Merman Christian here, this is a follow up review to the tail that I posted about a few weeks ago:
When I sought out to finally purchase a silicone tail, I knew right off the bat I wanted the SPLASH fluke shape, I've grown up with that film and I am a die-hard fan, especially when it comes to the tail design. The only person that I saw that could TRULY capture that look was Mike Van Daal of FlipTails. As beautiful as his tails are, they are FAR to expensive for my price range, but then I discovered Mermaid Creations, and the tailmaker was just as big of a SPLASH fan as I was! So I sketched up my design and sent him many pictures, including pictures from the movie too. I made my first down payment in March of 2013 and the second in the fall time, but no work on the tail had even began yet. Now at the time, Jesse was cranking out good work, which why I felt safe in going with him, little did I know what the end result would be...
Merfest 2014 came and I had previously ordered a custom monofin made specifically for ME, the maker had-delivered it to me at Merfest and I gave it to Jesse to take back home with him, that was in the beginning of January. I didn't hear much from him again until February when he said he had gotten the fabric to start making my extra fins for my tail, which was something different for him because he used Nylon this time, which was what was used in SPLASH to achieve that super flowy look. I've worked with nylon before for my own neoprene tail and I know that you can't paint it and let it sit out for months because it becomes hard and 'crunchy', well they sat that way from February to the time he attached them which was October. Now at the time Jesse was offering a special deal that for $600 you could get a tail that was all one color. He was hurting for business and since he had become a friend I purchased one to help him out. He told me I would have the tail within a month, I didnt recieve the tail until around the end of April, not to mention hadn't even heard from him for atleast almost two months, also I asked for the tail to be bright red, instead I got DARK red or 'blood'. Well the red tail did end up fitting perfectly, although wasn't as strong as I thought because it was used during a movie shoot I had this summer and I was pulling the tail on to do a scene and it tore in a small area above my right thigh...
Getting to the OTHER tail now. Throughout the summer I would message Jesse almost on a weekly basis due to his lack of communication with me, which took me through a loop because I had read read all these reviews of how he good he was at that, this wasn't the case here. Now when it came time to FINALLY mold the fluke, I knew it was going to be 40"( I now regret that decision) and I told him to cast it THIN due to its size, well when I finally did get the tail it was almost 2" thick on the sides. NOT what I asked him to do. I will say that he atleast got the SPLASH shape correct! During the tails creation time I was given many FALSE deadlines, first it was going to be done by June, then in August, then September, then October. When he finally started mixing the color for the base of the tail he got it almost to the color I was after but not quite, so I suggested that he add a bit of white to the mix to give it more of the pastel green that I was looking for; he didnt. Instead I ended up with a Joker-like green. I was already growing more frustrated with the process, so I just agreed to it. When he finally got the fluke together and painted it, he DID manage to get all the colors right, but the blending process was another story, the colors are bright and intense and they just seemed to bump up against each other with no transitioning at all, I had him go back and fix this. Now the big problem is when it came time to attached the nylon fins to the tail, the dragonskin silicone that he used wouldn't bond to the nylon, so he ended up attaching another fabric to the bottom and used that for the silicone to bond to. I purposely told him not to tatter the fins because I wanted to do that myself. Another thing that was going on during this time was LACK OF PICTURES, one was that he had only showed me two pics of the dorsal fin, I never even saw pics of the heel fins during this process. The pics he did send me were usually only PARTS of the tail, which was good, but I was I had more of them because I would have seen what I eventually did once the tail got to me.
After a full year of waiting the tail finally came to me on December 1, first of all the tail was just thrown into the box, no packing material whatsoever except for two crumpled pieces of brown paper and part of the box was coming apart, even the UPS man said how horrible of a packing job it was. The tail itself weighed 50lbs, but I knew that was due to the fluke, had Jesse cast it THIN like I told him to do, maybe it would have weighed less. This is where the tail took on a whole different light. AS i examined the tail, my heart began to sink as I took in all the sloppy work that had been done, now a few pics he had shown me I noticed a couple little things here and there and I asked him to fix them: they were not fixed.
I couldn't believe the poor craftsmanship of the the tail that I had waited over a year for:this was SUPPOSED to be the blended waist, having seen the blended waist of other clients I thought this would turn out great, but as you see It simply is two pieces stuck together, with only some minor patches of blending.
the parts where the extra fins are attached are already starting to separate from the tail, and the messy lay of silicone sticks out like on orange in the bed of apples. On the last photo you can even see the stiching starting to show from where the nylon and the other fabric were attached.
as far as the fluke goes, I was leaning on it while I was in the process of tattering the heel fins(which were horribly shaped, had I been shown a more clear pic, this could have been fixed), and when I sat up, the black painted had rubbed off on my arm in a nice streak from where I guess the silicone hadn't cured all the way.
The next day I tried to test swim it and I even had one of the mermaids on my team go with me. I don't know what Jesse did to the body of this tail, but it fit me different than the red one, which he even used the same measurements from. I havent gained weight, I've actually done the opposite and the red tail still fits great, but this tail was very tight in the calf area and even with the help of my mermaid and her boyfriend I still couldn't pull it fully up over my butt. The new fluke was just so heavy and cumbersome I tried to do all my usual tricks and flips in it, and it just wasn't working, I felt like I had a channel marker around my ankles.
This was supposed to be my dream tail, but the whole process has been anything but a nightmare. I felt heartbroken, betrayed, lied to, cheated, and like I had lost a child.
NOW, one thing I do want to make clear is that I am NOT lashing out, bashing, or hating on Jesse. Knowing him personally he is a kind-hearted and sweet person and a friend. It's the work I am mad at. He is also NOT a scam artist or is out trying to scam others. I feel that he just stepped into a business that became way too much for him to handle in such a short time, but I do know that once he finishes his current orders he is officially done with making tails for people. I know he has had a rough year in his personal life and that's his business. But communication is key with any tailmaker and I feel that was not his best attribute this year not just with me, but with his other customers too. I asked for some a refund of most of my money back and he DID agree to it, which he said I will have it after the first of January 2015. Overall I encourage future mers wanting to purchase a silicone tail to choose wisely! Do your homework and asked questions, maybe contact other mers that have bought tails from whatever company you decide to go with and ask them about their tails. But one thing I firmly encourage is don't be afraid to voice your opinion to your tailmaker, YOU are the paying customer, and they are making YOUR dream tail, and if they are a good tailmaker they will be open to your new ideas and work with you instead of trying to do what THEY think looks good and giving you attitude back, I've had people write to me with these horror stories.
Am I glad I went with Mermaid Creations? Honestly, NO, but I don't regret the learning experience...
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Originally Posted by Poseidon
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