The huge lot - my Custom Head & Helmet sculpts - All of them

[Evergrey]

Hi again everybody

Some of you who sent me a PM lately already knew this would be coming ... :grin:

Here they finally are - ALL the tiny 3 3/4 inch head and helmet sculpts that I
have made so far. Some of them you've seen, others I haven't shown before.

This is a huge lot of 36 pieces, and exactly these works pictured here are now
up for sale in the sticky *custom commissions and sales* thread.
Since I can't post a stand alone *sales* thread you'll find all the details on how
to get your hands on this lot in that above mentioned sales thread.

Well. since these are all works that I especially cast and painted for this lot, you
actually haven't seen any of those, yet ^^

... so I hope you just have some fun looking through all those pics.

Just feel free to send me a PM if you happen to have any questions.

I just love the shots of the unpainted Master resin copies - these really show that
especially the human heads are screaming and crying out loud to be cast in flesh
color ... paint sometimes ruins some details that just look better unpainted ...

ARLEIL SCHOUS / painted resin copy & resin master copy

AT-AT DRIVER HELMET / painted resin copy & resin master copy

BESPIN SECURITY GUARD with Moustache / painted resin copy & resin master copy

ESB BOBA FETT HELMET / painted resin copy & resin master copy

DARTH CAEDUS (Jacen Solo) / painted resin copy & resin master copy

(heck, I don't know this guys name) COLONEL 1 / painted resin copy & resin master copy

(not sure about his name, too) COLONEL SOLOMAHAL / painted resin copy & resin master copy

DARTH PLAGUEIS Version 1 / painted resin copy & resin master copy

DARTH PLAGUEIS Version 2 battle scarred / painted resin copy & resin master copy

DARTH SION Version 1 / painted resin copy & resin master copy

DARTH SION Version 2 (the force unleashed) / painted resin copy & resin master copy

ANH DARTH VADER / painted resin copy & resin master copy

JEDI MASTER DOOKU / painted resin copy & resin master copy

DR. EVAZAN / painted resin copy & resin master copy

ANH HAN SOLO / painted resin copy & resin master copy

AOTC JANGO FETT HELMET / painted resin copy & resin master copy

MOSEP Version 1 Red beard / painted resin copy & resin master copy

MOSEP Version 2 White beard / painted resin copy & resin master copy

ADMIRAL MOTTI / painted resin copy & resin master copy

MUNGO BAOBAB / painted resin copy & resin master copy

ROTJ EMPEROR PALPATINE / painted resin copy & resin master copy

CAPTAIN (ADMIRAL) PIETT / painted resin copy & resin master copy

PONDA BABA / painted resin copy & resin master copy

COMMANDER PRAJI / painted resin copy & resin master copy

TPM QUI GON JINN / painted resin copy & resin master copy

SNOWTROOPER COMMANDER HELMET / painted resin copy & resin master copy

ANH STORMTROOPER STUNT HELMET / painted resin copy & resin master copy

GRAND MOFF TARKIN / painted resin copy & resin master copy

TIE FIGHTER PILOT HELMET / painted resin copy & resin master copy

GENERAL VEERS / painted resin copy & resin master copy

WUHER DA BREWER / painted resin copy & resin master copy

ESB YODA / painted resin copy & resin master copy

HENRY JONES JUNIOR / painted resin copy & resin master copy

LAO CHE Temple of Doom / painted resin copy & resin master copy

WALTHER DONOVAN Last Crusade / painted resin copy & resin master copy

MARCUS BRODY / painted resin copy & resin master copy

Hope you all enjoyed ... that might *be it* from me for some time now ...

Cheers and take care,

Evergrey :weeabooface:

 

[Nihilus]

These are amazin

 

[AgentClaret]

I almost SOILED MYSELF.

You already know I love the Fett Helmet's but the Plagueis heads you did are the best!

 

[JohnSilence]

these are incredible. i'm floored...

 

[Cell]

A real pleasure to look at all these amazing headsculpts!

 

[starwarsguy]

Nicely done!

 

[Spookymufu]

insane, I would love to have some of these, and many of a few of them

 

[Wishing_Well]

A lot of nice sculpts, really liking the Yoda one, not so sure about Caedus though.

 

[Revanfan1]

I don't believe my eyes. Those are....wow...

 

[JediMerc]

Some of the details in the sculpts almost seems to get lost in the paint---not that there's anything wrong with the paint jobs on these at all. I'd almost just want the plain sculpts: absolutely beautiful!

Loving the Indy stuff: Lao Che and Marcus Brody(!) in particular look phenomenal!

 

[SGT_A]

Holy $**+ *****!!!!!

