Goals

July 26, 2021July 30, 2021 crazmadsci Goals

My Not So Lost Adventure – Mega Project Status Update

Group Image of all Miniatures printed so far for the Lost Adventures Volume 1 Kickstarter project.

What’s a Mega Project?

At the beginning of the year, I wrote up a very lengthy list of 2021 Hobby Goals for myself. While this list has been very ambitious there is one category that I have been working diligently on, my “Mega Projects”. I designated 6 mega projects that I wanted to work towards in my 3D printing hobby. The focus of most is to print 100% of the files from a Kickstarter I’ve previously backed.

There are a few exceptions to this rule such as props and such that come along with 3D printable Kickstarters. I only desire to grow my miniature collection, terrain, and buildings and not larger objects. I will perhaps consider going back to those once my kids are interested so they actually “find” an object or one such thing or another. Maybe they would drink real “potion” bottles to heal. Bring role playing into a bit of reality as they grow their understanding of tabletop games and inspire imagination. However, I believe I still have a few more years before we get to that point.

Example of some 3D printable props from Lost Adventures Volume 1. Dwarven Tankard, Wearable Tiara, & Potion Bottles

Why start these mega projects? Why is there a need to print these Kickstarters? I have two main reasons.

There is nothing worse than buying a bunch of games, models, and terrain but never actually getting it on your table. The primary focus of these mega projects is to have a larger reexamination of my 3D printing model collection. For many 3D printing enthusiasts collecting digital files of sculpts is very similar to a wargamers pile of shame, pile of potential, or pile of opportunity depending on your preferred name. The goal was to convert these digital dreams into reality and therefore represent physical reminders for things to paint. Or turning this digital vault into “Piles of Opportunity”. Absolute worst case scenario I can still play with physical miniatures instead of digital files even if they aren’t painted.
This is the first time in my hobby experience where I am crafting without having a current gaming group. Previously my hobby time was motivated by what I needed for the next session with my hobby group. Now I have free reign to make what ever I desire and potentially craft my sessions around these builds and miniatures instead. I’m excited about the inspiration and creativity that is driving my Dungeon Master mind to come up with new and exciting stories.

This hobby project idea and goal has brought me a ton of joy and excitement in my hobby time and i’ve been falling in love with models and figures I never would have otherwise. I do end up in spurts of mass production which can definitely chew through my hobby budget but I find that it’s worth it.

Since the year is half over it is time to evaluate my progress on one of these projects.

Lost Adventures Volume 1 Kickstarter

Lost Adventures Volume 1 is the second Kickstarter from the now titled company Lost Adventures Co. which focused on almost the perfect essentials kit for starting to 3D print and desire to add models to your table. With a healthy mixture of common monsters, bosses, scatter terrain, buildings, and scenery it is probably my number one recommendation for buying files. As a Kickstarter from 2019 FDM filament printing was the predominate style of printing miniatures so many sculpts and ALL the terrain and scatter prints absolutely supportless which also makes it useful for any starting 3D printing enthusiast. Also, out of any project I’ve ever backed these are most likely going to be the most used monsters and terrain I’d ever need for my tabletop.

This Kickstarter comes with 47 sets of miniatures and 37 sets of builds, terrain, and scatter (sets meaning individual purchasable sets such as “bandits” or “trees’ etc). Lost Adventures Volume 1 is my largest Kickstarter ambition of the year. I have decided to not print the supplemental props that could go with the encounters that come as well. The goal is 100% printing for functional tabletop pieces.

This Kickstarter I’ve been working tirelessly on for most of the year so far. I have printed several of the terrain and scatter pieces in the past as a test printer for the Lost Adventures Co. but I have yet to print the models in my own time. I have always known that I wanted the complete set for this Kickstarter but have set it aside for one reason or another. Now it is time to dust off the cob webs and knock it out of the park.

My Current Progress

I started to dive into this project at the Beginning of March full throttle. My primary focus was to work on tackling the miniature portion of this collection and then slowly add the scatter terrain and buildings.

So far in this project I have printed 75% of all the miniature sets, and 13.5% of the terrain and scatter. Combined making it approximately 47% of all individual bundles in the Kickstarter. I don’t think I truly realized how incredibly large this Kickstarter truly is and how much of a deal it was.

The Statistics:

Total Number of Models: approximately 108
Total Print Time: 14 days 18 hours 15 minutes
Total Resin Used: 1808 grams
Total Cost of Resin: $73.49

Original Kickstarter Price: $50.00 (Purchase now for $80.00)
Total Cost to Date: $123.49

Special Note: This calculation only includes the time for “Successful” prints. Failed prints are currently not counted and number provided above is ideal scenario. Total time and Resin usage is actually higher but exact value cannot be calculated at this time.

