Its cool that at least some ppl care enough to try and sort this horrible mess out. I can only hope to someday see awesome finished products on my self of ppls work from this debacle.
I heard the molds were in a few places. I also heard they were difficult to get back ( probably cause they want to get paid in full for all the pieces). But if Cory can save the day that would be great!
Maruyama has several outlets that pull vinyl, so yes molds are scattered across the multiple outlets. As far as getting your mold back, it’s very difficult even if it’s located and Maruyama will likely never give the ok, short of flying out there and having a face to face meeting and securing your mold personally.
Are Maruyama part of the problem? They sound like they are being unreasonably difficult about it.. I mean most artists paid for the molds, and Maruyama pretty much provided the service of electroplating and constructing the molds? So really - they don't own these molds. Or did they buy Ricky's molds in bulk when he decided to become the K-Pop version of David Geffen?
Let me say, I'm just repeating what I've been told, so I don't want to say I'm 100% right. But from my understanding there are a few independent factories that do all mold making, and pretty much all the factories that pull vinyl, Maruyama, Obitsu, Lulubell, and all the rest use the same molding factories. One closed not long ago creating a bit of a log jam, but it seems like more established factories like Maruyama and Obitsu continued to get stuff molded pretty easily, probably just because of politics and connections, like any business. As far as debt owed by Ricky to Maruyama, yes I've heard it is a substantial amount, but again all hear-say. Maruyama has all of Ricky's clients as a single book of business, so even if you say "I've paid all my bills", he doesn't keep a personal record of every one of Ricky's clients, it's a collective. As far as releasing molds, it's for some reason just a very hairy thing, I don't know why, and factories just don't do it unless it's some kind of licensing issue. Maruyama is an older guy, and plays the I forgot card to his advantage. I have had dealing with him that are great and he is amazing, but if he doesn't want to do something, he will never do it and just keep acting like he can't remember or forgot. I think a lot of it again, is just politics and the way things are done in Japan, that most of us just don't have a grasp of. Lately Maruyama has become a lot more responsive, and this is probably a better time to get things moving. Truthfully I think sales and manufacturing probably peaked over a year ago. I think there has been a large decline in interest and sales over the past year leading to fewer toys being made in Japan and a situation where before he was probably pulling so much, he just didn't care, to a place now where maybe he could use the extra business.
If I were Maruyama, and Velocitron owed me money, there would be no incentive for me to return tooling to artists who used Velocitron as a middleman. Why do something that would reduce the pressure on someone who owes me money?
Is it me or are people not as outraged as they should be in this situation? I'm not trying to shit stir here I'm just genuinely amazed. Am I reading the situation wrong?
I would have lost my mind..... Start a gofundme/kickstarter page to get the molds back. There has to be a price they would release the molds. Someone in Japan should be able to negotiate a price.
as someone who hasnt been able to make toys for years now because of various issues on the prodution side of things I can say very clearly that yes i am very very upset. Ive had moments where i wanted to smash things in with a baseball bat Ive gone through months where I was beyond depressed about it. But all of that doesn't change a thing and when its all said and done "Screaming gets you nothing."
This is sad and upsetting. Do we have SBers who have a good working relationship with a Japanese sofubi artist? Say Elegab or Sunguts? Perhaps if we have someone "in the industry" willing to speak on "our" behalf, it might bend Mr. Maruyama's ear (or jog his memory?). Throw in a basket of uber cute kittens too?
I'm def upset, those molds are not cheap. I've paid my bills early every time I get an invoice from Ricky. I'm still sending him e-mails with no replies back. We're currently looking into getting the Japanese authorities involved. My aunt lives in Japan and she's willing to get things rolling on my behalf. Right now I'm giving Ricky every opportunity to reply and settle this in a civil way. I gotta say tho my patience is getting spent and that takes a lot to do.
Ok so I’ve heard the same things about Ricky’s insane debt and while it sucks for us I can’t blame Maruyama for not wanting to find the molds until they are paid in full. That said my patience are gone and I blame Ricky 100% I don’t know what the solution is but I’m going to be in Japan in November and hope to get a trip lined up to see the factory. Not that I’ll be able to get my molds but maybe a little face to face time would help. I really don’t know at this point. I just know that those molds cost me a ton and I would love nothing more than to be able to have some new Semi Korosiya to release.
I've seen lots of small to medium toys with one or two parts cost from 3 to 6 thousand which includes everything except sculpting and actual units of finished vinyl. Most of the full size toys I know of with 4 or more parts cost closer to 8 thousand. I remember a couple people who contacted Velocitron specifically to give them a price so they could do a kickstarter and he quoted both of them the same number which was 10 thousand bucks.
@toothaction What I’ve seen quoted from was also a different middleman source than Ricky, which has been known to be less expensive. Metal mold factories pretty much always stay the same, but the silicone/wax part of the procedure can differ from source to source in terms of price. But it also depends on the size of the figure and how many parts there’ll be.
Yeah the actual metal mold work has a fairly consistent price. Which is why with smaller figures it's not uncommon to put two or three of the same design in one metal mold. Doesn't cost that much more but you get double or triple the amount of toys with each pull and the price can actually be nearly the same whether the mold pulls three toys at once or just one toy. The waxing and joints are where things can vary greatly. Some people charge very little for wax work and some charge a lot. One guy I used to know would let people send him the wax proto themselves to skip a whole step of the process and save money. Back when I talked to him many years ago Velocitron refused to let people send him wax figures because that was a big part of where he made his money. He claimed no one used the right kind of wax and he refused to tell people what kind he used. I am no expert though. I am sure things can be totally different from one place to another including the price of each step in the process.
That's bullshit - he's obviously skimming a couple of thousand off the top there. The average I've ever heard for any sofubi figure (middle/standard size) that I've known about has been around $5000 - $6000. Seems like his biggest issue was becoming overwhelmed with work when things were heating up about five or so years back.. not being greedy and allowing makers to save some bucks while lightening his workload could have been a win/win for everyone. This guyyyyy... sounding more and more like a money-hungry scumbag who just took everybody's hard-earned cash and ghosted
Way back I think the Cadaver Kid was 2500 from Ricky for wax and molds. Today even a cadaver kid sized figure like CK Beta or Shinjuku Demon costs 5k. Standard size figures can hit 8-10k no problem. I don’t even want to think about how much the arch Usir is costing me, probably closer to 12k. And lulu did the wax which probably save me a few grand. Probably would be closer to 15 if obitsu also did the wax.