 

[darth_stranger]

i'll second that!

 

[Dak]

Wow, those are beautiful. The Indy sculpts really stand out. Wish I had a spare $9000 lying around.

 

[Evergrey]

These are amazin

Thanks a lot - glad you like them

I almost SOILED MYSELF.

You already know I love the Fett Helmet's but the Plagueis heads you did are the best!

Thanks AgentClaret The Plagueis heads were fun because I wasn't so limited
from much Refference Material, and after I had done the *regular* Muun head
I just wanted to make a Version a bit more brutal. I had seen a tin Miniature of
Plagueis that had some kind of breathing mask on, so I just tried to sculpt my
own version of that.

these are incredible. i'm floored...

Thanks a lot JohnSilence

A real pleasure to look at all these amazing headsculpts!

Thanks also to you Cell

Nicely done!

^^ glad you like!

insane, I would love to have some of these, and many of a few of them

Hi Spookymufu - well, at least this time there is a chance ... let's see what happens

A lot of nice sculpts, really liking the Yoda one, not so sure about Caedus though.

Thanks a lot Wishing_Well For Caedus I went for the look from the pic I posted here below.
It's a bit *pretty*, but that was what I thought was so interesting - a Sith Lord who doesn't
look like he was run over by a Convoy of Peterbilts ... this is more like *Darth Bieber* :grin: ...

I don't believe my eyes. Those are....wow...

Thanks a lot Revanfan1

Some of the details in the sculpts almost seems to get lost in the paint---not that there's anything wrong with the paint jobs on these at all. I'd almost just want the plain sculpts: absolutely beautiful!

You're absolutely right - that's EXACTLY what I'm thinking ... that's why I really wish I could get
especially the human heads in flesh colored plastic or resin ... there is much more potential in
them when all the details are not smudged over by paint ... I tried my best with the paint jobs,
but my personal taste is also the plain *Action Figure Look* with just the eyes, eyebrows and hair
painted on ... sadly I couldn't manage to mix a proper skin color to make colored Resin copies ...

Loving the Indy stuff: Lao Che and Marcus Brody(!) in particular look phenomenal!

Glad you like those there are still a few Indy heads that I would like to do in the future ...

Holy $**+ *****!!!!!

:grin: :grin: :grin: ... thanks ^^

i'll second that!

:grin: ... and thanks ^^

Wow, those are beautiful. The Indy sculpts really stand out. Wish I had a spare $9000 lying around.

Thanks a lot Dak - glad you like them ... well ... I know the price is most likely shocking
at first, but in fact it's quite a bargain ... as I know that most collectors (including me!!!)
are mostly always pretty low on cash (... at least I am all the time - thanks Hasbro ... ^^)
I am open for offers ...

Let's say if the person who wanted them would send me two complete sets of properly
colored casts for free (human heads cast in flesh tones, Ponda in Olive, and so on ...)
I would considder going down another whopping 1000,-$ - and that only for sending me
2 sets (always need spares) of copies of my own works, since I would really love to have
them for my own customs in all the proper base colors.
That would then be *only* 8 grand for all the sculpting, making all the molds, doing all the
casting, 36 Master Resin copies and 36 painted resin copies ... really ... that's a joke ...

Cheers and take care guys

Evergrey

 

[ctonra]

All I can keep saying is WOW wow wow. These are amazing

 

[Tuskenj]

Wow. The craftsmanship is superb. To bad you are not doing castings of individual heads, I would loved to get a few of them. Just don't have $9000 to buy all of them. Again excellent work

 

[Trooper31]

Those are too cool!!! Great work, man.

 

[Darth_McBaine]

Absoluty mindboggling! Especially love the aliens, but is this 9000 amount accurate?

 

[Evergrey]

All I can keep saying is WOW wow wow. These are amazing

Thanks a lot ctonra

Wow. The craftsmanship is superb. To bad you are not doing castings of individual heads, I would loved to get a few of them. Just don't have $9000 to buy all of them. Again excellent work

Thanks a lot for the kind words Tuskenj In my last post above I dropped the price
to 8 grand IF I get 2 complete sets of *colored casts* from the buyer later lol ...

Those are too cool!!! Great work, man.

Thanks a lot Trooper31 - glad you like 'em

Absoluty mindboggling! Especially love the aliens, but is this 9000 amount accurate?

