I almost missed my chance. I was in Iceland at Fanfest and the meeting almost didn't happen. It wasn't anyone's fault, but real life impacts everyone. The person I was supposed to see was leaving and suddenly about four or more devs sprang into action. And soon I found myself sitting in a conference room explaining why I thought now was the perfect time to launch a store featuring my artwork. And, for the first time since 2015, the person across from me at that table - agreed.
Before I get any further into this let me give a huge thank you in writing, officially and publicly to Anna Katrín Ólafsdóttir for all of her help, support, and encouragement. And, only to be fair, to Hilmar and everyone else at CCP who worked to help make this crazy dream a reality. Thank you all sincerely. I just wanted to take a minute and say how much I appreciate the opportunity.
Right now over at Rixxjavix.com you can purchase 15 pieces of my Eve Online artwork on posters, both un-framed and framed - with a few special pieces also available on canvas and metal prints. Officially and legally. As time goes on I will be adding additional pieces on a regular basis, so be sure to bookmark the site and visit often. I plan on adding new pieces about every 4-6 weeks depending on my work schedule.
I can tell you that in the past few weeks I have test printed all of the available posters and they are sitting behind me as I write this. I even used this exact system to print the recent commissions I finished for Jin'Taan and have them shipped to England for him. So confidence is running high. However, like all untested systems, this one remains untested at scale. So please be patient with any potential bumps in the road that may happen. I don't expect any, but until it has been up and running smoothly for awhile - I will remain nervous about it.
Now for a few words about the details. I searched far and wide for a system that would achieve my goals for this project. I wanted to provide affordable posters of my art that wouldn't cost an arm and a leg to ship around the world. Back in 2015 when 8 of my posters were available the shipping costs to certain parts of the world often amounted to double or triple the costs of the actual posters. I did not want that to happen again. That meant choosing a print-on-demand solution and one that had extensive shipping/printing facilities across the globe. Shipping is never going to be cheap. But with 30+ locations around our planet I believe I've discovered the best solution currently available. I can tell you this, no matter where you are in the world - the shipping is never more than the price of the product. In fact it is amazingly reasonable.
Now, not all products are available everywhere. As I discovered with Jin's commission, framing was not available in England for some reason. And I am legally not allowed to sell product in a handful of countries. So there are some built in restrictions I have no control over. But I honestly don't believe any of those will impact you all that much. Posters are all available in standard poster sizes.
Speaking of which I personally choose the sizes available. Some posters come only in one size while others come in a wide variety of sizes. The SoE poster, for example, comes in a wide variety of sizes including a huge movie poster sized version.
Those are the details.
Those of you who have been reading this blog for any length of time already know - this has been a long journey. And I don't want to belabor the point. But allow me a moment to take a deep breath and do two quick things here. First a quick "neaner neaner" to all those who said it would never happen, or who told me to stop trying, or otherwise threw negative energy at me over the years. And secondly, and much more importantly, let this be an example to all of you about patience, dedication, and stubborn fortitude. Never give up. Never surrender. Eventually the stars will align. They say luck is just hard work, dedication, and being a little crazy. I've proven that a million times in my life. So if you've managed to read this far (and didn't skip out way up there at the link to the store) let this be an inspiration to you. Whatever your dream happens to be, don't let anyone take it away from you.
That was a lot of words.
TL;DR - The Rixx Store is now OPEN!!