Scale and saleability

[Shellshock]

Speaking from a hyperthetical retailing perspective, in your opinion would 28-32mm scale miniatures, interchangeable with various game systems be more viable for sale than 54mm collector scale miniatures?

I dont actually know myself, as more of a painter than a gamer I'd look at all scales and buy what appealed to me, rather than something that appealed but would also serve as a stand in for a particular army I game with. I'd hazard a guess and say painting gamers are more abundant than painting collectors, so to answer my own question 28mm would be the best option to work with given a wider audience.

Perhaps to offer both 54mm scale collector pieces and 28mm stand ins would be the wisest choice? Or maybe not?

Reasons I'm asking is I'm abit bemused by all the scales, and honestly abit stupid. I'm getting into sculpting, I have a ton of ideas I'd love to put into practice. Talking down the line once I can create minis at a saleable quality I'd concider production. I was going to start with 54mm, given the bigger size I thought it may help with basics, at the same time I don't want to get stuck into perfecting a scale that theres not much market for, and just learn from 28mm scale instead.

My ideas are a dime a dozen and usually manifest while I'm mindlessly stacking shelves at work, so don't take this too seriously

 

[Torn blue sky]

Nah, often wondered the same. It'd be nice to have both realistically, but costs figure and all that jazz. Far as I know though, it's possible to do a 54mm and downscale it to make another cast using teknolojeez. I can't remember who actually does this but one company sculpts big and shrinks it this way for more awesome detail. I want to say Kingdom Death, but i'm not sure...

 

[cassar]

practicle reason i would start with the larger stuff until u get yer eye in even tho the sale-ability's not as high just means that you pic up the tricks of the trade easier then what the hell do both, win win.

 

[freakinacage]

Nah, often wondered the same. It'd be nice to have both realistically, but costs figure and all that jazz. Far as I know though, it's possible to do a 54mm and downscale it to make another cast using teknolojeez. I can't remember who actually does this but one company sculpts big and shrinks it this way for more awesome detail. I want to say Kingdom Death, but i'm not sure...

yeah kingdom death do 54 and 32mm

for making money, i think troops for wargamers that you can knock out quick and sell cheap is the best way. it's like the painting malarkey, single beautiful pieces often sell for a price which, if converted to an hourly rate, would be lass than simple armies done neatly and then dipped

 

[Chern Ann]

I think historical 54mms are quite saleable, but I'm not certain if more so than 28/32mm wargaming / rpg figures. If you want to quickly build an audience, I'd say the smaller scale makes the most sense, but really that depends on how long you take to sculpt at the various scales. 54mm has lesser utility but commands higher prices.

 

[Shellshock]

Cheers fellas.

Chern: Yeah I get the impression historical 54s, for example a WW2 sniper sculpt would be more popular than a 54 fantasy paladin given a wealth of military history enthusiasts, couldn't be certain but it's a gut feeling. I don't know how quick I could knock something out, that's something I need to test before jumping in and finding out it takes 6months to put out a new figure.

TBS: I'll see if I can find some info on this teknolojeezical gaff, sounds interesting although expensive comes to mind instantly lol.

cas: that's what I thought would help ye, if I can find TBSs shrink ray may start on 54cm hoho.

freak: mmm yeah tried that malarky, I spoke to a casting co out of curiosity for costing, £47.50 for 9" master and production mould, further production moulds free on signs of deterioration, £3.00 per spin + cost of metal, as many figures as can fit on the mould although not sure how many spins would be needed for enough troops to sell in one go I don't think it'll be too expensive to do. Plastic casting is apparently mega expensive to tool up so couldn't start with it atleast.

Want to be very realistic about this, I have space to work from home (man garage rawr) and the mrs thinks I smell anyway so shes happy with me spending enough time as needed working. Think now I have a rough production cost, rough idea where to start, I need to test my ability, test speed of creation, all going well at this point look at advertisment and then launch for sale, which leads to another question, what would you think is a solid ammount of sculpts/troop sets to launch with? And a good rate of new releases?

Thanks again :good:

 

[Noddwyr]

I think if you can start with 3-4 and then release 1 every couple months you are doing well. But then I dont really know anything about the industry.