Total number of different sculptors & creators for models: 28

Note this does not include concept art & other members of the Lost Adventure Co time, only creators who produced a digital sculpt for printing.

Favorite Models to Date

Graveyard Golem- Khaldoth the Corpse Keeper

My absolute favorite model to date is the Graveyard Golem. What makes this sculpt really unique is that this stone golem has risen into creation in the middle of the graveyard. There is so much story packed into this model. On the model you can see coffins, chains, religious symbols, and so much more which was buried directly underneath the tombstones that are above the head of the golem.

Sculpted by James Dorrington this is now an absolute must have in my collection. However I am actually really incredibly nervous about painting and doing this model the justice it deserves.

Hydra Horror – Malgáthez the Devourer

The Hydra Horror will also always have a special place in my heart as it is the first miniature I have successfully magnetized. As a hydra this model has 5 necks with swappable necks to go from a 5 headed beast to a 10 headed monster and any variant inbetween.

Check it out if you want to read more about magnetization.

Sculpted by Artem Bespalov & Deryck Pelligrini.

Honorable Mention

Some of my other favorites in the collection so far are the Fire Giant, Commoners Pack 1, Watcher, Eye Horror and Lizardfolk

Not so Favorite Models

There are a few models that I have made that due to their design either just doing match my personal art style or I just don’t think they are modeled well for tabletop gameplay. With all good things and especially large scale things like this there is bound to be a few.

Lord of Liches Niru the Everlasting

This model would definitely fall in the “Love Hate” category. While I absolutely love the artistic style the design of the model and its super thin joints along with massively heavy spell effect make it absolutely non-ideal for gameplay. I would absolutely recommend that you NOT print the spell effect if you desire this model in tabletop play as it is prone to toppling over and breaking. Which is of course what happened to my figure not even a day after I took the picture.

Sculpted by James Dorrington, which is incredibly interesting because my favorite model the Graveyard Golem is also sculpted by him.

wolves

Also in the category of least favorite models. I do not know why but the fur texture on these wolves is not my ideal sculpting decision. While absolutely functional for tabletop play I admit that it is just not my art style. However that is one of the beautiful things about this Kickstarter because you can see so much variety of what is available in the tabletop space. I definitely think i’ll still paint these guys and practice on different types and colors of fur. Maybe with some color i’ll fall in love with the models.

Sculpted by: Eder Lindorfe

I am also not a big fan of the Storm Giant Seer due to her immense size which is much larger than my other giants from this collection and the hobgoblins. I think the hobgoblins are just too “bearman” like instead of a goblinoid but again personal preference.

What Next?

Well considering I have so much still to print especially in the terrain and scatter categories I am going to start working on that and writing the print logs for models printed before the site existed. At the moment I am taking a break from printing the miniatures but still plan on knocking the collection out before the end of the year.

I intend to work on updating and improving upon some of my other mega projects set aside for the year and will be writing status updates for those in the weeks to come.

If you want to see more of what I made and printed check out the complete list of the 108 miniatures below. Each photograph and Description will take you to their corresponding print logs which talk about my experiences, troubles, print settings, and more pictures of that collection.

Also feel free to check out the Lost Adventures Volume 1 Project Page for an entire list of all the models in the collection.

Complete List of Prints to Date

Lost AdVentures Volume 1

May 22, 2021 crazmadsci Goals, Tools & Organization

Storage Wars (Part 4) Project Tracking & Workflow

Introduction

Last but not least, regarding my war of attrition against entropy is my recently improved project tracking and workflow system. It might sound silly that one would need to require a method of keeping track of projects and steps within projects, however since I jump around alot having some kind of method to my madness helps. Not only do I need some kind of system to help me keep track of project statuses, I want a method to keep track of what I’ve done, plan to do, or ideas for the future. The whole process has become increasingly more complex with the addition of the website as well.

Previous Project Software

Before I go into the current system I’m using lets talk about ones I’ve used in the past. Previously I’ve used and tried all kinds of software such as Trello for project statuses. Using software such as Trello is what was most familiar in form and function to systems used in previous jobs so navigation for massive projects was ingrained in me already.

While I enjoy this software a lot and it does have integration to my cell phone and other electronic devices. The system uses a series of boards which can have cards to slide across the boards to track what step pieces of that project are worked on. Each card can have notes, links, attached files, and even be integrated without side programs. This would make it easy when sitting around to add more or less to the Trello board and see project status.

