BiteTheBullet
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Daniel and Elisa: "A Bite the Bullet Story"
🕑 Added 2022-08-02 15:06:03 +0000 UTCWe reached 1800 Subscribers last month !! (1400 here on Patreon)
It’s has been 2 Years (and a month) since we began this adventure, this dream.
At this point we don't even know what to say ... reaching this milestone in just 2 years shows us that our dream is not a dream anymore, it’s a reality, called Bite the Bullet.
During this first 2 years we have been able to gather an AWESOME crew that has strongly supported us during what's only the beginning of our journey, THANK YOU very much!
Sometimes, even blindly (like this month), all of you who are here right now ... thank you even more!
Both of us (Elisa and Daniel) want to express again how HUGE it's for us that we have reached this milestone and how PROUD we are of our community ❤️
Now ... those of you who know us (mostly from Discord), know that we are not exactly the type of persons who constantly upload pictures of themselves or shares their life on social media, in fact, if you look up any of our names online you won't find much, except for a few 3D related stuff and a couple very old pictures ...
But even if we don't really like to share our lives with the whole Internet, now that we are family (and crewmates in this awesome adventure) ... we would like you to know us a little more in depth.
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Now, while we wait until the announcement of the first model of the current release (we'll upload him before the weekend) ...
It was about time that we properly introduce ourselves.
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Elisa:
This is Elisa, you can call her Eli or as you can find her on social media ... @nadye_crysis.
Eli was always a very nervous and active girl. She was (and is) interested in everything she saw and she wanted to try everything (especially if it was food, her first word was "bread").
That desire to do everything and her competitive spirit that made her want to do everything she tried to the best of her ability sometimes caused her problems ... and when she was a little bit saturated, she became "a little nervous" and she let off steam by punching some of the things she had around (classic Eli).
She may very good at creating things digitally but physically ... what she is good at is destroying them.
When Eli sets herself a goal she won't stop until she achieves it, but this can become a problem when your goal requires all your time or when you have too many goals and setting limits is not your strong point ... it's difficult to find a balance.
Her love for video games and art initially led her to study Computer Engineering and also to drop it shortly after to finally do Fine Arts.
During this time Eli continued to play video games (mainly World of Warcraft) as well as something you will be even more familiar with, Warhammer.
Other of her hobbies to which she also dedicated much of her free time were exercising, going to music festivals and tattooing, because on top of being a 3D sculptor, Eli was also working as a tattoo artist.
She also studied piano and played in a metal band with her friends, because that's her favorite music style.
Then it was time to decide what she wanted to do as work and she decided to mix both of her careers and ended up studying 3D sculpting.
Upon finishing her ZBrush master and a few other courses, she decided to redirect her knowledge back to video games, studied more about 3D modeling and then ended up working for a video game company in Madrid.
After she began working there, every day when she arrived home, she continued studying and improving her 3D knowledge while she also worked as a Freelance for different companies, in some of them sculpting miniatures for 3D printing.
Then, little by little and after several job changes and many freelance works, she ended up becoming a true miniature sculptor.
Daniel:
This is Daniel (or Dani, or Dan, definitely not -iel ... 😒🌲).
Dan was always a fan of video games, anime and fantasy themes and spent quite a while developing these hobbies (some would say too much, his parents certainly did say it).
Like a lot of other "videogame enthusiasts" he decided to study Computer Engineering, it took him ... a while to finish it.
Then, when the time to decide how he wanted to earn a living arrived he wasn't really happy with the job opportunities available where he lived ... that wasn't exactly what he had in mind for his future.
He tried a couple computer related jobs and also helped in the family bussiness and, of course, he kept playing video games in his (now not very abundant) free time.
Then, convinced by some friends (like it always happens) he reluctantly went back to World of Warcraft one more time (don't blame him, it's a very long detox process) and without looking for anything (or anyone) in particular ... he found it.
Us:
And that's when they met ... You guessed right!
They met playing WoW !
Dan joined the Guild where Eli was and with both of them being Resto Druids (Healers) they spent quite a few time talking about their raid and dungeon strategies, about where to get the best items for their cahracters and ... also about other things not so related to the video game 😏
A few months after that, when they finally met in person (yes, it was a guild meeting in the city where Eli lives, what did you expect 😅), it was on a Halloween night where Eli was disguised as a Silent Hill nurse, and after giving Dan a good scare (and some very "encouraging" words via whatsapp, you'll never guess what she said) ... they decided to meet again.
But ... Dan lived in another city quite far away, so ... everything was a bit complicated for the relationship to work, and for a while they had to settle for talking on the computer.
Every day, when they came back from work and were both at the computer, they spent a lot of time talking on Discord, working and playing video games together, at the time one of them (there were a lot) was Overwatch and because of this, one of the first times Dan went back to Madrid (Eli lives in a small town on the north of Madrid) ... this is what happened ...
They weren't professional cosplayers, in fact it was Dan's first time doing something like that (a man's gotta do what a man's gotta do, he just wanted to see Eli), but this is not where the dressing up ends ... two of the things Eli loves the most are: cute creatures and making weird faces ...
Oh, one more thing, Eli truly hates being on photos so you should be very grateful for this awesome display of pictures and weird faces ... and speaking of weird faces, Eli's dog is a white boxer named Kayle ...
