Oliver is having trouble with the validation of his account so he has asked me to post this-----
Hello, my name is Olivier, I'm new here, I'm not a big statue sculptor or collector, I messed with sculpey once and I only got a couple statues from sideshow collectible and the team fortress characters by Gaming Heads. The reason I'm posting here is because Peter Mook pointed me to that thread.
Apparently this ironman story, which I had moved on from, is not over yet. This story goes back to 2008. I was working as a software developer back then, and doing a bit of 3d modelling as a freelance artist.
I had bought an ironman statue from sideshow, which I would post a link to if I could, but they don't have anymore apparently, and I can't find it on google. Anyway, it was based on one of the the comic book version, the extremis I believe, not the movie, with stylized proportions, big head, big head, big feet.... but the pose sucked, it was just standing still with his hand slightly raised. I decided to model in 3d, as an exercise, just for myself. this is what I got:
http://pussycat.cgsociety.org/gallery/662186/
Then I learn about 3d printing, which was still something new back then. I wanted to get one of my characters printed so bad! so I decided to go with the ironman, and this time try to give him a better pose. It ended up like this:
http://pussycat.cgsociety.org/gallery/716296/ it's not very dynamic because I was getting too much deformation with more extreme poses. But still, it was better than the original I had
I got this print done late 2008, I remember because I gave it to my sister for Christmas. I posted those pictures on my portfolio, and around February 2009 I got contacted by this guy Darren Martins, saying he was working for First4Figure, that I got license from marvel to make super deformed characters and that he saw my ironman, loved it, and wanted to produce it to 500 units. Oh and that I would get a 10% cut of profits. Even if those 10% ended up being $3 or $4, it was still a good deal for me since the work was already done. Plus, I got to get my own model turned into a statue, I was super excited, and did not think to mention that my model was based on an existing one.
Turned out that when Darren showed it to people of Marvel, they recognized the statue it was based from and told him that they were too similar, which was true, and they did not approve it. So I felt a bit guilty here, I should have told him that the design was not 100%.
Back then, Darren seemed legit, his email were signed with a first4Figure image. What I did not now was that he was no longer working with them.
Anyway, I thought it was too bad to miss this opportunity, so I offered a solution, why not make the movie version of the armor, with the same style, proportion? That would mean I had to make a new model, but why not, it's good for portfolio. Darren liked the idea and negotiated to change the license because it's not the same for comic and movie product. I got green light, and Darren provided me some cool concepts for the MKIII armor. So I modeled the MKII and MKIII armor, which are almost the same except for the bolts and colors. You can see the two armors with the MKVI armor in this image
http://pussycat.cgsociety.org/gallery/871936/ I will come to the MKVI soon. This was during 2009, I'd say around April or may. Yes it took some time because I only worked on those during nights and weekends, and also because there was some long negotiations with marvel.
Marvel really liked it and everything was going fine, the ironmen were supposed to go to production. Darren asked me if I wanted to work on a Halo project. I said ---- yeah, cause you know, I was just this programmer working for a small startup in austin texas. So he send me so very official stuff from Microsoft and Bungie: concept art, color keys, actual game models. All those were legit, you could tell, stuff you could not find online. So I never thought this guy could be a scam if he got access to such material. So I started working on a masterchief model :
http://soletme.free.fr/jorge/ms03.jpg http://soletme.free.fr/jorge/ms04.jpg
I did not get to finish it because now there were new problems : marvel liked the ironman but now it was too close to the release of ironman 2, which will feature new armors and they did not want to release products from the first movie. According to marvel, the new armors were no that different from the first movie.
So I had a choice, either drop it, meaning I had worked for nothing, or modify the existing armor to match the new one. At this point I still had not seen a dime, but guess what, Darren sent me concepts of never seen before armors from ironman 2, almost a year before the movie release: MKIV, MKVI, and even war machine, which was still not sure if it was going to be in the movie or not.
This was real, no way he could have got his hands on these if he was not really involved with marvel.
