Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited.
Commentary by Russian military journalist Boris Rozhin:
[ColonelCassad] An interesting interview about the production of soldiers on the theme of the war in Ukraine, as well as Russian manufacturers of soldiers.
I remember that in 2014, already in the first months, the first sets of soldiers and militia figures appeared. This year, the first sets of soldiers in the NWO have already appeared.
From the article:
Who produces domestic soldiers in the NWO?
Ave lovers of toy soldiers! In 1944, for the first time during the Great Patriotic War, sets of Soviet soldiers were issued. The paper army (circulation of 100,000 copies) was produced by the printing factory of the Moskvoretsky district industry trade. Soviet children could play with figurines of the Red Army soldiers, who in that distant year had already turned the tide of the war, which the Nazi invaders hoped to complete victoriously in a matter of months ...
On February 24, 2022, the Special Military Operation (SVO) began. What do you think, did the figurines depicting the military of the Russian Federation and New Russia appear? Yes, such soldiers began to be produced. And today we present to your attention an interview with the representative of the VyZOV project, Oleg Vasilyevich.
Good afternoon, Oleg Vasilyevich! Tell us when and where did your studio come from? What was the first released miniature (set of miniatures)?
Hello Bogdan! Thank you for the opportunity to tell you and your blog followers about us! Our team consists of collectors of military-historical miniatures in a broad sense, from unpainted soldiers to poster models, although, of course, game soldiers in 32nd scale are a priority. We are hobby friends from different parts of historical Russia.
When Special Warfare began, we were looking forward to being the first of the big name studios to create a set dedicated to our heroes. And if such figures began to appear among the manufacturers of VIM figures in resin, and rather quickly, then the production of toy soldiers in the 32nd scale on the theme of CBO was not even announced by anyone.
In April 2022, it became clear that it was pointless to wait any longer. Now that ten months have passed since the beginning of the NWO, time has shown that our guesses were correct, no one has even announced the start of work on game sets on this topic until now, except for the set "Modern Russian special forces" from a deeply respected manufacturer - "Publius Soldiers", but it was made for Syria and does not fully reflect the theme NWO. So we decided to make VyZOV in several senses at once.
You called your project Front of Mobilization Miniature, why not just a workshop or a studio?
For us, the war that the Motherland is forced to wage is the pivotal event of the present. We are convinced that victory requires mobilization not only in the Armed Forces, but in all spheres of life. This means that mobilization is also needed in our, albeit a toy, albeit a model, but military-historical hobby. Of course, we like the Vikings, landsknechts, Indians and all the wars on the North American continent, but today our contemporaries, living or already gone, are the most important heroes for all of us, which means who, no matter how they deserve to be embodied in miniature.
By the way, in the project group, we simultaneously support the creative mobilization of artists who draw on the theme of NWO, collect our own gallery of such drawings and paintings by various authors, as well as music videos and documentaries that record the military exploits of our heroes.
On what scale, and from what material does VyZOV produce its soldiers today? And why did you choose this particular material and scale?
We have two directions in mind. The main line - game, on a scale of 1/32, figures 60 mm high, in fact it is even 1/30. We make them in a two-component injection molded plastic, which is now commonly called rubber plastic for its resemblance to rubber. These figures can be safely dropped on the floor. They are ideal for playing with children. But one of the goals of the project is precisely to popularize military toys as a tool for patriotic upbringing, education and personality formation through play and interest in the history of the Fatherland. We plan to produce the second line in 1/35 scale made of model resin for painting for those who are fond of poster modeling.
How long does it take from the first draft of the figure to the first cast soldier?
We launched "VyZOV" in mid-April 2022, the first castings were ready by September, and then we deliberately slowed down a bit with the announcement in order to skip ahead the release of the "Modern Russian Special Forces" set from the Publius Soldiers studio, as a sign of respect for Yuri and his landmark project for us. It took four months from the idea to the implementation of eight figures and one terrain element.
