I just realized that this is my 10 year anniversary as a freelance sculptor. I had sculpted figures for Privateer Press during my time there but I was doing more mold making while most of what I sculpted was on my off hours. But it wasn't until mid Dec ember of '06 that I decided to give up the hourly wage situation and sculpt full time.
Back in July/Aug of '06 I was employed through a temp agency at Nike working on the production line making soles for their new line of shoes that were going to be released in '07 but it turns out that the design didn't test well overseas and the line of workers they hired to meet the expected demand for the shoe began to progressively be cut back. About every week the management would tell us that the dwindling number of employees was because they were building a team of the best workers and those not there just didn't meet their standards and that there would be no more lay-offs and there was nothing to worry about. But every week there would be less workers and that same speech and by mid December I was the last of 5 workers hired out of an original 160-ish people (on my shift alone) when they announced the closing of the line. So, 2 weeks before Christmas I was unemployed and very unenthused about the upcoming job hunt.
But this actually coincided with the Dire Troll Mauler Extreme sculpts, (who is also celebrating his 10 year anniversary too,) purchase by Privateer Press. I had sculpted it during the summer, shown it to Jason Soles when we met up in October and got an email asking to buy it soon after. It was right about the same time I got laid-off that I received the check for the DTMX. I had asked my girlfriend how she felt about me doing sculpting as a freelancer instead of dealing with the buracracy of a regular job and she said to go for it. Luckily businesses have been employing me ever since.
I wanted to say, "Thank you" to all the miniature game projects and people who have enjoyed the work I have done and kept me employed this past decade and hopefully I can keep on doing this gig.
Back in July/Aug of '06 I was employed through a temp agency at Nike working on the production line making soles for their new line of shoes that were going to be released in '07 but it turns out that the design didn't test well overseas and the line of workers they hired to meet the expected demand for the shoe began to progressively be cut back. About every week the management would tell us that the dwindling number of employees was because they were building a team of the best workers and those not there just didn't meet their standards and that there would be no more lay-offs and there was nothing to worry about. But every week there would be less workers and that same speech and by mid December I was the last of 5 workers hired out of an original 160-ish people (on my shift alone) when they announced the closing of the line. So, 2 weeks before Christmas I was unemployed and very unenthused about the upcoming job hunt.
But this actually coincided with the Dire Troll Mauler Extreme sculpts, (who is also celebrating his 10 year anniversary too,) purchase by Privateer Press. I had sculpted it during the summer, shown it to Jason Soles when we met up in October and got an email asking to buy it soon after. It was right about the same time I got laid-off that I received the check for the DTMX. I had asked my girlfriend how she felt about me doing sculpting as a freelancer instead of dealing with the buracracy of a regular job and she said to go for it. Luckily businesses have been employing me ever since.
I wanted to say, "Thank you" to all the miniature game projects and people who have enjoyed the work I have done and kept me employed this past decade and hopefully I can keep on doing this gig.
