Betomatali Customization advice

[karamazov80]

That one's a gray area where folks' opinions will differ, because there are different standards. Several boardies have modded official SSC heads (Ash, Han Solo) and resold and no one really seemed to care. But if you did it with a sculpt from an artist doing and selling custom work here then some will probably get up in arms about it.

 

[mightyq]

....i made a mistake and bought some garbage recasts from him, a they live sculpt, i even sent him hands to pain to match....at the time i didnt know that a guy named barlow offered these...i thought they were striaight from ebay,, anyway i also bought a pair of dude sneakers, they were painted extremely close to rainman's...i thought i scored a great pair of rm sneakers..... Wrong!!!.....

What q does is hound you for a positive feedback, he is trying to snag everybody that makes a mistake so he can use it against them...see he never got that feedback from me.. I ignored his cheap recasting a$$......i decided to tell my story about my purchase in aniother thread......problem is when you are new to the game, say a year or so in, and many of these customs are long forgotten about and not brought up often nobody know's whats right and wrong.....i came in in 2011, i never knew about this guy barlow? Until way after i bought from q....the they live thread was long inactive ..i blame somewhat this board for not being proactive and having an ongoing thread with listed current and past dead beat customizers and recasters....the theread should have a mention in the faq's... This way a newbie can educate him or herself before they start buying and collecting... Lets face it, many people do not have the money to blow for no reason, if member newbie x just spent $200 on customs heads and whatever, and then finds out they are recasts, but cant afford to not use these, i bet you they will use these no matter what.....and i dont blame them, this is an expensive hobby when it comes to customs and people cant afford to just throw away a sculpt or 2 or 3. I had to find out about all the bad apples through trial and error and months and months of following threads. It would have been much easier and more beneficial to everyone if their was a on going thread about the scum of the hobby.....maybe even a list of whats been recasted that members kmow of, and if somebody see's something new they post in the thread with a warning...show their ebay id's...you tube id's like odell, whatever it takes ..this would stop a ton of money going to these recasters and maybe put the money in the pockets of the right customizers. Granted there still will be members who buy recasts, for either because they are cheaper, or just cant find them, ot whatever. It will never totaly stop. But to not have something on here to try and warn not just newbies but everyone is just foolish. The bad stories need to be told to help stop new ones at least a little.

A mod needs to step up and get something going. Lets educate people before not after when guys like "q" already got the money.....

 

[mightyq]

that one's a gray area where folks' opinions will differ, because there are different standards. Several boardies have modded official ssc heads (ash, han solo) and resold and no one really seemed to care. But if you did it with a sculpt from an artist doing and selling custom work here then some will probably get up in arms about it.

thats true, but ss and hot toys are huge co's. They arent putting out a limited run of 30 sculpts or 20 figures. You probably can recast hot toys and sideshow all day long and they wouldnt feel it in their pockets one bit. They will sell their new figures no matter what. A small customizer would not only feel it, but it may kill his business.

 

[karamazov80]

Maybe, but is the question about hurting a business, or of doing something that's wrong in terms of "stealing" work? If the latter, then edition sizes are irrelevant. I don't have an answer to this, but it's a legitimate question. I think the community norm here is to defend and protect the rights of custom artists who come to and sell on the forum, and so that dictates a lot of opinions. Often folks here don't care at all about recasts affecting Sideshow or Hot Toys. And there are a lot of reasons for that, a major one an interest in helping to make sure these artists continue to do what they do.

 

[galactiboy]

Agreed... and really we're just a small group of informed collectors. Many are not and they are likely the largest group buying casts from people like Q and Diver4 since they don't know the pedigree or even the difference in quality between a real and recast item.

I think that any artist probably should expect that their work will be recast at some point. It seems almost inevitable and maybe the only consolation is if the original artist is to plan and be able to get the value they wanted out of their own sales before the recasting hurts them.

 

[William Shatners Toupee]

Well this thread title is totally misleading. I thought it was Betos thread about "How to customize" and he was going to teach us the fine art of doing things like adding real multi-colored clown pubes to his "It" figure or something.

 

[Hidden Jitsu]

Slightly stupid question if you bought a recast with intention to re sculpt it is that still frowned upon? I ask because me and fellow boardie were talking and the question came up.

