BOYL Ephemera and takeaways?

cheetor

Member
I know relatively little about this stuff technically by the way. I did work in 3D printing and achitectural model making in the late 90/ear; 2000s and while the processes involved these days are more or less identical in principle, 3D prints are far cheaper now. Nonetheless, what I have in mind wouldnt require even that sort of expense I suspect.

What I was thinking was a keepsake sort of thing that can be simply used in a game environment if thats what people want, rather than a limited edition sculpted and cast miniature that will fetch a fortune on Ebay in years to come :) More like the cheaper architectural models that are sometimes made using flat card silhouettes for features like crowds and trees etc, except in this case using laser cut plywood rather than card.

What I had in mind is very basic, like a cross between a tiny Ikea flatpack piece of furniture and a Kinder Egg toy, if that makes sense. This video is by a guy who runs his own laser cutting service called Chimeric Designs. I bought his silo "Canversion" kits last year, but have yet to assemble them. Take a look at the video (which has terrible sound that Cam, the owner apologised for) to see how the items slot together and to see the sort of detail he gets. Thats the sort of glue free (or glue minimal) assembly that I am thinking about and it also illustrates what sort of edge detail any proposed details might be able to take.

http://youtu.be/kMo-xs1XA1A

Note that one of those silos costs £5 and five silos cost £20. That gives some sort of ball park regarding how much a far smaller and simpler five or six piece kit like I am suggesting might cost. Im guessing no more than two or three pounds a piece and hopefully less.

I was thinking some sort of simple lasercut rectangle for the tabletop, simple. That could be etched with a "BOYL" or possibly some sort of other detail like the outline of roads or streams or whatever. Basic line drawing stuff, but enough to be picked out easily with a paintbrush later if desired. In addition to some sort of table legs (possibly two flat rectangles with corresponding notches from the edge to halfway that allow the two pieces to mate , forming an extruded "X" shape or similar. Like I said, functional, simple and easy (and hopefully cheap) to cut and assemble.

Possibly the table would have couple of slots in it to accommodate some sort of essentially 2D representation of a forest of a block of troops or whatever. Imagine the silhouette of a Warmaster front rank but flat and featureless and made from lasered ply. Im not thinking of perfect even-more-miniature representations of miniatures really, just something that from a distance gives a vague impression of whats on a gaming table. I would leave painting the elven heraldry or flocking the 2D tree shape to the owners, this would be a skeletal structure, like a card model from the middle of WD, or the back of a cereal packet, except made from wood with a laser.

assembly.jpg


The bottom of the items to be represented on the table would have slots in them that could mate with slots on the table. Hopefully this comically bad pencil illustration that I just scrawled on paper on my desk will make what I think is feasible clearer. I am certain that there is a better way to make laser cut table supports than what I came up with off the top of my head, but they illustrate the level of simplicity that can be applied to make passable shapes.

Note that I do not think that a miniature, functioning game table with majestic armies clashing in even miniature-er is on the cards. I do think that with a little imagination and TLC that something like this could be used to make a fun piece of novelty terrain, but its not worth doing unless people are arsed with it.

Mister Rab":xj6l7b6x said:
A miniature TTG would look awesome, but might be a little complex for a give-away for August.
The technology used to etch dice is very similar to that used to etch/cut plywood interestingly enough and not significantly more or less labour intensive I would think. The potential "kit" (a grandiose terms for about five pieces of wood that jigsaw together) that I envisage is about as complex as assembling a WFB 4th ed plastic elven spearman :)

Anyway, just a thought. I have to get back to work :)
 

Mister Rab

Member
Cheetor - That looks great, and far more achievable than what I originally thought was intended. Like I said, if it works, I'm in!

Zhu - Dicing with Dragons!!!! I lost that when I left home to go to university back in '98 and couldn't remember its name when I realised it was gone. Off to amazon/ebay/abebooks I go!

How about this? Capitals and smoother font rendering.
 

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Chico

Member
I was thinking something like this for a T-shirt, simple badge with a back slogan
 

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Chico

Member
Adding a custom font will just add to price I'm afraid. With 5 I'm already eating the price of £80 to give these away, so for a free give away t-shirt It's not too bad. So much more I'd like but I have to compromise a tad.
 

Asslessman

Member
Chico":3b053dbw said:
Adding a custom font will just add to price I'm afraid. With 5 I'm already eating the price of £80 to give these away, so for a free give away t-shirt It's not too bad. So much more I'd like but I have to compromise a tad.

Didn't know the fonts were extra, forget about it. Don't think anyone would dare complain whatsoever about generous gifts (maybe just about the size if you only take S's or XXXL's ;) )
 

Mister Rab

Member
Zhu Bajie":1ypcmfg9 said:
Yeah, that's got teh vibes. :grin:

Glad you approve :grin:

Chico - hold fire on any order you were planning and I'll do you a version that is white instead so you get white on black for the image.
 

Chico

Member
Mister Rab":2ynbyqh2 said:
Zhu Bajie":2ynbyqh2 said:
Yeah, that's got teh vibes. :grin:

Glad you approve :grin:

Chico - hold fire on any order you were planning and I'll do you a version that is white instead so you get white on black for the image.

