flying through the airwaves and into your podcatcher it's the jersey jack pinball podcast hey what's going on pinball and welcome it's another edition of the jersey jack pinball podcast my name is ken cromwell and i'm your host we've got a fun episode in store for you today we have a conversation with senior software developer ted estes and mechanical designer peter Dorn of Jersey Jack Pinball, and they're answering a question that was submitted with the Behind the Backglass segment. If you're not familiar with what that is, I'll bring you up to speed in a little bit. We're also going to have a conversation with Joe DiRusso. He's the owner of Pin Graphics, pingraphics.com, and Jersey Jack Pinball founder, Jack Quinari, about a charitable campaign that they're both working on collectively to help benefit those that are in need. But first, let's get caught up on a little bit about what's been happening at Jersey Jack Pinball. now you've heard that jersey jack pinball here in elkrow village illinois is hiring as of late in fact you've probably heard me mention this on prior podcasts but i did want to welcome somebody new to the team and that is mr jim patla he is going to be and he currently is the coo which is chief operating officer of jersey jack pinball jim comes over here with over 50 years of industry experience we're going to have jim on next episode next week to kind of discuss a little bit about what's going on with his role at Jersey Jack Pinball. So stay tuned for that. But Jim, welcome aboard. What's going on at Jersey Jack Pinball? Have they moved entirely? Are they still moving? Is anything happening inside? Is the factory set up? What's going on with games, et cetera, et cetera? Listen, I wanted to address just a couple of these things. And that is, number one, yeah, the factory, we did move, right? So the factory is set up. So we have a fully functioning pinball factory here. Also, I'll let you know, games are on the line here at Jersey Jack Pinball. Now, hopefully that answers some of your questions, and I understand that doesn't answer all of your questions. But for now, yes, we have relocated, and there are games on the line at Jersey Jack Pinball. More news to come on that soon. But I also want everybody to know that's been eagerly anticipating the next release that we understand and we share in your excitement as well. But I'm asking you to kind of consider where we're coming from. We want to make sure that the game is ready to ship when we officially reveal and launch this next title. I understand that some are felt as if they are owed something or they need to see something now in order to satisfy their curiosity. And I get it. Listen, as somebody that came over from the enthusiast side of things and I'm still a pinball enthusiast. So like I'm anxiously always awaiting what the next game is from a company. I totally understand. But I'm asking you to understand that. Hey, you know, we're going about this in a way that we feel most comfortable on how we're going to roll out the game. And again, that is going to be when the games are ready to go. we're going to go ahead and announce and i think that's something that the public had asked for us to consider uh originally and we're listening to the feedback so always know that we're listening to your feedback all right let's get into it behind the back glass this week's featured question is from bill woodcock and bill for going ahead and submitting that question you're going to receive a jersey jack pinball podcast uh prize pack so go ahead and contact us at podcast at jerseyjackpinball.com to claim that prize. And if you'd like to go ahead and submit a question to be answered by Jersey Jack Pinball staff on Behind the Back Glass, you can do so by sending an audio or video question or just a simple email to podcast at jerseyjackpinball.com. And if your question is selected or chosen to be read on the air or featured on our social media pages, you'll be sent a Jersey Jack Pinball prize pack. It doesn't get better than that. Again, podcast at jerseyjackpinball.com. Let's get back into Behind the Back Glass. and joining us on Behind the Backglass, mechanical designer Peter Dorn from Jersey Jack Pinball. What's going on, Peter? How are you doing today? I'm doing good, man. So I have a question here from one of the listeners of the show, and it was an interesting question to me because I was also wondering this, and that is, paraphrasing, how does the creative process for the Playfield 3D items work? Does the Jersey Jack Pinball creative team come up with the idea and then present it to a vendor to refine it, or do we go directly to the vendor and ask them to kind of come up with a prototype? Oh, no. Wow. The 3D toys or anything that's molded under the glass in a game, the game designer and the game team come up with their concepts of what they want in the game itself. And then they present that to the people internal. They present it to the people that actually own the IP. like the people that own Hobbit or the people that own Willy Wonka or something like that because it's very specific on what those toys have to look like based on the design guides that were provided and what we have to really hold to. So the license comes into play when this is getting designed, obviously. Absolutely, absolutely. Sometimes we can get away with a lot depending on the license or we have to be very, very restrictive on what they allow us to even use. Once the game designer and the game team themselves