Yeah, it kind of fix joins me again from Australia. I think I might, yeah pretty good. Apologies in advance if I miss anything because I had a bit of like a little break but I've tried to scramble through and and make sure I've got a list of stuff to talk about, I guess the
first thing. I need to mention is that Mark Smith basically gave away some Rule books in exchange for a donation to cancer research, UK and ingerson and Davide provided some donations and made a new home for these Rule books that were given out for like 2nd Ed 40K and things like that. So that's pretty generous and I think like all people Involve there should pat yourself on the back because that's it's a good good way to do a donation and receive something in return.
Well, done glass, I like it. Yeah that's an awesome awesome initiative. So yeah. Well done everybody involved with that. That's that's amazing. Yeah, good work. Now all over social media, Facebook, Etc, bring out your lead 2022. Some insane pictures of beautifully, painted rain, and battles, and models across the board, across all games. I guess the thing that really stands out for me, is, there was a talk versus ultramarines battle with some amazing Terrain.
I'm sure you spotted that as well. Yeah yeah I saw that I did. Yeah and I pretty cool selfie from old man. Paints with some basically Games Workshop celebrities marlys but you guys can check that out in the Discord. Bring out your lid area. I highly recommend. It got a good giggle out of me. Yeah, well mine paints. He recently joined our Discord after finding out how to join it. Like he had no idea what Discord was.
His daughter went on about it. He said, what's this Discord thinking on About. So yeah. Old man old man paints. Finally joined us, he worked out how to do it. How to work, how to change his profile picture that kind of thing. So yeah he's a really good guy. I met him through Instagram. Yeah he's good. He's really good guy. He was he was like sendhil descend like videos of him just talking about stuff related to hobby or Hilda, sound like a
voice message. And I thought that's a really weigh a good way of connecting with people, like his his friends on Instagram. So I said, might come and On this code. So he has and really good to see this a good lot of old cameras, present on our discords now, which is great. And yeah, bring out your lead. I think it might have been the most successful one, especially such a short time after, like, you know, all the lockdowns, our stuff in the UK, but have like gerbils Johnson turn up.
And to check out the Revenge of the Doom Lord battle scenario that he wrote and the guys are playing it like Dave and all the other guys are Saying it that would have been a pretty spectacular thing, I think. Awesome Circle and so-called to yet, again, I'll use this term but live vicariously through the photos and uploads that I saw from people. So thanks very much for doing that.
Guys need to shout out. Happy birthday to my cell and Joe the Guardsmen. I know it's well past now but, you know, we had a hilarious time. Wishing them, a happy birthday and we haven't seen You know, Justin mustering of arms online on the Discord in the paint and Chad. So come back home. Justin! We miss you. Yeah, I've, I mean, quite guilty of not being on there for a very long time, so I'm going to try to make it on there.
Now it's my holidays, I have no excuse but I have been pretty busy last three days, watching the end of stranger things, like series for suddenly, my wife being hooked on And just finding the time to watch that, after my son's going to bed and that kind of stuff, so, but now there's no excuse, I'll have to go and say hello to the guys there, and and see what they're up to.
Yep, come in and have a chat over on YouTube, Community Channel. So, there's been some new channels mentioned there big, small worlds, and on the lam games, highly recommend. You just add, I guess soon as you open up one of those links to those YouTube Pages, just hit, subscribe, straight away. Like Because eventually, like people are just going to be training out videos after videos. It'll come into your feed. It's definitely going to be something you're going to enjoy
to watch. So do that support everyone and get a nice list of subscriptions going. So your feeds not flooded with strange clips that the YouTube algorithm thinks that you want to see. It's all rubbish. Can they all right there, you got that right? Oh yeah, it's really bad. So What's happening with? I'll just touch on this briefly but a lot of social media platforms are trying to become Tick-Tock, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube clips.
They're all trying to cram in these rubbishy little 10 seconds to 30 second clips and just flat everyone with its it's just Mindless drivel fight against it. Subscribe to things at me like that's them and always hit a lie. Resistance, you have five seconds? Put a comment in likes a great video or something like that. It doesn't matter to support, support, what you like, don't be brainwashed by this horrible machines and watch, watch The Alex Jones. Well, what's the Alex Jones trial?
That's absolutely hilarious. That's worth every penny, every time, my God, I'll go there. But that might you be In might just to break things up a bit but you've posted pictures with Brandi, dog. You've actually played the game. You're not even just talking about it. You actually played it. Yeah, guilty as charged, so myself, Brandy dog, mitosis fish, and wondering valve. Are we got together and did sort of like a 2 V 2 game with some Orcs and Jenn still has and terrain.