And the official start of sales was made at the Moscow exhibition "Sandbox", for which we thank Andrey Litvinenko, its other organizers and our subscribers, who volunteered to present our project at the exhibition! Of course, from these four months, time was spent on creating the basic marketing components, and on developing the concept of the Liberation set series, and most importantly, on finding “their” sculptor.
The Special Military Operation has a chance to become a key and, I am not afraid to say, in many respects a fateful military conflict for the history of Russia and, perhaps, the whole world in the first half of the 21st century. There are more than fifty Russian manufacturers of soldiers today, so why only the unknown, mysterious studio VyZOV produced game soldiers in the NWO? Is it really all about the fear of the players already present on the market to lose foreign buyers?
Unfortunately, this is probably the case. It seems to us that we accept the reasons for what is happening. It should be recognized that, including as a result of economic and cultural sabotage during the period of perestroika and the collapse of the Union, the domestic military toy was placed in an extremely difficult and disadvantageous position compared to foreign manufacturers, large-scale production stopped or significantly reduced its activities in the production of toys. .
And the Soviet soldiers were supplanted by the characters of the Western, so to speak, "pantheon" of the so-called "super-heroes". Promoting for us the concept of even children's disarmament up to the days of the destruction of military toys, the "Western partners" left for themselves both military-historical miniatures and the culture of playing in the most ordinary plastic soldiers.
Abroad, since the mid-80s of the 20th century, a decline in interest in the production of soldiers also began. But in the 90s, in the United States and countries oriented to its market, both by enthusiasts and large companies, the production of soldiers and game miniatures resumed.
It is clear that the Americans began to release soldiers primarily for their history: cowboys, Indians, the US Civil War, etc. The cooperatives that have developed in our country have discovered that the bulk of the market for toy soldiers is located abroad. The first cooperative reprints appeared, but by the 2000s they also stopped their production. Since 2010, the so-called “renaissance of Russian soldiers” began, as we believe, with an amazing project by Igor Baseevich, who released his first set in 2010/2011. The era of the revival of the domestic soldier has begun.
For 10 years, manufacturers have built sales of Indians dear to the domestic heart, knights, heroes of the Great Patriotic War, and were also able to break into the Western market. But the market always dictates its own laws, and the West did not need exclusively Russian or Soviet images. Therefore, gradually, domestic manufacturers were forced to replace most of their products with images familiar to Western collectors: Vikings, knights, pirates, Indians, American and British soldiers in World War II, Vietnam. But the SVO began.
Payments were interrupted, access to the western market was closed, it would seem that it was time to reorient to the domestic market, as did the outstanding 1/35 scale model project - Live Resin, but, apparently, not everyone has yet dared to make this decision. There is hope that this will end quickly that everything will return as it was and you can continue to release non-sharp sets on general topics. But will he return? .. There is no need to condemn, you need to understand. And we just decided to help, as a new project that has nothing to lose in the West.
Perhaps the reason is also that we are enthusiasts and the commercial success of the project is not so important to us, we even have a front fund in its economy. In any case, we, as collectors, of course would like to supplement our set and Publius set with CBO-themed figures from other manufacturers, for example, from the brilliant Plastic Platoon, which we also love very much! we even have in its economy a front fund.
In any case, we, as collectors, of course would like to supplement our set and Publius set with CBO-themed figures from other manufacturers, for example, from the brilliant Plastic Platoon, which we also love very much! we even have in its economy a front fund. In any case, we, as collectors, of course would like to supplement our set and Publius set with CBO-themed figures from other manufacturers, for example, from the brilliant Plastic Platoon, which we also love very much!
How popular are CBO miniatures with our collectors today?
Of course, there is a supply-leading effect when it creates demand, and not vice versa. How many of us, fans of the game soldier, have collected Vikings over the years, and yet each studio believes that it is their duty to make them, these unique 387 Vikings. Topics guaranteed success by force of habit! That is why we really appreciate the project of Ivan Kostenko "Little Man", for the ability to open up new topics.
And for us, not only a new, but the hottest topic of the NWO today has become a challenge in itself. How to evaluate, how to plan production if you don't know how many people will want your set? Well, reality put everything in its place. The first hundred orders were placed and shipped almost immediately. We still do not have time to send sets, clearly underestimating the demand.
