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They have a very familiar sculpting style, similar renders, using a digital painting of a model to promote their product and located in Poland.... I wouldn't be one bit surprised if these were being made by Prodos and being sold under an alternate name.

 stanman wrote:
They have a very familiar sculpting style, similar renders, using a digital painting of a model to promote their product and located in Poland.... I wouldn't be one bit surprised if these were being made by Prodos and being sold under an alternate name.

Why would you even think they are the same just because they are Poland and use the same rendering software? That makes absolutely not sense at all. Has there ever been any other link other than Poland and renders? There are quite a few sculptors and in Poland and none of them are even connected to Prodos.

 Dark Severance wrote:

 stanman wrote:
They have a very familiar sculpting style, similar renders, using a digital painting of a model to promote their product and located in Poland.... I wouldn't be one bit surprised if these were being made by Prodos and being sold under an alternate name.

Why would you even think they are the same just because they are Poland and use the same rendering software? That makes absolutely not sense at all. Has there ever been any other link other than Poland and renders? There are quite a few sculptors and in Poland and none of them are even connected to Prodos.

Cheescake subject nature, very much in line with their boob plate models from Space Crusade. The style of sculpting is fairly signature as are the renders, yes a lot of people use zbrush and many of the same rendering programs but even when people use the same programs they still have a personal touch and flare. It's the same way you can look at a mini and have a good idea if it's Bob Olley sculpt or Perry Bros sculpt, most everyone has a fairly signature style. Based on the style it looks like it's probably done by the same artist as the style is very close despite being different subjects. Previously the renders from Titan Forge struck me as being in the same boat and after doing some reading on BGG it turns out that Prodos did the models for that KS line as well, they have done plenty of models for other companies so it's not like that's a impossibility.

No, not every artist in Poland is working for Prodos, but the style and rendering on these it seems to match very closely to other projects that Prodos has done. Additionally I haven't seen any other companies doing digital paint overs of models in their advert pics, which is something that Prodos has previously done.

Do you know the identity of sculptors? If not what's your criteria for assuming they are different artists?

There's no info about their company, or artists on their website, Prodos attempted to secretly operate under a different name with LOAD and has numerous business names and addresses connected to owners of Prodos & Archon so it's not much of a stretch that they could have yet another miniatures company under their wing. Does anybody have any clue who the WE people even are?

For the record I like their models and sculpts but there's no indicator of who actually makes them.

 stanman wrote:
No, not every artist in Poland is working for Prodos, but the style and rendering on these it seems to match very closely to other projects that Prodos has done. Additionally I haven't seen any other companies doing digital paint overs of models in their advert pics, which is something that Prodos has previously done.

Well you can strike that part off your list. This has happened in with Bloodbowl miniatures a couple of years ago, with some people kicking up a stink that the images were digitally painted over actual models.
Just for the record they were a Spanish company (It seems Spain is to Bloodbowl what Poland is to the 40k at the moment) so very unlikely to be Prodos in that situation.

 stanman wrote:
The style of sculpting is fairly signature as are the renders, yes a lot of people use zbrush and many of the same rendering programs but even when people use the same programs they still have a personal touch and flare. It's the same way you can look at a mini and have a good idea if it's Bob Olley sculpt or Perry Bros sculpt, most everyone has a fairly signature style. Based on the style it looks like it's probably done by the same artist as the style is very close despite being different subjects. Previously the renders from Titan Forge struck me as being in the same boat and after doing some reading on BGG it turns out that Prodos did the models for that KS line as well, they have done plenty of models for other companies so it's not like that's a impossibility.

Additionally I haven't seen any other companies doing digital paint overs of models in their advert pics, which is something that Prodos has previously done.

Do you know the identity of sculptors? If not what's your criteria for assuming they are different artists?

Once you've initially created your lightbox and settings, it can easily be passed on to others for renders or they use the same render farm. One of the 3d sculptors I use who does classes passes them on to students. The settings are all the same or almost similar.