have their little powwows and they come up with some ideations of what they want in the game, especially the game designer, then they get that approved, and then we start work. Then they can present it to the electrical and the mechanical department, and then the mechanical department will start doing some sketches and some refinement work a little bit, and we can go from there. With the technology that we have today, we've kind of surpassed what we did in the past. We present the overall envelope that the toy had to fall within to a sculptor. And that sculptor was working in Joshua Clay. You know, some sculptors still work in Joshua Clay. There's nothing wrong with that. It's a very fine way to come up with a part. And it gets very, very good detail in that Joshua Clay. but now with the 3d sculpting programs that are out there that the artists are using the sculptors are using it's just fantastic it goes right into 3d manufacturing and you know we can take a 3d print we can put it on the game and see how it functions and fits fairly rapidly these days much you know much much quicker than what we did in the past with a sculpt because when the sculpt was being done we couldn't use the Joshua Clay we had to wait for the sculptor or whoever he was working with to make a tool and make some prototype parts out of a tool so it was a very long drawn out process in the past nowadays it can happen pretty darn quickly there is a lot of refinement that goes in between you know and a lot of conversation that goes between the sculptor the mechanical guys the game designer how things function well and again and then throw the licensor in there right because even when you think you've got everything honed in you still need to submit that you know for approval for proper representation of the product right absolutely especially with something with smog too because smog had talking and you know when we activate one of the toys it's it has to act certain ways too whether that with internal lighting external lighting sound motion then everything has to come into play at the same time So everybody involved And for the listener right So Smaug is the dragon that featured in The Hobbit It's the main playfield toy in the upper left-hand corner. Correct. Right. Correct. And it's the same with, you know, when we look at Wizard of Oz, the spinning house and the doors that open and the little feet that come out. or the spinning gobstopper or the images in Pirates, the ship, the pirates on the pop bumpers. Everything comes into play. So it's not cut and dry. That's a very simplistic view of – or overall view of what has to happen. But it really does encompass quite a bit of work. Sounds like it. I appreciate it, man. No problem. After having this conversation with Peter in regards to Smog and the Hobbit, I went around the office and I had asked if anybody else had anything to add. And it was interesting because Ted Estes, who's the senior software developer here at Jersey Jack Pinball, remembers a lot of details about making Smog from a 3D image and getting him into a pinball machine. And he discusses the legendary story of Smog and the Pink Foot. One of my stories, favorite stories, I guess, is thinking back to Hobbit timeframe. When that game was designed, Joe Bulser sort of left this blank area on the play field. Right. He says, oh, in that circle right there, we're going to have a dragon. Yeah. Okay. But we'll make it fit. And then one day he walks into my office. I had the whitewood next to my desk with this big lump of pink modeling Joshua Clay. Nice. Crudely shaped into like a – maybe it looked like a dragon head, but it really looked like a foot. And he sticks it right there and he goes, that's where the dragon head is going to go. So we had this pink foot in the game. Smog was originally a foot. A foot. That's great. And the darn thing, that foot stuck around for way too long. Somebody would come in and work on the game and they'd put the foot on my desk. and I'm like, I don't need the foot on my desk. Oh, man. Right. And so then I put it back in the game or I put it back on top of the game and then somehow it would back in the game and then it would end up on my desk again. Right. Usually like on a pile of papers or something. And then, you know, the oil and the Joshua Clay would seep through and I'd have this big greasy spot. Thanks a lot. So Joe's not winning any sculpting awards anywhere is what you're trying to tell us. No, I wish I had a photo of it. But do you though? some things are left but are not the if i find it i'll give it to you all right that's awesome so somewhere along the line um matt reister from uh back alley creations got involved because he was going to do the sculpting and um one of the problems with sculpting smog at the time was wb was really secretive about um what did smog look like as you recall at the end of the first movie all we get to see is his eye as he's waking up that's right so because you guys are in production of this game before the second movie was released correct uh well we were developing it wasn't production okay right my fault right in fact the due to a bunch of circumstances we ended up being real late on the game okay i'll be i'll be honest um which sort of worked to our uh favor because then we got more and more details as things went along. But at that point in time, no, we can't give you a picture of smog. You can't, you know. And so we were scouring the Internet and whatever we could find. And one day, all of a