I'm happy to announce that the London prints got finished last week before I left for a bit of travel. All the handsignal prints (Chicago, Singapore, New York and London) are beautiful and the process of getting them made was fun as well. Collaborating with people who were passionate about their chosen craft was amazing and that was the biggest reward. Everyone involved in creating the prints and tradingpithistory.com work independently to pursue art and it's refreshing to be around that perspective just as there aren't too many people trading on their own like I do. FYI, the shop link on tradingpithistory.com is down as I need to rearrange something on the backend but have been too busy/lazy to get it done but any print enquires can be made to tradingpithistory 'at' gmail.com
Just to give a little background on everyone involved I think will help express what the tradingpithistory project is all about.
All the prints were illustrated by Mike Nudelman who had to interpret explanations of the hand signals and then develop the layout of the print. Mike didn't start with anything but a vague idea of what the prints were meant to represent and used his creative powers to realize the vision greater than I imagined. There's actually two websites that Mike has and this is the link to his other.
The prints were brought to life by Dan Grzeca who did the physical printing and is the most prolific printmaker in Chicago and beyond. Dan has a passion for his craft that's quite obsessive and turns out a large amount of his own works as well which are worth checking out at his blog.
As far as the tradingpithistory.com website itself, right now it's maintained by Jason Vandecreek who is the man behind the curtain. If there are any issues w/the website it's generally my fault cause I neglect any non-urgent issues until they become urgent. If I was as dependable on this project as Jason then we'd see a 10x magnitude increase in quality.
The project is a lot broader than I originally imagined it and the development of the tradingpithistory.com website was originally created with Tuan Le who truly made it all possible to coordinate w/everyone and serve as the photographer. Tuan and I are going to do a full reshoot of all the photos now that the gallery of signals is realized as the photos on the website were taken over many years in many random locations. Jack Birmingham was also there from the beginning to assist in many ways, particularly with the late night photoshoots. The webpage "skin" of tradingpithistory.com was designed by Justin Gum who was able to create the clear gallery layout and design concept.
Before working with all the above guys, I didn't have a proper appreciation for the talents of such freelance craftsmen but I came away thrilled with all their work and creative focus.
I can't embed the video due to an issue on youtube but I can atleast link the video for Dire Straits "Sultans of Swing" which is most appropriate for a bunch of guys following their passion.
And since I like to refer to my hero of all heroes, the great explorer Sir Richard F. Burton, he often questioned his own drive to follow where his heart leads:
Starting in a hollowed log of wood—some thousand miles up a river, with an infinitesimal prospect of returning! I ask myself "Why?" and the only echo is "damned fool! . . . the Devil drives!"