Thanks Darth_McBaine

Well, let me try to explain the price: try and commission a professional sculptor (wich I am)
...
(god how I hate to say that line - I think it sounds stupid ... other people can go and say
*I'm a banker* or *I sell used cars*, but saying *I am a professional Toy sculptor* just
feels strange to say - feels a bit *show-off* wich I absolutely hate, so usually I don't tell
people that I meet what I do, but it's my job, that's what I do for a living, I sculpt toys)
...
Ok sorry for that - back on track - so you go and ask a mid-priced professinal sculptor
to sculpt you a 3 3/4 inch head with a decent likeness, then to make a mold, make some
casts and to paint one example for you and tell him he'll get 250$ for all of that together.
The reaction would most likely be that he will shake his head and start laughing at you
and tell you that for all of this you are missing about 500$ bucks you still have to add.
The *accurate* or realistic amount for this lot (if officially commissioned by a company)
would be about 27.000,- US$ (those 36 heads including the sculpting, moldmaking, casting
and painting represent a total worktime of about 4 months, you know ...)

In no way I meant to sound harsh, but that's reality. A lot of people simply underestimate
the time and work that things like these take. I could sculpt a *passable* likeness in that
size in a day, but at that size the hard part is really to get the character feel and a nice
expression that works in that size but still doesn't look like a grimace, so the least time I
have put into any of those (likeness involved) heads was about 3 days ...

On the Darth Vader Helmet I worked several weeks to get that wonky but menacing look
that I wanted right, Yoda also took a lot of time and most of the aliens like Ponda Baba
took about 4 days (except Arleil schous - he took forever - lol). I think the Bespin Guard
was the *easiest* - that only took 1 day because he did not include the hard part of
having to match the likeness of any specific persons face.

Hope that explained things a bit

cheers,

Evergrey

 

[BountyHunterBen]

These are beautiful
Would not suspect that they are only 3 3/4 inch scale... The detail on them... :O

Rather fond of the Indiana Jones ones.

You done a great job on all of them not only in sculpting but capturing the likeness

Ben

 

[Montross]

Impressive work. Extra certified-geek points for throwing Mungo Baobab in there!

 

[Spookymufu]

yikes! $9000.00????

Well, good luck, I know you feel thats what the effort is worth and you might be right but wow, good luck trying to find a collector here able or willing to pay that.

I hope you're able to sell them and that person finds a way to mass produce them and sell them to the community at a more affordable-for-the-common-collector price.

 

[bilbofett]

Hi all just wish to say what great fab cool amazing work on these heads I would like a couple if they were on sale.bilbofett uk

 

[CHEWIE]

Amazing stuff... wish I was a wealthy man.

I'm not, so all I can do is enjoy the pics.

 

[Scarrviper]

Amazing stuff... wish I was a wealthy man.

I'm not, so all I can do is enjoy the pics.

Same here.

These are simply unreal, I hope that whoever takes this offer does get these mass produced so we can all enjoy these sculpts. Shame on hasbro for not taking them.

 

[RoadWarrior]

How do you DO this? Is there magic involved??

 

[GrandAdmiralJSK]

I would love the fett/vader/stormie. Simply awesome. Hopefully whoever manages to land these allows for others to snag them somehow as well.

Fantastic work.

 

[Darth_McBaine]

Thanks for that elaborate explanation Evergrey! Certainly understand it better now. I´m quite sure we don´t have a true grasp of how much work goes into these, though we do appreciate it! I think had I been ridiculously rich I would have actually bought these as I am quite sure Hasbro will never get to this level, especially regarding human likeness.

Hope somebody pays you good money for these, and keep it up!

 

[UKHistory]

The most logical thing would be for a company like slayers, which I guess is no more or at least on hiatus, to pick them up to build molds and mass produce on a customs scale. I don't know molding and I am not sure I understand the demand for these heads. At $9,000 you want to make money off every head. What is the ROI? This quality I could see charging 8 to 10 dollars US. But Evazan, for example, is a head that was long over due to be produced. Now Hasbro has one and a great body to boot.

It looks like Hasbro looked at Stephen Hayford's customs and said, "oh yeah. that is what Evazan looks like." How would one sell Evergrey's head with the figure sort of available?

Chewie or anyone here--how many people would really buy these heads? They are beautiful works of art. Everyone like them. But who really is willing to pay. How many units could be sold? I am thinking about this more than I should.

 

[padmesghost]

these are cool but asking 9000 is ridiculous. no offense but each head isnt worth 250 bucks. people sell whole custom figures on ebay with some sculpting for less than a quarter of that.

by the way hasbro holds the license for these characters so if someone reproduces them in bulk and sells a bunch get ready for a lawsuit. i'd say apply to hasbro for a job. keep it legal.

 

[Evergrey]

These are beautiful
Would not suspect that they are only 3 3/4 inch scale... The detail on them... :O

Rather fond of the Indiana Jones ones.