sudden, we find this big picture of smog on the side of an airplane. I'm like, how come they got a picture? Right. So we're studying it. And how many more pictures can we see of smog on the, you know? And then shortly after that, Weta, who was involved in the special effects and stuff with Hobbit, a movie, they put together this big smog head in the Wellington airport. And that was a big splash kind of thing. And now we're studying this dragon head. So you have two references. Right. Right. Even though we don't have much from WB yet. Right. And so the first rendition of Smog, as I recall, looked just like this dragon head in the Wellington Airport. I thought Matt did a beautiful job, and especially with the hand painting and all that kind of. Right. Better than the pink foot. Well, way better than the pink foot, right? Yes. And I'm glossing over all the problems he had trying to fit whatever he could fit into that circle in the spot. Right, right. Right. Because then the ramp was already designed and there's a mechanical person designing the thing that the foot is going to stand on top of. Right. And, you know, it's a poor Matt's trying to get everything that fits in there, you know, to try to. Does this look like a back of a, you know, of a dragon? And in fact, the back of the dragon would take a little side trip. Originally, the back of the dragon was going to look more like the mountain. And so the idea was you open up the mountain, and then you get to see the dragon. And, man, my memory's a little fuzzy on it. I don't remember what the reaction to that was, whether people reacted negatively and said, well, what the heck's going on here, because they have no imagination. It seemed pretty clear to me. Right, right. Here's the mountain. Now use your imagination. Now we're going to open the door, just like in the movie. In the movie. And then eventually you see the dragon. But that didn't work out so well. So that ended up being kind of a weird back of the neck kind of thing. But back to the actual sculpt of Smaug, here's this thing that, you know, the paint job looked just like this thing in the airport. and we're putting in LEDs to light up the eyes and like, hey, hey, our eyes look just like their eyes in the video, you know, online on the YouTube video. And we sent it to WB for approval and they go, no, it doesn't look like smog. Oh, man. What? Right, right. And keep in mind, at this point, we still haven't seen any of the footage of the movie or whatever. Except on a big plane. Well, yes, but that's just one profile. For sure. Right. so they're telling us no the color's wrong and his snout is too wide hey you have to have to make it much narrower and we're like you know we're done we we gotta move on we got other stuff to do and there's no convincing them so poor man had to go back and somehow narrow the snout and and change the painting you know so that he wasn't quite so bright red and colorful just like the one in the airport and tonight's a little more subdued and all that kind of stuff and eventually they were like okay that looks fine right right right um and i think probably around then we we were able to get um some footage from the movie and we go well yeah sure enough this is what they looking at versus what we been looking at which is this 10 high I wonder if the licensor was surprised about how close you were able to get it without really had been given any of the assets to replicate from Well, I don't know about that. It's interesting. We had some other interesting experiences with WB during that project. project sure um and now we're off topic again right but there's always like a legal aspect of what can you do and then it goes to the creative team and this creative team comes back and goes well that's not really middle earthy and or you know like if you're trying to do a script or something um you can't say will you have to say shall right right right so I'm not quite sure exactly I never worked directly with that team it was more like here I'd submit it to the licensing person for some of the stuff that we were doing like the voice script and then it would be handed off to that other team I never acted you know and then what we'd get is a three sentence response back So who knows whether they were surprised or not. Right. Mostly what we got was no. Right. Right. Wow, that looks fantastic. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Fascinating. Well, I'll tell you what, I appreciate you telling the story. Yourself and Peter, you guys have been in the industry for a long time, and I know that you guys are both a wealth of knowledge. So for you to come on and kind of give us an inside perspective is always appreciated. Well, my pleasure. Thanks. Awesome. Thanks. Always great speaking with Peter and Ted. here on the Jersey Jack Pinball podcast. And you're going to hear more stories coming from these guys and the staff here at JJP as we get into more episodes of the podcast. But I wanted to transition now and go to a discussion that I had with Jersey Jack Pinball founder Jack Guarnieri and a friend of his, Joe DeRusso. And Joe is the owner of Pin Graphics, pingraphics.com. And the two of these guys are collaborating on what I think is such a great charitable cause, especially in a time where the world seems like it's been turned upside down, for the lack of a better term. So let's just jump into that discussion right away with Jack and Joe. All right, joining us on the Jersey Jack Pinball Hotline, we've got Jersey Jack