I made a very horrible PDF file that I put into the battle reports section that you can squint. And have a look at but yeah, we just basically cut it down, you know, for term limits for by for battle game area, and no psychics and just limited points and was very fun because we kept things flowing, you know, we had a lot of reading and catching up on the rules and just remembering how restrictive some things were, but this a friendly match.
So you know, no weird rules allowing or Like that and lots of hilarious things to do with vehicles. Like people penetrating rhinos and not killing them as really bizarre. And, and forgetting just how tough vehicles and second edition were because that jump from second edition, a third added. Yeah things like rhinos were came complete rubbish. No really tough and second is really strange but yeah, you can
check that out. I did manage to catch a bit of the remote gaming that you were doing as well with the Manowar game the other day and I noticed you did a hero, Hammer match and compensation as well. So you've been really busy. Oh yeah, we're trying to get some some games in of my holidays. Always try to do that if I can but yeah, I had a really good game with the Justin and Paul that was in the first day of the holidays. We thought we'd kick it off with a game of Warhammer fantasy
battle 5th edition. But with the flylo skulls twist, And on the patreon, that videos up there now, it's like it just like a, like a post turn kind of review of what happened each turn. Now that's up there for those guys who want to watch it and thanks for thanks for supporting me guys. So enjoy that one. But good news is they're going to come back on the 22nd because Justin got another day off to come up here to play with Paul
and myself. I'm going to bring the same list, maybe with a slight change. And I think the The guys are going to change their wood elf list as well. But one of the guys in the community totter from Denmark, he wrote my list for me and it's been just so awesome like he made up all the names of all the characters and the unit names from The Wharf language lexicon in the door 4th edition book so just hilarious stuff totally
unpronounceable. I can't read what they actually say but I'll I've posted up that on the Discord of the entire list. So we're going to play that again. N on the 22nd. So I'm really looking forward to that, because I really enjoyed the guys coming up and playing a big game of one on the fantasy. But yeah, played with Chris, again Manowar with this time. The britannian fleet I've never played britannians before, he's got a beautifully painted, full complete Fleet of that.
So, I took batting to the High Elves and had a really good match with Chris that was yesterday yesterday morning. Really enjoyed that and I played some Confrontation with Paul as a year, since we played a game of that, so really enjoy that. I'm just now uploading the video to the YouTube channel. I had some difficulties with it last night. Some reason, it was only uploading an hour of the one hour and 40 minute video, but it seems to be going well now, so
that's cool. So look out for that very shortly. But yeah, made are been having lots of lots of fun playing games and, you know, sort of dreaming of the projects that I want to fulfill but just not having the time to body do Oh though mate. Yeah you really got to chip away at these things and just do a little bit of planning and then hopefully it'll falls into place. Yeah, Mike. Yeah, absolutely, but I love seeing like the bring out your
lead. Like watching that scenario that Dave put together with a lot of other guys. But I think mainly, Dave did all the Dave Gilson he painted all the armies, he made all the terrain, you know, seeing something that coming to coming together. It's really inspirational and it's You know it's getting me inspired to do some do something like that. All start on doing some scenarios like battle for you skate and that kind of thing in the works.
But yeah might have been talking about for ages but like you say you got to start somewhere and you've got a really cheap at it like 30 minutes a day kind of thing to realize these sort of projects a Yeah. I mean for myself I'm hoping to eventually get a regular gaming session done, maybe every month, minimum one day within a year. So that's that's the goal at the
moment. I've learned if you can paint these things and work on them and then actually get a game in, that's that's the best, that's the best feeling in it. Like, you see them, but I know, I really like to see ya. You'll tyranids against Brandi dogs space walls and be quite
cool. Oh yeah, that'll be crazy one day when I promise, well, gotta fix you won't be disappointed because today, I've got a very good old friend of mine and he's part of who's the main person behind where we've or Miniatures, people may have been will make may have seen his work on Facebook or on his external site at a Facebook. Basically, he has designed the Of Miniatures based on the 40K universe, so think of like squats and aux and mainly,
mainly squat. So he's got like this egg Bots type designs which are like guys and exo-armor and that kind of thing doors and exo-armor. So he's done a lot of that and I think. Yeah, you really like this kind of chat back in time into playing 40K with your old Squad armies. And you'd want to know if you wanted more designs or more variation in your in your units or this is the way to do it because Marcus is designing them in casting resin and selling them.
So, look forward to bring that interview to everybody very shortly and yeah, getting getting in touch with him, go to the show notes, you'll find the links there to his site and so you can check out his full catalog of models and and order a way. So yeah, and let's be honest, they'll be a hundred times better than the current squats that GW has decided to put out. Which are horrible and generic and then audience outside needs. They don't even have beards.