For some time, they even didn’t specifically use the channels of our friends of the project, fearing that we would not be able to keep up with the wave of orders, because the production is manual and not at all fast, and among our friends there are various artists who draw about SVO, and the wonderful poet Yuri Rezaev with his project "George", and military commander Andrey Filatov, and the sharpest and most clear consultant on military equipment Alexander Razvedos Arutyunov - and they have thousands of subscribers. So the main challenge is yet to come!
What were the theme options for the debut set?
We heatedly discussed the people's militia of the LDNR, and our motorized riflemen, and the Airborne Forces, and even the fighters of Kadyrov, who thundered at the beginning of the NWO, but two of our comrades, one from the Pacific Fleet, the other from Kaliningrad, somehow imperceptibly turned us on the topic of marines flaming in those the days of Mariupol, a city that is also very close to some of the participants in our project.
Let's take a look at your "Russian Marine Corps" set - how accurate is it in terms of materiel? Do the images of the figures correspond to the uniform and armament of the modern marines of the Russian Federation?
We initially decided that in order to achieve distinct game differences between the sets of the series, we would go for some intentional generalizations and even deliberately introduce some markers so that we could, having placed different units on the table, immediately say that these are paratroopers, and this DPR, and this is Akhmat, and not only and not so much focusing on the color of the sets.
The Marines had the role of a trial balloon, on which we studied uniforms, equipment and weapons. As a result, they are dressed mainly in the statutory uniform of the VKBO, helmets, unloadings and knee pads - all from the “Warrior” set, the nominal figure of the String, which was made last, was dressed in a camouflage coat of the same set, in which, by the way, he fought.
The variety was made by two figures shooting from the knee, they were made by another sculptor, there are already slabs and other knee pads. And just to the set, by the way, we involved three sculptors, and each of them got their own wonderful images. In terms of armament, everything is according to the chronicles, AK-74M with and without an underbarrel grenade launcher, RPG-26 "Aglen", silent sniper rifle VSS "Vintorez". We believe that on the whole we coped with the materiel, although now they would have done it even better and more accurately.
You have a pretty active group on the social network. How useful is communication with collectors? Were there any valuable tips, additions, constructive criticism that would be useful when creating the set?
Our group is still quite small, no more than 600 people, but it is already obvious what sincere people have joined us, real like-minded people. We have created a separate wishlist discussion for the topics of the next packs. And our subscribers give very interesting material and ideas!
We are collectors ourselves, so it is always interesting and useful for us to communicate with collectors, but it is no less surprising to discuss the creation of NWO soldiers with non-hobby people, getting a fresh look and a new vision from them, inevitably involving them in the world of miniatures. We see no reason to compete with other projects for several hundred already established collectors of toy soldiers aged 40 and older, we are interested in attracting thousands of fathers and their sons to our hobby, breathing new life into it. And when, if not now? Unfortunately, ten-year-old boys
During the Soviet Union, many figurines of our soldiers from the time of the Civil and Great Patriotic War were produced, but there were no soldiers who would portray their opponents. Will "VyZOV" release opponents to our warriors?
No. We are not interested in NATO soldiers. And if you need adversaries for the game, then finding American warriors, wild monsters or the undead is not a problem at all now. This goodness is now being let out with a vengeance.
And the final question. What topics will the next sets of your project focus on?
Recently, we conducted a survey in our group, on topics that attract subscribers the most. The first place was expectedly taken by PMC Wagner - top fighters and top PR! The second line was taken by the Airborne Forces, and the third - by the colorful and fearless "Akhmat". The fourth was the special forces, but he is already brilliantly embodied by Publius Soldiers. We are sorry that the heroes of the people's republics of Donbass are only in fifth place, and yet they have been at the front not for nine months, but for nine years already.
Well, the preferences of collectors are now known, and we will of course decide on the theme of the second set not without taking them into account. In any case, we promise that the new set will bring new skins, new heat and new hero names. It's only beginning!
See the link for photos of their latest products. 
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