'Augmented reality' for collector pins? Yes, and more out now from FanSets—aka my old buddy Dan Madsen!

Some of just the first offerings from Fan Sets

It's the 50th! Everyone is looking for a new way to show and celebrate their Trekness... and now here's a cutting-edge spin on an old favorite from none other than my buddy and colleague Dan Madsen.

His new company FanSets just launched with Dan, founder of the former longtime Official Star Trek Fan Club and my boss-publisher for the late great Communicator mag, and two partners in a great new enterprise: combining official and beloved 2-inch Star Trek character and ship pens in a bunch of new ideas for wearing and display—including a blow-your-mind way to see and enjoy pins in a whole new way!

Wait, what? you're saying by now:  Pins are kinda retro, old-school —and yet still fun for when you can’t cosplay and just want to wear a favorite ship or character. But what's cutting-edge about a pin?

My annual catch-up with Dan at San Diego Comic-Con

"It’s the Augmented Reality pins," Dan told me in an exclusive chat. "We are working with a company out of Indonesia that is one of the top three Augmented Reality companies in the world. Essentially, what this is, is—let’s take the Enterprise pin: You'll be able to take an app that we’ll provide and, when you see that pin on anyone, hold your smartphone or your tablet up to it for a second–and suddenly the Enterprise will come alive, out of the pin: it will literally be 3-D and move—shoot off into warp drive, with music and sound effects."
 
Or, say, point your app'd smartphone at one or more certain characters on a transporter pad and get a 3-D holographic beam-out effect, with voices and music. Or stand your Enterprise pin next to your buddy with her Klingon ship, and point again:  "The Enterprise will come out of the pin, the Klingon will come out of the pin, and they’ll have a space battle right there on your phone! Firing back and forth at each other."

Dan says he and FanSet partners Lew Halboth (28 years in the video game industry) and John Garrison(his industrial background backed by comics fandom) expect to have the first AR pin out by Christmas, and to demo the system for fans at "STLV"—Creation Vegas Khaann. But long before then, there are lots of other lines coming—and an ever-growing batch of the basic pins are up at the FanSets.com website right now."The fun thing is, not only can you wear them, you can display them," Dan says. "If you decide today you feel like wearing Sisko, then you put Sisko on and wear him— then you come home and you put him back in your display."

They have "tons" of these pins planned—from basic character and ship pins by the "hundreds" of styles, where minor characters like M'Ress are just the start (she's in the first 50). "She's one of the coolest pins, to me," Dan says. "That’s just an example of how we’re going into more of the minor characters that you don’t see turning up on most merchandise, if at all."

But you can also look for everything from pins with moveable parts, to autograph pins (to get and wear your favorite actor's inking), to "alphabet" pins sporting a notable of that letter (S with a Spock!) ... to the AR pins and app. The autograph pins are slightly larger, but "not so heavy they weigh down your jacket!"—and take any pen used for signing regular photos.

"By Vegas in August, we will probably have 50-70 different ships and characters, and probably have some of the first autograph pins there for the actors who are appearing," Dan says. He's especially proud of the vibrant colors and the enameling on even the basic pins: "The website does not do these colors justice! The little Chakotay pin—it's only two inches tall, but you can see in detail the little tattoo on his forehead."

"And by the end of the year we're going to be launching a collector’s club, so that people can not only get exclusive pins but get access to order first on our limited- edition pins—like a run of 1701 pins, and once they’re gone, they’re gone."

Look for a special FanSets display case coming, too. "The fun thing is, not only can you wear them, you can display them," he notes. "If you decide today you feel like wearing, you know, Sisko, then you put Sisko on and wear him— then you come home and you put him back in your display." You can collect them all, he adds—or maybe just the original series. Or Next Generation or Voyager, or just the ships, or the captains...and so on.

Dan was most enthused and insistent that his partners all came together with a business plan that took over three years to design and capitalize and, in a word, is not flimsy. They fully intend to "pump out" hundreds of pins, go deep into the Star Trek bench of characters, ships, and gear—and not be dependent on early sales to make the full line come to pass, including the high-end AR pins. "No, we're not launching with just a bare-bones line—that’s the reason it’s taken so long," he says. "None of us wanted to get involved if it was gonna be hanging by a thread, at first. We wanted to make sure we had all our ducks in a row, so as to have the biggest launch and rollout we could."

