R66 Magazine x MIPA Toys interview

Welcome to our first Interview of R66 Magazine. Today we have a talk with MIPA Toys about his journey in making physical toys to creating NFT Toys on the blockchain.

- How did you fall in love with Toys, can you share your story?

Oh man, that’s a great question. I think it was about 6-7 years ago. I stumbled upon something called designer toys / art toys. I was so overwhelmed by the amount of creativity and talent in the space and I really wanted to be a part of it and that inspired me to start creating. And with all 3D printing technologies it wasn’t that difficult to start making your own stuff

- Which designer Toys / Art toys were the ones that inspired you back then?

That’s just a handful of examples. There’s a lot more but I think Joe Ledbetter was a big one at a time for me with his range of bunny figures. Then I created my first figure - force bunny

- Could you already design toys? How did you learn all this?

So I am by day a design engineer and I’ve been working with 3D software for a while. The difference is I was working with parametric software so everything is driven by dimensions and is less capable of achieving organic shapes. So that’s how I started. Then with time it turned out it’s not enough to get what I need from it. So I started looking into zbrush! In the process I met my zbrush mentor and overall an awesome guy… Ian Reyes. We collaborated a bit and he used my base mesh I designed to make characters and was teaching me in the process. So currently I have been using zbrush for over a year or so And during that time I have reached new levels of skill. Recently I decided to now redesign my force bunny

- Can you tell us about your brand before NFT became a part of our life?

Well I have always been a huge fan of Superheroes and Star Wars so I have been making a lot of fanart with my custom characters. I think generally MIPA Toys is about doing what I love and this is to design toys and make them. 

- What does MIPA stands for or how did you come up with the name?

When I started working on toys I relied a lot on my wife’s opinion as she is very good with aesthetics so then decided that in a way it is a joint effort - my name is MIchal and her name is PAulina. That’s how MIPA came to be. 

- When did you feel that you want to enter the NFT space to expand your brand?

That is also an interesting story. I found out about NFTs by accident honestly. Was just scrolling YouTube and one of the guys I watch for 3D sculpting was asking if he should do NFTs and I was like what the hell are those? So I started googling and that was the beginning of going down the rabbit hole! There are many parallels with me entering the NFT space and designer toys space. I discovered both by accident and then was just truly overwhelmed by the sheer amount of talent and creativity. I saw things I haven’t seen before, I saw amazing designs and Amazing artists! One of which are you guys btw as I absolutely love R66! On top of that I have recently become a dad! The little one is 12 weeks old now and I currently don't have as much time to actually make toys. NFT provides the opportunity for me now to continue doing what I love. And when I heard about NFT I decided to actually first come up with an original design. That’s how crypto crunchers came to life and I loved it as I could finally do these and not only fan art stuff. Now I got a mixture of those on my NFT as I’m still exploring the space 

- What do you think of the whole Phygital Movement? Not many people now are making both: Physical and digital toys, you are one of them.

Yeah, I have just partnered up with a fantastic toy designer and we are about to drop a new figure. This will be both digital and physical and we are going for the Cardano network. I think it’s a great combination to be honest. When I design toys I always want to make a great fender of them as well and previously I was always thinking that there should be a way to do something with those renders. Now there is… I think the combination of digital and physical is very interesting. We are heading into a more digitalised world whether we want it or not. Better embrace that earlier! Back in the day we used to collect cards, stamps and what not. Soon kids in school will be showing their NFTs , trading them after school and boasting who got better ones like we did back in a day with cards etc.

- Your Rarible bio says: "Toy design is an absolute passion for me and I dedicate almost every free time I have!". Can you tell us something more about your obsession?

Yeah I mean whenever I get time I work on toys. At work I don’t take lunch breaks, I go to the workshop and make stuff. I got my 3D printer setup there and do all the finishing of prints and at home when I get the chance I jump into zbrush and create more and more. I also paint the ones that are not painted yet. I’ve just got a new thing on the go right now. I just love doing this, so many projects I want to do and I just can’t stop. It’s like a serious addiction and I don’t think they do rehab for that haha. You see that’s the thing, I told you I’m working but then instead I’ve been talking about toys. 

- What are your next NFT projects or drops?

Well for sure the one that I just showed you a sneak peek of. There is this one as well! This one will be on the Cardano network. And I think it’s time for another crypto cruncher 😜

- Can you tell us something more about the Guardians of Cardano?

I did that collaboration before with a friend on Cardano network and since then really started to shift focus to that space. Came up with the idea of Guardians of Cardano, As you know Cardano logo got all these circles - so I thought that if each if them is a separate world and all the world's build the universe of Cardano and each if the world will have a guardian. The idea is that each of them are going to be unique and I can play with all sorts of characters.

I did my first release for Oni of Cardano and Dragon Spirits. So Oni is a Guardian of the world of Spirits and the little dragon ghosts are the spirits from that world. I made total of 70 unique NFTs with different rarity levels and sold out in under 1h! Some systems on Cardano network allows you to do a blind box sale. Where you buy an NFT from the pool but you don’t know what you are going to get. So there was mix of Onis and Dragons. Now I’m working on a next one - next one is a pirate. I’m going to call it Black Beard of Cardano Sea and the world will be Infinite Cardano Sea. He will be similarly accompanied by little sharks. As you know the world of digital art is dynamic and I kind if dropped the other projects I have in mind last time we spoke and now full focus is on those.

I’m also looking to collaborate with various artist to expand the worlds of Cardano and introduce them to Cardano NFTs

- Thank you so much for your inspiring energ!

Thank you for allowing me to be a part of your movement! Yeah, you guys just stay awesome and keep creating - to me you are one of the best in the space! Rock on 🤟🏻

Ps: Let me show you a preview of a upcoming collaboration ;)