The Fwoosh Secret Santa Custom Swap has become an annual tradition around these parts. This year’s edition was the biggest and best yet, and we owe a lot of that to fellow Fwoosher Ethansuplee who manages this event each and every year. He is tasked with figuring out who each participants Secret Santa is; handling all the addresses, which include international Fwooshers as well; and makes sure to keep all involved on a tight timeline to ensure that every participant gets their custom in time to have under the tree for Christmas. It’s definitely not an easy task to pull that off, but he indeed does it, and we thank him for it.
This year Ethan managed to snag more than a few industry professionals to add to the great mix of talented Fwoosh customizers already on board for the annual event. Ethan was nice enough to give us his thoughts and his process for pulling all this off.
“It would be awesome if you could get Doubledealer to participate somehow….” Those are the words that kicked off this year’s crazy Secret Santa event. I was speaking to a fellow customizer, reminiscing about the olds days and the guys who inspired us to start creating customs. The guys who changed the game. Guys like Doubledealer. “It WOULD be awesome. Maybe he’d be willing to do it. He’s super busy now between Hasbro and Boss Fight Studios, but it’s worth a shot.” So I reached out to Fred Aczon (aka Doubledealer). While I waited for a response I thought about an old college acquaintance, Trevor Zammit (aka Hank Sargoofden) of NECA and formerly of the now defunct Palisades Toys. I reached out to Trevor and asked if he’d be interested in participating, not really being sure if he had ever made a custom figure before. “First of all everyone at NECA loves the Fwoosh. You guys have the best He-Man photography by far. I’d say probably count me in. I do a lot of He-Man and TMNT customs.”
Almost simultaneously I received a response from Doubledealer agreeing to participate. During all of this I had already started the normal sign ups for Secret Santa. For those who don’t already know, I take Secret Santa very seriously. I open it up to the general public, but I also take the time to recruit members for the event. A lot of really talented members have gone somewhat dormant in the last couple of years, so I reached out to them. Participation was dwindling, but now we had an exciting way to rejuvenate the event.
Soon Dennis Chan (aka Chan) of Hasbro would decide to join up after some encouragement from Doubledealer. Meanwhile, I approached another college friend, Joel Jackson (aka Ottocon) of 2 Headed Monsters Comics about joining. And later Tommy Hodges (aka Battlemonkey) of ToyBiz, Mattel, DC Collectibles and just about everywhere else would approach me about joining as well.
The pieces all fell in to place. Suddenly we had five industry professionals participating in our Secret Santa. Participation levels went through the roof as a result, making for one of our most successful events yet. I am really proud of our accomplishments from the 2014 event, and have already had some interest from some of the pros in possibly participating again for 2015. My hope is always that Secret Santa will help keep our custom boards alive, and that it will inspire greatness. Some of the best customs that I’ve seen have come from this event, and I am truly excited to see what this year will bring. Thank you to Rob W for creating our class pic, to Warrack and Spawnsauce for their video diaries of the event, and to all of this year’s participants. Please be sure to check out the class pics and the links below!
You can check out all this year’s Secret Santa customs here!
Part 1 of the Secret Santa custom wrap up.
You can always see these customs plus a ton of other talented customizer’s creations in the Fwoosh customs galleries.
Fellow Fwoosher Warrack made an awesome video diary of his entire customizing process for his Secret Santa entry. Check it out!
Here are some links to check out the toy industry professionals who participated in this year’s event.
Doubledealer’s Facebook and his Boss Fight Studio Facebook page.
Trevor Zammit’s hilarious He-Man Customs Facebook page.
Joel Jackson’s “We Are The Shazzbots!” Kickstarter.
Joel Jackson’s 2 Headed Monster Comics.
Battlemonkey’s Deviant Art page
Thanks again to all who participated in this year’s event, and we look forward to seeing everyone back next year, plus we hope to have a whole new crop of participants to add to the mix next year! Special thanks to Ethan — you’re a huge asset to this community!