"We’re gonna have a huge collection in Vegas—our very first appearance at a convention, " he adds. "We hope to have an augmented reality demonstration there to show, and we’ll have a ton of pins there to buy. And at Mission New York a month later, and at Destination Star Trek Europe." The license includes many countries globally and covers all Prime Trek, with the Kelvin Timeline movies about to be added and the new Bryan Fuller TV Trek series dealt for as soon as possible.
 
FanSets also has a license for the same ideas with Harry Potter and DC Comics, and will be adding more franchises soon. "But I wanted to start with Star Trek because that’s where I started, with the Official Fan Club," Dan says, "and it’s still the closest to my heart. And to get them launched in time for the 50^th anniversary!"

Timing did not allow FanSets to get a booth at massive San Diego Comic-Con—but Dan says they'll have a presence with two exclusives, available from either the Stylin' Online at the Official Star Trek booth or at the Stan Lee Comikazi booths at SDCC. One of the pins is a tribute to Nimoy, Doohan and Kelley on the transporter pad, the other is an Enterprise inscribed with the SDCC 2016 line—and both to be sold for that weekend only for $12.95.

Otherwise, the regular character pins sell for $8.95, the ships are $12.95, and the Augmented-Reality pins are $12.95 as well. The line of the moveable-part and larger autograph pins are not set yet, but everything the company sells will be under $20.

And, he proudly adds, no consultants were used in the choosing of these pins.

"We’re all Star Trek fans—we sat down and thought, who should we do?" Dan recalls. "We have to do the main guys, but once past that—who are the ones we don’t see very often that we ought to do? We don’t have to sell a million of each one—we’re selling to collectors, so we can do a smaller run and do pins that appeal to a smaller number."

Sure, that's great talk, I tell him—but have you thought about a Tellarite?

Dan knows me well: “I am absolutely proud to tell you that we have a Tellarite!"

I can't wait to see it.



FanSets also has a Facebook page.

STV: Meet Star Trek's '60s-style poster artist, Juan Ortiz

This one has been in the can for a while, but hey—people still love Juan Ortiz' funky
60's-style Star Trek poster looks, and very few folks have got to meet this incredible artist who's started a mini-franchise all his own with these iconic, widely-diverse graphics: posters for all 80 original Trek episodes, and now the animated series, too, on everything from T-shirts to trading cards.

CBS helped collect them all into a "coffee table" style book, STAR TREK: The Art of Juan Ortiz —it still makes a great self-gift if you didn't get enough Trek in your stocking!—and during the 2013 holiday season sponsored a gala signing event for author and book, opening a gallery show of the posters at the West Coast venue of the Paley Center for Media in Beverly Hills. The event was reported, but here's how it looked and sounded, along with Juan and his fans:

Single episode posters (and in the U.K. too) and spin-off goodies like shot glasses, and trading cards from Rittenhouse Archives, are available, too.

New Bye Bye Robot 'Voyager' art: it's my bud, at last

It's taken 20-some years, but I finally feel I've done right by one of my oldest friends—or at least that's me personal reaction to Friday's news announcement at startrek.com of a new five-piece, four-artist original print offering from Bye Bye Robot.

Actually, here's the full frame:

I met art studio Bye Bye Robot founders Charity and Chris Wood in 2010, before they were BBR, and was happy to help how I could as they worked to get their official CBS license for Star Trek fine art prints and graphics in 2012. 

But even further back: Many of you know my logos for Trekland, The Con of Wrath, the Trekland Trunk, and most of all Mystar Media; some of you even remember the incredible black-and-white line art in my old, original annual "TNG" concordances.  THAT was all my bud Kevin Hopkins—met up the first week of sophomore college year as I hosted aTrek/sci-fi club organizer, then oft-roomates and mutual best men… and, since my days with pro Star Trek, my perennial candidate for breaking in to the licensed art world. 

Like many others whose Trek work you've seen before, he has a great style that includes portraits, heroic fantasy, and photorealistic biology/botany—in both "analog" pigment and now digitally.

Charity tells me she's excited for this set, each one repping a different series, and to work with two new artists among the four—Thomas Ziffer, who's been involved with the gallery, as well as Kevin.