 

[mud duck]

I like the sound of 54 Fantasy Shell. If you could have a ace product I could see people painting up them for D&D, or as they're avatars from computer games like WoW, Everquest, Farmville, or whatever. As an aside, with the fantasy, you have freedom to produce what you see in your minds eye, with the historical your going to have to get it right down to the buttons. Cuz you know that there is going to be some knuckle head out there that is going to raise a fuss because you have the first aid pouch on the left side and the earplugs on the right on the Alice harness. And "As anyone with half a brain knows that the 1st Armor wore the aid pouch on the right and the plugs on the left. Stupid!" As for WW2 seems like 28-32's would be the way to go. Large-ish armies and proper sized tanks look good at that size, just doesn't seem to be that many lines in that scale. Mostly 15s and 6s that I've seen, but that's just me.

Leman Russ Vs. King Tiger anyone? :smile-big:

Either way I say go for it! Show us what you've got!

 

[Shellshock]

Lol yeah I suppose I'm asking for trouble if I sculpt a non standard issue bayonet haha. I totally overlooked D&D, and I'm going to get some funny looks but never played the game myself... I know you have the dungeon master, and players have their avatars, what sort of figures are usually used? For example can people use whatever they want (obviously not a salt shaker as a knight) or are they restricted like anal GW tournies to GW minis? Races? I've wikid D&D classes and the info is pretty generic like "healer," "knight," no mention if they can be human, elven, dwarven, odd forest creaturen, and would 54mm be abit big still, or reasonable aslong as it's on the right base size (assuming standard base size is used) /question bombardment. I'm very very curious, in my minds eye I have several ideas for elven and human fantasy type characters aswell as subspecies, yet to put pencil to paper but they are there alright, so much so I can't sleep at night sometimes lol.

 

[Serenity]

Scale is around 28mm for figures in D&D. They sit on 1" square grids where one inch equals five feet, so that fits the scale about right. Some people use whatever markers they like (tokens, pawns, etc.), but there is a line of D&D miniatures from Hasbro/Wizards of the Coast with many hundreds (thousands?) of pre-painted plastic figures in it. Manufacturers like Reaper also produce hundreds of metal figures that are suitable for the game in 28mm scale.

D&D has a lot of different races including humans, elves, dwarves, half-elves, half-orcs, halflings and gnomes, plus more esoteric ones, depending on which version of the game you play. Classes cover fighters, wizards, clerics, rogues, monks, rangers, paladins, sorcerers, bards, barbarians, and druids. If you check out the sources of existing miniatures, you'll see what all is available, including a vast variety of humanoids and monster types.

 

[Skrit]

, I spoke to a casting co out of curiosity for costing, £47.50 for 9" master and production mould, further production moulds free on signs of deterioration, £3.00 per spin + cost of metal, as many figures as can fit on the mould although not sure how many spins would be needed for enough troops to sell in one go I don't think it'll be too expensive to do.

Mind sharing which caster you've spoken too?

 

[Shellshock]

Yea was Griffin, UK base.

 

[Shellshock]

Ta for the D&D info guys, so if I have something that appeals it pretty much doesn't matter if a "knight" is human, elven or whatever, someone may concider buying it and using it to represent their character.

I was thinking earlier, although I wouldn't have my own game system and anything produced would essentially be used to fit whatever the buyer is playing, do you think giving them names and abit of a story would increase interest through greater atmosphere or be a time sink that wouldn't help anything?

 

[Dedwrekka]

TBS: I'll see if I can find some info on this teknolojeezical gaff, sounds interesting although expensive comes to mind instantly lol.

The most common method I've heard of, and also one that GW uses on almost all of their major releases for the past 3-4 years, is 3d scanning/printing. You take the larger scale model and put it in a 3D scanner, then send the information to a 3D printer which prints it out in a type of photoreactive resin (Others wire-wound the thing out of a resin string). You can scale up or down with the 3D printing technology and it's accurate and detailed enough to even make moving parts (I managed to catch a demonstration where they made circular track with moving ball bearings in one print). You take the resin prototype and make a master mould out of it. The best part is that if the original is damaged, you still have it saved as data.

The models come out very crisp and detailed. I need to re-find it, but there's a group making an open-source version of the 3d printer that you put together, that can be used with a large number of 3D drafting and design technology, and can even have the majority of parts for the printer made by another printer of the same type.

 

[Shellshock]

Just had a browse based on that info and i'm really fascinated by 3D printing lol /nerd. E-mailed one company that does scanning and printing for a ballpark figure based on what minimal info I could give them, did see an example costing of an action figure they printed with bigger dimensions than I'd need at £212.00-ish, that's without scanning I belive, so call it £200 for print, £90 for molds, 10 run start.... min £320 per figure into production with that process, does that sound too much hrmmm, pockets aren't too deep sadly but if the quality is worth it at the end product then perhaps it may be worth it, given that I wouldn't be paying a sculptor for a master which can be pricey alone.