How the Lion's Tower Came to Be!

I've always loved miniatures, first laying paint to a mini back when I was just 5 years old, and while other kids were out playing football and socialising, I was in my room painting minis, building wargaming terrain and occasionally playing wargames with my friends.  

Conversions!

As I got older, I discovered conversions with the aid of some old citadel journals and a compendium from the early 80s that had some hand drawn tutorials about sculpting new details onto your models with Milliput.  In the later 80s/early 90s, Games Workshop published a hobby book which featured conversions (I want to say it was the "Citadel Miniatures Painting Guide" but I can't be certain now). 

Once I started hacking off heads, limbs and weapons and customising all of my miniatures I was hooked, and this firmly became my favourite part of the hobby.

Beer, Girls and Regret!

Skip forward a few years and when I started college, I had a massive miniature collection and a bits box* many people would die for!  Then beer and girls became a thing, and when I got into my first long term relationship at 17 I didn't have the time or money for my beloved hobby anymore.  I decided to sell my collection, and with it went my bits box.  

*A bits box was all of the parts left over from conversions - I'd buy a model because I wanted the head, and the rest of the model would end up in the bits box ready to be cannibalised for future projects! This was before the days of multipart kits where you have hundreds of spare parts and customisation options - most models in those days were metal and one piece, and the plastics were uninspiring, low detail one piece models with no variety.

3 years later, my girlfriend went to University in Manchester, the relationship eventually ended and I was all of a sudden at a complete loss.  I got back into the miniatures hobby again, starting from scratch and with no bits box to fall back on! I'd always done bits of sculpting with my conversions, but this time I decided to lean into that more.  Rather than spend loads of money on bits, I'd sculpt the pieces I needed and make them even more unique!  Gradually, the sculpts got more elaborate and extensive and I finally ended up sculpting complete miniatures!

Semi Professional Sculpting

in the early 2000s I dabbled with my first miniature line which was produced for me by a wonderful company called The Figure Trader who are sadly no longer around.  The range was called DK Miniatures and I only released a handful of absolutely awful sculpts!  They really should never have seen the light of day, and I have no idea if anyone ever bought them.  This was in the dawn of the internet so getting them out to customers meant getting them into hobby shops and I just didn't have the network or resources at the time to do this effectively. I changed tactics at this point and instead began doing commission work.  I did the original range of 40+ miniatures for Cursed Empire, an award winning miniature line for Table Warfare and a bunch of other commissions.  In fact, pictured below is one of the only ones I still have a record of -  this is Scratch-N-Sniff - A goblin pimp for a company called Magnificent Egos (also sadly no longer around)

The Digital Era

Then in 2010 I'd become aware that digital sculpting was looking to be the future of miniature making, and after struggling to learn poly modelling in Blender to make miniatures, I came across Sculptris which overcame the limitations of Blender and let me sculpt using a more organic user interface similar to how I sculpted with epoxy putty.  The software was very limited but then I discovered Zbrush when the owners, Pixologic purchased sculptris.  Zbrush was the perfect tool that I'd been looking for!  I purchased a lifetime licence and never looked back!

There were no tutorials around then to show you how to do anything that didn't relate to video games or animation.  3D printing wasn't really a big deal, particularly not resin 3D printing, so information was virtually non-existent.  I reached out to a few industry pros who were in groups I was in (a big shout out to the awesome Bobby Jackson who gave me a steer in the right direction!)

I found with each new sculpt I was developing new techniques and figuring out what worked for me.  And as each sculpt progressed I ended up hating the work I'd done on it previously and invariably the sculpt would get shelved and never see the light of day again! 

Beating Procrastination

This pattern of  "start a new sculpt>learn new stuff>hate the sculpt>shelve the sculpt" continued for several years until I had a conversation with my friend Oli at Table Warfare.  He noted that both he and I were procrastinators and kept flitting between projects, doomed to never actually see one through to completion.  Having had reality shone in my face, I decided I'd do something to change that.  I'd seen a load of fitness tips from people saying that you'll get better results if you post your current state online for the world to see and then keep updating with new pictures so you're held to account.  I thought I'd apply the same logic.  I set up Lion Tower Miniatures ltd and made a public announcement on social media that I'd be running a Kickstarter Campaign for a range of Fantasy hero miniatures.  Getting backers and taking money from people was the ultimate commitment to hold me to account and make sure I finished the figures!  TLDR, the campaign was a success, I over promised and took ages to make all the sculpts but I finally did it!  

Fun Fact - at the UK Games Expo 2018, I submitted my miniature range for the award category of Best Miniature range. Of over 60 entrants, I was shortlisted top 3 alongside Steamforge and Games Workshop! I was all but told I'd won the judges award too, but then with a last minute change to the judging panel, Games Workshop (the Major Event sponsor...) won instead.  I still chalk it up as a win though even getting to the top 3.  GW with all of their vast resources couldn't have their professional pride damaged by coming second to one guy working from his man cave could they?!

Why The Lion's Tower?

When I was setting up the company, I needed a name that had some impact, fitted in the world of miniatures and fantasy, and I also wanted something with some personal meaning to me as the company is essentially me on a plate!  I'd got a picture of our Kelly family crest which I had painted on the wall in my bedroom when I was younger, and I was always a fan of the design - 2 lions rampant on either side of a stone tower holding chains.  I redesigned the crest design with Lions in my own drawing style and a simple tower to create my first company Logo for Lion Tower Miniatures! In a later rebrand this got changed to The Lion's Tower, because any time anyone referred to my company it was always as "Lion Tower", so I thought I'd embrace the short hand rather than try to change people.  

From Physical Miniatures to STLs and into a Full Time Job!

Selling a physical miniature line as a side hustle was taking its toll.  I worked long hours in my day job and had an hour commute either side of the day, then getting home to even just one or 2 orders a day would lead to me needing to pick, pack, post, stock check, order new stock, order packing materials etc.  This meant that my time was taken away from Hayley and the kids (Jacob was 4 and Willow was only 1 so I was still in a sleep deprived parent/zombie state too), and our house was full of stock, packing materials, and other business related bits.  This led to arguments and family life was tough and we were all at breaking point.  Then at UK Games Expo in June 2019, Nebo from My Mini Factory stopped by my stall and realised I'd digitally sculpted all of the miniatures in my line.  At this point I was completely unaware that there were consumer grade resin 3D printers (such as the Elegoo Mars and Anycubic Photon).  He convinced me to sell my STL files instead of physical miniatures and it was the answer to my prayers!  All of our family issues suddenly stopped being a problem, and then by the time we got to November 2019, I was earning more selling STL files than I was earning in my day job as a Health and Safety/Facilities Manager!  Time to go full time!  

So that virtually brings us up to the current state of things - some ups and downs since then, but I'm still full time making miniatures for a living so I can't complain!  Thanks for taking the time to read this, now run down to the related products below and grab yourself some of these (almost) award winning miniatures from my original range!!