You done a great job on all of them not only in sculpting but capturing the likeness

Ben

Thanks a lot BuntyHunterBen ... I must admit I was a bit surprised by the detail
myself when I saw the high Res images on my PC for the first time ...

Impressive work. Extra certified-geek points for throwing Mungo Baobab in there!

Thanks Montross - I always liked Mungo (except for his lame name) and thought he would
be fun to do - I always saw him as a cross between Han Solo and George Lucas ^^ ...

yikes! $9000.00????

Well, good luck, I know you feel thats what the effort is worth and you might be right but wow, good luck trying to find a collector here able or willing to pay that.

I hope you're able to sell them and that person finds a way to mass produce them and sell them to the community at a more affordable-for-the-common-collector price.

It was 8000 btw ... and that is already more than 2/3rds off the official comission price ...
I explained it a couple of times on the last 2 pages already ... 99% of people simply do
underestimate all the time and work that things like these take. It isn't cheap to hire
pros (in no business).

Hi all just wish to say what great fab cool amazing work on these heads I would like a couple if they were on sale.bilbofett uk

Thanks a lot bilbofett

Amazing stuff... wish I was a wealthy man.

I'm not, so all I can do is enjoy the pics.

Hey Chewie - thanks and cool to hear from you again - it's been a while ^^ ...
I knew it wouldn't be easy finding a collector with deep enough pockets to pull
this thing, but I know guys like those - collecting SW stuff and driving a Ferrari,
so I have not given up hope, yet ...

These are simply unreal, I hope that whoever takes this offer does get these mass produced so we can all enjoy these sculpts. Shame on hasbro for not taking them.

Thanks a lot Scarrviper ... we'll have to wait and see what happens ...

How do you DO this? Is there magic involved??

:grin: ... thanks RoadWarrior - no magic - just me and my pocket-miniaturizer :weeabooface:

I would love the fett/vader/stormie. Simply awesome. Hopefully whoever manages to land these allows for others to snag them somehow as well.

Fantastic work.

Thanks GrandAdmiralJSK - glad you like 'em

Thanks for that elaborate explanation Evergrey! Certainly understand it better now. I´m quite sure we don´t have a true grasp of how much work goes into these, though we do appreciate it! I think had I been ridiculously rich I would have actually bought these as I am quite sure Hasbro will never get to this level, especially regarding human likeness.

Hope somebody pays you good money for these, and keep it up!

Well, *good money* would have been the full price for the comissioned lot - that would
have been nice ... but since I'm already gone down almost 70% (it's 8000,- not 9000,-)
so someone with a bit more cash on his hands can afford them, it's not much more than
compensation for all the time spent on all the work ...

The most logical thing would be for a company like slayers, which I guess is no more or at least on hiatus, to pick them up to build molds and mass produce on a customs scale. I don't know molding and I am not sure I understand the demand for these heads.

Slayers did not want them as they don't pay more than 40$ a headsculpt (THAT is ridiculous btw.)
I don't know about the demand either - all I wanted to do is give somebody a chance to get them
and *spread* them to fellow collectors since I can not do that.

At $9,000 you want to make money off every head. What is the ROI? This quality I could see charging 8 to 10 dollars US. But Evazan, for example, is a head that was long over due to be produced. Now Hasbro has one and a great body to boot.It looks like Hasbro looked at Stephen Hayford's customs and said, "oh yeah. that is what Evazan looks like." How would one sell Evergrey's head with the figure sort of available?

... it's 8000,- ... (I think I have to edit that post in the sales thread) ... and as I said above that is
already almost 70% off from the regular official comission price that sculpting a likeness in 3 3/4 inch,
making a mold and castings and painting a sample would usually cost.

Those heads are for the customizing guys who want to put them on their Hasbro bodies to improve
on the look of the available figures ... whoever is happy with Hasbros Dr. Evazan - keep him - I bought
the figure twice - one to put my custom head on - one to keep as released by big H ...

Chewie or anyone here--how many people would really buy these heads? They are beautiful works of art. Everyone like them. But who really is willing to pay. How many units could be sold? I am thinking about this more than I should.

Just an example ... I have about 80 Stormtroopers - up until now I have made about 50 casts of
my own Stormy Helmet (and finished painting about 20) to replace all the lame buckets on my own
Stormtroopers ... that will (when I'm through some day) be 80 Stormtrooper Helmets for just one
person ... and I have yet to do all my TIE-Pilots, AT-AT Drivers and so on and so on ...

these are cool but asking 9000 is ridiculous. no offense but each head isnt worth 250 bucks.