I was ok to work on it, but this time I asked for a contract, something to sign. I did sign a paper, with his signature on it but I have no idea where it is today, I'd have to look for it. But I clearly remember it was not saying first4figure on it, but One2One, which surprised me.
I remember starting working new armors around november of 2009. I remember it because I was back to france at this time.
In the end, the new armors were not that close to the older mkIII, I ended up redoing everything except for the helmet and the feet. But what the hell, I was motivated and excited to work on such a project.
Things were going smoothly, I got a few retakes from marvel (smaller head, colors...) We were only going to make the mk6 in first time, and if it were successful, I'd modify it to make the mk4, which is pretty much the same except for chest, and I would make the warmachine. Here is the final model
http://pussycat.cgsociety.org/gallery/871951/ and also a test for a "battle damaged" version
http://pussycat.cgsociety.org/gallery/871938/
At this time, I was talking to Darren on the phone almost every day, he was very friendly and had this confidence that makes you trust him. I was not worried at all, especially when he sent me new concept for the upcoming game from Bungie: Halo Reach. It was the beginning of 2010, the game was not going to be released before october, so here again, this was very secret material that would have made any fanboy insane. I had detailed model sheets of every character, some 3d game models or armors, weapons... Since there were no way to get your hands on these unless you worked a Bungie or if you had a business deal with microsoft, I did not worry for a second and got even more excited when he asked me to model those characters. Sure, sometimes I thought "damn, I still never got paid" but that was part of the deal, do the work, get a cut, and thins I was working on big licenses like ironman and halo, I was not too worry about it failing. How naive I was.
I started working on one of the characters, Jorge, but never got to finished it:
http://soletme.free.fr/jorge/jorge-helmet-03.jpg
http://soletme.free.fr/jorge/jorge-17.jpg
http://soletme.free.fr/jorge/jorge-21.jpg
http://soletme.free.fr/jorge/noble6-06.jpg
http://soletme.free.fr/jorge/noble6-08.jpg
I was also working on warmachine at the same time, only made the helmet and part of the body, but I don't have any image of it here, probably archived somewhere on a hard drive
I never finished it because that was when it fell apart. Around february2010, I got contacted by Alan Green from first4figure saying he had important information about Darren.
I called him, I can't remember everything, but it was something like: Darren used to own a part of first4figure, then sold his shares, but kept using the company name to make business on his own, signing bull---- contracts with marvel and others. And from that day he had vanished in nature, never heard from him again while he used to call me daily for the past three months.
Alan told me he was going to try to produce the ironman, but marvel disagree or something like that, it did not happen.
So the whole story, from when Darren first contacted me, to when he disappeared, spanned over a year.
That was over in early 2010, I was devastated, but whatever, I decided to move on. You learn from your mistake and I decided to stop doing freelance and got hired to work as a character modeler in a movie studio, so I'm doing ok today.
Yesterday I got an email from Peter Mook, who I had already been in touch with when Alan contacted me. He said that apparently Darren was back and that my model was going to be sold after all.
Is it possible? Can he produce it if all he got to show is a 3d model? Well, technically, yes, because when the MK6 was approved, he went to China to get a prototype made and to negotiate production cost. In order to make this prototype, he needed the 3d file, which I had to hand over to him. This prototype actually got made, here it is :
http://soletme.free.fr/mk6/P6050045.JPG http://soletme.free.fr/mk6/P6050046.JPG
Pretty cool hu? I never got to see it for myself, those photos were sent to me by Alan Green or Peter Mook, not Darren. I think they manage to get this prototype before him, but never the less, he still had the 3d file, so if he managed to fool more people, he could totally get it made again.
So there you have it. I probably forgot some parts and details, since it was over 3 year ago, but you get the whole idea.
The irony is, I just built myself a 3d printer, it's not fully working yet, but I'm very close, and guess what is the first model I want to print?
So Olivier knew NOTHING about Darren putting it back on sale or offering it to other companies (Halima-w)! Another artist cheated by Darren...............when are the unbelievers going to accept he's a con-man and stop buying from him?