It cool mate, that was just a mock up to show people what I was planning. It'll be a month before I press the go ahead button aka remind the Wife I'm doing it hehe
 

Chico

Member
New version, not sure which one I prefer :) Both look great
 

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cheetor

Member
Mister Rab":3g53kv4o said:
A miniature TTG would look awesome, but might be a little complex for a give-away for August. If it does get made, I'm in!

minitables1.jpg


holotables1.jpg


boyl-etched1.jpg



The facts:

These are prototypes. There will be some changes to the final design. But this is a pretty solid idea of what we will be getting if we go ahead. But bear in mind that everything is subject to some change from these designs.

Troops are not really feasible in this scale, so units are represented by small blocks with etched generic symbols. Like battle report units if that makes sense. Some of the sci-fi units are represented by things inspired by this classic bit of art rather than blocks:

rtholotable1.jpg


The table sets will be manufactured to quantity as determined by interest here.

There will be numerous small design differences in the tables: some will have etched roads, some rivers, some contour lines, some hexes etc. The scatter terrain and exact table pattern will be supplied randomly. Purchasers will have the choice of acrylic or MDF, but further details will be supplied randomly.

There will be a number of bits of "scatter terrain" "woods, stepped hills etc) in each "flat pack" table pack. Number of scatter items per pack as yet unknown.

There will be a number of "units" in each "flat pack" table pack. Number of units per pack as yet unknown.

Cost per table will be under £5 each, details TBC. Payment will be collected by me in advance of BOYL, likely over the next fortnight just to be sure that everything gets done with plenty of time. I am not going to be trying to make a profit out of this, but the group buying power that we have makes a cool little souvenir like this possible. If you dont trust me with your ~£5 between now and early August then dont get involved, but cash up front is the only way that I can make this work

I need to gauge interest before proceeding further. If interest is shown here, then I will start another dedicated thread for this. So what sort of numbers are we talking about? Does this particular ephemera appeal to the Oldhammer collective? I think that they are pretty cool little things but perhaps you tasteless heathens might disagree ;)
 

Asslessman

Member
The RT illustration was the final nail in the coffin, just take those 5 quids from me.

On a side note, I'm really more attracted by the MDF version than the crystal acrylic one... matter of taste.
 

cheetor

Member
Asslessman":2hilmwcm said:
The RT illustration was the final nail in the coffin, just take those 5 quids from me.

Hopefully it will be a little cheaper than than that, but no guarantees. A double pack (one Acrylic and one MDF) might incorporate a further discount, but price will all be dependent on the numbers interested.

Asslessman":2hilmwcm said:
On a side note, I'm really more attracted by the MDF version than the crystal acrylic one... matter of taste.

I think so. I cant decide which I prefer myself. The MDF one is a better representation of the games that we play I think, but the acrylic looks like a cheesy 80s sci-fi holographic image of a game of Heroscape or something. I like them both.


Chico":2hilmwcm said:
They all look great, well done with running with the idea :)

Thanks Chico, Im glad I did. There are occasional benefits to being an obsessive anal retentive ;)

Even if nobody else wants any I will get one or two for myself. I already have plans for a game where the Chaos cultists raid the local games club to find virgins to sacrifice... a little bit mean maybe.
 

Chico

Member
Well put me down for 1 of the Si Fi style ones, this is what I plan for using mine like:

Unreleased_-_Genestealer_magus_with_consol.jpg


Muhaha
 

Asslessman

Member
cheetor":2orn79n4 said:
Thanks Chico, Im glad I did. There are occasional benefits to being an obsessive anal retentive ;)

Never thought Sigmund Freud would make it to this forum despite the numerous mental troubles displayed by most of its members :lol:

regarding the material used, the only bias I have towards the acrylic is that I don't see it painted, it has the retro charm I agree but Apart from painting the feet, I don't see much personnalisation possible, the MDF on the other hand nearly has to be painted, which may prove a drawback to some, wood is also inherently more of an oldschool material (even if it's medium in that case) but let's not go that way or we risk to open Pandora's "what's oldhammer" box again...
Either way I'll be happy with what come out really.

cheetor":2orn79n4 said:
I already have plans for a game where the Chaos cultists raid the local games club to find virgins to sacrifice... a little bit mean maybe.

In a hobby filled with genestealer hybrids, fimirs with red redemptionists applying red hot iron mask over their own flayed faces... I think we can handle that ;)
 

Mister Rab

Member
:shock: 8-) That is properly brilliant, cheetor! I'll have an MDF one, please. Really fabulous. 8-)





(a bit of a gap so as not to crowd out my first comment)




The feedback I've had about the goat dice from dice.co.uk (nice, helpful people so far) is that I needed to simplify the design a little, so I've had a little play and stylised the image a touch. I was concerned about the lettering being legible at 22m dice size but I wanted to keep Bocklin as the font, so that's been tweaked as well.





If there is sufficient interest, and the laser chappy is happy with the file, these will work out at about £1 each.
 

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