... it's 8000,- ... and it's a pretty big offense and rude, as you are questioning the worth of my job
and what I do for a living ... that's like telling a painter his picture is not worth more than the sheet
of paper its drawn on ...

... and your're right - the price is ridiculous, as the lot is actually worth about three times as much
if it was oficially comissioned by a company ... that is the reality of the pricing in professional prototype
sculpting. And I never had any company complain about my prices, as I'm in the mid-field ... some of
top sculptors in the business charge more than twice of that ... it's pretty simple - prototype sculpts
are made for companies who can afford these prices as they make a lot of money with those sculpts.
Private people with *normal* incomes can't usually afford things like these, as they make no sense to
most. It's simple: time = money! If I spend 3 days on sculpting a head, and then a day to make a mold,
2 casts and painting one, and I only ask 50$ for 4 days of work (and I still have to pay 40% IRS here)
I'd have no home, no car, no food, no nothing ... could you live with under 300 dollars a month ???
Well, I can't ... so now go ahead and tell me once more the asking price is ridiculous and that each
head isn't worth 250,- ... it isn't to you, because you can't afford it ... but somebody out there can
and knows what bargain he's actually looking at.

You don't have to buy it ... I'm not forcing it on anybody ... but you also don't have to insult me.

people sell whole custom figures on ebay with some sculpting for less than a quarter of that.

Yes - No offense to those people - there are some real talents out there, but just have a good look at
most of those cusatoms and maybe you'll realize that you're comparing Fiats to Ferraris here ...

by the way hasbro holds the license for these characters so if someone reproduces them in bulk and sells a bunch get ready for a lawsuit. i'd say apply to hasbro for a job. keep it legal.

That's why I can't (and won't) sell copies, as I work in that business, and I won't crap in my own garden.
But I am legally allowed to sell one-of-a-kind comission sculpts and whatever the new owner does with
those is out of my hands.
I don't need to apply for a job at Hasbro - I work for another Toy company already ... and I like my job
as I do have a lot of creative input in the products I sculpt ... and I want to keep Star Wars a hobby
and not make it my everyday work, as that spoils all the fun pretty quickly ...

Folks ... I don't know why I even have to explain myself now - all I wanted was to give somebody a
chance to get them and to make the rest of you happy with copies ... but you can't expect me to give
them away for free ... even if I went town 90% of the *real price* you'd still be looking at 2700,-, and
there would still be people complaining about the price and saying it's not worth it ... I'm really sorry
this isn't priced for the *normal income* people, but there are enough people who can actually afford
such things, and I still think 8000,- is a hell of a good deal for what you get ... nobody said you'd get
your investment back in a month by selling 5 copies of each head ... but make that 25 of each head
(and guaranteed many many more of the helmets) and the money would be back in a couple months.

Anyhow ... I feel a bit misunderstood and frustrated now and I think I'll be going for a walk ...

Cheers and take care,

Evergrey

 

[Spookymufu]

it's pretty simple - prototype sculpts are made for companies who can afford these prices as they make a lot of money with those sculpts.
Private people with *normal* incomes can't usually afford things like these, as they make no sense to
most.

yup thats the problem, the price your asking is ridiculous for a collectors forum such as this and might be perfectly reasonable when approaching or being commissioned by a company. I think your pricing is completely unrealistic on a forum such as this and maybe you shouldnt post such ads for work if you want that kind of cash on a forum such as this.

I love your work, I think it looks fantastic but the pricing is way too much for the common collector.

You said the price is $8000, your add said $9000 but you would go to $8000 IF the person cast another set for you, so if the person isnt willing to do that, then the price is in fact, $9k (unless you edited that little stipulation).

but you can't expect me to give them away for free

no of course not, but you were willing to give them away for free to Hasbro....In hopes that they would do exactly what you said you wanted the purchaser to do...So I'm a little confused but that doesnt matter.

I understand what you wanted to do, sell them and let someone else assume the risk and sell them to the collecting community and I think thats great thinking on your part, a nice idea, but I just think the asking price makes that prohibitive to 99% of the people on this forum, even if someone did buy them at $8-9k they would have to charge a few hundred a pc just to break even where $3-$4ea seems more reasonable for the avg collector here (I think)

 

[Koth]

8k for resin. Marble or stone, maybe. Gold - defiately, but resin....

 

[jokabofe]

Pretty sure I've already told you how amazing these look, but just in case.... they look great.

However... you couldn't be more mistaken about this statement:

nobody said you'd get your investment back in a month by selling 5 copies of each head ... but make that 25 of each head
(and guaranteed many many more of the helmets) and the money would be back in a couple months.