For the sculptors you can find a couple links to their sculptors on Facebook, from their the portfolios. They are buried in a few places, but that was essentially how we've found a portion of the miniatures from Wargame Exclusive. As for the digital painting it isn't new. It however isn't actually a digital painting. They are painted miniatures, photographed, then utilizing photoshop essentially utilizing the dodge and burn tools. There are a couple other methods but it is simply photoshop.

Ffyllotek wrote:
So they started going on about boob size... some people are never happy.

Maybe it's because some people have been showered in the same bs for ages?

This isn't a Polish company though IIRC.

Aren't Wargames Exclusive based in Ukraine?

Is the genestealer available yet? So up for an assassin....

 Zywus wrote:
Aren't Wargames Exclusive based in Ukraine?

Not 100% sure but IIRC my order was sent from Ukraine, yes. So I assume that's their location.

But it was a nice try to discredit WE for also having models with boobs, stanman. Who's next, RH?

 stanman wrote:
There's no info about their company, or artists on their website, Prodos attempted to secretly operate under a different name with LOAD and has numerous business names and addresses connected to owners of Prodos & Archon so it's not much of a stretch that they could have yet another miniatures company under their wing. Does anybody have any clue who the WE people even are?

Sorry I have to come back to this, it really irritated to me and I may have taken it a bit personal. Even though it should not have, it struck a chord with me. I have a few renders done that could be mistaken for Prodos renders because of how they were done, so the fact that someone would just say "It looks like something so maybe it is" without doing any research or looking up of evidence, which is fairly easy to find. Does that mean someone is going to accuse me of being Prodos under another name. It reeks of a type of racism, it is like a new type of racism, company-ism or Prodos-ism, whatever it is that the only assumption was based on look. (It doesn't matter if the company was Palladium or Defiance, my answer would have been the same. When the only justification for an accusation is "look" and "feel", with no hard or even soft evidence is just wrong) Which for the record the majority of the renders don't look the same as the Prodos renders. But since they look similar and digital painting, must be.

Here are links to their facebook as well as to the websites (half are in the original post). Their paypal uses a Coasta Rica contact information, but that could be because of paypal. The item location on their Ebay says they ship from Coasta Rica. I've never ordered from the ebay, I only ordered from their online store which uses the same paypal as the ebay based on the location. When I have purchased from the online store, it ships from the Ukraine.

https://www.facebook.com/wargameexclusive/
http://wargameexclusive.com/
http://stores.ebay.com/warexstore/

https://www.facebook.com/grimskullminis/
http://grim-skull.com/

nekooni wrote:

 Zywus wrote:
Aren't Wargames Exclusive based in Ukraine?

Not 100% sure but IIRC my order was sent from Ukraine, yes. So I assume that's their location.

But it was a nice try to discredit WE for also having models with boobs, stanman. Who's next, RH?

Maybe they are in Ukraine, currently it's impossible to tell where they are as there's not one snipet of information about them on their website and as somebody pointed out their ebay store is being handled out Costa Rica (their shipping page says they won't ship to Russia so I'd assume they aren't in Russia). Most other online retailers tend to have an about us page that contains a basic profile of where they are physically located. Not having any information at all raises some red flags and I'd prefer to know a bit more about a company that I'm interested in doing business with.

How is having boobs discrediting? I made the connection of WE models to Space Crusade because they have a similar sculpting style. RH has plenty of cheesecake models as well but they are clearly done by a different artist as the sculpting style and proportions are distinctly different. I didn't make one comment about cheesecakle being bad or slam them about it, like I said I like these models. I am curious to know who did their sculpting and design work and who's making this stuff as it seems to be under a complete information blackout other than the company name.

 Dark Severance wrote:

 stanman wrote:
There's no info about their company, or artists on their website, Prodos attempted to secretly operate under a different name with LOAD and has numerous business names and addresses connected to owners of Prodos & Archon so it's not much of a stretch that they could have yet another miniatures company under their wing. Does anybody have any clue who the WE people even are?

