The first three volumes of a series of books about wonderful miniatures art.
Latest Updates from Our Project:
Continuing to march forward!
almost 3 years ago
– Sun, May 02, 2021 at 03:02:41 PM
The Road to Mordheim by Aaron Lovejoy - converted Slaanesh Daemons from Games Workshop
Thank you all so much for you continued support. We've passed the last Stretch Goal and are more than halfway towards the next! Your sharing of the campaign is obviously bringing a steady stream of supporters ready to march forward on this exciting journey.
The Gaming Tokens
When Ana and I first spoke about working on a book together and launching it as a Kickstarter, we both thought that creating a sheet of gaming tokens would be a fun way to connect the work that she does to create immersive gaming experiences with a tangible item that could be enjoyed by everyone backing this campaign. Ana has created some quick sketches of various token ideas that are going to go through some refinement before we get to the final product, but even in their sketch form, you can certainly see the "Ana Polanšćak style" in them. This sheet will be approximately 7"x10" and be sturdy die-cut card like you would find in quality board games. The sheet is now available as a $7 Add-On.
Here you can see the "Buff" and "Debuff" concepts up close.
The New Stretch Goal
One of the projects that Christof Keil worked on during the latter half of 2020 was an homage to a glorious piece of John Blanche art, the cover of the Warhammer 40,000 3rd Edition boxed set, featuring a "last stand" of sorts of a battered group of Black Templar Space Marines. Christof spent a lot of time refining his kitbashing and paiting of these Space Marines as he worked to bring the homage to life. The development of this piece will be an integral part of Volume 2, and we wanted another way to celebrate the piece. So, once we reach this Stretch Goal, we'll add this A2-sized poster (approx 16.5" x 23.25") to the Add-Ons for $7. Please note: to print this and roll it up for shipping in a tube would essentially double the costs of shipping, we have chosen to fold the poster and be able to include it in packages without adding to the shipping costs at all. Not ideal, of course, but shipping costs around the globe are kind of crazy at the moment.
Ana Polanšćak and the Between the Bolter and Me team
You can listen to the Wier Brothers chat with Ana about her art here in their Twitch stream from earlier today and get an insight into the influences on one of our artists. Check it out here:
What a way to start the day!
about 3 years ago
– Sat, May 01, 2021 at 11:57:01 AM
The Mercenary by Matt DiPietro - Bust from Fine Art Miniatures
The lead-up to a Kickstarter can be very stressful, particularly when you're launching a new style of product that, while familiar, is also a bit different to the norm or expected. That has meant that I haven't slept too well prior to launch, with nervousness and anxiety tugging at the corners.
Well. After the response yesterday, I slept very well in the knowledge that there are lots of people who really want to see books like these, drool over the art within, and explore the minds of the artists that created it. I slept so soundly I missed us passing the second and third Stretch Goals!
That's right. All three books will now be hardback books AND every backer (of $20 or more) will be getting (for free) a PDF tutorial on how Christof Keil paints his black armor like the fantasy art masters - Frazetta, Bonner, and Blanche.
Next Stretch Goal
Now we are headed towards the die-cut card sheet of gaming tokens designed by world-builder extraordinaire, Ana Polanšćak. This will be a fun sheet to create, and when we reach the Stretch Goal we'll unlock it as an Add-On for $7.
New Stretch Goals
Now I get to reveal the next two Stretch Goals!
The first is another one that, as a lover of fine books, I really appreciate. We'll be able to upgrade the interior paper quality. At the moment it's a healthy 130gsm (grams per square metre) which is quite nice as it is, considering standard magazines use 80-90gsm paper. With this stretch goal cracked we'll be able to upgrade it to 150gsm coated paper to give the images a very crisp print and the pages a slick feel.
The second new Stretch Goal is another freebie for everyone, a PDF tutorial from Matt DiPietro on how he creates such rich and warm oranges and ochres.
Typically we'd have a few conventions around this time of year that we'd all be appearing at and talking to folks about the project, but sadly that's not the case this year. We need for you, our early adopters, to share this campaign with your local gaming groups and painting friends that might not spend much time online. We have much more we would love to bring to you.
Thank you all!
Cheers
Dave
Incredible! We've passed our first Stretch Goal!
about 3 years ago
– Fri, Apr 30, 2021 at 04:28:33 PM
Not only has your incredible support taken us past our funding goal, you've now taken us past our first Stretch Goal! Very cool indeed!
Now we've added a set of 6 oversized art postcards to the Add-Ons section and you can now add them to your pledge. You can do this by clicking on the "Manage your pledge" button typically found on the right hand side of the campaign page (towards the top), and increasing your pledge total amount by $7, or whatever the total of your Add-Ons happens to be. After the campaign closes we'll be sending out pledge manager surveys (from BackerKit) where you will have the opportunity to specify the particular Add-Ons you want to spend that pledged money on.
Next Stretch Goal
The next Stretch Goal is one of my favorites, and when we reach it, we'll be able to upgrade from a quality softback to a quality hardback book. For those of you who have the previous books we've published, these new hardbacks will have the same height and width, so fit perfectly beside each other on your book shelves. Of course, the quickest way for us to reach this goal is to keep doing the wonderful work of sharing the campaign.
NEW Stretch Goal
We've also revealed the newest Stretch Goal, one that I'm very excited to work on. I've never designed a die-cut card sheet of gaming tokens before, so I turned to Ana for her help. Ana is all about the immersive gaming experience, so she will be making a sheets of tokens that features items you might use in many different game settings – Wound markers, Objectives, Buff/Debuff tokens, and possibly a Turn dial!
When we reach the $33,000 Stretch Goal, we'll be able to unlock this great item as an Add-On.
Matt DiPietro and Vince Venturella on YouTube
Not long now until Matt appears online with Vince, and Matt has let me know that this will be the best link to check it out:
FUNDED! Thank you all for making this a reality!
about 3 years ago
– Fri, Apr 30, 2021 at 01:51:45 PM
You have done it! Thank you to everyone who has pledged to get us to this point. We are all very happy to have funded.
We still have a lot of things we'd love to share with you in the coming weeks – Upgrades to the books themselves, cool Add-Ons to show your additional support, and free PDF tutorials from each of our wonderful artists. The first of each of these are posted on the campaign page now, and I'll share them here again.
Each of these holds a special place in my heart, and when you share this campaign with your friends and fellow miniatures enthusiasts, it bring each of them so much closer.
Also, over the coming weeks we'll be sharing more information about each of our artists, and sample pages from their books (each author is roughly 30-40% of the way through their writing). It will be busy and exciting times for all of us as we journey through this with you at our sides.
Media Appearances
We're going to be talking to quite a few gaming media outlets in the coming weeks and the next two appearances will be Matt DiPietro hanging out with Vince Venturella on Vince's YouTube channel, this evening at 8pm EST (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCgptSaRLvd1QH0SURdQNYgg).
At the top of this update you can see Christof Keil's latest kitbash. He took the day off work (he's a blacksmith, you know) to prepare for the Kickstarter launch, and to pass the time he put together this excellent Deathwing Terminator that was somewhat unwittingly inspired by this piece of Wayne England artwork done for Games Workshop:
Christof also sent me through this photo of what it looked like when he first started putting the pieces together. It'll be things like this that we can look forward to reading about in Christof's book.
