January 2021 WIP Update

Hello Loyal Patreons,

Another month down & it's time once again to take a look back at what has happened this month. I was hoping to have gotten Symmetra's blender model up & running this month & although she's close there are still some kinks I need to work out. Monthly to do with the skeleton & weight painting for her hair. I do have an effective work around for this by just giving her a pre-made hair just imported from Daz Studio which isn't ideal, but will work for now. It actually does look better & is much more useable than her default hair ever was, but if possible I'd prefer a useable version of her real hair. But you have to work with what you've got.

I'm also flirting with a different method of making these models which involves actually shaping the daz model's head to match the original. It's just a theory & I'm not devoting much time to it because I'm at about 85% that it is a lost cause, but if it does work it'd be such a break though due to all the time it would save in the future.

Also I've bene putting together some content with Mercy & Sym in SFM which is almo9st ready to render. It's a very short 12 second loop, but it's come out quite nicely & should be out with in a week. I have a few other shorts like this that I've been chipping away at here & there but I haven't had that moment where it all just clicks into place in my mind-brain & I suddenly know exactly what I need to do.

Major gains here this month! Mostly of the final BJ scene is now completed. I'm working on the hair pulling bit at the moment. There are two parts, the side angle & the front closeup. Side angle has all the basic stuff done, it's now just a question of adding flavour. The front closeup is still having it's basic loop built, but the majority of that has been done. That was my main thing this morning actually. Spent quite a lot of time this month getting her hair right. Characters with this kind of solid mass hair always require a little extra attention if you want them to do much moving about & I was keen to try & get a specific look of it draping over her arms & lower back. Not completely successfully, but high 90% so is all good.

I'm so far through this one now that I'm starting the render process for the beginning so we'll be getting our first look at some actual animation soon, maybe even by the next monthly update! Once I'm rendered up to the part where she moves closer to the pier I'll release a rough cut of the first half so you can get a look at what's happening.

And of course the weekly updates go up on the Patreon every Saturday (or occasionally Sunday) if you want to see some pics!

And to everyone's delight we finally got a Chapter 6 update for Eldar Narn this month! Feels like it's been ages since one of these came out but I finally finished. We get to meet yet another character, Meredhel's 'friend' Kala who was reference briefly back in Chapter 2. Unlike the other two characters we met his chapter, Kala is actually important to the story & not there just to serve as meat for the grinder & to get bad ended.

Anyway, I like the little interaction they have together. They don't have as many scenes together as I'd like so I'm probably going to need to add a few more in a long the way. Their relationship is important & there isn't much time to build upon it before circumstances will split them apart for quite a while.

The rest of this Chapter will probably come with 2 releases. There isn't much more to cover, we go back to the others for a minute for a little scene with Erolith, Myriil & the priestesses, then back to Meredhel for a little bit & then they leave although the means by which they leave the garden is important & might be a little time consuming the set which which is why it'd be best split in two.

And there we go. It's been a very Mermaid month & I'm looking forward to getting her off my to do list. It's been too long this one has been hanging over me. Hope you all are doing well, hope you all like what you see & hope to have some animated Mermaid previews for you very soon.

Take it easy my dudes & thank you for your time,