I am the great and powerful OZ!

Many people ask why is this so expensive. The short answer is that nothing about making resin models is quick or cheap. The long answer requires a more in depth look at the costs involved. Unlike many manufacturers, I do not feel it is constructive to dance around this question. An honest question deserves an honest answer.

So let us pull back the wizards curtain and see what hides behind...

Pricing my models is a subject that often causes me a great deal of discomfort. Every kit, every release begs the question what is a fair price? What do I need to charge to keep the doors open and continue making things I, and hopefully others enjoy. While understanding not every model will be a spectacular hit, what is a reasonable number of models you should expect to sell to amortize your upfront costs?

Now we look at the ugly numbers. I already own the equipment so I will not count that in the total but I show them here for general reference. Also, keep in mind this rough overview is for a rather large and complicated model with over 32 molds and 136 parts. Although the costs are not accurate to the penny, they are honest reflections of the true costs. There are numerous other costs that will not reflected in this break down, such as overhead, web development, problems with molds, etc. These costs likely reflect another 3% to 5% reduction in true profit.

Initial equipment investment: (This cost is not reflected in the totals below)

Compressor, Pressure pots, Vacuum pump, Vacuum chamber, assorted tools, mixing containers, etc

Rough estimate- $1800.00

Initial materials investment:

Model print cost, Initial molds (RTV Silicone cost), Mold boxes, clay and other tools, Resin for mold master.

Rough estimate- $3850.00

Cost for each model produced:

Assuming a conservative25 pulls per mold, before mold needs replacing. Estimate for resin, rubber and packaging.

Rough estimate-$89.00

Cost for casting service:

Assuming the molds are made and supplied by me.

Rough Estimate-$75.00?? (This number is still unresolved)

Shipping costs back to me from caster-$4.00

Credit card transaction fees:

3% to 6.5% (average 4.75% of $350.00 retail) $16.62

TOTAL  PER KIT COST TO PRODUCE AND SELL A SINGLE MODEL- $185.00

RETAIL PRICE PER KIT- $350.00

Taxes on profit:

 $65.00 (Uncle Sam and California demand their share of my hard work)

 TOTAL NET PROFIT- $100.00

DreamForge-Games company profit- $50.00 per kit

Costs of initial investment, $3850.00. (First true profit after 77 kits have been sold)

My profit per kit- $50.00 per kit

Target of $15.00 an hour for my time. CAD Modeling, Benching, Mold Making. Four hundred and sixty hours invested, and an additional ninety hours for the three mold change outs needed to meet the 77 total kits sold to square up the initial model/materials costs.

Total dollar cost of my time $8,250. (First true profit after 165 kits have been sold)

What do I make per hour, if we try to zero my hourly rate at the 77 kits sold, based on the initial investment costs of the model and materials. I net $6.99 an hour for my time…Hmmmm…

Add the taxes back into the total that we removed earlier and were up to a “respectable?” $9.44 per hour actual working wage. This begs the question, if you possessed the creativity and the skills set in CAD and mold/model production, would you work for $9.44 an hour with no health plan.  I am not crying poor me, this work is something I love doing or I would not be doing it.

I hope that this release is a smashing success and I sell hundreds…  This would improve the look of my financials greatly. I would much prefer to amortize my investment to the first 40 or 50 kits sold, and on smaller less expensive models, this is always my target.

For the immediate future, I will need to cast these in house while I search for a suitable service provider. This will increase my profit margin but will slow the development of new models and severely limit the number of kits available to my customers. With this in mind, moving production out of house is a very high priority. If the contract casters services are far greater than expected, I will need to increase the price to reflect the additional costs.

Things being what they are, I feel it is a fair price for my customers and a fair price for the product I deliver. I hope that you feel the same and I hope that I helped to dispel the age-old question “why is the price so damn high?!”

Leviathan Azazel sneak peek.

Azazel will be the last of five in the series of VR5 frame Leviathan.

Azazel and subtlety are two words seldom used together. There is nothing subtle about this Leviathan. It wields one of the largest projectile weapons mounted on any Leviathan and a whirling blade of destruction. This is the King Tiger of Leviathans

Just to recap, here are the five VR5 frame Leviathans in the series.

