Update! The Mirai Mousepads are now on sale worldwide at the following trusted online retailers - if you are in the same country as the retailer that means you will get your mousepad quickest by ordering from them but they all ship worldwide. There is no pre-order period and all these retailers have stock but is limited. Mirai Mousepad is released under the Culture Japan label and the Japanese retail price is 3980yen but some of these retailers are selling them with a discount.
The illustration of Mirai-chan is by artist Nao Shirahane (DMYO).
And folks in Singapore can get them from the following stores.
(Singapore)
Kareshi Kanojyo no Mise (Inside The Anime House)
1 Selegie Road, PoMo,
#B1-17, Singapore 188306
http://www.theanimehouse.com
Rapid Culture
109 North Bridge Road Funan DigitaLife Mall
#05-18, Singapore 178087
http://rapidculture.livejournal.com
KuroCha!
East Point Mall, 3 Simei Street 6,
#02-41, Singapore 528833
La Tendo
109 North Bridge Road Funan DigitaLife Mall
#05-10/11, Singapore 178087
http://www.latendoshop.com
Toy Coin
http://www.toycoin.com.sg
You all voted for "A" so I went ahead and put the design to production. The softness of the wrist support system is perfect and is designed to cater for wrists of all shapes and sizes. The mirai mousepad can also be used for taking a nap at work.
It has taken a while to get the quality up to what I've been expecting and at last the time and effort has paid off. The reason it took so long was because I wanted the wrist support to be very soft - much softer than other mousepads with similar support systems. The problem is that when they are too soft, the material tends to come loose which makes mirai look 70 and not 17.
You will first be able to buy this at the Anime Festival Asia in limited numbers.
Will soon be available to the rest of the world though online retailers during end of November and is being released under the Culture Japan label.
The market price of most Oppai mousepads in Japan retail at 4,200 yen but I've only managed to get the price of mirai mousepad down to 3,980 yen as I only had budget at this moment to make a small quantity - the larger the quantity I make, the lower the unit price becomes. Am guessing that some retailers may sell cheaper as they do with figures though.
I'll do a separate post on how to work with factories to make stuff and take into consideration things like logistics, taxes, packaging, samples, retailer/wholesalers and pricing strategies.
I do most of my design work in Fireworks and export to PSD. Its annoying that the latest Photoshop does not allow you to save in an earlier version ToT
Decided to keep the box design simple.
And more photos of the sample.
Side by side with Mahiro Tokiwa mousepad.
"Itadakimouse"
The wrist support system can also be used for chopsticks.
And these are the box photos from the factory.
Just received a photo from Singapore - the Mirai Mousepads have just arrived! Currently shipping some off to the US and Japan. Will let you know when you can order them. There will be no pre-order period so you can just order and wait for it to be shipped.
And everything below is the previous post where I asked you which design you preferred.
So I was finalizing the design for the new Mirai-chan mousepads but DMYO-sensei sent through the illustration for the dakimakura which fits nicely in the mousepad template. Which do you prefer?
This version wasn't originally illustrated for the mousepad which is why her head is cut off quite a bit. I prefer "A" myself.
There is a poll embedded in this article.
There is a poll embedded in this article.
