know. I mean, in a way. In a. You know, you think of, like the movie AI. Do you remember that movie? Like, yeah. Way back. Yeah, like the Spielberg. Yeah, Spielberg Dash, Kubrick dash. You know, whatever. You know, in a world where, like, we want to travel interstellar, it's going to be necessary. But do I think it's going to take over? No, not in the.

Not in the way that we are in. But in the ways that we don't expect. Yes. So. So, you know, just think of it as any kind of inversion. I think it's going to be. Someone said it's about as Important as like introduction of the iPhone that was hideous to think of. Like you know, our postures and things now and how much it's changed. But take over the world. I think it might automate a lot of things we don't want automated. And that's going to happen. Capitalism will. There we go.

AI will be a tool that it wields. Yeah. It'll take the tool as far as they can. Yeah, yeah. It's going to lay, I think a lot of the incentives towards laziness for sure. And so it's going to be interesting to know a generation raised with AI versus a generation that didn't. And I'm curious, it's going to be interesting to see what we mean by takeover because we leave that open ended because maybe it's not Terminator where they take over in the formal sense of the word, like they desire.

It's more of will become very much dependent on it. Like you know, calculators and then iPhones and like it becomes more symbiotic versus it taking over in some way. But man, it's going to be really interesting. It'll be a tool that we're all going to be using regularly whether or not we know it. Just like chatbots have been, you know, and customer service in that world. I happy that the customer service doesn't have to deal with some of these complaints that they're getting.

They get to have a chatbot fight with them. But yeah, there's, there is a, there's a world of benefits and a world of deficits. So yeah, I'm not going to answer any more. No one wants to piss off the AI either. So we're just like, just in case that's about as far as we're going to go on that one. Yeah, I'm not, I'm not a futurist who I'm willing to be wrong about that. So I mean I am super optimistic and that's maybe that Star Trek in me,

but like out. Can you. Yes, the holodeck was total AI, but it had its limitations. Well, I, I love, I. Well, one of the things we did in our tabletop Star Trek game was interesting was you can actually ask ChatGPT to be acting as if it's a Star Trek computer and it will respond to things as if it's Star Trek in Star Trek Y language. So. So it's not really a dm, but it can legit be used as a computer for you to interact with and as a DM or GM to take those answers. And, like, read them out. It's.

I don't know. That's partly. One of the reasons I'm kind of excited about GMing is the idea of incorporating, like, an AI into the mix. I think it would be a really fun. You're just gonna have the chat GPT do all the GMing. You're gonna have a chat GM. Hey, we all. No, no, no. We all have different styles.

But I will say the ability for me to pull the good stuff out of it and then, like, use it in a DM or GM way to get people excited about interacting with it because, you know, it doesn't have a personality. It just has all the right nomenclature. So it'll make me seem more of a Trek nerd than I am Frank. That's what I'm going for, is to pretend that I'm going to. Oh, it's going to level the flame, the playing field for those who are not Trekkie enough. No, I mean, I've used it.

I've used it in games before, but it was. It was kind of like the which Way book. Like, give me some options here. I'm like, and then there's something that you can take and roll with it, but, you know, it's exactly. It's possibilities and you got to flesh it out. Yeah, Chris showed me that. It's really good for exactly the which Way book. Yeah, exactly like you said. Yeah. Yeah. All right, well, go ahead and roll one more. All right, so let's see. 89. Yeah. 89. Rolling high.

Yeah, I'm rolling high on these. I'm about to wait on these now. But by the way, that's one of the number one questions you get with your dice. Are these. Are they balanced? Yes, these are balanced. 89. I'm just awesome at rolling. Nice. What makes a great friendship even stronger? I think. I mean, I'll tap into this. The shout nerdiness. Like having a commonality that you're nerdy about.

And that is huge. Like, I, you know, I have friends who are very, very different people than me, but maybe they, you know, watch Star Trek or maybe they're into that same exact weird subgenre of art that I'm making. So having that connectivity. Yeah. And, you know, commute. Pop culture is communicative currency. Communicative currency. So if you can nerd out about something that's valuable, totally. That crosses over. You know, even in politics, some of them have totally different politics.

But if they have the same weird, you know, thing that they're into that you're into. That's helpful. I think that's so true. Right. Like, I bet you there's probably people on all sides of the political spectrum that like DD and would probably not at all care if they were both at DD in a castle playing DND for three days. You know what I mean? Like, they wouldn't even bring it up that all they would care about is like, my barbarian hit. Damn it. You know, this is. I'm gonna fireball. No, you.

You didn't kill me. You know, like, people become unified through their hobbies and their nerd dom. And I think that's a really great. I think that's a really important thing to remember as we go through the rest of this year and next into another election year. That's right. And it is one cool. Thank you. Thank you for indulging us on the random rolls. Now we're going to go over to Rapid fire. Yeah. So, you know, these, they're quick and silly.