Pinball founder Jack Guarnieri and the owner of Pingraphics, Pingraphics.com, Joe DeRusso. Gentlemen, welcome to the show. Hey, thanks for having me. Yeah, no problem, Joe. What's up, Jack? Thanks, Ken. Yeah, everything's great. Everything's great. Thank you. Absolutely. I know. So times are kind of up in the air right now between this, that and the other thing. And I wanted to go into a charitable campaign that the both of you guys have been working on. But first, I wanted to kind of give the listener an understanding on how you guys know each other and what your relationship is. So you want to pick it up? I met Jack probably around the time when Wizard of Oz had just started was announced. And I met Jack at Allentown, and Jack was just kind of standing there. And I said, hey, that's Jack. I mean, I heard of Jack before, but I was like, no, that's Jack. That's Jack in the flesh. I've got to go talk to him. In the flesh. In the flesh. Right. So I said, hey, Joe, yeah, how are you? And Jack happened to have an iPad on him, and he started pulling out pictures of playfields and the mini playfields for Wizard of Oz. And I was just blown away, you know. And Jack and I just kind of hit it off from that moment on, you know. And I remember going to Comic-Con. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That was the center. So, right. So Jack had brought Wizard of Oz there at, you know, the center. and I'm really not into that show at all, but I heard he was going to be there with Wizard of Oz. So I was like, yeah, I got to go. I saw him and I saw him in the booth and I saw Wizard of Oz for the first time in person and I was just that, you know. So that's how, you know, we go back about that far. That comic book show was great. I mean, it sounds like a comic book show, but thousands and thousands of people bum-rushed us at our booth over the few days that we were there. We were all the way in the back, but it was on an aisle. It was a corner booth, I remember. And, you know, there were pictures from that show. People were just amazed looking at that game. They were just blown away. And they weren't pinball people, per se. They were just people that loved technology and loved seeing something new brought to a pinball machine. None of them expected to see that kind of game at a show like that, which surprised everybody. So you guys have been buddies for going on 10 years, and that extends outside of a personal relationship. I know you guys have also done some business together. But recently, collectively, you both are kind of working together on a Be Positive campaign. And I was wondering if you can kind of clue us in on what is the Be Positive campaign and how did it come about? So the funny thing about it was years ago when I first donated blood, I really never knew my blood type. I didn't pay attention to it, and I found out that my blood type was B positive, and it's not that common. It's probably 8% of the people in the world have B positive blood. And I remember being at a pinball show, maybe it was the Chicago Expo or something, about a year, year and a half into starting the company. And somebody just asked me one of those questions. They said, hey, you know, you're always really upbeat and you always have this great attitude, even with all the problems you have in getting Wizard of Oz to the marketplace. You know, what do you attribute that to? I think I said something like, well, you know, my blood type is B positive, so I can never be negative. Natural response there, right? It's like, well, what makes me positive? It's got to be my blood type. Yeah, blurting that silly thing out. Yeah, blurting that silly thing out. It got a lot of laughs, and some people even clapped. And after I said it, I said, what the heck did I say? And then I used it a little while after that, now and then. And it kind of caught on as something that became part of my, what I would call my shtick of what I would say, among the other billion things I would say. And with this whole pandemic and the world the way it is and a lot of negativity and a lot of just life happening, Joe and I were talking, we were thinking about something that we could do in a very small way to have a positive impact on people and we thought it would be a positive thing and then Joe made something it surprised me and you want to pick it up Joe Yeah so I picked up I recently picked up a laser cutter and I made some coasters and I showed them to Jack and he was like these are great you know I have, you know, why don't we do this great thing, you know. and he started explaining to me about, you know, the Bon Jovi Soup Kitchen and how people are, you know, if you make a donation, you get a set of these coasters mailed to you. And so far, I have to say, it's been a really great success. I've been getting emails every day. And, you know, all you really have to do is go to the Bon Jovi Soup Kitchen website, make a donation. and to reach that website you can go to jbj soul kitchen.org that's uh jbj like john bon jovi jbj soul kitchen.org go ahead joe and basically send me an email say hey joe i sent the donation you know how about a set of those you know jersey jack coasters and that's it it's as simple as that john bon jovi jersey guy i don't know and i'm not trying to make uh john bon jovi game or anything Oh, I was going to say some foreshadowing, Jack. This is how the speculation starts up. You heard it here on the Jersey Jack and the Ball podcast. Bon Jovi as the next release. Yeah, so, you