The largest downside to this method is that I struggled having a board for each project and having the projects fit my monitor without scrolling. Having a better global picture of my progress at one easy glace was not easy.

Another downside of this is that I want to keep track of what I accomplished each day or what area of the hobby I was focused in. This aspect is not accomplishable through trello.

To compensate for that I have been using Evernote which is a digital notebook to keep track of different write ups, mental notes, etc. I used both Evernote and Trello in tandem to build a workflow state. But again it became too complicated as I began to grow the number of ideas I had, projects in various states of completion or just things I want to remember. As I wrote more notes they slowly got lost more and more frequently in the depths of my various notebooks defeating the purpose of writing them in the first place. I still sometimes write drafts in Evernote such as a recent post draft: How Do You Magnetize Models Anyways

The New and Improved

I have been using Trello and Evernote together since about December and decided to try something a bit different. After listening to one of the latest episodes of Paint Bravely the Podcast, Brent from Goobertown hobbies mentioned the usage of a bullet journal for the hobby. I have always appreciated the concept of a bullet journal but never considered it for a specific aspect of my life. If you are not familiar with a bullet journal it is essentially a planner that is catered exactly to your needs. The reason for this is that the bullet journal is essentially created by you the writer to fit your needs. There are some people who completely obsess with the visual appearance of their bullet journal and I’m definitely aiming for more function.

There are Pinterest boards, YouTube videos and even a designated subreddit on the subject of bullet journals and various templates for creating each page.

To better understand what I mean how about I share some of my favorite pages so far.

The largest pages that I am currently using regularly are:

1) A main project page

This includes all the steps it takes for each category to get from being printed to having a write up on the blog along with being cataloged in my collection.

This is the same as a trello board with cards mentioned above but there is something extremely satisfying with coloring in each square and being to see the project as a whole more clearly. I use blue as completed and orange as blocked due to some reason or another at this time.

2) An idea bubble.

This is new and is essentially my idea page for a landing website page for the blog. I like to have an idea of what I want to add to the page when designing and planning things I have to come. This can help me scheme global layouts and I can mark them off as they are completed.

You can see in this page I’m hoping to have a series of guides regarding resin printing. It can be a wide and complex category so any time I think of more to add I’ll put it in the bubble with notes to the side of what they would contain.

3) Monthly hobby type wheel.

I absolutely loved seeing the percentage of days I spent doing different aspects of the hobby for my January/ February Retrospectives but I lost track of it in March/April due to the data being hosted on a google spreadsheet. This is a super easy way to summarize a large overview of what I did for that day. I have a key at the bottom to dictate what each color means. Anything blank means I unfortunately did not get anything worth noting done that day.

I do also have a weekly/monthly planner of sorts which I write the info of what I accomplished in more detail.

Overall the system appears to be working for me and it is easy to carry a notebook around the house. The only difficulty is if my small assistant runs off with my pen or colored pencils which he loves to do.

I have noticed that since moving to a physical medium for note keeping my productivity has increased. I am also working through my backlog of data faster and more efficiently.

I don’t think any system is perfect and it is a long work in progress. I’m hoping to include paint recipes and colors in the future to the notebook but I am burning through pages faster than anticipated. I might need another book which stays on my desk at all times.

Do you have a system in place for project management?

Conclusion

Thank you for following along with my short series for storage and organization. I know this was a ton to unpack but has been essentially the last two months of my hobbying experiences.

I am slowly starting to hobby again and finish things up but doubt I will be really ready to dive into something again until after the new addition arrives to our house and a new normal is in place in terms of routine. However I have been putting a lot of work into the Kingdom of Thamarya buildings I’ve printed. I’ve tried several new things that I’m looking forward to sharing with you. Stay tuned for a write up on that!

As always thanks for hanging out and reading. Let me know what you think.

Happy Hobbying,

Crazmadsci

Continue Reading

Storage Wars: Part 1 State of the Crazy

Storage Wars: Part 2 Hobby Space

storage Wars: Part 3 Miniature Storage

March 25, 2021July 31, 2021 crazmadsci Deep Dive, Goals

Introducing: Crazmadsci “Deep Dives”

Introducing a new post series: Deep Dives

As a 2021 Hobby Goal it is my ambition to work on “Deep Dives” of 4 different major topics. This is a post series i’m extremely passionate about and look forward to starting.

What is a deep dive?

From an analytical standpoint a deep dive is an “intense, in depth analysis of a certain problem or subject.” What does that mean for the tabletop hobby? Well for one I want to research, explore and experiment with all the different ways myself or my fellow hobbyists tackle a subject in the tabletop space. Either painting, printing, playing or something perhaps something else entirely. A deep dive will document my entire journey, the successes, failures, and methods.