"Kevin has been on our radar for a long time," Charity says, when I asked her for some thoughts for TREKLAND. "I first met him while he was accompanying Larry at the Dallas Comic Con, back in 2010. We chatted about his penchant for fossil digs, and then I found out about his art career and talent. Well, it took us nearly four years to capture one of his paintings, but we’ve finally done it. Now (besides more awesome artwork) all that’s left is to weasel my way onto one of his paleontological digs so I can fulfill my dream of finding my very own fossilized megalodon tooth!"

My getting Kevin and Charity introduced was a happy serendipity that finally led to this "official Trek" opportunity: but instead of Kevin's faces of actors, it's ships—as in, the fourth print just released by BBR and their first-ever Voyager subject. Take a close gander, up top—and I'm proud to say I lent a couple eyeballs and notes for it, too. 

"Being able to work on this Voyager poster project and doing the art for "The Long Way Home"  is a very special thing for me because it lets me give back a little bit to an idea and a an ongoing project that has given me so much," Kevin says. "And doing an officially licensed piece of Star Trek related art (for Bye Bye Robot) is a special milestone in my career."

Kevin reminded me that he grew up in an even more rural area of Oklahoma than I did, where the sparse TV offerings like The Twilight Zone, The Outer Limits, Lost in Space, and "the annual Saturday afternoon showing of This Island Earth " was enough to tease but not satisfy the sci-fi craving they awakened. 

"There was a bookmobile that stopped in the community sporadically, and one summer I managed to read the entire science and science fiction sections that it contained," he says. "I would save up for visits to larger towns where I could find cheap science fiction paperbacks.  Still, the scifi sections were small in even the best of book stores.  I still remember the first year that science fiction novels outsold westerns nationally."

And that was about the time Star Trek hit, Kevin recalls: "The first season of the original airing was like a breath of fresh air for me—it supplied something that my mind was aching for; it allowed me to see that world as something larger and more diverse than the little town where I lived. My affinity for Star Trek continues on through the present; it has brought me friends, experiences and life lessons I would never have encountered otherwise, and I am very grateful for them all."

And me…I'm just grateful to have finally helped play a part in getting that talent out to the "official" Star Trek world. Yay, Charity… and yay, Kevin.

Official ST Shop helps with post-Vegas fan expression! Here's my picks

Today I'm a day away from heading into the ultimate Trek experience that is, of course, Creation's Vegas Khhaaann!  (And I'm not the only one.) But then what, Treklanders? After Vegas and all the other summer cons before, fandom's summer pretty much calms down... and many turn to thoughts of cooler days, school and such.

The Trek never stops, of course—it just manifests itself differently in the new season. Your Trek pride doesn't end with the slowdown of summer conventions ... It's time to head back into crowds of the unwashed at school, work, concerts or football games, and spread the Trek word. More and more, fans in that mode like the subtle approach in displaying their fandom—subtle, that is, or unaltered.

And in a movie year like 2013, any mass mainstream audience thoughts turning to Star Trek turn to Star Trek Into Darkness, of course. With its intensive and long media blitz worldwide, the latest film is the surest way, short of original Kirk and Spock, to get across your personal preference in pastime passions.

All this is to say that just because Into Darkness has come and mostly gone in theaters, though, is no reason that the title and design are not still "hot"...and it will already be Blu-ray/DVD release time come Sept. 10, anyway.

That's why, given the chance to pick out a few items from the official Star Trek Shop at shop.startrek.com— exclusive items from STID, and with many characters and slogans— I kept it simple and went with the basic. And by basic I mean unaltered.

Such as: your basic T. No catch phrases for me—just that original ad image of Harrison atop London rubble in the outline of an insignia patch.

And what better way to get the message across than that original STID teaser image—the "poster" version of the T-shirt, when you order it at the Trek store online. Sure, you can catch the manicure models donning it, but here's how mine looked: it's a quality garment and one





Next up, your fandom-display options expand when school's back in session—whether for you, or one of your kids. Proclaiming your faves via notebook cover is an old hallowed tradition in those first back-to-school days. Establishes your identity in the ego pool, right? So I also chose this basic-teaser option ... Into Darkness journal book: More the scope of college students and pros. but it gets the point across to anyone sitting across from you: "Shall We Begin?"





Finally, nothing is more personal and telling these days than the cover one chooses to sheath a smartphone in. For me, my iPhone 5 can sit tight in this STID case—again, basic and unadorned with extra wordage, but what a tough little side tri for ruggedness. But hey, there's plenty other designs to pick from: Your mileage may vary. (And it makes a statement to those who no longer look at your notebook.)










