[IC] KAM_Superuser | GB: NOW LIVE UNTIL 2ND MARCH

[FreshFromTheGrave]

[~/]>kam_superuser

GROUP BUY: 1st February - 2nd March 2021

GROUP BUY THREAD


This is the set for all you sysadmins, IT professionals, Linux users, power users
and the people like me who had to learn to launch their games from DOS when
they were kids and grew up around computers ever since. Three mod options
and a choice of accent or non-accent colour keys means you can really make
this set your own.

As a creative professional I wanted to design a set that did more than just
custom colours and novelties. Using the freedom of dye sublimation I treated
the keycaps as a blank canvas and designed everything from scratch. I hope
you enjoy the result of what has been around 3 months of work so far.

TEASER TRAILER

Not a valid vimeo URL

Since I'm a motion graphics designer by trade, I wanted to be one of the first
to create an animated promo for a keyset. I hope you like it and you'll want
to turn on your audio for this one!

COLOUR

Dark greys with a hint towards steel blues have been chosen as the base colours.
353 C green has been carefully selected as the accent colour after initial
feedback pushed me away from a more turquoise hue, but I did not want
the green to become garish or oversaturated. 353 C seen in reality carries
a wonderful luminance with just the right amount of saturation and almost
glows off the coated swatch which helps to attempt to imitate the emissive
properties of monitors.

I have done my best to colour match my Pantone GP1601A swatches to
my display, which has been calibrated and profiled with an X-Rite
colorimeter. This matching has been done by eye to make the renders
as accurate as I can to what the swatches look like in reality. If you have
access to Pantone swatches, I recommend taking a look so you can see
the colours for yourself.

TYPOGRAPHY

Roboto mono in medium weight and all lower case has been chosen as the
typeface for the set. It's a monospace typeface that would look right at home
in your IDE or your terminal and is relatively modern, being commissioned
by Google in 2015.

RENDERS

Rama M60-A


Rama Koyu


TKC M0llY


SP-111 by BlindAssassin111


TKC CandyBar


Isometria75 by ebastler


HAUS by Hand Engineering


Rama M10-A


Whimsy by prkns

KITS

The terminal legends have been carefully chosen to balance these three things:
Aesthetic - it must look nice.
Length - it must fit on as many keycaps as possible.
It must make sense in the context of a bash terminal bearing in mind that prompts are highly customisable.


inspired by terminal highlighting, but given a bit of design flare by rounding
the corners slightly. I found that while the hard edges were accurate, they
were not as aesthetically pleasing as the rounded corners and this will always
be the more important consideration.

SAMPLES
Keyreative and zFrontier have sent me some fantastic samples for superuser,
they have done an exceptional job at colour matching to the Pantone swatches!
I am very pleased with how these have come out, the legends are super sharp
and the colours completely carry my design intention. Once again please be
advised that if you do not have a capable, calibrated and profiled monitor that
you may not be looking at an accurate colour. 353C green is a bit more saturated
in reality and 4280C is not quite as black looking in reality.

COLLABORATIONS

NovelKeys will be making a custom NK65 Superuser edition to perfectly pair with your set!
A translucent dark grey case with 353C green scanline stripes on the rear and bottom facets
is the ultimate way to complete your setup!

Rocket Cables will be creating a themed custom cable to complete your setup!
353 C Cerakote aviator with a deep blue coiled cable.

RAMA

I've worked together with RAMA to create the very first KAM RAMA cap to be made available!
With this new CNC profile, other designers will be able to collaborate with RAMA on KAM caps
going forward. The Superuser RAMA will be matched to 7545 C (mods grey) with glow in the
dark green enamel infill!

DESKMATS

2 deskmats designed by Eura will be available, these will be run by NovelKeys and proxied by the other vendors.

VENDORS

PRICING

Additional info:

• KAM is a uniform keycap profile from Keyreative, the manufacturer of the KAT profile.
• KAM is a symmetrical version of KAT R2 (that's R3 in other profiles).
• Made of 1.65mm thick, all over dye-sublimated PBT.
• kam_superuser will be matte, instead of glossy.

To do list:

• Find vendors.
• Finalise kitting and add u numbers to kits (perhaps break into smaller kits).
• Get samples (samples have been ordered).
• Decide pricing.
• Fix a group buy date.

Support:

You can help this project by filling out the IC form.
Find kam_superuser on Discord: https://discord.gg/UwbeqBb Ulliam has very kindly offered me a channel on his server (check out his far more awesome stuff too!)
Consider using this signature to show your support around the forums:

Code: [Select]

[url=https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=108326.0][img width=360 height=120]https://i.imgur.com/AYtifVh.gif[/img][/url]

Special thanks:

Ulliam for generously reaching out to offer a spot on his Discord server.
GTRX, ImperfectLink and Marco for their help with the bash terminal output.
Geewiz and Whizzard for their expertise and feedback on the terminal legends.
NoPunIn10Did for feedback on the ergo kit (I hope I interpreted the feedback correctly because I forgot to show you the corrected version!)
Konstantine aka the king of kitting for his input on legends and kits!