The Never Ending Questions

The primary goal of a deep dive is to begin to answer some of the many questions I face when crafting and playing. Some of those questions include:

Where do I even start for X Project? How do I break out of the rut of doing the same method over and over again? How do I make my collection of scatter, miniatures and terrain stand out and be unique as opposed to all look the same? What materials do I need? What problems will I face? What is the lore or history around this project?

The downside is that some of these questions end up becoming so overwhelming for me, projects never get completed or even started. Uncertainty and fear of messing up especially when I have so little hobby time can be debilitating.

Since the purpose of crazmadsci.com is all about sharing my experiences in the hobby, how about also including my experiments?

Introducing…

The crazmadsci DeepDives. This area of the site is going to be the location of all my “experiments” or rather rabbit holes. For painting I admit while learning and figuring out color schemes, paint recipes, paint techniques etc. I do have an affinity for painting along with others or taking the advice and experiences of others to heart. Almost every youtuber, guide writer or instagram poster has a different method of painting bone for example. Or depending on the area of focus either via 3d printing, buying kits, or foam crafting the process of painting terrain may vary based on materials and tools on hand. The goal of my deep dives are to attempt to figure out not only why these other hobbyists make these decisions but also what suits my current skills, materials, and preferences the most. Why not take advantage of time spent by others to figure out what works?

Perhaps painting bones, wood, metal etc in a dozen different ways apiece will give me a wide array of experiences and examples to choose from to help diversify my hobby playbook.

Deep Dive Goals

What are my goals for the Deep Dives:

1) Learn numerous ways of tackling a problem

2) Increase the diversity of painting in my collection

3) Grow in both mentality and skill for the hobby as a whole

4) Understand more the mentality of others who are also in the hobby

5) Create a collection of choices or swatches, when painting for future inspiration. A portfolio of sorts.

6) Document the process so I do not forget what i’ve learned and have reference material to go back to.

Deep Dive FAQ:

1) Will the deep dives stay purely focused on painting?

Absolutely not. I plan on doing deep dives and focus research on many aspects of the hobby such as miniature photography, materials for crafting, various aspects of 3d printing and more that come along the way. I do want primary focus for the time being to be on painting though.

2) How do I choose what is researched?

This will mostly be revolving around the subject matter that currently perplexes either myself or a reader. Once we encounter a question we will tackle it as it comes. However there will sometimes be some larger pre-planned projects resulting in a “series” of posts and experiments.

3) Once researched once will I ever go back?

Absolutely! As I grow in the hobby i’m sure my questions will as well requiring me to constantly come back and fine tune. I”ll try to keep every major category numbered to more easily follow along. Find more guides online that you think I should try myself and add to the collection. Don’t hesitate to bring them up as I will constantly be evolving myself.

4) Where will my “research” be coming from?

All of the experimentation will have references & links to the original source of that method. Sources will come from as many places as I can find: Youtube, Blogs, Random search engine responses, Pinterest, Facebook, Discord groups, etc. No credit will be taken in my hobby experimentation but rather become a repository to hear how something is solved in numerous different ways. All ideas, methods, and concepts learned from a particular location will have the citation to go with it so you can hear it from them as well.

5) Format of Deep dives on the site:

The current intent is to post more about my current project progress rather than just start and finish. So hobby posts which subscribers/followers of the site get notified of upon publication will get updates of project progress after milestones are completed. Eventually upon project conclusion a reference page will be created so we all can go back and refer to images, paint schemes etc as needed. This will make it easier to find information down the road if you are not following along. Also all posts will be hyperlinked for easy navigation. Posts will occur on Fridays if a series is in progress.

Potential Future Deep Dive topics

Current areas that I as a hobbyist am planning to investigate (No order of importance):

Painting Bone
Painting Wood/ Trees
Printing with Transparent filament
Supporting models in FDM & Resin
Miniature Photography
Flocking & adding foliage to my terrain
Painting castle/ruin terrain, various stonework
Painting Skin, humanoid and other

Conclusion

For the month of April I am currently planning on doing a 5 part series on a deep dive into painting Wood & Trees. Starting with its introduction on Friday, April 2nd. Stay tuned.

This will allow me to better compile my experiments while answering some of the many questions I have about the hobby. Perhaps others might have the same questions as well or if i’m lucky answers. These deep dives could also prove valuable in the years to come as I hope to repeat or reuse pieces of builds or add to my collection. Lastly the aim of this is to instill confidence and a form of accomplishment in the hobby. It is incredibly easy to always feel like nothing is ever done in a space of never ending goals and projects.