Sorry I have to come back to this, it really irritated to me and I may have taken it a bit personal. Even though it should not have, it struck a chord with me. I have a few renders done that could be mistaken for Prodos renders because of how they were done, so the fact that someone would just say "It looks like something so maybe it is" without doing any research or looking up of evidence, which is fairly easy to find. Does that mean someone is going to accuse me of being Prodos under another name. It reeks of a type of racism, it is like a new type of racism, company-ism or Prodos-ism, whatever it is that the only assumption was based on look. Which for the record the majority of the renders don't look the same as the Prodos renders. But since they look similar and digital painting, must be.

Comparing it racism? Are you serious? I think you need to climb down off that cross ser knight.

Why are you so jumpy about Prodos? The only thing I was asking is if there's a possible connection due to the way their stuff is presented. Nowhere did I say that being connected to Prodos is a bad thing, they are a company that has built up a business model based on designing and producing lots of miniatures for other companies and seem reliable to deliver when it's not a KS. I fail to see where it's suddenly "morally wrong" to ask if they might have done the models for WE because contract work seems to be the current cornerstone of their established business model. Prodos/Archon has repeatedly mentioned how much work they've done for other companies so please explain how is it "wrong" to ask if they are involved in something that has no other company information being provided? There's more information given about the LOAD "creator" than what is being provided about WE, which isn't saying much.

Maybe I'm overly cautious but I'd like to know who I'm actually dealing with before I just throw money at a random in cyberspace.

 stanman wrote:
Maybe they are in Ukraine, it's really hard to tell as there's not one snipet of information about them on their website and as somebody pointed out their ebay store is being handled out Costa Rica.

I linked to you quite a few snippets of information. There is also information in this thread from people who have purchased from them. You should have some general knowledge and understanding about things like ebay and paypal. For example until Feb 13th 2016, people in the Ukraine had no access to Paypal. They could not create or receive funds from paypal due to the banks. They can now do so, in order to do sales outside that requires a different address and location setup, similar to offshore accounting. Except instead of doing so because of a low-tax jurisdiction it is because they need it to do business.

 stanman wrote:
How is having boobs discrediting? I made the connection of WE models to Space Crusade because they have a similar sculpting style. RH has plenty of cheesecake models as well but they are clearly done by a different artist as the sculpting style and proportions are distinctly different.

They aren't similar at all. In fact that is what spawned a whole different topic in General Discussion because of the different sculpting styles. This line along with Raging Heroes and Kingdom Death were compared to Prodos models because the Prodos ones were bad sculpts vs sexism and other things. I'm not going to hash into that topic since there is another thread devoted to that.

 Dark Severance wrote:
Comparing it racism? Are you serious? I think you need to climb down off that cross ser knight.

Why are you so jumpy about Prodos? The only thing I was asking is if there's a possible connection due to the way their stuff is presented. Nowhere did I say that being connected to Prodos is a bad thing, they are a company that has built up a business model based on designing and producing lots of miniatures for other companies and seem reliable to deliver when it's not a KS. I fail to see where it's suddenly "morally wrong" to ask if they might have done the models for WE as contract work seems to be the current cornerstone of their established business model. Prodos/Archon has repeatedly mentioned how much work they've done for other companies so please explain how is it "wrong" to ask if they are involved in something that has no other company information being provided? There's more information given about the LOAD "creator" than what is being provided about WE, which isn't saying much.

I did apologize and state it struck a chord. No you weren't asking if there was a possible connection, you flat accused them. There is a difference between saying:

"I wouldn't be one bit surprised if these were being made by Prodos and being sold under an alternate name."

and

"Does anyone know anything about this company, the style reminds me of Prodos so I wanted to make sure they weren't done by the same people"

One is asking a question in a somewhat polite manner, the other is just flat out making an accusation.

I am not jumpy about Prodos, but I am jumpy about people just making accusations without properly doing anytype of research. Within less than 5 minutes I found the above links I already linked. Within 10 minutes I was able to go through the accounts, see where they came from, read posts from the sculptors. Like I said it is one thing to ask a question ina query manner.

Also the infromation about Titan Forge is also wrong. Prodos did do some 3d printing for masters and some sculpting however the majority of them are not from Prodos themselves.