know, he had this idea, I guess, years ago, and he set up, you know, a kitchen more than soup, and anybody could go there and eat. And if you had money to pay, you paid whatever you want. And if you didn't have money, you didn't pay. maybe you did some volunteer work or something like that, and there's also a food bank where, you know, the people lined up getting food. People that are needy. And it's nearby. I took a picture in front of it. And so we kind of did the coaster thing the same way. You know, really, if you make a donation, great. Joe will send you the coasters. If you don't make a donation and you just want the coasters, great. It's all on the honor system. We don't expect to really raise millions of dollars for this thing. It's just kind of like a tongue-in-cheek effort to try to raise awareness and get some positivity and do something good for a good cause. So these aren't limited, right? There's not like the first 300, 500 sets and that's it? I mean, these can go on infinitely, I guess, until you guys pull the plug, right? Yeah, absolutely. We have plenty of material. We have plenty already made to go out. So, you know, if anyone wants a set, all they need to do is get in touch with me, joe at pingraphics.com. Can you spell that out, Joe? Because I know graphics can go a lot of different ways. Yeah, sure, no problem. It's J-O-E at PINGRAFFIX, P-I-N-G-R-A-F-F-I-X.com. Just send me an email. Say, hey, Joe, I heard about the coasters. You know, I would love to have a set, you know, and that's pretty much really, you know, go to the website, the Bon Jovi site, make a donation. and even if you don't make a donation, I'll still send you a set. You know, I'll link to your email on the website in the show notes. So for anybody that's listening to the podcast now, look down at your phone at the description and we can easily link you there, no problem. Yeah, that'd be great. I appreciate that. You know, we need to stay focused and be positive and, you know, that's what's going to get us through everything, you know. I truly believe that and I'm a positive person. I know Jack is as well, and that's why great things happen. Great things happen with positivity is the key. It's funny because I remember when I had first met Jack, again, I think it was at Pinball Expo a few years back, and his positivity was infectious. It was myself and my co-host at the time on Special Inlet Pinball Podcast was Bill Webb, and we found ourselves just kind of following Jack around the show and running into him any chance that we could because, again, he's just a fun guy to be around, and he's very positive. So it's awesome to see what you guys are doing. I look forward to seeing, you know, coasters in everybody's home across the United States and internationally. That'd be great. It's a good time. And I'm sure you're up for a lot of international shipping, guys. I'm sure that's right where you're looking. Yeah, I mean, and Joe, I'm guessing that also, Joe, when you get orders, you just might pop a set in there anyway just for the heck of it, right? I actually have been doing that. Yeah, I didn't want to say anything. But, yeah, I've been doing that. Oh, that's perfect. Perfect. So go ahead, get those coasters. You know what? Make a donation to the Jon Bon Jovi Soul Kitchen. We'll get you the exact link to that in the show notes. And most important, be positive. Be positive. And play some pinball. Play some pinball and smile because smiling and being happy and playing pinball and forgetting about life's troubles and some of that stuff, it also helps with your mindset. positivity too. Joe, Jack, thanks for joining the podcast. Thanks for everything you guys are doing. We're all going to be positive. I appreciate it, guys. Thank you, Ken. Thanks, Jack. Thanks, Joe. All right. A couple of class acts there doing what I consider to be a real noble cause. Everybody remember to be positive. It's an outstanding campaign. If you want to know more about the background story and more of the specifics involved in this story, I would encourage everybody to go to replaymag.com R-E-P-L-A-Y-M-A-G.com. And there's a full length story there that kind of gets more involved as far as what that whole campaign is about and how it benefits the Jon Bon Jovi Soup Kitchen. So go ahead and check that out now. Well, it's time to say happy trails here on the Jersey Jack Pinball Podcast. Hope you enjoyed sticking around for the entire episode. I appreciate it. If you want to contact the show, you already got that email a couple of times. I'll give it to you one more time. It's podcast at jerseyjackpinball.com. If you'd like to go ahead and leave your career and start a new career or continue a career with a great pinball company, you can do so by submitting a resume in your email at careers at jerseyjackpinball.com. C-A-R-E-E-R-S at jerseyjackpinball.com. And finally, before we send this one off, I wanted to wish very happy birthdays to two guys that had birthdays on the exact same day, ironically. Lead guitarist of Guns N' Roses, Slash, celebrated a birthday here on the 23rd. So slash happy birthday. And also Leonard Abbott, such an important person here at Jersey Jack Pinball. You know, happy birthday again on the 23rd. These two guys on the same day. I'd be remiss if I didn't wish them both a very happy birthday. So from the entire team here at Jersey Jack Pinball, I want to wish you a great week. And don't forget to take some time out of your day and play some pinball. So long, everybody.