What kind of questions do you have in the hobby space? Have any questions about painting wood and trees?

As always Happy Hobbying,

Carrie, aka crazmadsci

Wood Painting Deep Dive Part 1

New Website Sections!

I’ve recently added new sections to the website to make this conversation and others for deep dives more easily accessible. Found under Painting you can navigate to either the homepage of all Deep Dives or directly to Wood Painting for more easily accessible information and pictures of the color palette.

Deep DIve HomePage

Wood Painting

Previous Write Ups

March 1, 2021March 2, 2021 crazmadsci Goals, Retrospective

State of the Crazy March 1, 2021 & February Retrospective

Update Quicklinks: Life, Painting, Printing, Blog, Hob b ystreak, Hobby Goals

Wow I can’t believe it is already time for another Retrospective, I can’t believe how much shorter February feels and it is only 2 or 3 days shorter than other months. Regardless lets get to it!

Last week I finished the Catfolk Fisherman from Lost Adventures 1. Stay tuned for a painting write up later in the week! I also spent a good deal of time cleaning up models, building another organization shelf on my desk, assembly of the Blacksmith (another write up on the way!). Not only that I FINALLY got to play a game of Frostgrave for the very first time. All of these things are actually so exciting for me I’m going to be releasing a post about each one this week.

All in All I feel almost like I’ve not accomplished anything last week. Perhaps it was due to having a visitor for several in my home for the first time since July. I kept up my hobbystreak but it was still incredibly difficult to deep dive into any one task. Instead I jumped around to various tasks and necessities I had around my hobbyspace.

Now for the retrospective….

Life of February

February was overall a quiet month. I feel like it moved in a blur without a massive milestone or event happening. The largest and most exciting thing that happened is that I saw more snow this month then I ever have living in Tennessee. Since moving further south it is rare to get snow and snow that sticks past noon the next day is a unicorn. While we didn’t get as much snow as many surrounding areas the 3 inches of ice and snow lasted almost a full week resulting in my handsome husband working remotely and the whole feeling like it shut down. There was zero infrastructure for snow that other than the interstate and highways no roads were treated or plowed. This was such a crazy concept for me as I grew up in the mountains. Regardless it was fun however I did run out of filament and almost out of resin waiting for a package that was 8 days late. No worries we still got plenty done.

Painting Overview

As for painting in the month of February I accomplished 1 miniature and 1 building. The building, the Fishers Hut took quite a bit of time and was a roll over project from January. Overall i’m happy with it. Enough so that I even put up my first display shelf in my hobby corner so I can see my created stuff and be inspired!

As for the miniature I completed the catfolk fisher from Lost Adventures Vol 1 the Tradefolk Storytelling Pose pack. While I feel like I could have done a better job and put more time into the paint job. I in truth got distracted and didn’t take good enough notes on the paints I used and couldn’t remember what to blend with. I guess that is what you get for juggling so many things at a time.

While I feel like I could have definitely spent more time painting this past month i’m still pretty happy with my progress and growth in skill. There is definitely a difference between some of the early paint jobs and now.

Catfolk Fisher

Fishers Hut

Printing Overview

For the month of February I got quite a bite accomplished in the printing category. As a whole I worked towards printing 4 different kickstarter projects I am currently juggling.

Lost Adventures Vol 2 (Greensea): This contains most of the miniatures I have printed this month including the Catfolk Fisher I painted. I am working towards printing everything and at this point have been making steady progress. Largest hurdles of what is released is two sets of models I wish to rescale smaller to true D&D scale and the 3 released buildings. FDM & Resin Print project
Kingdom of Thamarya: This is predominately the buildings I’ve been focused on printing, First with the Fishers Hut and now the Blacksmith. Next building is still slightly up in the air but I am currently leaning towards the cottage. FDM focused print project
Monstrous Encounters- Undead Rising: This FDM supportless miniature campaign I supported in 2018 and began printing in September 2020. I got distracted finishing this project when I started resin printing and desire to finish the collection. It is very close and I just got a page created for it to keep track of my progress! FDM exclusive print project
Lost Adventures Vol 1: Being the 2nd kickstarter by Danny the 3DPrintingDM from 3dPrintedTabletop, is also one of the kickstarters I aspired to complete as a 2021 goal. I have begun printing these models, more specifically the miniatures. Currently Resin Exclusive Print Project

Over the course of February I estimate that I printed:

Two Buildings

EverSpring Temple (Early Test print)
Lost Adventures Vol 2

4 Different Groupings of Terrain/Scatter:
Waterwell, Breadcart, jungle trees, and Fallen Jungle tree sets

Miniatures:
11 FDM Miniatures (Various Monsters from Monstrous Encounters)
73 Resin Miniatures (Lost Adventures 1 and 2)
Note this does not count duplicates and print failures.