Changelog:

27/08/2020 - Added Pantone chip photographs to pg.2 - Please read the notes carefully alongside it.
28/08/2020 - Added homing kit. Condensed numpad kits into 1 (not sure what I was thinking tbh)
02/09/2020 - Split international kit into ISO terminal + UK, North and South as well as fixed key errors and added missing keys.
03/09/2020 - Added collaboration with Rocket Cables for a custom Superuser themed cable.
03/09/2020 - Added missing keys to int_south kit to prevent requiring two kits. Corrected altgr legends in both int kits.
16/09/2020 - Added first vendors.
19/09/2020 - Huge kitting update. Multiple kits added, legend adjustments, added missing keys and many other corrections.
20/09/2020 - Fixed silly mistakes in the update like missing homing bar and missing accent enter.
12/10/2020 - Groupbuy date announced!
17/10/2020 - Minor kitting updates to alphas and mods kits.
15/11/2020 - Updated all renders to reflect changes to legends and accurately represent colour of the samples.
07/01/2021 - Added NK65 collab and deskmats.
13/01/2021 - Added RAMA collab and adjusted 1.5u convex keys to concave in 40s ortho because moulds are not available.
17/01/2021 - Added cable photos.
22/01/2021 - Prices added. Int_north it eth symbol fixed.

[PRJKT_]

Good luck with IC!! I really like this set!

[frostykoala]

reserved

[ssdt]

Looks awesome!

[Owl]

Really fantastic presentation with this. The animations, the video, the renders are all well done with lots of polished details. This is a marketing teams wet dream. And the set is great too. Very cool and appealing colors. Out of the countless sets that have had a theme like this, cyberspace, coding, IDE themes, ect. I think this might be the most well done and polished and it features colors that I find personally very fitting and attractive. I will 99% be getting this. Again, great work.

[VagueOrigin]

I like the set! I feel like Black would represent the back screen better than the blue in my eyes.

Sent from my SM-G975U using Tapatalk

[Ulliam]

Oh hell yes!

[NotFai]

Wow this set is so creative, I love it. Good luck with the IC

[Pach]

neat modifiers

[gutsack]

The terminal highlighting mods are where it's at, love it.

[geewiz]

Oh hell yes!

What he said!

[Starston3]

Nice set. Like mods_highlight

A looooot of kits.

Numpad could be paired down to 1 with 4 extra keys.

FYI KAM is not the equivalent to KAT R2... KAM is a modified row 3 of KAT.

[dirtegg]

holy beautiful

[fakedSkill]

Really nice set! Love that the smooth color theme and the mods! Looking forward to it!

[Convergence]

Absolutely nailed the aesthetic. KAM profile isn't my cup of tea but good luck with the IC!

[Bachoo]

kam set of the year :chefskiss:

[macomac]

Best interpretation of a "hacker" keycap set that I've seen. Very excited for this!

[eskimojo]

FYI KAM is not the equivalent to KAT R2... KAM is a modified row 3 of KAT.

KAT is numbered from the bottom, so it is R2.
KAM is not equivalent to KAT R2, but it's a modified version of it to be symmetrical, as you said.

[Starston3]

FYI KAM is not the equivalent to KAT R2... KAM is a modified row 3 of KAT.

KAT is numbered from the bottom, so it is R2.
KAM is not equivalent to KAT R2, but it's a modified version of it to be symmetrical, as you said.

Show Image

Show Image

Thanks for the detailed clarification

[DrHigsby]

Omg. The colors are excellent. Loving this.

In the 40% kit, it appears there is only one 1.75u spacebar. I recommend adding a second 1.75u spacebar or removing it entirely. Of the three layouts which use this size spacebar (JD40, JD45, Vortex Core), two of them use two 1.75u spacebars and one of them uses only one 1.75u spacebar.

Further, on the 40% kit, I recommend adding green accent enter keys. Esc and Enter accents are the most commonly requested accents for 40% kits.

I recommend cutting the page up and page down keys from the 40% kit as those are not common mods on any 40%.

Most 40% layouts which use 1u ctrl and 1u alt only need one of each, not two. These extras can likely safely be dropped.

The “menu” key can safely be dropped too. It’s just a 1.25u filler key and you already have other good choices for a generic 1.25u with “su” and “function.” 

Lastly, I recommend dropping one set of arrow keys from the 40% kit. Most 40% don’t use arrows. And for the 40% layouts that do use arrow keys, one set is enough.