What is going on? And those this like, those, I am there's a Kickstarter recently life from Ginger beard. He did some, they look awesome. They look fantastic, but the price is so prohibitive of things like 80 Euros or something like 45 guys, unfortunately. But yeah, that was that was the, that was the only one I can think of that. Would that really, you know, Did them Justice that look like the kind of second edition. The ones used that featured on The Dark One idiom inside
covers. They had those two unreleased squats. Yeah, those ones I absolutely love. I mean, that, that that epitomizes what, I think squat should look like in 40K more so than the road Trader ones. But yeah, I really really love that design. So anybody can pull that off, I'll get asked Marcus to do, that is actually based on those ones from second edition. I think you learned, A great time and great success in doing those but even Marcus is playing
second edition 40K. So it's the bug is sort of caught on to him as well and he's got his old collections out and playing with his Elder and aux now. So he's really busy. Painting up his old collection of pile of pile of Shame, a pile of lead. So that's really awesome to see mates. So yeah, I'm really happy to see people playing games. Yeah, it can't wait to listen to that. Well, they will that further Ado, let's get on with the interview and let's see what Marcus has to say.
So thanks again. Awesome. Thanks for joining me again. This week. Sorry for the lateness of this recording. I'm of this podcast coming out. But yeah, basically, when I get an interview lined up, we can, we can release it. If we don't have one, well, then you'll just have to wait. Unfortunately, but luckily. We've got a couple lined up already. So yeah, and sit back, enjoy. We enjoy guys and let's listen to what Marcus has to say.
Okay, I might take care until next time, kind of fix will do and a big shout-out to everyone who's posting up their Minis and Discord. Thanks very much, guys. Enjoyed it. Yeah, guys, thanks for joining the, the communities we have online, and please keep in spite, keep being inspired and keep producing and keep enjoying a hobby, okay? Until then, take care guys. Bye sir. Let's do this. Thanks again for joining us again. Marcus, whether we wish you a key trying to tap our times up
mate. But we're lucky because Japan and Australia only like an hour away. Yes, it's very serendipitous, it is indeed. But we've been good friends for a long time, and if people haven't listened to our chat with yourself and Bradley, that's on another podcast about gunners. Lane. Isn't it in London? It goes real and to London back in the good old days when we were young and had no gray hair, well speak for yourself. A I'll get no gray here. I can just hear your sultry
voice. That's right. But yeah we started off way back in the mid 90s we went over to London and 94. Yeah and maybe but at we Met obviously before that. So how did how did you actually get into like wargaming and that kind of thing? Wargaming was a Natural Evolution from role-playing.
When I was about 13 in high school, I remember sitting there listening to a couple kids talking about dragons and ogres and killing these things and you know, leveling up and what, and I had no idea what they were talking about, but it intrigued me because I was always a big Fan of fantasy. And and so I eavesdropped in on their conversation and, you know, the longer I listened, the more intrigued I got it
eventually. I plucked up the courage and said, well, you know, what are you talking about? And they more or less tried to brush me off, you know? And I said, no, no, I'm actually interested. What, what are you, what are you talking about? And so they they gave me a, you know, a bit of a rundown of, you know, ice Dungeons and Dragons and this that and the other. I thought, well, that sounds pretty cool.
And kind of left it at that and then, you know, a couple days later I heard them talking about it again. And again, I sort of started asking questions and long story short got into their D&D group, absolutely loved. It got really hooked on it, and we played that for years, probably for the next five or six years, we played, you know, and, you know, some of the marathon sessions that we had were just, you know, the things you look back on really fondly.
as an adult, you know, from some of the great things you did when you were a kid, was the old D&D sessions and then we had a lot of fun but you know, that that recreation in the mind was more sort of put into a 3D view when when you know the DM started using some figures to represent, you know, our characters in The Monsters and what not and I've never really seen them and so I was quite White interested in them and then one of my other
mates, his older brother was playing 40K and I went over there one day and saw them playing this game and I was just blown away like it, I'd never seen anything like it. It was like, you know, it was almost like looking at, you know, that the handful of figures that we've been using for D and D but Times by 100 because, you know, they had like
40 or 50 figures. each side and it was all over this massive table with full of terrain that look like it you know you know miniature landscape which just it just totally ignited my imagination and I you know it certainly helped that one of the guys could actually paint quite well and I was utterly fascinated by the figures and and then I kind of got hooked on that and Yeah, but that's how basically I sort of got into it and you know like everyone when I first started painting
miniatures, I was pretty ordinary. Think most of us are, you know, unless you've got a savant ability or have a really, really good teacher, helping you from the very first figure you paint, you know, you go through a lot of trial and error and you know, watching other people. And yeah, I suppose bearing in mind to back then when you and I were Getting into painting. The only thing we really had to refer to was either our friends or white dwarf.