All in all i’d call it a successful printing month. Wouldn’t you?

Blog Overview

As always this is the section i’m most critical. I keep having to re-evaluate my time and how long it is taking to do something. I have accomplished quite a lot in the month of February. Lets do a quick review of the blog.

Posts: 7 published (4 update posts, 3 painting posts).
Pages: 28

Posts vs Pages:
Overall I have been attempting to document the when of a project via posts and through my weekly updates. Pages currently consist of the How something was accomplished, directory of a project, or future information. Since posts do go to the “blog” section of my website and archives along with notifying followers of posts I am attempting to not spam but also publish consistently. The downside of this is that I update pages with significantly higher frequency than post resulting in the reader discovering less of the content that is being added. If you are reading this and have any suggestions i’m all ears.

Pages of note this month created are my Work in Progress (WIP) page. This houses a listing of all the current projects i’m working on. It directs to the various kickstarters I am working on and what is contained in them along with printlogs, what i’m currently working on, and what is in the print queue. I have been attempting to update each project’s page whenever I create a print log which is 2 to 3 times a week.

I have also created pages for the kickstarter projects I’m doing:
Lost Adventures Vol 1
Lost Adventures Vol 2
Monstrous Encounters – Undead Rising
Kingdom of Thamarya

The coolest part about the project page for me is that I am beginning to reference the site significantly more and more as time progresses as a way to track my own projects as opposed to using my Evernote and Trello Boards. It is really cool to see myself finding the site useful which was a goal all along.

As a result of attempting to make more of these foundational pages I am yet again behind on the print logs and data of what i’m working on. Don’t worry I haven’t forgotten and am working as much as I can.

Last but not least I surpassed my goal of the month and gained 4 new followers to the blog. I am so excited that people are showing interest. Thank you, truly and deeply thank you.

I also received my first comments to various posts on the site. I am absolutely tickled pink! I will respond to each and everyone if you have something to say.

Hobby Streak breakdown by Activity in February

Hobby streak documentation can be found on my Instagram. Breaking this down by what I did or worked on for the week helps me to visualize what I’ve been doing or focusing on. It actually has been really helpful to me as days can sometimes blur by.

Below is an overview of my month based on Hobbystreak documentation. As a whole I spent a lot more nights focused purely on the website while painting less. While I wish I painted more I do not think it is currently a loss. I do think it is hilarious that my photography time went up because I took photographs 1 more night than January.

2021 Hobby Goal Summary

February was a month of slow and steady wins the race. Nothing of significant note for the Goals but definitely making a dent.

Below I broke down my goals and color coded based on work put into. Green means essentially “on track” or “better than expected”. Yellow is “in progress” and Red means “no progress or does not meet up to goals currently.”

Painting

Paint an average of 4 days a week
- All but the last week I achieved this goal
Have greater than 183 hobby days (more days than not)
- 59 hobby days and 32% completed towards my goal
Create 12 different bases for miniatures
- Did not work on any basing in the last month
Paint to completion at least 24 models (regardless of size)
- Painted only 1 model last month making it 3 instead of 4 painted.
4 deep dives to paint techniques or methods/recipes of painting
- no progress

3D Printing

6 mega projects
- Making major progress to this goal with trying to wrap up Monstrous Encounters & starting Lost Adventures Vol 1
In-depth study of supports for FDM
- no progress
Learn how to support resin
Inventory 3D printing/tabletop collection
Develop a deeper understanding of print settings

Blog

Weekly update write ups (Mondays)
- State of the Crazy Posts do get written but not on time nor consistent.
Weekly Page addition to site (Fridays)
Complete Digital Catalog of what I have made
Complete Beginners write ups to 3D printing
Get 25 Followers to Blog 4 followers! Thank you people 25% of goal completed

Until the next time,
Crazmadsci aka Carrie Day

February 9, 2021 crazmadsci Goals, Retrospective

January Retrospective

Update Quicklinks: Life, Painting, Printing, Blog, Hobbystreak, Hobby Goals

I’ve decided to do a monthly review of what I accomplished in the last month (January 2021). This is going to be great at the end of the year to evaluate my annual goals as well as have a better grasp of what i’ve accomplished. It is so easy to take for granted what you have already achieved. So here it is my January Retrospective.

This has been incredibly hard to do as there is a lot to unpack in the month, in project development, site evolution and well just life.