Honestly, you'd have to sell a LOT more than that.

$9000 for the master copies
$500 for molding/casting supplies (I just ordered a batch of the product that I use from Smooth-On - which would probably not be enough to do all the molds/cast required - and it cost me $350)

$9500 initial investment

I sell cast heads from the Slayer Design team for $6 each. To make $9500, I would have to sell 1,584 pcs - or approximately 44 of each head - and that's just to recoup MY investment. Add to that all the associated fees for selling via eBay and taking payment via PayPal so that's approximately 7% of that amount, so deduct another +/- $700. As you pointed out, nobody likes to work for free... so I'd have to sell DOUBLE that amount of pieces - over 3000 - to make it worth it for my initial investment.

I understand where you're coming from, but you have to remember that you're not dealing with a company here, you're dealing with individual collectors and customizers. Obviously, no company is going to purchase these from you, at any price - simply because they have no license to reproduce these products. Only Hasbro has that.

If you want to send them to me, I can pay you in installments over the next several months as I make my money back. As the casts sell, I'll send you payments. Think about it

And as I mentioned to you, Slayer Designs uses several in-house scupltors including ex-employees that have worked in the toy industry and Games Workshop from what I understand, and yes - they pay $40 for most head sculpts. But to say that their work is not intricate or detailed would be a mistake. Just take a look at any of the casts that they have produced over the years and you'll see how much detail their sculpts have, even at that small scale. And just for the record, I am not the owner of Slayer Designs, or a partner, or anything like that. I'm simply making some molds and casts of their product for the time being.

 

[UKHistory]

Evergrey,

For what it is worth, I would say $8,000 may be a fair price. Value is based on time, effort, skillset, resources, and of course what the market will bare.

I am thinking out loud how to justify spending $8,000 on your wonderful art and make it doable for me to seriously consider when I mentioned Evazan's head. I love the sculpts and the paint jobs are exquisite.

I also respect your position in your profession with regard to mass producing them. For me to spend $8,000 on anything it would need to be an investment in my future. I have spent a lot of money over the years on star wars. But $8,000 while maybe a fair price for your efforts is a significant amount of money for anyone person to spend. Keep in mind that many of us here complained about the prices Hasbro and the various stores are charging for action figures.

Those store prices makes us gulp a bit. It is nothing personal. Most of us are on the retail side of star wars toy purchasing and not on the commissioning a professional designer side. This is new to us. And there have been customizers who have offered custom heads to the public at a much different individual price point.

It is a damn shame Hasbro was not willing to take your sculpts. But I do hope you continue to share your creations as they are something to behold. You have a great gift and if I can figure out a way to swing it, I will definitely contactly you in a more private setting to offer to purchase the head sculpts. I would just need to find someone or a group to help either a) shoulder some of the cost and b) help sell them.

 

[darth_sidious]

Hey everyone, if you're interested in this users work - please contact him via PM to discuss any further details about price, etc - selling and auctioning are not permitted in these threads - they are for showing off and discussing custom work only. thanks.

http://forum.rebelscum.com/t954366/

 

[drod26]

beautiful sculpts man.. The best i have seen at this scale, your work is as good as Hot Toys @ the 1/6 scale.. Best wishes to you selling these for your asking price.

 

[Dak]

I just want to say to you, Evergrey, that as a self-employed artist myself I understand how difficult it is to deal with sticker shock when it comes to your work. Placing and maintaining value on your time and work is difficult in the open market, and I appreciate where you're coming from. Your price for this lot, while not affordable for most, is still more than fair for the work involved and the quality of the product. Don't get discouraged by those who devalue your skills.

 

[Evergrey]

yup thats the problem, the price your asking is ridiculous for a collectors forum such as this and might be perfectly reasonable when approaching or being commissioned by a company. I think your pricing is completely unrealistic on a forum such as this and maybe you shouldnt post such ads for work if you want that kind of cash on a forum such as this.

All I wanted was to give it a chance - and everywhere you will find people who actually
HAVE that much money (or don't care to spend it) - even here ... it's just finding the
right person ...

I love your work, I think it looks fantastic but the pricing is way too much for the common collector.

I wanted the *common collector* to benefit from the *cheaper* copies the buyer of the lot could offer.

You said the price is $8000, your add said $9000 but you would go to $8000 IF the person cast another set for you, so if the person isnt willing to do that, then the price is in fact, $9k (unless you edited that little stipulation).

... yeah you're right I will edit that ... and btw. - after weeks of experimenting with colors
I just found a way to make colored casts yesterday ...
I'll take some new pics soon then - the first tries already look great ...

you were willing to give them away for free to Hasbro....In hopes that they would do exactly what you said you wanted the purchaser to do...So I'm a little confused but that doesnt matter.

