CREATION OF THE COFFEE TABLE BOOK

Please forgive me, but I have to start this story with the epilogue of this book: whenever you are going through a hard time, you either find yourself miserable or at some point you discover the will to improve, showing no mercy to the circumstances that dragged you down. Well, as a German, I can attest that our nation’s journey involved emerging from the depths, demonstrating our capacity to excel and contribute meaningfully on the global stage. The virtues of German reliability and precision are the very attributes we aim to celebrate within the pages of this book.

As a kid I was always amazed by tanks and guns in general. There was always something mysterious and very interesting about them. Back in kindergarten people were worried about my upbringing because I kept bringing tanks and camouflaged vehicles along to play with. But heck, I still cannot say why, but they fascinated me all the same. Fast forward, and I am writing this blog post about a journey on which I got to meet so many special people, starting with guys who are just doing their “regular” army duty without any interest in showing off the job, through to people like my comrades at BIA who really move things for us Germans and are a great example of how the German community has developed.

When I first started RawForces it was just a project for me to do what I like as a hobby: designing and creating a vibe, connecting subcultures and celebrating a certain lifestyle. It was never intended to sell gear or to pull so many people together into one big project like this coffee table book. One day my friend Gazo from Nocturnal Reaper Cult texted me and planted the seed of a coffee table book in my head. Our American comrades, like FOG, had already done it, and we wanted to put something out there that would eventually represent our own German forces, but in a RawForces manner. Lavish edits paired with pictures that simply belong together. We reached out to so many people who are known in the “German forces Instagram community” and who put their trust in RF to put this book together. Since I am really a one-man army, I was lucky to get in touch with the guys at BIA, who offered to help me with the whole distribution, uniting people under one label and keeping the motivation up during the creation process. I went through almost endless nights, hit a creative slump and really felt that what I had put together was not good enough. I wanted to do justice to all the contributors and set a benchmark for us Germans in general.

BIA, the contributors and I are delighted to put out what we think is a milestone for us as a community, and we are looking forward to volume 2 next year. We are looking forward to all of you who want to be in GERMAN ISSUED volume 2. But for now, let us honor the courage of those who have served and chased the dreams of the next generation. Thanks to everyone for taking the time to contribute to this effort, for the support and for the interest in general. A person’s time is the greatest gift they can offer you, so don’t take it for granted: it is limited.

With love, and a reminder to be the best self you can be, one day at a time,

Florian from RawForces

Also found as book, coffee table book, photo book, Bildband, Fotobuch, Buch, fotoboek, boek, livre, GERMAN ISSUED, RawForces.