And, you know, I don't know about you Josh, but for me, seeing the original stuff in white dwarf, was it seemed unachievable? It just seems so good. And so far ahead of anything that I was doing at that point that I just saw know when the world I'll ever get to sort of that standard or anything like that.
And, but, yeah, look obviously Things change when you put a bit of effort and time into it and ask questions and get the right advice and see other people's examples and you get better. And I mean without I'm going to probably end up mentioning the evil overlords Games Workshop a few times in this this chat Josh. But I'll try to refrain where possible but there's no no secret that most Gamers have
there. Origins in Games, Workshop games, certainly from, you know, 20, 30 years ago anyway, because they backed them, they were the pretty much the Kings there was not a hell of a lot of competition and many of us had our roots in, you know, in their games. And yeah I mean obviously you and I met through through that through the gaming and the Miniatures and painted stuff.
And and you know, obviously we've been friends ever since And our own sort of personal painting Journey for one of a better term, is also sort of gone through all sorts of different, you know, iterations and Heights. You know, and obviously, back when you and I were living in London with Brad and you ended up getting the job at Games Workshop, in the, every male Studio.
I was so stoked for you. I just thought that was awesome, you know, because You know, when you and I first, I suppose met our painting abilities were pretty much on a par and yeah.
And, you know, when you went to the heavy metal Studio, I just saw your painting sort of go through the roof and after, you know, you finished your stint there, even though it was relatively short it, I think it expanded your repertoire so to speak and that spurred me on to sort of You know, do better and and then of course, eventually in 1998, they finally ended up holding a the first gold of demon competition in Australia. And yeah, I think you entered the first one.
I didn't go down that first one I went to the second one and, you know, many more after that but that competition spurred me at least on to be, as good as I possibly could be. And that was my main focus was. Come competitive painting for the next 10, 12 years and then then, for whatever reason, they pulled the pin on it and there was no more Games Workshop.
Sorry golden demoness in Australia and not long after that, you know, they pulled the pin on it in many other countries and only ended up having it in the UK. And I think it's only in the last what year that they've actually open it up again to the US.
But yeah, I mean, long story short there as I said you know that the The first thing that got me into it was was role playing and it just evolved from there but I suppose, you know, the next logical question, you might be thinking after that is
Will what? What made you start sculpting and it literally follows on from from the ending of golden demon in Australia. You know when they stopped holding it I was you know I had probably another Dozen injuries planned for the next few years and they pulled the pin on it and I thought, well buggy, yeah, you know why should I paint your figures and why should I do you any favor in it?
If you've just pulled the rug out from under me and all of the other painters, you know, around Australia that loved you know competing and you know meeting up every year and doing, you know, encouraging each other and doing the best we could and things like that. And unfortunately, at that, Point. There was no other real sort of prestigious painting competitions around.
So, you know, there was plenty of plenty of other Regional competitions in each state, where you'd have, you know, like in Sydney they had a couple, like, Moab and in Canberra they had can con and things like that, but none of them were on the sort of same level of exposure, or, or level of
competition, as what, you know. Goddamn demon was so Anyway, you know, after that, I just thought to myself, well, maybe I can start doing more of my own thing for starters and I think, you know, I'm not the only one in that respect because many many other painters I used to compete against went on to do their own thing as well. I mean, two of the top of my head Victoria lamb, you know, with her, Victoria Miniatures and Sebastian, Archer with his veiled lamp and before that I
think was Guild of harm. Annie and a few other iterations before that. But, you know, there's a couple of us, you know, that ended up sculpting arrow and figures and and and and you know, that was our Prime Focus or creative Focus instead of painting for gold demon. So yeah, that was that, was that Yeah, it's good memories actually from Golden Demon Days on it. From like, what I remember always paint is being like the
Forum the Australian form. Yeah, I think those International forbidden, but yeah, we have a lot of people at Sebastian Archer on there, man. That guy could paint could me like, wow, he is like a prodigy that guy. Yeah, look, dude, you know, he, the first time I saw him, enter was literally the first time he entered, and he won the sword. But the figure that he entered I was just blown away.
I'd never seen anything. Even in the UK, when I went to some of the golden demons there, I'd never seen anything as good. You know he did this. I think it was a word Bearer Chaplin and it had all this free hand on it and he did a lot of his own sculpting and converting on it and things like that.
