Blog Name Change and Other Updates

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So I’ve changed the name of my personal hobby blog from the Sacrarium of Secrets to the much improved (in my opinion) Outpost 206. Mostly because Outpost 206 is easier for people I know to remember, sounds cooler, and is more evocative of the kind of vibes I want this place to have. And yes, I did go back through my 48 previous entries and fixed all the links after posting my action figure customization article yesterday.

I was never really a fan of the Sacrarium of Secrets name and I doubt anyone else was either. But my mindset at the time was that I needed to come up with a name for a blog and since it was a lazy, hazy summer day, the creative side of my brain probably wasn’t firing on all cylinders and that was the best I could come up with in that particular moment in time. I’ve long since made peace with the fact that, while I have tons of ideas, not all of them are good ones.

So why did I go with Outpost 206? Well, 206 was the number of my first apartment (a tiny studio in the Youngstown-Boardman area where I lived for four and a half years). Plus, there’s something about titles that end in a three or four-digit number that tickles my fancy for reasons that I can’t explain. “Outpost” because it sounds cool and was the only word with vaguely sci-fi connotations that wasn’t already taken (unlike the word “planet” for example).

Now that it’s a new(ish) year and the blog has a new name, what can we expect? I still want to write an update at least once per week (my work life permitting), ideally twice per week. And aside from my usual action figure and miniature customization projects and crafting experiments, I’ve been kicking around the idea of incorporating some new regular series into the mix. They’re just ideas at the moment and whether or not I actually develop them further is still up in the air, but I’m excited about the potential for the following:

·         Crafting Quickies - Inspired by the kind of stuff seen on the Miniature Mash-up youtube channel (though what I have in mind isn’t geared toward tabletop gaming but rather, standalone crafts like what I usually make), it might be fun to do a series on quick and dirty projects that still look good. Maybe for some entries, there will be a challenge involved like “paint something using only cheap acrylics” in an effort to burn through the massive pile of cheapo toys, scraps, and other random materials that I’ve accumulated throughout the course of my crafting journey.

·         Random Resin Recasts – I have a bunch of reusable molding material (both Composimold and homemade stuff) and lots of random minis and figurines in my bits bin, so my idea here was to set aside a couple of them at a time, make a mold and a resin casting, and (if it comes out well) customize the recasts further like I did with my Jungle Barbarian project. I’m having a lot of fun with moldmaking and resin casting of late so I’ve already been doing a lot of this sort of thing. To focus these kinds of projects under one “umbrella” series of articles like I do with custom miniatures and custom figures will go a long way to, in turn, help me focus since I tend to get bogged down in all the different projects I have going on at any given time.

In addition to the new name, I also want to eventually switch up the overall look of the blog with some custom graphics. So far, 100% of my effort has gone towards closing out projects and doing the write-ups themselves and very little towards the overall look of the blog outside of the premade themes. It’s actually been a couple of years since I played around with Photoshop outside of work, but it’s always been something that I enjoy doing.

I think I’ve rambled enough. Even though I feel like I started 2022 behind the eight ball on all the goals I set for myself at the end of 2021 (again, thanks to all the recent work-related craziness), I’m still hoping I can make this year one of my most productive yet. I hope I’m not jinxing myself by saying that, but in the meantime, I now return you to our regularly scheduled programming…

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