The guy was gonna resculpt a head play Liam neilson into darkman with real bandages and send the sculpt off to a caster to be done so we can offer it to fellow members. I suppose because it's a mass produced head people don't care although really it's a resculpt casted and offered.

Yeah but you would not need to see the face as he has bandages and headplay stuff is not licenced.
I'm intending on doing the same for my own use and if enough people want them I will have them cast up.

 

[karamazov80]

To GB's post, that seemed to be Rocco's perspective on it. I think it's a practical one, and probably part of why he charges what he does. Nothing is going to completely stop this kind of behavior so long as legit sculpts are pricey/hard to find/take a long time to acquire.

 

[Godfather1408]

That one's a gray area where folks' opinions will differ, because there are different standards. Several boardies have modded official SSC heads (Ash, Han Solo) and resold and no one really seemed to care. But if you did it with a sculpt from an artist doing and selling custom work here then some will probably get up in arms about it.

I thought so didn't know where people stood with that aha. Because some people prefer not to ruin the orginal so they buy recast and resculpt them.

 

[mightyq]

to gb's post, that seemed to be rocco's perspective on it. I think it's a practical one, and probably part of why he charges what he does. Nothing is going to completely stop this kind of behavior so long as legit sculpts are pricey/hard to find/take a long time to acquire.

lots of truth in this..some customizers not only do they not stay connected they ignore any pm you send whatsoever. Thats alone tics people off and maybe just maybe entices them to go to ebay and deal with dirt like q, and diver4...

DOESNT TAKE MUCH TO BE CORDIAL WITH YOUR FELLOW FREAKS AND CUSTOMER'S AND ANSWER A PM.

 

[SwedishHeat]

I should probably just let this thread die a slow death, but I have a brain teaser of a question. . .

If AMC won't allow the sale of any unauthorized merch. . . why is Q able to sell recasts of heads on eBay, that aren't allowed to be sold here? Has Dave messaged the person at AMC who told him to shut it down, and told that person about Q and him selling unlicensed stuff? Perhaps a knock on the door from a lawyer would get him to change his mind.

 

[SwedishHeat]

You mean get someone from AMC to send Q on eBay a cease & desist? Waste of time for pettybootlegging. The best way to combat this would be for the artists to get some of their reps to set up eBay accounts and offer the same exact sculpts on eBay aswell for the same price as Q. Surprised they haven't done somthing like this yet

That's my point.

If it's petty bootlegging on eBay. . . why is it serious business on SSF?

And I agree with you about artist reps selling on eBay. Q is offering a service that no one else is providing. The vast majority of people in this hobby purchase their stuff on eBay. Sellers need to go where the customers are. That's why people set up shop in strip malls and shopping centers and not stores in the seedy back alleys.

If AMC is not interested in stopping the sale of unlicensed sculpts on eBay, but they will stop the sale on SSF, then it would stand to reason that artists should start selling their sculpts on eBay.

 

[turbo.VS.ozone]

I deleted my comment previously because this really is a dead issue at this point. This is all unlicensed work anyways so there's that issue also. The fact of the matter is recasters don't eat unless people put money in their pockets, that's the truth so trying to control collectors who want their stuff quick and cheap is never gonna happen. My thing is SHAME on collectors, that know better, who like to point fingers but than secretly go and buy recasted stuff.

Going back to my initial idea though, yes it would be beneficial to set-up some level of competition against said recasters by setting up shop on eBay as well, but only offering what they've already recasted, that will give people choice and draw some attention away. I think Madbug is doing this actually.


At the end of the day though it's not the same thing. Getting a completed full figure from Beto is a totally different experience than buying cheap resin recasts.

 

[Godfather1408]

Well this thread title is totally misleading. I thought it was Betos thread about "How to customize" and he was going to teach us the fine art of doing things like adding real multi-colored clown pubes to his "It" figure or something.

This made me laugh they'd have to be bloody bright red pubes! Kind of scared to touch my pennywise beto sculpt now just incase it has crabs!

 

[xphilx]

Normally I hate to leave negative feedback in fear of getting it back from them. But I'm an artist myself and I'd hate it if someone was taking my work without my permission and profiting off it, So I'm gonna make an exception

any reason as to why u didn't leave him negative feedback when you said you would?