And you know, the only thing that I could pick on from a critical perspective was some of the sculpting on the face was a little Little bit cartoonish, but that was just me and my, my homes and, you know nitpicking, but the painting was Flawless and I just I was stunned. And you know, I wasn't surprised at all the one, the sword that year and I certainly wasn't surprised in the several years after that, that he won a few
more. So and again beyond that for him, you know, doing more sculpting, it was a logical. Evolution for him, to start up his own, you know, sculpting company. Because I think some of his dog demon entries. You know, after that ended up being false Cults, like I think he ended up going to the golden demon, the UK and winning gold with a full scratch-built skaven and also a scratch-built nergal Terminator or something like that. But yeah, look at that were
phenomenal. And Yeah, he's kind of bath. I mean, there's there's a couple others of, you know, seen in the last few years, sort of crop up which one in particular and I'm going to use sort of heard of him or not but Cole. Well what's his first name? David Cole. Well okay everybody this guy, yeah yeah he's fine, he's in Melbourne but Some of his stuff is just Sublime, it really is. Like I've been doing a few painting tutorials over the last
two years. You know, I'll just hold these classes where, you know, we cap it at 10 people and we go for about three or four hours and go through all the, you know, a 2-0 of of painting and whatnot. Mainly I aimed at for sort of beginners to intermediate, but at the end of that, I usually give everyone a list. Of practice exercises they can do but also give information about things and places they can look at and miniature painters they whose work they can.
Look at if they you know Google it and yeah look both you know both Sebastian and and Dave's name is on that list so you know it's good to see if you Aziz on the list. I mean obviously there's a bunch of other International painters as well but Yeah look at this, you know, I think that if he was painting back then when I was competing, if I was in the same you know, category I'd get blown away.
But now look, it was good. Funny it pushed my abilities, you know, I mean, I love, I'm a naturally competitive person. I suppose whether I like it or not and, you know, I try to sort of do things in the right spirit and not be a sore winner or a sore loser, but I do like I do like a bit of competition. And that's why I love to live going to go.
And even each year was it was a. It was a reason for me to push myself with my painting because I think without it, I don't think I would've pushed myself anywhere near as much as I did. And certainly wouldn't have really sculpted because again, you know, like Sebastian and you know Vic as well the full sculpting you know was an evolution from converting figures and you know making your own Unique Ones based on just chopping and changing and adding a few bits and sculpting new
faces or weapons or pouches. And backpacks. You know, simple stuff to, you know, the first attempts at full scratch builds. I mean, I did do a few attempts when I was a lot younger, but they were always pretty ordinary. I know and because I think Because I will marry. I was, I suppose a bit one of tho disheartened because I didn't have any help. I didn't have anyone guiding me, although, I could sort of ask for help or show me how to do things.
So I was always again self-taught, you know, watching reference of other stuff and things like that. So some of my, you know, first sculpts were crap really. I mean, that was they really were, I still kept them alive. I've got all my old sculpts, I've never thrown anything away. But you probably don't remember Josh but I think I actually ended up. I sculpted one or two figures waiting and not him. You Scott, you like in London, sorry you scared you sculpted the Squig bombs enough.
Yes, you have it with those. Yeah, so there was those and but even before that, there was two two figures, it was a goblin and a dwarf and they were terrible. Like, I'm like I'm sitting here at my desk looking at across it. Where they are on the shelf and they're terrible. But yeah, they're completely made out of milliput. I had no idea about the properties of how to sculpt that and what tools to use and things
like that. I think I'd be using a needle and a toothpick or something like that. But yeah, look, it started off very slowly and small and then I sort of put them away for a while and then after five or six years of no gold demon, I was just pottering around doing my own thing doing a bit of painting of armies and stuff like that, excuse me. And and then I got the urge to do something a bit different with sculpting and I'd seen a
few other people online. Give it a go and and funnily enough again, I think it was the competitive streak in me. I was seeing people Bringing it Their Own Line of figures or their own little ranges of figures that I felt were. And I really don't want this to come across as arrogant, but I thought they're pretty ornery. And and, you know, I thought that if they can do that and make money out of it, surely some of the pretty ordinary ones that I've got sitting on my
shelf. You know, may be able to sell also and but I wasn't happy with what I was sculpting. I mean You know, I thought my stuff was pretty order as well, but it did give me the impetus to pull my finger out and actually start getting better at sculpting.
So I did I started sculpting and you know doing more and pushing the boundaries and then I I sort of ended up sculpting this this talk which later went on to be the second figure in my range of where we've If she's and call it the universal awk because it was never designed or intended to be a knockoff of anyone's you know, Aesthetics or anything like that from any other gaming company.
