"There was no contempt, merely a statement that I couldn’t tell if you were serious."
The whole of my post was serious enough. Your taking it as a joke, that's derision, especially when you go on dismissing the rest of my post with inaccuracies and inventions.
"Personally I don’t think it would make a difference, but if you do. Go for it."
"I don't... I don't believe it!"
"That, is why you failed."
"If you don’t give a damn what some random stranger on the internet says, then good for you. But there is no need to be rude about it. You like petitions for their peaceful nature, why not keep your posts the same way?"
Because of unnecessary derision on your side, plus your overly delusional use of uncertainties. A clear response was needed.
"This I totally disagree with. You think people could make these things without being engineers? Think of the equipment needed to make the bodies, cast the metal items, mold things whatever. Its not something I could do without some training for sure."
Convenient unaccuracies again. I have never said anything about people designing anything, but people physically assemblig the bodies or rooting the hair.
Factory workers must have had training, of course, but they are by no means the artist that makes the prototypes. Factory workers are less skilled, and told to work quickly. It is mass production, not art or research. Whatever training they get, just can't be too complex, and anyone can get it too. For instance, the guy who made the Frodo head, you, or me.
"Not artists? Again I am artistic in some ways, but being able to pull off the detail in the paintwork that the people in the factory is something I have no hope at doing."
If you were told exactly how to do it by the artist who made the prototype and broke its inception down into simpler steps (and here I am drawing from Mr Asmus itself), even you would be able to do it. And remember: what you get is only rarely as good as the prototype. Normally, it is noticeably inferior.
"And the guy that made the Frodo you linked to? Self taught or not, he is an artist. Maybe not professionally (although now he has sold a head he made, there is an argument for that!) but he is definitely talented."
Can we just stop this? The rooted and styled Aragorn head costed $40, shipped. Enough said.
"Boromir and Aragorn are both bigger and with longer, straighter hair so I would assume easier. The hobbits are smaller, much curlier hair and by the fact they come in packs of two, there would be twice as much workload on a harder to complete task. So until the techniques or technology advances, I would imagine it is not cost effective for them to do this, which is probably why they went the route they did. And you say logical statement, I say opinion."
The set of 2 costed $200, according to Asmus' shop. I'd have happily paid $260 for a rooted hair version that looked as good as that custom Frodo. Wouldn't you? I would even sell my set and re-buy the rooted one.
Not using rooted hair was a mistake that they had the chance to fix with the slim versions.
"I have someone ready to root my Legolas head, and I have confidence he will do a great job. I am looking forward to seeing what he can achieve, as he is definitely an artist in my humble opinion. If sculpted is ok for you (in Legolas’ case at least) then thats great, I am happy for you."
Let us know.
No. It is not at all. It is only "by now", as I said.
"You are welcome to want whatever you like, so you are welcome
"
...?
"Asmus made a great figure with Aragorn, but unfortunately the hair sculpt (and I specify hair, as the face part was actually pretty good) was terrible. That lead to a lot of criticism. For a business such as theres, this kind of bad press is damaging to both reputation and sales. So they found a way to rectify it and do it in a cost effective way, and the Slim version allows them to re-use the tooling etc that they developed for Aragorn so increase profit margin (without which I doubt they could justify doing only heads)."
Head was terrible too (looks like Viggo with advanced AIDS) but it is the best available. Asmus doesn't have good sculptors yet. Not a single figure by them has ever nailed the likeness. That's not to say they are not cool. They are. But they are supposed to be cool AND nail the likeness. Just like HT normally does. We pay on that contract.
Saruman, both Gandalfs, The Bard, all hobbits thus far.... come on... They look like sculpted in stone and likeness is way off.
BTW, if you need to learn what a good headsculpt looks like, please refer to this:
https://www.sideshowtoy.com/assets/products/902010-storm-shadow/lg/902010-storm-shadow-015.jpg
Criticism by fans is not a sales or bad press problem at all. It is a shot in the arm, as Asmus has given proof of. Criticism by people who indefectibly end up buying your product because there is nobody else doing it, is good, and the very least you can expect at $215 a pop. It guides you, it opens your company's eyes to your customers' actual needs and priorities. It helps you make less mistakes the next time. We should criticize more. It is not negative, even when done harshly. Asmus has enough vision to have Mr Asmus roaming around here. Let's help them by criticizing them. They are learning a language they still don't master. They need our help to become fluent. We are failing them by shutting our mouths out of silly and fearful gratitude.
"This doesn’t mean they can do any head. If they could do it confidently and make money, I am sure they would have done. Look at their recent post about Gimli/Legolas;
“After taking into accounts of all the suggestion and feasibility, we opted to take a step back and stick to sculpted hair for this release because we cannot overcome the technical difficulties for rooted hair at this moment. So ultimately the sculpted hair will have better result than the much anticipated rooted hair.”"
Man, there are unprecedented challenges here. I take it. It's like "Clint, you've had a tough week. We won't hold it against ya if you can't get it up.".
And again: no such challenges on the Hobbits.
"They have admitted there are technical difficulties with rooted hair, they consider both options and then they go with whichever version they think looks best and is within their production capabilities. I have no doubt they are aware that some of their fans (you and me included) would like to have good looking rooted hobbits, but cannot at this point achieve it to a standard that is worth them doing. They already get plenty of fan feedback here, Facebook, reviews etc.
Hence why I thought a petition would be of no benefit. I still believe that is the case, and that is just my opinion."
A petition would be unprecedented and overwhelming. It would shook the pillars of Heaven. Far better that sparse comments here and there. It is one single voice screaming one single idea. Petitions have changed reality. Sparse comments, very rarely have, unless they have become... petitions.
"Sorry for the wall of text, but we both have opinions, and you know what? That is ok. It is going always going to happen with everyone on the planet. If somebody doesn’t agree with you don’t take it personally or get aggressive. I certainly meant no offence, I was merely participating in the ‘discussion’ part of the discussion forum."
If somebody doesn't agree with you, don't deride their ideas. And if they are wrong, give proof of it. Let facts do the talking.
You are forgiven.
Regards,
m.