I sent Hasbro 8 of those sculpts, not all of them! I am by far not a rich guy - I have a
rather tight regular income and I'm still a businessman, so a good business contact is
worth a lot. Hasbro could have *bought* the other 28 sculpts if they wanted more.

I understand what you wanted to do, sell them and let someone else assume the risk and sell them to the collecting community and I think thats great thinking on your part, a nice idea, but I just think the asking price makes that prohibitive to 99% of the people on this forum, even if someone did buy them at $8-9k they would have to charge a few hundred a pc just to break even where $3-$4ea seems more reasonable for the avg collector here (I think)

... all I can say is I just wanted to give somebody a chance to get them for a reasonable
price seen from a professional point of view ... I did not want to spawn endless discussions
what something is worth in the eyes of different people ...
other people pay 100 bucks to throw themselves off a high bridge with a rope around their
feet - 100 bucks for 5 seconds of *fun* ??? ... Let's just stop those discussions, ok ...

8k for resin. Marble or stone, maybe. Gold - defiately, but resin....

... it's for the work ... the work, not the material ... I would've sent the original sculpts,
but over 90% of them got damaged beyond reasonable repair in the molding process, so
the resin masters are simply the stand in for the original sculpts as they are virtually the
same in detail and size as the original sculpts ...

Pretty sure I've already told you how amazing these look, but just in case.... they look great. Honestly, you'd have to sell a LOT more than that.

Well, maybe it's because I was thinking more about 10,-$ a head (I'm from Germany and
I'm used to European prices wich are sadly considerably higher than in other countries) ...

$9000 for the master copies
$500 for molding/casting supplies (I just ordered a batch of the product that I use from Smooth-On - which would probably not be enough to do all the molds/cast required - and it cost me $350)
$9500 initial investment

See - you already mentioned what I have (aside from the work) already invested only in
material just to create this special lot ...
I never had in mind to provide somebody with a cheap *moneymaking machine* ...
if I wanted to do that I would simply sell 1 set of painted copies and then I'd sit and wait,
as I know for sure (from past experience) that about a good month later re-casts of those
sculpts would be all over the place ...
I simply don't see no reason anymore to have the *re-casters* kind of people take any
more advantage over me and make money with all the hard work I did ...
I was not talking about you here joka - but I'm sure you know these kind of people who
just take other peoples work and copy it for profit ... seen it a great many times and it
happened to me a lot in the past.

I sell cast heads from the Slayer Design team for $6 each. To make $9500, I would have to sell 1,584 pcs - or approximately 44 of each head - and that's just to recoup MY investment. Add to that all the associated fees for selling via eBay and taking payment via PayPal so that's approximately 7% of that amount, so deduct another +/- $700. As you pointed out, nobody likes to work for free... so I'd have to sell DOUBLE that amount of pieces - over 3000 - to make it worth it for my initial investment.

I absolutely understand that from your point of view. You have to find a reasonable priced
prototype to get your profits from all the work you still have to do after purchasing it ...

I understand where you're coming from, but you have to remember that you're not dealing with a company here, you're dealing with individual collectors and customizers.

There are private collectors who are willing to spend that kind of money. Let me just give
you a couple examples - Once I sculpted a 7 inch bust of a Biker Scout with the likeness
of the client. He spent about 2000,- US$ for that, and he never had it cast or anything,
it was just for himself.
Last year I sculpted a 30 Centimeters high Disney Style Pinocchio for a lady who wanted
to give it to her mother as a Birthday gift. She had no problem paying the 4500,-$ bill for
the 4 weeks of work this took including paintwork.
I did lots of custom headsculpts for 3 3/4 and 7 inch figures in the past 15 years, and the
private collectors who comissioned me did not complain about the costs, as these are the
costs of hiring a professional ...

Obviously, no company is going to purchase these from you, at any price - simply because they have no license to reproduce these products. Only Hasbro has that.

I would have no problem if Hasbro came here (I know some of them read along here) and
said - we'll take that lot for the asking price (for them it's an absolute bargain even if they
only used half the sculpts - wich would be a real shame ...)
... I did not rule them out. But since I've already tried to give them a couple of those
heads and they had to send them back I thought I'd give one of the guys here a chance
to get these ot to fellow collectors.
Mr. Depriest wrote me a very nice letter where he told me that the he and the Art Director
were really impressed by the quality and detail of the works and paintjobs, but that they
sadly could just not accept the gift because of some kind of legal reasons they just can't
use uncomissioned work.