Life of January

The biggest life related things that threw a curve ball into everything is the fact that I truly believed I was going to move 800 miles and start over putting down roots in a whole new place. I started packing the house, signed a lease for a new place, and even started organizing my hobby stuff in anticipation. I attempted to use all of my resin I owned and finish up spools of filament left laying around in order to reduce the “stuff”. Turns out long story short, we did not move and decided to stay. WOW what a roller coaster. We also discovered that the baby on the way this June is going to be a boy! So all around super exciting for this crazy household.

Painting Overview

Overall I would say my painting is the weakest part of my hobby skill. However being able to finish projects has given me an increasing level of confidence along with all the positive comments and likes on my Instagram, yay for dopamine! As a result i’m finding myself experimenting more while painting and actually finishing projects more so than I would have otherwise. Over the course of January, i’ve painted 2 miniatures: my Dwarf 2021 benchmark and the Purple worm. I also painted 2 pieces of siege equipment and 19 Tavern Dungeon tiles . On top of that I’ve started painting the Fishers Hut from CastnPlay and should be finishing painting shortly. This is probably one of my most productive hobby months to date in painting mostly due to the hobby streak.

Printing Overview

Printing this month has been a bit all over the place. Overall my goal resin printing was to attempt to print as much of the resin I had left and use it before I moved (not anymore). I did not want to move with any opened bottles of resin so I made ALOT of small bits from the Fantasy props kickstarter along with weapons from the STL Miniatures patreon Blacksmith. As I am still new to resin printing and learning how to gauge how much resin is in my vat is a developing skill. There was a lot of slow experimentation. I also printed some props that I was missing or pieces such as the siege equipment. I also started the props and bits for the Fishers Hut.

As for my FDM printer I made the Fishers Hut building! This was an incredible amount of fun and I spent a lot of time into learning the prints and began the development of my new preferred support settings. This is one of the first released buildings from the Kingdom of Thamarya kickstarter and CastnPlay is still optimizing the files for printing. Throughout the process I took a ton of notes and submitted some feedback which I hope helps the future community. I have also started printing a very very large building as a test printer for the Lost Adventures Vol 2 Kickstarter. This is still in progress into the month of February.

Blog Overview

This is an area that has seen a lot of growth as well as frustratingly not. As a whole I am only posting approximately 50% as frequently as I hoped coming into the new year. However the pieces that I do post i’m proud of. I definitely have been going above and beyond the original goal and believe I am building the foundation of something truly great. One such example is the write up for the Fishers House with printing logs, assembly guide and in progress painting write up. I have not been writing as much content for others getting into the hobby as I would have hopped but believe it will come but my imposter syndrome makes me feel like I have to “earn my street cred” with the projects I have done before I start writing about it. I am attempting to take better notes as to what I’m posting when so I can get a better summary of all the work that is involved in the site for my own understanding and appreciation of the work I am putting into it. I know i’m being harder on myself but look forward to the day I get my very first comment on the site. So far interaction in views is growing but likes and comments are still non existent.

Thank you to the TWO new followers I gained in the month of January! You know who you are.

Hobby Streak breakdown by Activity in January

	Painting	Photography	Modeling	Website	Misc	Primary Project that Week
Week 1	5	1	1			Purple Worm basing
Week 2	3		1	2	1	Benchmark
Week 3	5		1		1	Organization/Website
Week 4	3		2	1	1	Siege Equipment
Week 5	3					Fishers Hut Assembly/Prime
Total	19	1	5	3	3
Percentage of Month	61.29%	3.23%	16.13%	9.68%	9.68%

2021 Hobby Goal Summary

As for project development I have 100% printed all the models form the Fantasy Props Kickstarter which has been a ton of fun. I have ended up with more scatter terrain than I ever thought I would have otherwise and even some pieces which are super unique and wouldn’t be in my collection otherwise. This has definitely started thoughts on future write ups for things such as “What is too small to be on your table?” “What prompts you to get out of your comfort zone” and “How much dungeon dressing do you really need?” I’m interested to see how these pieces will be used in the future. I am overwhelmed in write ups for this project but have learned some great lessons regarding the data management component of printing.