She now has almost 11 years old and even though she doesn't have a more than a couple teeth and it's a little bit crazy (like Eli), they love her very much.
Same as Eli, she doesn't like being photographed so she's an expert avoiding the camera once she sees a phone pointing at her.
Oh, and this is Dan's cat, he's almost 13 years old and it's named Kuro (it means black in japanese and yes, he knows he isn't black, it's a long story).
On the other hand, Kuro loves acting as a model and even if Eli isn't really a fan of cats (she's a dog person), inexplicably they get along really well, sometimes it even seems like Kuro likes her more than Dan.
Eli doesn't like to hear this but Dan think this is related with Elisa secretly being a cat (sometimes she acts exactly like one of them 😹).
They finally got together but ... truth is that they didn't have much time to do things together because Dan was working afar and Eli was switching between video game companies and of course she couldn't resist taking more and more freelance jobs, some of them for big Patreons and Kickstarters.
* some of Eli's previous works
At that moment, Dan, who had been messing around with 3D modeling, because loved watching Eli sculpt and that always ended up amazed with all her awesome creations, decided to start learning about 3D sculpting more in depth.
All this taking the advantage of being able to learn as much as possible from Eli and with the secret intention leaving his current job, moving in with her, and hopefully being able to help Eli with her at that time almost infinite freelance workload so they could have more free time to spend together (this will later backfire greately with the creation of their Patreon 😅).
With this goal in mind, and as Eli kept getting better and better, Dan completed the same master she did in the past, a degree in organic sculpting with ZBrush.
* some of Dan's previous works
Then, while talking about the future, they decided to buy their first two 3D printers (one FDM for bigger pieces and one of resin for smaller and more detailed models) with which to print their own creations and they began to investigate about possible uses of 3D printing.
Initially with the intention of creating a few miniatures, other useful stuff and house decorations and printing them to sell online.
During those first years, they also went on a few trips to different European countries, like when they went to the Hellfest, a big metal music festival in France.
One day, because they really love animals and nature (even if nowadays the barely leave the house), while they were visiting Dan's hometown (a small city in the north of Spain) Dan took Eli to a surprise trip to an Alpaca Farm (shoutout to all our beloved Merchant Alpacas! ❤️🦙).
Alpacas are ... weird, and they can do some awesome faces! (again, same as Eli).
And then they went to do some mountain climbing (via ferrata), a ... scary but rewarding and really fun experience.
They also went skiing (snowboarding) to the pyrenees, it was Eli's first time and Dan taught her everything she knows.
Since then they have only been able to go one more time but it's definitely on their to-do list, even despite all the falls.
And they went on a last trip travelling with a campervan around Switzerland, definitely not the best roads to drive a "big" vehicle but ... it was awesome.
It was really fun experience and there were a lot of “interesting” incidents ...
One of them was when they ended up stuck on a very narrow and downhill street on their last night where they weren't able to turn around or go backwards (they tried ... think of the worst burnt clutch smell).
It was a very long street that was blocked by some construction machines (the works sign was down) and they had to spend the night trying not to fall from the bed (because of the slope) and thinking they weren’t going to arrive to the airport on the next morning.
Thankfully the workers started their day at first light and moved the machines in time for Dan and Eli to escape and arrive to the airport in time.
A few months upon returning from their last trip, things changed “a little bit” ... COVID arrived ... Eli started working from home, the pace of work finally slowed down and they were even able to go out and enjoy the snow.
But ... absorbed by the powerful spirit of 3D printing and minis, instead of taking advantage of that long-awaited moment to rest and do things together ... they began to think about different work options.
They were looking for something where they didn't have to depend on going to an office, or intermediaries ... the possibility of starting something new together, something of their own, of starting ... Bite the Bullet.
Then, approximately 10 months after their started the Patreon, a period where they did their best to balance BTB and their daily jobs, both of them decided to leave their jobs and go all-in with their dream project.
Now 2 years have passed since then and the rest is history, history of Bite the Bullet and yours! (Thank you everyone!) ❤️
And for those who are curious, since we started Bite the Bullet we haven't been out of the house much 😅, so ... here is where we spend (at least) half of our days.
This is the room where it happens! (and the printing room)
Here you can remember our previous Anniversaries and the time Eli sculpted Dan as a surprise for his birthday.
1st Anniversary! / 2nd Anniversary!
Dan's Birthday > Free Exclusive Model! (Daniel, the Righteous)
* yes, this is the face she makes when someone points a camera at her
THANK YOU AGAIN!
Let's go full swing to the next goal and into our third year!
Elisa and Daniel, Bite the Bullet.
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AMA / Q&A / AUA (Ask-Us-Anything):
Oh, one last thing, we thought this is also a good opportunity for all of you to ask us anything you are curious about in the comments and then we'll update this post and we'll add the Q&A here below so everyone can read them.
Update (August 2022):
Q: ...
A: ...
Comments
Bite the Bullet
Welcome to the crew! 🥰
Joz M
Thank you for sharing some of yourselves. It makes me feel connected to you guys and more likely to stay a Patron!
Bite the Bullet
Thank you very much Big G! ❤️
Keep up the great work and congrats to both of you!
