Alchemy Art
CREATOR
9 months ago
Project Update: Production (Note on Surveys and Shipping, Apologies!)
Hey friends! I apologize for taking so long to catch up with you. Things are underway in production here, but also have been incredibly insane the last few months. I've posted a long number of updates to socials, but I was waiting to get a firm update for you guys here before posting... then got caught up waiting for the "right" update. This was supposed to go up last night, but we got hit by hail that took out some power, so apologies for the Sunday-to-Monday delay which I'd communicated to those who asked.
- The first thing I wanted to mention that this project did get delayed because of my involvement in (and running of) Purrtagonists. You have my firm apologies on that. What started as 26 designs turned into 55 art designs, vectors and sample passes with that campaign (with we admitted there and in all updates was something we didn't predict correctly) and caused waves on anything that followed it. We've caused a few of our manufacturers to actively melt a bit (55 designs, even split up to 4 manufacturers, proved to be too much for them to keep track of).
It's been almost entirely just myself and Venetia handling the Purrtagonists campaign - and we've had some insanity in our lives in big ways. I had a surprise move that took up all of March and most of February since it was over 10,000 pounds of stuff... all on a pulled hip disc (so I was relatively heavily medicated during March when I repulled it the second time), and Venetia had her child in January (of which still is trying to turn her into a zombie prematurely, with love). I've still been finding and assorting things from the move even this month since I had to get help packing (which meant nothing was labelled correctly). Bluntly put, our lives became a chaotic mess for a minute.
- The artist-friend we hired on to assist with vectoring also has going through some abrupt life changes with medical related items, so the vectors for the previous campaign were only finished out last month. However, before their latest scheduled medical operation, we pushed through the last of the translations of the Venti pin, fleshed out the detailing, and pushed it into production. I've included the generalized artboard in the backer only body (sans codes) just so you can see how that looks - we typically never show these artboards from having had things stolen before, but I just wanted to show that progress had been made.
We're currently tweaking some design aspects in the sampling process.
SURVEY & EXTRAS ADDITIONS:
I'll be updating surveys (as they mainly take shipping funds) once the samples have been fleshed out. I found out in April (so shortly after the last update) that there were some serious changes happening to how first class mail (going to Ground Advantage), as well as priority changes to rates. Our UPS contracts have also updated, so largely their rates actually are better than Priority rates going forward.
Because of this, I've opted to pause collecting those funds until we have a better gauge on when we'll have these in hand (probably know in 2ish months depending on how samples go and how quickly they're completed). The fear right now is that I'll either overcharge massively, undercharge massively, or the service will change significantly by the time we roll around to it. Billing closer to will allow this to be more accurate, as if UPS is actually cheaper, insurance is included and so on (while USPS isn't inherently).
All said, the wait on surveys was intentional on my part with watching the situation, but I do apologize that I wasn't clearer while running around that I'd planned on delaying them for this reason. It also gives me time to work on the (addition!) display box that I'd been looking into and seeing if we had enough residual funds to offer that to the full set backers, and offer it as an option to anyone else. Thankfully box turnarounds are far shorter than pin turnarounds, but it will impact shipping.
NEXT UPDATE TIMELINES:
I'll try to tune in again in the coming month (at latest in early Sept) with further progress!
-Mel
I'll be updating surveys (as they mainly take shipping funds) once the samples have been fleshed out. I found out in April (so shortly after the last update) that there were some serious changes happening to how first class mail (going to Ground Advantage), as well as priority changes to rates. Our UPS contracts have also updated, so largely their rates actually are better than Priority rates going forward.
Because of this, I've opted to pause collecting those funds until we have a better gauge on when we'll have these in hand (probably know in 2ish months depending on how samples go and how quickly they're completed). The fear right now is that I'll either overcharge massively, undercharge massively, or the service will change significantly by the time we roll around to it. Billing closer to will allow this to be more accurate, as if UPS is actually cheaper, insurance is included and so on (while USPS isn't inherently).
All said, the wait on surveys was intentional on my part with watching the situation, but I do apologize that I wasn't clearer while running around that I'd planned on delaying them for this reason. It also gives me time to work on the (addition!) display box that I'd been looking into and seeing if we had enough residual funds to offer that to the full set backers, and offer it as an option to anyone else. Thankfully box turnarounds are far shorter than pin turnarounds, but it will impact shipping.
NEXT UPDATE TIMELINES:
I'll try to tune in again in the coming month (at latest in early Sept) with further progress!
-Mel
Includes Backer-Exclusive Content
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