Painting

Paint an average of 4 days a week
- Estimate 61% of the month
Have greater than 183 hobby days (more days than not)
- 31 hobby days and 16.9% completed towards my goal
Create 12 different bases for miniatures
- Completed the experimental “expoding base”
Paint to completion at least 24 models (regardless of size)
- Painted two miniatures (Purple Worm & Dwarf Benchmark)
4 deep dives to paint techniques or methods/recipes of painting
- I’ve begun research but not actually dove into anything

3D Printing

6 mega projects
- completed Fantasy Props Kickstarter is finished printing, writing in progress
In-depth study of supports for FDM
- Support Tests have been started. Deepdive in progress
Learn how to support resin
Inventory 3D printing/tabletop collection
Develop a deeper understanding of print settings

Blog

Weekly update write ups (Mondays)
- State of the Crazy Posts do get written but not on time nor consistent.
Weekly Page addition to site (Fridays)
Complete Digital Catalog of what I have made
Complete Beginners write ups to 3D printing
Get 25 Followers to Blog 4 followers! Thank you people 16% of goal completed

Until the next time,
Crazmadsci aka Carrie Day

January 1, 2021February 4, 2021 crazmadsci Goals

2021 Hobby Goals!

I am not one for New Years Resolutions so instead i’m creating a list of 2021 Hobby goals. Since I know that the next year will inevitably come with a few curveballs as well as a few known changes such as a new addition to the family June 2021, I am unable to attempt to change my behavior every day of the year with a resolution. So instead I am setting goals for 2021 i’m going to break into 3 categories: Painting, Printing and the Blog along with a final Other bucket. Below are the goals for 2021 in each category. This is definitely a list which will take time to focus on but I think it is absolutely accomplishable.

Painting

Paint an average of 4 days a week
Have greater than 183 hobby days (more days than not)
Create 12 different bases for miniatures
Paint to completion at least 24 models (regardless of size)
4 deep dives to paint techniques or methods/recipes of painting

Painting can include modeling, terrain crafting, basing etc. I have some very doable goals for this category as I believe it to be my weakest of all 3. Overall my painting is my least confident area and I am slow to complete models due to needing significantly more knowledge and practice in the area. I also am counting hobby days instead of a hobby streak due to the incoming baby. Knowing that I cannot continue a streak in the hospital and with a newborn i’m instead focusing on total hobby days for the year and will attempt to always beat previous hobby streaks. For the deep dives to paint techniques I am going to attempt to grow my skill in a technique or practice as many different methods people paint things such as bone. By practicing different ways others achieve a goal perhaps i’ll discover my own preferred system or different ways to accomplish things. I am not counting terrain as completion for models but do end up painting terrain and scatter quite a bit, perhaps more than miniatures which I should fix.

3D Printing

6 mega projects completed
In-depth study of supports for FDM
Learn how to support resin
Inventory 3D printing/tabletop collection
Develop a deeper understanding of print settings

3D printing is my largest strength for several of these goals I’m already well on the way of completing. The largest difficulty will be to document, photograph and write up my work onto the blog to document my progress. As a way to mitigate that I am starting a rule that I cannot start printing for that work week without writing up what I’ve printed the last week. The largest area of weakness is the mentality, strategy and settings for for supports for FDM and resin printing. The 6 “mega projects” will consist of either 100% printing of a kickstarter or a large scale ambitious project. These projects I’m definitely super excited about but not limited to.

Blog

Weekly update write ups (Mondays)
Weekly Page addition to site (Fridays)
Complete Digital Catalog of what I have made
Complete Beginners write ups to 3D printing
Get 25 Followers to Blog

The Blog will keep me honest about my goals. With the mentality to create a historical and educational location of my projects, this will hopefully be a great place to see my personal growth and one day help others with their own goals and projects. At least perhaps inspiration. The largest thing I need to focus on is my weekly write ups and additions. I must be consistent in this and this will be without a doubt the most time sensitive of the entire collection of my annual goals. The weekly updates will be blog posts and page additions to provide depth to the site. Every weekday I am hoping to add bits of my projects such as printed sets and later link to a “Mega Project” page upon completion. The page additions will contain information that are more indepth such as learning write ups, introductions to the hobby etc. This will have more of a universal application and not time sensitive so will be located on a page on the site. The goal of the blog this year is to also improve navigation, usability and user experience.

Other

Improve photographing of projects/miniatures
Try 2 new tabletop top games
Monster Cards for each monster in collection
Read/Listen to 5 books
Play a video game to completion

Last but not least is my Other category. These things can relate to my hobbying but are not restricted to it. Overall I would like to improve photographing my miniatures and terrain as well as learn more about what goes into taking better miniature photographs. Also I desire to branch out and grow in more games and interests. I know for certain that Frostgrave is a game I intend to try as I have the book but have yet to play it. Perhaps i’ll branch out into wargames or sci-fi, who knows, but i’m excited about the future. Also of course my imagination is also fueled by some of my other favorite mediums books and video games, can’t forget some of those.

Overall 2021 is already looking like a full year but by chipping away at it. I believe that I can reach my goals. Follow along and find out.