If you want to send them to me, I can pay you in installments over the next several months as I make my money back. As the casts sell, I'll send you payments. Think about it

I already wrote a couple of times *PM me with offers* - I will think about it, but it will
not be that easy as *just send them to me*, ok ...

And as I mentioned to you, Slayer Designs uses several in-house scupltors including ex-employees that have worked in the toy industry and Games Workshop from what I understand, and yes - they pay $40 for most head sculpts.

Honestly - for a pro that is just not acceptable ... maybe for a hobby customizer with
sculpting skills (no offense), but you'd have to really rush up a sculpt in 1 hour to justify
that price, and that just won't come out as good as it should be.

But to say that their work is not intricate or detailed would be a mistake.

Umm ... I never said that - I said some of the customs I've seen on eBay don't look that
professional let's say.

Just take a look at any of the casts that they have produced over the years and you'll see how much detail their sculpts have, even at that small scale. And just for the record, I am not the owner of Slayer Designs, or a partner, or anything like that. I'm simply making some molds and casts of their product for the time being.

I have been on the page several times. Some sculpts were very nice, others I did not like ...

Evergrey,

For what it is worth, I would say $8,000 may be a fair price. Value is based on time, effort, skillset, resources, and of course what the market will bare.
I am thinking out loud how to justify spending $8,000 on your wonderful art and make it doable for me to seriously consider when I mentioned Evazan's head. I love the sculpts and the paint jobs are exquisite.

Thanks a lot for the warm words UKHistory ... ... feels good to read something positive ...

I also respect your position in your profession with regard to mass producing them. For me to spend $8,000 on anything it would need to be an investment in my future. I have spent a lot of money over the years on star wars. But $8,000 while maybe a fair price for your efforts is a significant amount of money for anyone person to spend. Keep in mind that many of us here complained about the prices Hasbro and the various stores are charging for action figures.

Oh I know ... I still envy the US prices, as here in Germany I have to pay about 16US$ for
the regular priced Hasbro SW Figure ...
as I said above - I did not have the *regular income collector* in mind here, but the
person with the deeper pockets and the same love for the hobby who will simply take on
the task to do the copy-work ...

Those store prices makes us gulp a bit. It is nothing personal. Most of us are on the retail side of star wars toy purchasing and not on the commissioning a professional designer side. This is new to us. And there have been customizers who have offered custom heads to the public at a much different individual price point.

Totally understood ... but please just remember I'm not forcing anybody to buy ... I'm
starting to feel really sorry that I even tried doing that, as I thought going down about
70% of the usual price for a comissioned lot like this would make people kind of seeing a
chance and make them happy, but all I get is complaints about the price ...

I can't go to a Ford Dealer and say I want a Shelby GT500 , but I'm not going to pay the
50.000 asking price because the material costs of this thing are at most 5.000 ...
But if he then offered me a 70% off on the car ... I would buy it in a heartbeat ...
(hmm yeah ... bad example I know -.- )

It is a damn shame Hasbro was not willing to take your sculpts. But I do hope you continue to share your creations as they are something to behold. You have a great gift and if I can figure out a way to swing it, I will definitely contactly you in a more private setting to offer to purchase the head sculpts. I would just need to find someone or a group to help either a) shoulder some of the cost and b) help sell them.

That's another idea to get them as a group - and as i said - *PM me for offers* - I'm a
guy you can talk to, and I really hate it when I see cool stuff I can't have and the person
who has it won't share it - that happened a couple of times to me before (and for one
special item I actually did pay a HEAVY price to get my copy a few years back ...)

Hey everyone, if you're interested in this users work - please contact him via PM to discuss any further details about price, etc - selling and auctioning are not permitted in these threads - they are for showing off and discussing custom work only. thanks.

http://forum.rebelscum.com/t954366/

Trying my best to end those price discussions here darth_sidious ... sorry for that ...

beautiful sculpts man.. The best i have seen at this scale, your work is as good as Hot Toys @ the 1/6 scale.. Best wishes to you selling these for your asking price.

That compliment very very sweet of you drod26, and I'm really happy you like the sculpts so much

I just want to say to you, Evergrey, that as a self-employed artist myself I understand how difficult it is to deal with sticker shock when it comes to your work. Placing and maintaining value on your time and work is difficult in the open market, and I appreciate where you're coming from. Your price for this lot, while not affordable for most, is still more than fair for the work involved and the quality of the product. Don't get discouraged by those who devalue your skills.

Thanks a ton Dak - that pretty much summed it up and said it all - thank you

Cheers and take care,

Evergrey

 

[SmugWindu]

RoboCop - I'd buy that for a dollar! - YouTube