Like I wasn't trying to copy Games Workshop or copy Privateer Press or you know whoever I just wanted to make my own orc and make it look a bit different and and so I did. And anyway I was pretty happy with How that turned out but I ended up Chuck and it in the in the Shelf you know in my desk and forgot about it for probably four years.
And I think it was around that time that I, you know, we had young kids and that kind of pulled the attention away for a while and and then eventually, you know I started doing a bit more painting and then got back into sculpting again. And again found myself drawn to I think by that stage Kickstarter had become The thing and again I started seeing these people doing these kickstarter's with all these figures.
That that were yeah, that all right, but I thought my aux better than that me. Why don't? I just pull my finger out and do something and and I think the biggest thing that stopped me all that time was I thought my stuff just wasn't good enough and why would anyone pay money for that? You know and it was just it was self-doubt and lack of Of self-confidence but I thought, no, I'm never going to. I don't want to die wondering and I'll never know if I never try.
So, I ended up talking to one of my mates that I knew makes it. I met when I moved up here to the Sunshine Coast from Brisbane Zach. As accident, he used to be called mango Zach on the internet and had his own
website. the resin addict and I asked him I said Mike can you do me a favor cast up some figures forming will rather cast up one of my figures for me because I've got no idea idea how to do it and by that stage I had had sculpted a second figure which was the Terminator as opposed to a terminator and that It was a auch parody. And again, you know, inspired by Games Workshop, 10 boys, you know way back in the day that
they've stopped making. And so I made, you know what, I thought a Terminator would have looked like if an orc made it and I thought I'll get him to make that one first because I really want to paint one. You know. And you know the the original that I've sculpted Was in bits and pieces. And I didn't want to sort of just put it together, glue it, and then paint it and then just not be able to do anything with it.
So I thought, like, maybe people might like that, they might see the humor in it and again, we'll give it a go. I'll just see, try this one figure. See how much it costs to get done and make a few casts and then, you know, see how it goes. So I did, you know, any cast this figure up for me? I think he Made made me 10 or 15 copies and, you know, I got them Flawless copies, I thought that was great. And and I thought well, that
didn't cost that much. I mean, if I sell these for x amount, you know, I'll I'll basically cover my costs and make a little bit of money out of it. And maybe I can sort of pay someone else to make another mold for me, because he knew he was busy, he was just trying to help me. And so, I ended up I did I found The guy I think he's based in Melbourne and he did, he send him down my Universal or to mold up and had some problems?
You know, without mentioning his name or anything like that, I had some issues with getting the work done in a timely manner and things like that. But eventually he did it then the cut the, you know, the mold was good at aiming like that in the cast for good but I thought to myself, I don't want to go through that Hassler. Again, you know that that was
like pulling teeth. So I thought, you know, I can't ask Zach because he's busy because I think at that stage he was still casting his own stuff as well. So he didn't really have time to do stuff for me. And this guy that I, you know, asked in Melbourne, I couldn't really rely on him to do more. So I thought I'm just going to need to learn another new skill set. And so I asked Zach, again, I said, make, can you really do me a favor? Can Can you show me?
You know, the ins and outs of mold making and resin casting and he said yep, happy too. And he said, have you read everything on my you know, resin attics page and I said, yep. Pretty much I said but I'm I'm better at learning if I see it rather than, you know. And I can ask questions while it's going on rather than just watching it, you know, or reading about it and he said, yeah, no problem.
So anyway, he showed me how to make a mold He told me what equipment and I needed pointed me in the right direction and he saved me a ton of time and money in wasted resin wasted silicon. And because he made all these mistakes himself when he first started, and he said, I can save you that, you know, that that Hassle and wastage, because if you don't get told certain things you will make the same mistakes and I think he was
right. But anyway, yeah, okay, he pointed me on the right track and I started making my own molds. And, you know, that's now what six years later, I've got over 100 figures in my range and its continuing to grow all the time. So, yeah, it's been a bit of a wild ride. Yeah, it's awesome to hear me. I'm really glad and really proud to To see you actually formed a company mate, edible this at about like a hobby, you know?
I mean like it's been grew but I think the most famous one of those, the product lines you have there. The Smurfs I like to call them the Smurfs but they'd like this squats of the egg box. Big W, the egg whites only and the the the squad looking good. Yes, Worf's. There's there's a reason I call them sloths and well actually the several reason I call them swaps. The first one was because I couldn't call them you know squats or damn earring or what's the one that made it?
