My Introduction to Hive

A few days ago @lovesniper and @indayclara from the @ocd team encouraged me to introduce myself on Hive, so here we are.

About me

My name is Ferdian, from Bogor, West Java, Indonesia. I am a sculptor and 3D designer who cannot draw and am also color blind. My hobbies are reading, carpentry, cooking, gardening, also raising chickens and catfish. I'm not used to writing, much less writing about myself, so I'm not sure what to write in this intro. However, I will start from the journey of my career until I discovered Splinterlands and Hive and why I was captivated by this game.

Sculptor

I studied sculpture at an art institute and after graduating I tried a career as an artist. My career wasn't bad, I often do art exhibitions, some of them abroad, but unfortunately, the profession didn't support me financially. As an illustration, out of 10 exhibitions, it is considered good if one statue is sold. While on the other hand, I need money every time I will make new artwork, and the cost is quite expensive. Therefore, to meet my financial needs, I also accept commission work such as making life-size statues, miniatures, and action figures, but it's still not enough.

To earn a steady income I worked in an art consultant company in Jakarta for 2 years. Not as a designer or artist, but as a manager. My job is to organize workers so that my boss's artwork/design can be done as perfectly as possible. The pay was great, but the work was very time-consuming, and I didn't have time to do my art. Until one day, my desire to make art and financial fulfillment became two opposing needs (yup, a classic artist problem). After struggling for some time, I realized that my current state was too dependent on others, and I hated that. I hate expecting collectors to come down from the sky and buy all my art, I hate the fear of leaving my company for fear of losing my income, I hate to think that if I don't work for them I feel useless. So I decided to leave the company and return to Bogor.

3D Designer

After leaving my job, I had to think about how I could earn, and all I had was the ability to sculpt. But from previous experience, I know that ability alone is not enough. One day, one of my friends suggested learning 3D software, so that I can "sculpt" digitally. And you know what? It was probably the hardest thing I've ever done. You could say I'm a caveman stuck in modern times. Ask me to carve wood and stone, weld, or forge iron, heck, I even build my own house, but learn 3D software? Dude, the only software I use is Microsoft Office, and it was only used to write college papers and financial reports at my previous job. But I knew learning 3D was important for my improvement, so I decided to buy a high spec computer with my savings and started learning the 3D software on my own. Those times were very stressful, to illustrate, 2 monitors were broken while I was studying the software, not because of an electrical fault, but because I hit the screen with my fist. Long story short, after eight stressful months of self-study, I sold my services online for the first time in 2016 and was paid $5. It's very little, but it's my first step.

My first 3D project.

Along the way, I bought and learned 3D printing cause I thought with this technology I no longer need to make sculptures manually. It turned out that it actually opened up a lot of opportunities. At that time, 3D printing was booming, and as a result, many people contacted me to create 3D printed models, ranging from individuals to companies. The business is growing and I was able to hire some workers.

With a fairly stable business environment, I have time to work on my artwork, and here are some of them.

Lady Poseidon. 2019

Glitch#4. 2019

Forgotten King. 2020

In addition to making artwork and commission works, I also make several toy designs, some call them urban toys/urban vinyl or designer toys, but because of the pandemic, many have not been produced.

Some of the toys I designed

How do I find Hive and Splinterlands

Unlike office workers, when there are no projects, I have a lot of free time. When I'm not doing my art, I spend my time learning to cook, gardening, raising livestock, repairing vehicles, repairing electronics, and finally learning crypto and NFT. I know crypto since early 2020 right before the pandemic happened, I traded for a few months then decided to invest in some of them and made a decent profit. Before deciding to invest, I always do my research and that's where I found Splinterlands, a card game where every card is NFT, and I think the concept is interesting. After a few days of playing with a free account, I decided to buy a spellbook at the end of July 2021. I first installed Discord just to know the ins and outs of this game, and thanks to @cicisaja for inviting me to SPL-Indonesia and introducing me to this great community.

I've been playing this game for almost 2 months and I really enjoy it, but what really impressed me was the character/creature design. I don't know how to express it, but it's funny, cute but also cool. I finally decided to make a 3D model of one of the characters, the Furious Chicken.

In case you missed it, you can see the making process here. Thanks also to @tedus who always helps me when I encounter problems in SPL.

That's all from me guys, I don't know what else to write, but I'm planning to make 3D models of other characters/creatures too. So if you have any suggestions let me know.