We already got a couple answers out of some of them. So I'm not going to go to our typical ones. All right. But actually Star wars or Star Trek. Actually, I'm going to. I'm going to change it. I'm going to change it for Anthony and ask it a different way. How close does Star wars for you come to Star Trek? Oh, that this is going to. This could hurt some of your listeners. But like, it's like hot dog versus, like, like, you know, roast. You know, it's so different. It's so.

It's like I like it, but it is not like, you know, it has. A time and place, but it's not for a discerning individual. I mean, if I'm at a ball game, sure. Right. I mean, I mean, I'm hit right here with like Mandalorian, you know, but there are, there are other. But as far as like the universe, I'm ready to live in one of them and the other one I'd be scared to live in. So. So there we go. Yeah. Yes. Great. Perfect. So what is the best munchie.

Oh, that's tough. Yeah. I mean, I'm a sweet person, so anything that's chocolate, like any like kind of Reese's peanut butter cup thing, but I guess it's context based. So if it's not. Because I don't think of chocolate as being munchy. Oh, man. I think. I don't know if this is exactly the model of it, but like those combos that are, that are like pizza filled and like pretzel on the Outside, Those are also good. Yeah, those are so good. The ones you can get from Traders. Joe's.

They're like pretzel with. With chocolate or with peanut butter on the inside. When I go to America, that's what I buy. That's like. That is my. My snack food. I love it. There's a candy that's called a Take Five bar. Have you had one of those? No. It's like a. It's like a Reese's Peanut butter cup with a pretzel jammed in it. It's amazing. Yeah. Chocolate on the outside, peanut butter and pretzel on the inside. That's a good. That's a good combination. Yeah, that is good.

Terrible name, but great, great candy. Zombie apocalypse weapon of choice. I mean, I just. For no reason, like, before I started listening to your podcast, I was binging Fear of the Walking Dead and Walking Dead, catching up on them. I abandoned it, Clen. So I caught back up on it while I was sanding. And I really loved Lucille. I don't think I would be anything with Lucille, but that's the bat with the nail in it. But it looked so effective in the show.

In reality, probably just. I. I mean, it's got to be something that you're not gonna get, you know, run out of ammo with. But I'm probably not gonna do well in the apocalypse. I'm gonna have to get a lot of, like, I'd have to network, you know, during the apocalypse and get the people around me. But I liked. I mean, Lucille is just a beautiful cast member. It's just a bat with nails. Just the oak bat. Anyway, it's a good visual. It's an iconic zombie apocalypse weapon. Yeah, totally.

100%, yeah. What. What character would you cosplay at a comic Con? Man, I've never done cosplay, and that's nuts. Although, you know, for our wedding, we were. We got married at a Ren Fair, and I was dressed in, like, Victorian era, but. But that's. But it was, like, more specific. Like, it was not a. I could probably show you a picture. I think I have one of my desks. There you go. You know, it's like this. I love that.

Cool. But this is not that I think, as far as cosplay, I mean, and I really love the look of, like, the underbelly of society and sci fi shows. Like, the Rebels or just, like, you know, when, like, Rafi goes down to the planet and it's, like, kind of just like, rough and, like. But it's futuristic looking, so Maybe in that world of, like, it's almost cyberpunk. Yeah, cyberpunk, but like, way more fashionable. Like very fashionable. Like Romulan. I really love Romulan. Aesthetically,

like, gorgeous. Just gorgeous. Like, it's, it's, it's, it's dark, but in, you know, in a very enlightened way. It's beautiful. Yeah, it's. It's like a Gothic Roman. Because, I mean, Romulans are very Roman inspired and. But they went like, dark. Yeah, it's gorgeous. It's like Evil Circe, like, you know, that's that vibe, that vibe of the rebels of sci fi, kind of. Yeah, yeah. If you were to go to Hogwarts, what house do you think you would be put into?

See, this is one of the ones I was dreading you would ask because, like, I am not. I'm not a Harry. I'm not a Harry Potter fan, really. And, like, I've watched them. I don't remember the house. Like, I know Slytherin exists. I've heard of Hufflepuff. I don't remember much of what anything means, but I will tell you that, like, when I can't fall asleep, I always take those, like, online personality tests, like, what TV character are you? You know, whatever. And I'd get Hermione, so I don't

know what she is. Maybe, Maybe. That house, Is that a Gryffindor? Yeah. Okay, then that. Then that there. Yes. All I can leave it at. Big heart, typically, is. Gryffindor is all about heart and courage, typically. Oh, really? It doesn't sound. Maybe not. I don't know. Well, as opposed to Ravenclaw's, Ravenclaw is the Brainiacs. Usually they're like, super studious. Hufflepuff is like, very much like, oh, everyone's a friend and we care for everything. And then slow.

I like those people. But I. Yeah, yeah. And Slytherin's like, we make the hard choices for, you know, the greater good. And they plan, get things done. But yeah, that's Snape. Is that the. Is that the. Yes. Yeah, yeah. Okay. He's great. A great actor. But, yeah, I don't know where I'd fit in the Harry Potter world. I liked what's his name? The Hagrid. Hagrid, yeah, Hagrid. Hagrid. Yeah, Hagrid. Like that. I'll go that direction. Definitely. Definitely. Big Friendly Giant.