Call them forged by others or something like yeah obviously there's IP out there that you can't just take, you've got to think of your own thing. Thus, Worf's, I named them that because I thought, Thought well, space to Worf what's short for space to Worf swarf and funnily enough. If you know anything about the engineering trade swarf is actually the side effect of what comes out of a hole when you drill into it. So you may remember that from from your old days at Coventry Fasteners.
Josh, don't remind me that, don't remind me for God, but yes. Offers I just thought that was a nice dual meaning to you know, the name because I thought well, you know, dwarfs or space towards they meant to be Miners and fully into fabricating things and you know, metalworking and, you know, all that sort of stuff and Drilling and everything like that. And I thought well swarf is a real thing. And the space to off is a non real thing just calling source. So yeah class, you know?
I mean, Again, I mean, part of the reason why my range ended up evolving the way that it has stems back from a couple things. I mean, it was really a desire to make figures that Games Workshop never made. And you know, for example, you know, I mentioned that the Terminator, the space or parody of the Terminator. I always wished that Kevin Adams. Head of sculpted the full range of races for 40K, not just the squat, the Elder and the Space Marine that he did. So he did 310 boys.
I love those figures. I've got them, you know? And there they sit proudly on my shelf front and center in my origami and I love them. They're just awesome sculpts. And I wished that he had just done all the other ones as well and that's why I thought. Well, he's not going to do it unless I I am and I couldn't, you know, at that time, I couldn't afford to sort of pay him to commission me, you know, private sculpts like that. So that I'll just give it a go
myself. And so that's why the Terminator came along. And then I did another Marine sort of version, but I call him a Marines with a zed and again, that there are, you know, different to the old, you know, GW ones, but they're my own spin on that sort of stuff.
And And then I thought well you know it's not just those figures that I wished were done, you know, I wish they'd made more squats in Exile because they only ever made for if you don't count the unreleased one that, you know, they made several years later. But originally, you know, in the old Rogue Trader days, they made to Imperials Exile more squats and to chaos Exelon or squats and that's it. So the variety was pretty bloody small and I thought, well, why
didn't they make? You know, different variants of the chaos, you know, factions and all more variations, and more weapons and things like that. And you know, I love them. The look of the mirror. Do, you know, they used to be called eggs on legs.
You know, that that was the, the, you know, colloquial name for them or at least we're up m, in my gaming Circle anyway and I thought, well, I want to increase my You know, eggs on legs, and in my Army. So I'll make my own and I thought, well, that would be a pretty easy shape to start with and something pretty easy to sculpt to start with and and, and that's where they came from. So, I mean, it's a funny little story behind that to the range of egg Bots.
That I've got, I think out of the 150 nods figures or so that are in my range, probably 80. And But variance, maybe 85 egg white variance in some way and all of those variants stem back from to egg bodies that I sculpted. And the majority are actually one of those, not the other one, so, I don't know. Do you ever remember the story that that Jays Goodwin used to tell about the Space Marine that
was used for everything? Not my night, please tell us, he back in the day, when he first started, you know, sculpting the new Space Marine range, he made a dolly or a basic Space Marine and that was used as like a dolly, like they cast up, you know, 20 of them. And then he re sculpted and over sculpted all different variances, based on this one
body. And every time they did it, it had to get vulcanized again and You know with the vulcanization process with green stuff it can it can really sort of dark and discolor the the original Green. And anyway, I saw a picture once somewhere online where he showed this original manga, you know, mangled old bloody Space Marine that are used as the basis for
everything. And, you know, again, like when he did these over sculpting and pose repositions and things like that, and then you'd over sculpt those other ones that had sculpted and It's literally snowball will say from one figure created hundreds of figures. So, you know, that's kind of what I've been doing with the egg box because I've never created a new egg bot literally
from scratch. Since I made those two figures, every egg bought in my range has started from those two and it's been an over sculpt of and over sculpt or a conversion of an over sculpt. So it's just, yeah, it's It's, it's a pretty cool and quick way of actually building up a range without spending a hell of a lot of time making new stuff from scratch. So that was the Xbox.
But you know, one other interesting thing with, you know, the whole swarf background is that, I'd always, you know, when I was making these egg Bots and thinking, okay, well, that'd be cool to add to my, you know, my old Squad will chaos quite Army. And I can play it by myself with my ex and stuff like that. Obviously don't need to go out into public or, you know, conventions or tournaments and
stuff like that as play for fun. So it doesn't really matter but I thought you know, I wouldn't mind actually having more squats and and I thought well maybe I'll do squats or my own version of squats one day and that said in the back of my mind for a while and And then funnily enough about, I don't know, three, four months after I had that sort of thought about, you know, what I was going to do in that side of things that a fella
from the US, contact me and say, look, I'm wondering if you can cast some figures for me. I was like, yeah, okay, no problem. What's the, you know what's the thing and long story short, he'd he'd bought the rights? To half a dozen bodies that Steve Marchant in the UK AKA in. So sculpted. Steve is he's been making his own fan stops of squats for ages and funnily enough. I'd actually seen his body's that, you know, this this guy had bought posted online probably a year or two earlier
and thinking that's pretty cool. And and anyway, you know, this guy told me that he'd bought the rights to reproduce it and so on and so forth. And, you know, as long as Steve gets credit, for, you know, the original bodies and whatnot.
