Meet the Minions
Meet the Artisan Dice Minions. We are jacks of all trades, and experts in our craft. We’re nerds, we’re gamers, we’re athletes, and artists. Get to know the AD crew below and find out just what it takes to be a Minion.
Roberto Avilia
EL Minion
Roberto joined the ranks of Minions at the tender age of 16. 6 years later he’s still permanently affixed to the laser engraver.
Not only is Roberto our lead production engraver, he runs our Tormachs, (our titanium milling machines), and does a ton of the inlay and polishing work on our dice. Roberto has also mastered the art of destructive testing our shop equipment. He once broke a machinist vice with a hammer… twice.
Roberto famously claims to have tried college for a day, but quit so he could focus his studies on training his cats in the fine art of feline boxing.
Nerd Cred: Functional weeabo, refuses to 100% a Nintendo game, addicted to tetris, and spends entirely too much money feeding his cardboard addiction.
Amy Chandler
Art Minion
Amy is a 12 year veteran caricature artist and our resident illustrator. If you’ve ordered custom art work, Amy probably drew it.
In addition to being our lead artist, Amy also works on our dice cases, as well as running our laser. She also specializes in putting the finishing touches on our dice.
Amy attained her BFA in Drawing and Painting from the University of North Texas, and spent the past 12 years as a Caricature Artist. She’s also skilled in metal working, textiles, and cabinet making. She’s also a phenomenal airbrush artist.
Nerd Cred: She is also a connoisseur of comic books and has begun to master the art of cat and dog butt illustration.
David Snowden
Tech Minion
David crushed his Minion interview with 2 custom built light sabers. His forte is fixture building, machine maintenance, & dice shaping.
When he’s not helping craft some of the best random number generators on the planet, David also helps with process engineering, along with welding, grinding and fabication work.
Rocking a Performance Art degree from University of Texas at Dallas, you’ll find David belting out show tunes to the acompaning 24,000 RPM screech of our CNC mills. David is also a skilled furniture maker, forger of lightsabers, and maker of stage props. He also modifies and customizes EDC (everyday carry) gear.
Nerd Cred: Builds custom Gunpla models, Dungeons and Dragons addict, and regular Dungeon Master. Raises dogs and goats in as nerdy a fashion as possible.
Josh Dryk
Media Minion
Josh is the proud owner of not one but three Art Degrees. These days he does production machining and helps run our social media.
Running our social media accounts is not all Josh does. He also does most of our product photography, helps with our website, as well as new product research and development.
Josh rocks a Bacheors of Fine Arts from Texas Woman’s University and a Masters of Fine Arts from the University of Texas at Arlington. A skilled ceramicist, painter, bookbinder, metal smith, and photographer, Josh has one of the most well rounded skill sets of the AD crew.
Nerd Cred: Owns a staggering collections of comic book t-shirts, DM’s his own D&D games, and is in the process of building his own fully fleshed out world for D&D 5th Edition.
Melissa Brumfield
Office Minion
Melissa has 2 Masters Degrees in education. She retired from teaching in 2017 to take over as our customer service & shipping minion.
On the production side of things, Melissa helps with applying lacquer to all of our dice and the assembly of our stamped steel tins. She’s also been known to run the laser from time to time, which inevitably earns a disapproving squint from Roberto. (He’s very protective of his lasers.)
Melissa has earned three degrees from Texas A&M University at Commerce. Her undergraduate degree is a BS in Interdisciplinary Studies. After which she obtained two masters degrees in Elementary Education and Early Childhood Education.
Nerd Cred: Has an unhealthy obsession with all things Buffy the Vampire Slayer related, and is a practicing Brown Coat as well as a total Marvel Fan Girl
Charles Harris
Apprentice Minion
Charles is the quintessential nerd, consummate athlete, and our newest hire. He fights on the Dallas Warlords with Charlie.
Charles helps out with production machining, dice infills, and dice box assembly. He also works on materials prep, as well as copy for the website.
Nerd Cred: Has been a commissioned writer for various LARPs and RPGs for nearly a decade. He started Armored Combat just over year ago and is now well in to his second season as a heavy steel fighter. Charles table tops regularly and is in the process of writing for two new games.
Charlie Brumfield
Boss Minion
Sporting a beard of Epic proportions, Charlie is our Boss Level Minion. A Master craftsman, machinist, photographer, artist, programmer and armored combat fighter, he’s as close to a modern day renaissance man as you can get.
These days Charlie spends the majority of his time programing our CNC machines, working on research and development, process engineering, and machine tool design.
After an 8 year stint majoring in Fine Art Airbrush and Commercial Photography at Texas A&M Commerce, (Van Wilder progam FTW!) Charlie went on to run a portrait studio, then worked as a freelance web designer, commercial photographer, developer, and graphics deisgner.
Nerd Cred: Has DM’d in most major RPG systems. Is an avid tabletop gamer with a wall of cardboard to show for it. Total Star Wars fanboy. He has read every single book in the Disney, as well as the Expanded, Universe. Yes *shudder* even THAT one…