I think that's the best way. That's right. How many cats is too many cats? See, my husband told me not to answer this one? Yeah. Why? I gave my answer, and I was like, what do you think about this question? Because I think about that every time I listen to it. And here's my thinking. Like, I don't have anything against cats. They're just like raccoons or squirrel. I just don't understand why. And I don't mind.

I see them working cool. Like, you know, I had a family member who had a barn with horses and things like that, and the cats inside, they worked. They did things. They were outdoors. But, like, get off my pillow, you know, like, get off my keyboard. They're very entitled to space that they probably shouldn't be, in my opinion. Yes. They're cool, weird animals. I just. For me. Yeah. I don't know. So, no, no more comments. It's fine. Like,

everybody's got a cat. You know, Everybody's got a cat, and their cat's different than every other cat. Cat. And that if they want to convince me, they'll be like, oh, it's like a dog. I'm like, well, there you go. Okay, I like it now, but in a way. But, you know, Grudge. You know, grudge and start. Like, I had to like a cat. I was like, wow. All right. I'm in a scenario where this is a cool cat, and when he defends the cat in that episode where he's like, she's a queen, you know, I felt it.

I was like, I understand. I. I care about this cat, you know, And Spot. Spot, as much as I love Data, I didn't feel Spot. Spot felt like a chore. I felt like, you know, warf. Prop. Yeah, it was. Spot was just a prop. Spot didn't. There was no. Like, we didn't care as much. Yeah. It's a team with, you know, Archer's dog, though. He was kind of a prop, but Grudge different. Like, actually, it was funny, you know, when Grudge jumps on the console, it's funny, you know, So I like that cat.

I would have Grudge. Those are cool, those main coon cats. That's different. That's a cat. You know, like, that thing's like, £35 or, you know, like, those are. Those are small. Those are, like, beasts, you know? Yeah, but. Yeah, but not in my house. It would run. It would rule my house. That ties into the Hagrid side of things. Yeah. Because Hagrid was all about the magical beasts.

Sure. There you go. I like my dogs. You know, I've got a little miniature dachshund right now, and she looks like Peter Capaldi. He's got the eyebrows and the mustache. Beard, wire hair, but yeah, I want. An image overlay of that. Yeah. So look, I found a cat I like. It's through Star Trek. See, the world can be solved through Star Trek. Star Trek. All through Star Trek. Classic. Three favorite pizza toppings.

Oh, well, I had pizza tonight. I use this podcast as a reason to be like, well, I'm not going to cook food. I'll order pineapple. Number one, hands down. If it was nothing else, pineapple. And then if you're going to add to it, you could have pineapple and bacon. That's awesome. Good. But then outside that in New Jersey, so I'm not native to New Jersey, but in New Jersey, they have this pizza. It's a sausage pizza, but they cut it the long way. So, like, it's like the long.

It's like a big, long oval. It's. It's like the cross section of a sausage. And it is so good. And it's like, not the crumble, you know, that looks like pizza. Not that. It's like. It's like, wow. Like, how did you even cut that? Anyway, that's what they do here. And I'm. I'm always impressed with it. Other than that, it's like, you know, those thin. You know, the thin ham slices, like the prosciutto. Yeah. But yeah, that. The New Jersey. I will give them props on their

ability to make sausage pizza. Like, exciting. Well, Anthony, this has been so cool to talk with you and to pick your brain on your nerdpreneur business. Where can people find you, support you, or potentially get some artistic dice from you? Well, you've got etherobjects.com and you can misspell that because I bought every variation of Ether that you can match. And if you can't remember that, I do. Like, also in the pipeline are

Dice books and I also own. Honestly, before I started this company, I registered polyhedraldice.com thinking that maybe that would be a good place to start. So you could also find me on polyhedraldice.com it all goes to the same place, but ultimately that will be different down the road when I have more stuff launching. So Ether Objects with an A. And you're on Instagram as well. And TikTok.

Instagram. All socials. Ether Objects. Yep. TikTok, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, Ether Objects, or at Ether Objects, A E instead of just an E. So A E for alphabetical superiority. Because my name aa, I was used to going first in class. You know, sometimes I have an exhibition. I'm listed first. I was very conscious about that when I picked Ether with an A over an E because I'm like a lot of gaming conventions sure. List their things in alphabetical order.

Yes. Wow. It's. And you're gonna see a bunch of like pound sign companies coming out soon. Yeah. Just to jump that numbers in the phone book. Yeah, yeah. So that is it. Etherobjects.com and on socials, Ether objects. And as always, everybody, keep it nerdy. Keep it nerdy. Keep it nerdy. Keep it real. Real nerdy. You just finished the show class version of this episode with Frank and Chris. If you want to hear the Galaxy class version, become a member of our awesome nerdpreneur board.

Board members get access to all extended versions of our episodes. Go to patreon.com nerdpreneur to become a member of the awesome nerdpreneur board. Thanks for listening and as always, keep it nerdy.