It's all good. So I thought, okay, well, that that actually gives me a good reason to start sculpting, you know, the, this Worf's because I've been putting it off and getting sidetracked with other Scopes that I've been doing and, and I say these these bodies turned up in the mail and you know the Bauer just as they look like in the you know photos that are remembered in that and I sort of said on them for a little while I'm thinking okay well what what I'm going to do
here, hemler do this. And I looked at them and they they weren't exactly my style and that that's no disrespect to Steve sculptor all that whatsoever. But his sculpting style is different to my sculpting style, you know. Steve's the original figures had quite a few rounded edges on them. They weren't sort of overly sharp. Like I like to get sharp detail on my figures.
So what I ended up doing is actually making molds of the bodies instead of sort of, you know, over sculpting the, the original bodies that I've been sent. So I over sculpted, sorry, I'm old it up new bodies and then I over sculpted and sharpened up the detail on these these All these that I made and you know sculpted some arms and new weapons and stuff and then sculpted a whole range of heads.
So I think I've sculpted probably fine enough, 20 different heads, all different kinds, you know, helmets, no helmets, sunglasses, no sunglasses Mohawks you know, baseball caps. You know, the Anzac style hats Safari hats. Like there's quite a few that I've done that I actually haven't released yet. Yet. Sometimes I give them out in random packs of source when I sell them as extras, but I don't
advertise them. So yeah, look it, it was a good chance for me to put my own stamp on those Scopes. One thing that I ended up doing was give them a bit more bum. Steve's sculpts had very flat. That he had that old man. I was like that literally, you looked at them from the side, you know, side view. And they're kind of almost went straight down and I thought now I've gotta go to do as I tell you something that's well describe.
Thank you very much Marcus. Um, yeah, so I over sculpted and did some more, you know, chopping and changing and what not sharpened up some detail and things like that. And and yeah, my made my own versions of them. And yeah, look I don't have too many in the range yet of those but I do have plans to do a lot more and including chaos. Worf's because again, I mean, my original army was chaos squats and whilst I do have imperial ones. I've got a lot more in the chaos side of things.
So have expanded both of those but definitely going to meet be making mutated versions of them, and evil-looking ones and horns, and whatever, and Tails, and stuff like that. So, Look, there's plenty more on the, on the horizon there with them and I'm looking forward to doing, so, that's awesome, mate. Well, that's wonderful has been really, really interesting. And I'm really happy for you about to see the rise of, we will Miniatures on Facebook because I know that's where it's
sort of primarily exists. Yeah, in the Facebook realm. So I'll definitely drop links in the show notes for people to go and check out where we'll where we've all Miniatures for themselves to check out the full. All range because there's some really, really good quality stuff in there of what you've done there, mate over the years. And it's been interesting to see how that's sort of evolved, and how it's grown in popularity, which has been really, really
good. Yeah, look, it's been interesting and I've been able to sell, you know, Miniatures to people from all over the world, like, usually everywhere. And, you know, even places like Alaska. I just, I could just imagine someone sitting there painting in like 100. Surrounded by nothing but white snow and ice. And then, you know, since I had the website up and running ww-we're, we've all Miniatures.com. That's got all the whole range on it and and you stuff that is added.
And when I have specials and things like that and sales, which I've had a couple of those which have gone down really well. Yeah, so and you know, when I find time, I'll update the blog and add new You little stories to it as well, so there's always sort of things being added to that. So, that's awesome. Yeah. Well, I'll leave, I'll leave a link to the external website as well as we're gonna check you out. Unfortunately, just run at a
time, mate. So, thank you very much again for coming to join us again on the crown of command. And I hope your business at well where we've all managers, if I can say it properly, it will continue to grow over the over the decades mate. So all the bad stuff. Yeah. Cheers. No problem. Okay, will you take Yourself in the family and I hope to see you in person to play some second division 40K at some point. Yeah. That'd be great. Let me that'd be the dream.
A taro. Make sure you take care and you to speak again soon. Okay. All right Jeff, see you next week. Bye bye.