Furfunding Highlights 12.27.15

Illustration from “Ice Dragons and Arctic Creatures,” now (successfully) funding on Kickstarter

Last Ladies of 2015

I’m from Texas. And that means that, while technically it’s winter, what these ladies are wearing, or failing to wear, is perfectly appropriate for our 75-degree days. They might want to put on a little something at night, but it’s down to personal choice really.

Furry art luminary Rukis ran her latest “Menagerie” portfolio through Kickstarter. It sounds like it’s a bit of a gamble for her—male pinup and imagery is a strong seller in the furry fandom, and she’s been putting the men in “Menagerie” for five years now as her annual subscription portfolio. The female portfolio follows a similar pattern—a subscription building up to the final portfolio. There ARE a few changes though, like going color (not full color, but at least a handful of the images will be created as full-color illustrations.)

At the challenging stretch goal of $7000—currently that’s only $2000 away, achievable but uncertain—Furplanet will release the book in hardcover!

A little less furry, but still vaguely on topic, the Buff Babes Zine project, is starting “Heiresses of Atalanta,” their next Zine project: a trade paperback-sized collection of art and short stories featuring buff women from the worlds of fantasy: centaurs, orcs, oni, and elves (though the idea of a sturdy elven woman really throws me somehow, since even the men are kind of willowy. Maybe they’re like hyenas?)

As a ‘zine style publication, there’s a lot of contributors, over 40 of them, so any discussion of the art quality would involve going into a LOT of artist portfolios. But overall it seems like appealing stuff.

The Bigger They Are…SizeCon

A quick callout to SizeCon, New York City’s Micro/Macro convention, spun from their local meetup community. This is scheduled for April 23, 2016, but they’re kickstarting through New Year’s Day, so you can buy your tickets and swag on Kickstarter.

This convention is interesting. They’re trying NOT to go full furry in their marketing copy, which I can understand. Most of the world does not care about furries or is generally fur-positive, but the internet geekdom is still run the “Tyranny of Small Differences,” and closely related fandoms (read: ALL INTERNET FANDOMS, they’re as incestuous as a Tudor Dynasty family reunion) tend to get their jollies by taking potshots at each other. So while you can find SizeCon on FA, they downplay their furry ties.

As a way of trying to find middle ground, you can pick up stickers and fair for your badge at SizeCon, showing your interests (or topics of avoidance), so if you DO have a “Giants” sticker on your badge, that’s a topic you want to engage in. If you have a “no sex talk please” sticker, you’re not in the con for the fetish elements. One immediate problem with this is that it’s an optional system, so you can’t know if the lack of a micro sticker means “Never mention micros to me” or “I don’t care about the sticker game,” but it’s still an interesting idea.

After hosting both King Kong AND Godzilla, I’m pretty sure the Big Apple has enough convention space for these guys…

Corbeau Tries Crowdfunding

After something near three years of talking about crowdfunding, I’ve finally opened my own page on Patreon! Well, it’s exciting to me, anyway. It’s not for Furstarter, but for my other favorite topic, thrift stores. Specifically, thrift store art from my wonderful home town of Austin, Texas. You can see the blog over at TAMONNATAOA, on Twitter, and the Patreon page. I need to work on that body copy, though, it’s awful short.  I’m pleased with the reward levels and goals, though. I’m also experimenting with Google Adwords, another tool to work with and learn about. An expensive tool…

For a “complete” list of furry/fur-friendly crowdfunding projects, check out the Project Page!

New Projects

Books/Print

Ice Dragons and Arctic Creatures (Ends: 1/20/2016)
Playing cards and books with a blue and white and frost theme from the successful maker of Fire Dragons and other dragon-themed lines.
Over goal! The artist has 18 Kickstarter campaigns, it looks like they’re all success stories. Check her book catalog.

Book of Ominiue: Starborn (Ends: 1/29/2016)
A Sci-fi/Fantasy crossover novel, a little magic, a little space, a little Frank Herbert’s “Dune.” Some nice maps and worldbuilding in project page.
Just a little bit furry, but novels with low graphics content are kind of borderline anyway.

Clothing/Costumes/Accessories

Sound-Reactive Mask (Ends: 1/24/2016)
A Jaguar-patterned, vector/line art sound reactive mask for festivals and raves.
Over coal!

Events

NYC SizeCon (Ends: 1/1/2016)
A Macro/Micro meetup convention in New York City. I guess NYC has had practice with giant creatures. You can also meet SizeCon on FA.
Very little furry content. The con is very inclusive, and there’s a lot of overlap, but they may be trying to minimize the furry fandom to keep more doors open.

Adult

Rukis’s Menagerie (Ends: 12/31/2015)
An all-female portfolio from Rukis, with pinups and more.

Heiresses of Atalanta ‘Zine (Ends: 1/17/2016)
Buff Ladies of Fantasy, art and pinup. Lots of very sturdy species: centaurs, oni, and orcs, to name a few.

….Just For Fun

Digimon Live Action Short Film (Ends: 2/5/2016): Well, the title says it all! A short animated Digimon fan film from Italy, with great CGI, but sadly no big blue wolf thing.

…Meh

Ziggy Zig-Zag the Light and Dark Fantastic (Ends: 1/13/2016): Part of this graphic novel project is compelling: Pembroke corgies, with their orange saddle shapes, were originally steeds for elves. Let’s take this story and run with it. But the Kickstarter has very little art (well, some in the updates). The author is heavily from the world of “Oz,” kind of interesting.

 What’s Corbeau Backing This Week?
Corbeau needs to remember, in between spending $200 on Google Adwords and god knows what on Christmas presents, that he has no job. However, I couldn’t let this kickstarter for the Voynich Manuscript reprint slide by without putting a dollar in the tip jar. One problem the project has is that the project creator has no credibility at all, and hasn’t bothered telling us why he’s qualified for this project or what his business plan is. But the manuscript is a fascinating artifact, particularly if you’re into codes and cryptids. I’d love to have a copy on my coffee table!