 Dark Severance wrote:

Here are links to their facebook as well as to the websites (half are in the original post). Their paypal uses a Coasta Rica contact information, but that could be because of paypal. The item location on their Ebay says they ship from Coasta Rica. I've never ordered from the ebay, I only ordered from their online store which uses the same paypal as the ebay based on the location. When I have purchased from the online store, it ships from the Ukraine.

https://www.facebook.com/wargameexclusive/
http://wargameexclusive.com/
http://stores.ebay.com/warexstore/

https://www.facebook.com/grimskullminis/
http://grim-skull.com/

That's great I've already read each of those links, none of them contain any information about where or who they actually are. All of their posts are done by the nameless page manager of WE company or by the artists handle Grim-Skull (who once in a while cites being female, or "we", or "team" indicating multiple people). But a handle is exactly that, not an actual name or identity.

Here's literally what the About Me pages read as on FB, which provides nothing to their identity or location. Outside their shipping policy there's absolutely no company info on either the store website or the blog. Ebay is useless for information as you are not privy to who you are buying from in advance of the purchase the only information they give upfront is the supposed country of origin and feedback. People buy from a seller listed in Costa Rica and items apparently arrive from Ukraine, so the upfront address is "flexible" at best. (I'd prefer to say false) It may be a workaround for not being able to use paypal in country X but I fail to see any reason why they can't provide some detail about who/where they are unless they feel they need to purposefully conceal that information and that does not lead to establishing trust as a potential business partner.

About Wargame Exclusive
Page Info
PAGE INFO
Short Description: Wargame Exclusive is a big online-store, that is specialized on selling miniatures including exclusively designed models for wargames.
Websitehttp://wargameexclusive.com/


About Grim Skull Miniatures
Page Info
PAGE INFO
Short Description
Grim Skull Miniatures is a brand new studio which designs the exclusive miniatures for wargames.
Website http://www.grim-skull.com

Let's all stay groovy please people.

Thanks.

 Dark Severance wrote:
...It reeks of a type of racism, it is like a new type of racism...

That's quite a jump to make.

 mad robot wrote:

 Dark Severance wrote:
...It reeks of a type of racism, it is like a new type of racism...

That's quite a jump to make.

1) Clearly someone doesn't know what racism is, other then a "very bad thing, the worst".
2) Dealing with any company in a country rated 130/167 for economic transparency involves a bit of risk. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_in_Ukraine

Since everyone else isn't staying on topic. In my defense it was meant as a comparison, not actually saying it was racism. When the only deciding factor used to determine something was something else was "look" and "feel"... nothing else. It wasn't even stated in a question but was accusing.

Might as well just accuse another company, that someone can't find out their sculptors because... they use the same "looking" resin and the miniatures "feel" like Prodos.

The initial sculpts that Wargame Exclusive did were actually traditional sculpts, not 3d sculpted. They semi recently made the switch to digital as you can tell by comparing older miniatures to newer ones, you can spot the differences and improved quality.

But enough about that. They are not Prodos. As with anything else, buying does buy a risk. There are multiple people in this thread who have purchased and purchase regularly without any issues. I have yet to hear an issue. That doesn't mean there won't be one, but at this time we haven't encountered one.

Durandal wrote:

 mad robot wrote:

 Dark Severance wrote:
...It reeks of a type of racism, it is like a new type of racism...

That's quite a jump to make.

1) Clearly someone doesn't know what racism is, other then a "very bad thing, the worst".
2) Dealing with any company in a country rated 130/167 for economic transparency involves a bit of risk. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_in_Ukraine

It's not that big a leap, considering one of the "they might be Prodos" justifications amounted to "Well they're both Polish, right? One o' them funny-speakin' Eastern European types anyway, same diff.". And now casting aspersions about corruption, go on, hit the hatrick, you just need a joke about Commies

You guys are so off topic worrying about how they might be Prodos (which they aren't) that you've completely missed some of the interesting renders floating about.









I'll admit, not as good as some of the others, but hey, it's new renders I hadn't seen before.

New model for sale: http://wargameexclusive.com/shop/greater-good/greater-good-marauder-new/



Or at least, an older model with a new weapon design.

Still no word on the not-a-Warp-Spider turning up in the store?

