Tale Foundry

Daily Update: THEME CHANGES

THIS IS A BIG UPDATE AND IF YOU VOTED ON OUR LATEST POLL YOU SHOULD DEFINITELY READ IT

Phew. Okay. So Chloe and I literally just ended another call with the World Anvil team and, frankly, it may have been one of the most productive business discussions either of us have ever had.

In trying to determine how best we should sync things up for our impending collaboration, we came to the realization that we wanted to do more than the standard cross-promotional plug. ...

Daily Update: I Can Count on My Fingers

The number of steps left in this creation of this list video, now.

Even with con plague running through our veins (that is, the result of all the physical duress that level of activity/fun/alcohol puts on your system), we managed to make a healthy amount of progress. Chloe's a good fourth of the way through the audio editing process, and all I have to do now is stick images on a timeline, prepare some minor animations, find music, sync everything up (when I have the audio), create a thumbnail,...

Daily Update: The Booziest Whetstone

At last, after 3(?) days of furious relaxation, Chloe and I have returned to our humble existence as video creators.

I'm presently sprawled out on our mattress, which is still bare due to our slowness unpacking. Tomorrow things should fall back into place. For now, I'm just waiting for this lovely, feathery thing to swallow me so I can spend a restorative evening in the sweet embrace of sleep, minus the party fluids (read: alcohol and nothing but alcohol, for that is as hard as I party) in sto...

Daily Update: There Goes Yesterday's Update

It was bound to happen at some point, but that doesn't make it feel any better. Sorry for missing an opportunity to let you guys know what's happening on our end.

I shall thus scramble to make up for lost text.

Right now I'm sitting on the floor in a hotel room attached to an anime convention, posting this through my phone's wireless hot-spot because the hotel wifi is exorbitant. This text is coming through the haze of last night's alcohol, and I'm eagerly anticipating to wash my gross, ...

Daily Update: I Made an LED Corsage

Phew. It's 3:46am and we're back from the planetarium prom. I'm fairly collapsing as I write this, but it must be done.

The prom was a very interesting experience. We had a lot of fun, had a lot to drink, and stayed up altogether too late. At this moment, my judgement may be impaired, so I'm going to keep away from topics with... any weight whatsoever.

What I will tell you is that we returned home in one piece, and now we're pending an early departure in tomorrow for the convent...

Daily Update: Spiffing

Like a prudent young lich, I have in many ways managed to put off growing up for a tolerably long while. Let me give you a frame of reference, here.

This year, for the first time, I've:
—Made enough money to present as a "person with a job"
—Paid taxes (although that was all Chloe really, in her cherubic splendor)
—Traveled out of state with friends instead of family
—Paid for my own gas at length (a symptom of the following)
—Had places to travel on the daily career-r...

Daily Update: How is It Already 11:43?

Welp, no matter. I've sixteen minutes until I officially miss the deadline for this thing, so all is well.

After nine hours of image searching, I have officially begun my assimilation into the google image search engine. I am one with the reverse search. I have opened my soul in a new tab.

Such is the cost of progress, and progress I have made indeed.

Today (with some help from Chloe) I was able to find just about all the visuals I'm going to need for this list. I'll have to do som...

Daily Update: Acclimating

News! Glorious news. 

After a days of R&R, we went back to hitting production hard. I'm about half way through assembling visuals at this point, and Chloe was able to begin in earnest on slicing and dicing the audio. We have a convention to attend this weekend (Thursday-Sunday evening), so we're trying to blow through this as quickly as possible. No guarantees we'll have it out before we need to leave, and we definitely won't be making much progress during the convention.

But! ...

Rewards Step 2: Placing Orders

Hey guys!

When I have received all the requests for shippable items it comes time to actually place the orders.

That's what I will be doing today. 

If you have responded to my email about your rewards then expect another one today from me after I have completed the order! If you have unlocked a reward but haven't yet placed your order and want to, feel free to email me with the design of the product you unlocked.

You all will be hearing from me again very soon!

2018-05-14 20:06:43 +0000 UTC View Post

Daily Update: Mommies Are Gr8

If you’re excited about all our intense forward momentum, then shield yourself. Today was a reprieve for this Benji. I spent it with Chloe, and with lovely mommies, and with my pathfinder character sheets.

I did spend a healthy amount of time dredging up visuals for our list and preparing for the upcoming changes to our Patreon schedule and our think tank sessions, but apart from that? Today was for sharpening the saw. Because sometimes, if you don’t, you never make any ...

Daily Update: A Marathon of Sitting

Here I sit, at my girlfriend's mother's dinner table, surrounded by script pages and notebooks and empty pizza boxes. My throat is spent, and my buns have atrophied to jelly after hours in this chair. Today felt a lot longer than it was, but that probably has a lot to do with the sheer girth of the audio file I just created.

That's the big news for today: I'm officially done narrating the audio for the list video. Now I get to pass off the wave form to Chloe and let h...

Daily Update: Graphic Content Warning

Because I spent literally all day planning and creating graphics, which was actually pretty refreshing after a solid week (or more) of writing.

I spent the majority of that time putting this thing together, because it's important for a whole slew of reasons:

Which is important for a whole slew of reasons, as I mentioned in 2018-05-12 02:37:58 +0000 UTC View Post

Vote: Next Series Theme!

We will be recording the list soon! As in very soon. Which means we must figure out the next series theme in the next few days. Then we will be able to delve into some research about the topic and produce an awesome series for you!

So now the moment you all have been waiting for, with some very interesting options:

Daily Update: Second Wind

Phew. I needed today.

