The March Update: Where Things Are, And Where They're Going

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Hello, everyone! It’s a new month, and so a new update! First things first:

What the heck is going on with the films?!

Right. So I’m now two videos behind, and Blue Star Episode 3 is just now continuing progress this month. What the heck is with that?

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The Elizabeth video is (hopefully) back on track now. InsideIncognita (Innie), my voice for Elizabeth, was hammered pretty hard since the end of December, having a big event for the Lunar New Year shoved onto her to basically both organize and perform in. The event concluded February 17, wherein she then had the opportunity to apply for a competition she’s had her heart set on for a long time now. We should be hearing if she is a candidate for that competition early this month.

In the downtime now, though, Innie is hoping to get all of the audio recorded for the Elizabeth video before next Friday (EG by March 9). This isn’t a guaranteed, but an aspiration.

I am in constant communication with Innie, and so I am intimately (sometimes too intimately) aware of what’s going on with her life. Take my word when I say she isn’t flaking, and she has very real reasons for the delays.

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The Leliana short is being backlogged into March. Milly Stern, my voice for Leliana, does voice-work as a side-gig to her day job, which can be pretty demanding. Combined with casual health things like her husband and her getting a cold right as I needed her to record, and other complications that being married present, she hasn’t been able to record as much as we both want her to.

I am currently waiting on a single missing line, and once I have it, then I can enter the dubbing stage of the short. Once the dubbing audio is received, the short should only be a week out from completion. However, I expect a delay in getting the dubbing audio back, for the same reason that has been causing her other delays.

Like Innie, I am in constant communication will Milly, and I am regularly apprised of what’s going on her life. She’s trying very hard not to flake, and (much like Innie, who also voices Liara in Blue Star), her performance is phenomenal (both as Jack in Blue Star, and Leliana in the short), and I am personally confident that most people will be willing to accept the delay in exchange for the wonderful performance.

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Blue Star Episode 3 is approaching the end of the initial construction phase (fucking finally). It only has 3 more segments of core animation to be done: the Shadowbroker cumming on Liara’s face; the segue between the end of the sex-scene and the post-sex scene; and some transition animations between the various positions in the sex scene.

From my last calculation (which shouldn’t have changed), the sex scene is currently 17 minutes total, with the total episode sitting at 22 minutes currently. I expect the final runtime to be about 25 minutes.

Once those final core animations are done, it will enter the dubbing phase. Optimistically, Innie will be able to get me the full audio before the fourth week of March. I have no concerns about Ivan’s role - knowing him, I’ll give him a 20-minute dub-video, and he’ll get me 8 complete takes of the dub, a total of 160 minutes, in under 60 minutes’ time. I don’t know how he’d do it, but knowing Ivan, that’s exactly what will happen. And each will be a perfect take and I’ll have to roll dice to pick a take to use.

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Plans for the Immediate Future

Well, that’s where we are. But where will we be?

Assuming everything goes according to plan:

• The Leliana short should absolutely be posted this month. Again, I apologize for the delay, but I ended up spending nearly two weeks of February waiting to get all of the audio necessary to move into the dubbing sequence (as of midnight tonight, it will be exactly 14 days; I sent the initial script on February 16, and am still waiting on that one missing line), so my hands are tied on it. I am expecting it to be about 3:30 in runtime.
  
  
• The Elizabeth video will hopefully be posted this month. Once Innie gets me the audio for it (and this is including the dub sequence!), then it is just a matter of post-audio and post-dub operations (Innie will be getting me the non-dub and dub audio at the same time, due to her schedule over the past few months). That means lip-syncing, detail animations, and camera choreography. Once I get the audio, I expect a week to get it all done and ready for release. I am expecting it to be about 8:00 to 12:00 in runtime. I can’t speak for the non-sex scenes, but the raw dub sequence is almost exactly 5 minutes of sex-scenes, so I am guesstimating the rest.
  
  
• Blue Star will be possibly ready for release in May. I want to emphasize possibly. I am expecting to get the dub audio by the end of March. Then April will roll around, where I will work on the Jill short. May I return to Blue Star, where I expect to do all of the post-dub operations. I am expecting 10 days of work after I get the audio. So it is possible that it will be ready for a release before the end of May. Possibly.
  
  There is a potential complication in this, though, and that is Femshep’s cameo. Some months ago, I announced the return of Pawsywasy, the best damn Jennifer Hale impressionist I’ve ever heard, taking on the role of Femshep. As it stands right now, that casting is being revoked.
  
  I love Pawsy to death, and I absolutely understand the things she’s going through that is causing these delays, but unlike Innie and Milly, she doesn’t communicate with me. Weeks go by without me hearing a word from her - and, in the case of Bounty Booty, it took her six months to respond to a series of emails I sent her across that time.
  
  She is an absolute joy to work with, and can crank out dubs that give the impression of “sex-depraved fireball” like no other voice talent I’ve ever heard, but she is just too unreliable.
  
  I am giving her until the end of March to get back to me on the retakes for the Femshep cameo. It has been exactly 21 days since I last heard from her, and that is with check-up emails being sent in the interim. If she manages to get back to me before the end of March, then she will be the voice of Femshep in the after-credits scene of Blue Star Episode 3. I will then recast her for Blue Star Episode 5, Femshep’s next appearance.
  
  If, however, she doesn’t get back to me by the end of March, then I am going to open a casting call for Femshep, in Blue Star Episode 3, in the first week of April. Hopefully a month+ will be enough time to find a good Femshep. I don’t expect to ever find one as good as Pawsy, but I’ll take “pretty decent and reliable” over “amazing and unreliable” any day.

Plans for the Farther Future

Well, that’s all great, but what about after Blue Star Episode 3?

Don’t worry, I have lots of plans. Lots. Of. Plans. Counting just the Shorts and the Films (excluding Seasons 2 and 3 of Blue Star), I probably have enough material written to keep me working for another 5+ years.

However, I don’t want to lone-wolf these anymore. I haven’t wanted to for a long time now. So, earlier today, I refactored my Patreon goals, taking into account some hard-crunched numbers (that I spent 4 hours crunching this morning...), and the fact that my previous hiring round was a colossal failure.

Last time, I offered $1000/mo for a co-animator. That yielded only a handful of candidates (less than 6 applicants), of which only a single applicant caught my interest. I was prepared to hand them the job, but before I could, they rescinded their offer and instead went to work with someone else for more pay.

So, this time around, I am aspiring to offer $2000/mo for a co-animator. From what I’ve heard talking to others, this is a much more competitive offering than my last one. Hopefully, it will be enough to bring in some talent to help me with these projects and speed things along.

We’re not there yet, but I’m confident that as the months turn to years, it will eventually come to pass. I’ve gotten this far, after all. And I absolutely plan to stick around for years, regardless of what anyone’s opinion on the matter is. I’ve still got stories to tell.

Oh, and you know how I said “excluding Seasons 2 and 3 of Blue Star”? There’s a reason for that: Blue Star is projected to be 20 episodes in length. Season 1 is 5 episodes, bouncing between Liara and Jack for narrative; Season 2 is 10 episodes, bouncing between Liara, Jack, Tali, and Aria for narrative; and Season 3 is 5 episodes, again bouncing between Liara and Jack for narrative.

And I’m only 3 episodes into Blue Star right now.

So Blue Star alone will keep me busy for a very long time. And is one of the things I would love to have someone to help me with.

So that’s where things are, and where things are going. I deeply thank all of you for sticking around for the ride thus far, however long it’s been for you. And I sincerely hope to see you all stick around for the ride yet to pass. It’s a long road, but I hope it’ll all be worth it for you.