GL with IC! I absolutely will be picking this up.

[SpinningHook]

Stuff like this is why I can't get my credit card payed off.

[neurot1cal]

I need this in my life...

[atlanticise]

Unf, what a clean boi. Kudos to you!

[fabijolo]

Nice, the teaser video is really great, didn't expect it to be that impressive/high quality, good job

[factoryofidols]

I was so hyped on this set right up until I saw that 40s users dont get any choice in mod styles. I would buy multiple sets of this to be able to use terminal mods and highlight mods on different boards. Please consider adding additional 40s kits so that we don't miss out on some of the coolest aspects of this set.

[hkhawk]

Great presentation

[psxndc]

I was so hyped on this set right up until I saw that 40s users dont get any choice in mod styles. I would buy multiple sets of this to be able to use terminal mods and highlight mods on different boards. Please consider adding additional 40s kits so that we don't miss out on some of the coolest aspects of this set.

I was disappointed when I saw 40s/ortho didn't have terminal mods. Will probably still get this, but terminal mods in 40s/ortho would be instacop.

Really nice job with this overall.

[Nathan_]

Looks awesome Fresh, will there be highlighted terminal mods?

[Vireca]

Really cool set, congrats. Now the things I think you should improve

I guess you made different kits because there are different mod kits but  because KAM is uniform, I suggest you to make a big base kit that cover most layouts. If I want to buy alphas+mods and then I need an ortho set, I'll end having keys duplicated like the arrows. I prefer to have extra keys that may I not use than duplicate keys to be honest. Maybe you could make a base kit with the "standar" mods design+alphas+some ortho keys and then add the spacebar to a separate kit and the ergo kit make it with alphas+mods. Biip made this with KAM Wraith and I think its really clever, you should check his kits

About the "-_" key I think you should change that. Right now they key is like _- but the _ its on the secondary layer, so right now looks like the _ its on the main layer and should be the other way. I suggest to change it to "-_"

On the ortho kit I dont know if there is a 1.5U spaceabrs but I suggest to add it, some ergo keyboards need it like the Corne. Also, the render looks like there is a 2U spacecbar but looks flat, I hope that key its convex and that its just you missed it on the render.
Also I notice on the ortho set there is a "sys" key but you dont have it in any other kit. May you should remove it, I dont see the point if we have the Su key

[wertqy]

Notified my bank that I'm splurging on this.

[marcofriedrichs]

yes.

[_PixelNinja]

KAM is not for me, but this design is great. Good luck with this project!

[pupper125]

Was an absolute pleasure watching you develop this set, and absolutely love what it's become, 99% getting this set man!

[violeaf]

FYI KAM is basically a wider, taller and thicker version of DSA

https://www.zfrontier.com/app/flow/2wQbz6Rvz3p4

Love the colours and concept. I'm being selfish here, but if the ISO UK keys can form its own kit it would be so much more attractive to me

Edit: remove massive screen-flushing images

[SmilingPudding]

This is going to be my first KAM set.

[harlekein]

KAM is not for me, but this design is great. Good luck with this project!

Same. Not a fan of uniform profiles, but just wanted to say this looks great.

[Pyrotech]

*Throwing money at my screen but nothing happens*

[vilagefool]

YES! Don't even know if I like using KAM (waiting on Wraith), but really digging the look of this set. Need to start planning a build for this one.

[Will Morrisson]

Never tried KAM but the look make it worth trying 
As per my comment in the IC form, I would love to see a bépo kit on this one (as standalone kit or in the International kit) or maybe a kit of blank 1u keys.

[Uberchango]

This is awesome! I've never tried KAM, but if a set will convince me to do it, it's this one...

[Janoma]

Dude this is so beautiful. GLWIC

[Bregoli]

YES

finally

[oldsantiago21]

any chance on nonstandard esc and del for vortex race 3?

[harlekein]

any chance on nonstandard esc and del for vortex race 3?

1.5u DEL is in standard mod kit. 1.5u ESC is highly unusual, but it is in the ergo mod kit.

[DerpyW0lf]

Holy ****... This is everything I've ever wanted. Hell. Yes.

[rikercd]

Is this Keyreative?

Are they gonna fix their stabilized key mounting molds?

[iSamurai]

Nice idea!
Just an observation, isn't it better to split the international kit into north/french/south like other kat sets (I assume that the moq works the same way so the number of kits shouldn't be a problem), it could even be more optimized removing doubled keys because of the uniform profile.

[echeetah]

wow... this set is just amazing!!!

[Runningtarrens]

looks sick. l want it

[FireLock]

Quite simple, an awesome person like you decides to include NorDe as part of an international kit. That's enough, my wallet is in.

Skickat från min SM-G960F via Tapatalk