 Yodhrin wrote:

Durandal wrote:

 mad robot wrote:

 Dark Severance wrote:
...It reeks of a type of racism, it is like a new type of racism...

That's quite a jump to make.

1) Clearly someone doesn't know what racism is, other then a "very bad thing, the worst".
2) Dealing with any company in a country rated 130/167 for economic transparency involves a bit of risk. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_in_Ukraine

It's not that big a leap, considering one of the "they might be Prodos" justifications amounted to "Well they're both Polish, right? One o' them funny-speakin' Eastern European types anyway, same diff.". And now casting aspersions about corruption, go on, hit the hatrick, you just need a joke about Commies

Way to punch the worse than Hitler card...

if anybody says something that you don't like they get labeled a racist, great way to make a balanced counterpoint.

 Dysartes wrote:
Still no word on the not-a-Warp-Spider turning up in the store?

I'm waiting on word of this too. Hopefully they make a full unit in the same style.

 stanman wrote:

 Yodhrin wrote:

Durandal wrote:

 mad robot wrote:

 Dark Severance wrote:
...It reeks of a type of racism, it is like a new type of racism...

That's quite a jump to make.

1) Clearly someone doesn't know what racism is, other then a "very bad thing, the worst".
2) Dealing with any company in a country rated 130/167 for economic transparency involves a bit of risk. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_in_Ukraine

It's not that big a leap, considering one of the "they might be Prodos" justifications amounted to "Well they're both Polish, right? One o' them funny-speakin' Eastern European types anyway, same diff.". And now casting aspersions about corruption, go on, hit the hatrick, you just need a joke about Commies

Way to punch the worse than Hitler card...

if anybody says something that you don't like they get labeled a racist, great way to make a balanced counterpoint.

You know, Eastern Europe and Russia have some cool miniatures coming out of them, but I have never ever, ever had problems with people there. I have had more problems with UK companies.

I have a feeling people tried the sexist card, now they are trying oh so corrupt card. whats next?

I too cant wait for those not warp spiders.

Also Jesus guys wana take your love quarrel to Off topic or something?

I haven't liked too many of their male Tau beyond that first samurai one, but I really like that sniper. I awonder if his head could be swapped with a helmetted one?

 Desubot wrote:
I too cant wait for those not warp spiders.

I keep checking but yeah waiting for the not-warp spider and the rest of the Samurai Tau before I make another purchase.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Barzam wrote:
I haven't liked too many of their male Tau beyond that first samurai one, but I really like that sniper. I awonder if his head could be swapped with a helmetted one?

I wish they would have pictures of the pieces. Some have heads separated and others don't, not that it is too difficult of a mod but would be nice to know what the individual pieces were.

 stanman wrote:

That's great I've already read each of those links, none of them contain any information about where or who they actually are. All of their posts are done by the nameless page manager of WE company or by the artists handle Grim-Skull (who once in a while cites being female, or "we", or "team" indicating multiple people). But a handle is exactly that, not an actual name or identity.

Here's literally what the About Me pages read as on FB, which provides nothing to their identity or location. Outside their shipping policy there's absolutely no company info on either the store website or the blog. Ebay is useless for information as you are not privy to who you are buying from in advance of the purchase the only information they give upfront is the supposed country of origin and feedback. People buy from a seller listed in Costa Rica and items apparently arrive from Ukraine, so the upfront address is "flexible" at best. (I'd prefer to say false) It may be a workaround for not being able to use paypal in country X but I fail to see any reason why they can't provide some detail about who/where they are unless they feel they need to purposefully conceal that information and that does not lead to establishing trust as a potential business partner.

All I can say is that I've ordered WE stuff through their website and through ebay (user montastore), although I'm not sure whether or not the ebay user is theirs or a reseller. All orders arrived from Ukraine within a reasonable time and in great quality/condition.

Why exactly does it matter to you whether or not Prodos is behind them and where they come from, though? Their products are of high quality, and I've yet to hear something negative about their (=WEs) business. Even if there would be links to prodos - how does this affect anything?

Prodos' and WEs styles are different, either you like both, dislike both or you like one or the other. If you dislike Prodos and WE that doesn't mean they're the same style or company.