 I hope to start limited production of the Leviathan Mortis some time in December, with the crusader soon after and the remaining three in this series to follow ASAP.

Anti-Grav upgrade for the Siler Tank

Jon at Khurasan asked me to make him a plug in unit for the track area of the Siler tank. I wanted to design something that changed the silhouette of the Siler and made it immediately recognizable as a Grav Tank.

I went with an asymmetrical design that mounted larger grav units to the front and adjustable jets to the rear... I felt it gave the model a vroom, vroom, ready to race look.

Here you can see the component view and how they simply plug into the track slot.. You can also see the additional nose length added to further change the lines away from the tracked version.

Wishing you a Happy Samhain "End of Summer"

Samhain or (sa:win) is an old Gaelic festival to celebrate the end of summer, now known as Halloween.

As a child this was my favorite holiday, I just loved making a costume and heading out for my yearly sugar rush. Now I head out with my niece and nephews and enjoy their expressions.

Leviathan update:
We are close to production! I am working on the last of the weapon arms... After that I need to make masters of all the molds and then complete the instructions and box art. best guess of release date stands mid to late November.

Why has it taken so long? I think we will top out at 30 to 32 molds, using about seven to seven and a half gallons of mold rubber.

It has been a LOT of work and I'm looking forward to moving on to the next set of Leviathan in the series.

Thought I would share some AMAZING pumpkin carving!

Some nice pics of a painted Siler Tank

I just saw on Miniature Review that Jon over at Khurasan is releasing the heavy tank I worked on a few months back.

I have to say, I think it looks great painted up in desert tan.

I missed this one as well.... Here is a pic of a missile AFV I worked on just before the Siler tank.

SpaceJacker at Tinysoldier painted up the AFV.

It sure is nice to see Jon busy releasing these and I just love to see them painted. With my head buried so far into the Leviathan mold process, I'm lucky to catch any of these ;)

Here is something I had to keep Hush-Hush about.

When John at Moddler contacted me about working with JBR on a commercial gig, I was very excited about the opportunity and jumped at the chance. My Leviathan molds would need to take a back seat for a bit.


This was a CAD model that JBR and I worked on for a Land Rover commercial. Moddler printed the CAD model and sent it off to an ad agency in NY, Hornet Inc. to have the physical model painted and ultimately used in a stop motion commercial.

Here are a couple of links to the final product....

Land Rover :30sec
Behind the Scenes

This was my first bit of work as a small cog in a big commercial deal. Very exciting and very tight deadlines. I am amazed to see the end results.

 The Model needed to be 100% with all details of the real world vehicle captured, all the way down to working headlights. You cannot see it in this render but even the interior headlight bezels needed to be created.

Here are some shots of the modeling work in progress.

A couple of pics of just some of the printed components.

This represented many hours of work for John Ross and I and flawless execution of the final print from John at Moddler.

Its running right now in Italy and you should see a 40 second spot here in the USA soon....


It was a real pleasure working with John Bear Ross and John Vegher on this collaboration.

Senji Studios: A wonderful diorama for the Leviathan box art

The wonderful and talented Pat over at Senji Studios made a stunning vignette for the Leviathan box art based on a crude sketch I sent to him. Please pop over to his site to see his process and more photos.

I can only hope my painting skills on the Leviathans can do justice to his stunning work.

The Diorama and box art will display the first two Leviathan models. The Eisenkern Leviathan Mortis and the Commonwealth Leviathan Crusader locked in battle on an Eisenkern held planet. The architecture is of Eisenkern origin with a decidedly gothic feel. The buildings are slab construction, cast off world and shipped to a planet for a “colony in a box” method of quick assembly while retaining the architectural interest and distinct retro-gothic feel of the Eisenkern society.

Where have I been?

It has been quite some time since my last update...


So, where have I been and what am I working on? Among other projects, I have been working on the molds. So far all the body components are complete and I'm starting on the molds for the legs and arms.


Molds are like the foundation of a house, you need to get it right or the house will not come together right. All my molds are two part, requiring two pours and a lot of pre-prep clay work to get the parting lines of the two mold halves set correctly.


Until this week I only had one adjustable mold box, I now have two so things should move a little faster.. fingers crossed.


To be honest I hate this part of the process but it has to be done, so back to work I go ;)