If you've been reading these things, you probably know I've been in a little bit of a funk for the last week or so. Depression can hit out of nowhere for virtually no reason, and the demon looks different for everyone it stalks. My weapon against it is productivity, hard work, and a variety of socialization. If I can get all three of those things, I can fend it off and shamble back toward something that resembles an emotional equilibrium. Lately I've only been getting tha...

Daily Update: A Knot

Today was interesting.

Once a week (usually Wednesdays) Chloe and I set aside a little no-work-allowed quality time. A much-needed weekly date night (or day, depending on how much pressure we're under). Believe it or not, being on a business team with the person you love is a huge emotional load. It can be pure magic at times, but it can also be really hard to separate the business relationship from the... relationship. 

So today I wrapped up some loose pieces of the script...

Daily Update: Striding Forth

The list is complete!

Hoo-rah. I don't know precisely what kind of time-frame that puts us on, but at least we have something concrete to show for our efforts. Between wrangling sources, thinning an abundance of material, and finding clever ways to write every unique piece of this script, this thing has been a disproportionately massive amount of work. I think it'll be worth it, but phew. I'm ready to go into hibernation. I think I might, in fact.

Yep. A season of rest.

...

Daily Update: Lemme ask you something...

This isn't going to be a huge thing, but I'm pretty curious...

If we were to do away with that Patreon video at the top of our Patreon page and replace it with... oooh, say, some progress bars to show you how far we are through the current video, how would y'all feel about that? I'm asking here because it's very likely that, if we do it, I'll be updating it when I post these dailies.

So give me your feels, and I shall read them, and I shall cogitate on them.

In ...

Rewards: Important Update!

Hello everyone!

I'd like to let you know that we are changing one of our offered Lifetime rewards. 

We realized a little bit ago that we don't feel comfortable with the $280 reward, Naming a character. We didn't like the prospect of possible shoehorning a character into our story that was irrelevant. We were worried it might hurt the story.

Instead, when your lifetime contribution is over $280 you will get to hide an easter egg in one of the videos of our series!

Thank y...

Daily Update: It's 2:45am...

But I haven't slept yet, so it's not technically tomorrow. Right?

Sorry this is going up so late. Between a surprise family engagement on Chloe's end and an ongoing battle with depression (something I don't struggle with often, but it hits out of nowhere every now and then), today's been a whopper. I managed to blaze through some script, but it's a long one that needs a lot of revision. I should be finishing it tomorrow, which (hopefully) means audio the day after, and then formatting...

Rewards Step 1: The Emails

Hey guys! It's Chloe.

Today I will send out more emails en mass than any other step of the process. 

I will be starting with the sticker rewards and working my way up through the other Rewards.

So be on the look be on the lookout for emails from me! 

☮❤️😀

—Chloe, Happy Human Helper 

Daily Update: Forthcoming

Hmm...

You'd think my wrists would hurt after a full day's script-writing, but for one reason another it's actually my left buttock. Perhaps I sat in a strange position on that armchair in Starbuck's for the hours I was there. It feels a lot like I just did fifty squats, but leaning heavily to one side.

Oh well. The cost of productivity is dear, and productivity there was.

Today I banged out half of the completed script for the list video, which I feel is pretty good considering t...

"May" I give out these Lifetime Rewards?

Hello Everyone!

It is time to start sending out lifetime rewards. As always I have some announcements to go out with them.

Pre-January Patrons

Please update your pledge to include your address if you haven't done so already. We can't ship physical rewards to you without that information.

International Patrons

Unfortunately at this time we are only able to ship the sticker reward internationally. When we are able to...

Daily Update: Concerning Skeletons and Trophies

This was going to be a pretty simple post until about 20 minutes ago. You can thank whoever nominated us for the Parsec Awards for spicing things up a little tonight.

It's not a big thing, really. Apparently some kindly spirit out there thinks we deserve a trophy for our efforts, which I am, of course, totally game for. Tangible symbols of affirmation are good for the soul. 

At a glance, the Parsec Awards are more or less an annual volunteer-run program that awards...

Daily Update: Good Steam

Another of these working-on-it-but-nothing-much-to-show-at-present updates, but we're getting there, brick by brick.

By the look of things, this list could easily be in the ballpark of 13-20 minutes. The outline alone is in excess of 10 pages now. I'll be writing the script all day tomorrow, which (I think) should be a bit easier than the research/outlining phase. Lists don't tend to be as hard to write as episodes, but you never know.

Also, I hope you guys like Domovoi—th...

Next Series Theme: Input?

Hey guys! It's Chloe.

As we continue to work on the list, we will get closer to the time to vote on our next series's topic. We want to open up the discussion with all of you about what should be on the poll!

We encourage you to make as many suggestions as you'd like, but to guarantee their usefulness we do have a few guidelines.

• Suggest a book, movie, TV show, author, or series.
• Keep in mind the popularity of the title, author, or series you'd like ...
  2018-05-04 01:19:22 +0000 UTC View Post

Daily Update: The List That Could Wrap the World

You heard it here, folks. This is officially our longest list to date. 

I feel insane attempting to squeeze this much into one video, but I more or less have your blessing to take the time I need to do it, so that's where we are.

Today's just been outlining and more outlining, making sure this is as lean as it can be while still hitting on all of the important notes. To give you some perspective, we're only two items in and the outline alone is just about two pages. That's crazy. Us...

Daily Update: Something (Perhaps) Unexpected

Eventful things! Development! Winds of Change! Prophetic Ramblings!

Conceptually, I could have ended the update there. But I owe you more than that. 

Today’s task list was an interesting combination of unrelated things. I had to get Felipe an updated Style Guide (see below) send our Reddit guy some new assets (including an updated background and header image), push through as much video outlining as possible, and—hush ye all with proper anticipation—draft a new logo and wo...