The official store has a whole slew of exclusive and basic fun gear heralding Into Darkness—and some oldtimers, too. Take a peek, get on their list, and get first dibs when a rock-out sale pops up!

Bye Bye Robot adds new artist, high-flyin' new retro art

A while back we told you about the smashing style of new stylized Star Trek high-end fine art posters offered by our artist friend Charity Wood and her new officially licensed company Bye Bye Robot—and while we were on vacation she broke out with exclusive offerings from an additional artist and his own cool retro style.

No need to elaborate—the "Enterprise Shuttle Service" poster by Steve Thomas says it all. If you are a TOS fan at all, though, you will not only get that obvious Class F model, but also the Cestus III and nearby landmark reference on the poster (where, coincidentally, where my head has been lately).

Take a gander here at Steve's fun design (which also comes as vinyl stickers) and its modest pricetag—and all the details at Bye Bye Robot:

'Bye Bye Robot': CBS turned my buds loose with a Trek art license!

It's not often that I get to watch the genesis of a Star Trek licensee from close up—but this week I'm feeling a little like a god-parent.

You know: having had nothing to to do with the conception or carriage, but honored to know the parents, be hit up for a little advice (very little) and be around at the delivery ... winding up with a title that's all glory and no responsibility!

So it is I'm thrilled to see the birth this week of a whole raft of LICENSED Star Trek limited-edition fine art prints as the debut offerings from Bye Bye Robot—otherwise known as Charity Wood, who with husband Chris is already well known as the Trek news blog and podcast Subspace Communiques. We've met and hung out several times on the con circuit the past couple years, and I'm really stoked for them as they launch this new endeavor. As Chris tells me: "We're devoted Trek fans and we're excited to be bringing an original take on iconic imagery." And with a license, they are fans actually empowered to do cool yet professional fine art by CBS/Paramount.

Charity also has some non-Trek, non-franchise original pieces as well in a series she calls AquaMARINE, with more variety on the way—but all her work is done in a technique she calls Pas de Lignes, which literally translated from French means “No Lines”; in effect, built up from a black rather than white foundation.

"It’s a modern style I’ve been working in for many years," she says on the site. "You can think of it as painting in reverse. I begin on a black canvas so the black “lines” you see are actually unpainted areas…not 'outlines.' Another way of thinking of it is that I paint everywhere except the 'lines'.” And they are available in a variety of sizes and options befitting fine art pieces designed to last, in Giclee, or museum-quality archival inks and acid-free cotton.

Charity just told me another news flash that's not up yet: "Along with bringing additional artists' work to the site, we're in the process of offering a line of original stickers."

I hope you have seen the launch news all over, like trekmovie.com and startrek.com, but here's my take from a front-row seat with both Charity and Chris. The first Trek topics are great choices to harness Charity's textured, color-splashed process to the max—but it is a business, and she artfully scores there as well.

Thinking for as broad a market audience as possible, the 1960s Enterprise is iconic and cool, of course—a familiar form to all, no matter what token Planet Hell cave set you may have been hiding away in. In a different way, I think the Gorn offers a surprise, even for those whose world orbits in a universe of mundanes; the reptiloid guy is eye-catching even if you've never even heard of Cestus III  or Bobby Clark. These are both on canvas, including the two views of the Big E.


But the unusual vertical "triptych" format for the tribbles panel on paper, is, I think, doubly perfect for the legit fan with an professional day-job office full of walls or halls to brighten up—and wants to do it both subtly and playfully. I can so see those furrballs in a Treklander engineer's office or doctor's waiting room. Who can argue with the perky hues? it will be fun to watch which visitors and patrons catch on to not only the tribbles joke, but the main Starfleet tri-palette behind them—and how long it takes...

So, good luck, Charity, Chris and Bye Bye Robot (no relation to that other Star Trek robot guy, as she shares the story behind the name on their site.) Everybody go take a look! Aside from online sales, they intend to be at a number of conventions this year, including Vegas Khhaaann in August, of course—as well as Comipalooza in Houston May 25-27, and Austin Wizardworld Comic-Con Oct. 26-28... and more to come.

Meanwhile, I'll be waiting patiently on my Tellarite Gav (or Grolst?) print in the next batch!