AlwaysRats

December - Sweden

Happy Yuletide everyone!

I'm preparing to fly to Stockholm this weekend and I'll be spending Monday in meetings with a very exciting project that I've made mentions of before. I'm itching to go and quite nervous as well as excited about the trip.

I've had a really manic year and a crunch this week so I'm quite tired and ready to wrap this next bit up. I want to have a bit of time after this to finish off old straggling commissions before the holidays roll in. I feel terrible as I ...

Moo-moo

We play fetch with Gracie to break up the groundwork sessions. She has her moments when she gets a bit too excited or bargy which occasionally results in a little buck and a fart gallop around the school. She's a very clever clogs and I love doing stuff with her from the ground.

I find it hard to find time for myself with work, so I try really hard to join Gracie and pals at the yard a few mornings a week. Lately it's been a case of forcing myself off the computer to just muck out in th...

Little Ratters

This last week has been a right bin fire. I needed some character therapy from all the shattered car parts.

Baby girls -and- boys, up to 4-8 years old, all wore dresses in the 19th century. There was no gender differentiation in their clothing at the early stage of their lives.

The new face is Jack's little boy. 🐀 Can call him Steps for now.

Shy boy - Miikka

During our investigative journey to the world of Unity and Blender, I thought I'd test how Veeti's personality would translate to a little animation.

Overall I was pretty happy with how Veeti turned out. It was fun trying to capture his sissy essence with a little bit of talking, a little bit of careful look-seeing, and walking.

Enjoy this haphazard collection of recorded GIFs.

- Miikka

2019-11-13 21:07:53 +0000 UTC View Post

Roskva

Jáhko's mum.

I've really, really struggled with anxiety recently and I haven't really got an outlet to talk about it and I fear putting people off if I was to bring it up. I've struggled terribly to continue Tistow alongside time commitments to the big-project, I just don't know what to do. I have great support from friends and family, but in the end it does fall down on me to make things work.

Something I've never mentioned in public before, and this links strongly to...

Harmo the horse - Blender

Apologies for the image heavy post but I figured this was the best way to share progress of this guy. This is not the entire progress because I lost some of it from months ago, but I ended up retopologising most of the model and redoing all the textures, so most of it's new.

I'm sorry for not having  huge deal to share lately, I've been very busy with the project I've previously talked about. I'm going to Sweden next month for a business visit, hopefully then I might be able to sha...

Run deer

We've not shared much of what the demo actually looks and feels like because everything is still under works, but here's a little snippet for the archive!

Woodcarver shoved into a hill as a request.

...

Character controller

I've finally sorted the issue that I have been banging my head against a wall over, which involved a character controller and its camera. The deer boy and Jahko can both now be moved with either keyboard or joystick inputs without weird jitters or odd bells and whistles.

Some placeholder graphics from the playground. There's not much to look at on the hills at the moment so I went crazy with a placeholder grass texture.

It feels like whenever we manage to fix one issue, ten others...

Run

The gif is huge but I have no way of resizing it at the moment. Running boy!

Fawn

And his little spiky tail and legs. I've made slight amendments to the mesh and here's the textured version. He's not finished but getting there.

I love his little cloven hooves and asymmetrical antlers. ♥ Thank you Miikka for making the base mesh for me.

Jaakko's day

Miikka here!
We finally finished the mini-chapter that will be uploaded tomorrow on Year In Hereafter's website. Drawn by me, but coloured (and co-written) by Elli. Didn't Elli do a fantastic job? ♥

A name day is a tradition in some countries across Europe and Latin America. As the comic already tells you, every single day is dedicated for a couple of names. Those that have not made it to the calendar yet would be celebrate in February 29th, or May 22nd.

Oh deer

You've seen the boys so far and we've made progress with the rat and player controllers.

I designed this little dude and Miikka made the mesh for him. I've been rigging and weight painting him. He's since been finished and just need a texture now, but here's some uh. Progress screenshots.

Oh and how the Rat looks like now. He's been shaded in Unity.

Character rigs

Oh look how clever they are.

Very much still a WIP as we're missing their cloth textures and bunch of the maps still need adjusted but, it's been a lot of fun (and rage) working on these two.

This is a combined effort between Miikka and me. Miikka's made the character models (all the polygon shenanigans) and UV mapped both of the boys. He's also the person working on their textures and I've been doing the environment side of things. So yeah, they'll have a scene to sit in at some ...

Crooked birch

Remember the tree from Small Trolls? This is it in Unity.

I mentioned previously that I've been learning to 3D 'stuff' to go alongside the big project I'm working on and Miikka's been teaching me how to model. I've had to pick up all those skills fairly quickly and I wanted to share at least -something- I've learned haha. So here's a tree. With gently moving leaves. I've slept very little recently because my head is constantly buzzing with work stuff, so I ended up spending some time on...

Rat

Ok I'm literally just trying to come up with something I can actually share with you all because I'm so wrapped up with this big project. I've considered changing the way the Rat appears in the comic. The 1st one is how he used to be in Chapter 1. I wonder if it'd be worth making him clearer to the reader? I feel like darker lines would help characterise him better, but take away some of his 'etherealness'. What do you think?

I'm getting really itchy to share the stuff we've been workin...

Wild gods

I've got so many of these type of sketches stored away that I've dared not show. Including their human masquerades. 

I love Sotka's dumb little peacock-like form, it's so fun to draw. Captain's been a big inspiration for it and I'm glad I changed him from a raptor type of dragon to a bird.

August

I feel quite awful about not being able to share much at the moment. I'm spending a huge amount of time on a project that I'm hoping I can start discussing in the near future. Apologies for the lack of content here, I really wish I could tell you more about what's been going on.

I'm really looking forward to it though. I feel like I've landed on something amazing and just up my alley with this and I want to do my best to make this work. But I'm also terrified to find out what people wil...

Mrs. Hook

Matron and owner of The Anchor. You'll meet her in the next scene along with some new urchins.

"She is brandishing a saucepan and resembles a vengeful god."

Goodwill washerwomen - Progress

I remembered to record this whole thing. Not on video but I took several screencaps of the whole progress. Find it attached and below!

54

And here's the partner to the previous page.

53

With text! ♥ Finally done.

The Anchor - stables

The street looks much cleaner in this than it'll end up being in the comic. Needs more grub and clutter. We've decided to go with the below layouts after more revision.

It's meant to feel more cozy and enclosed than the front of the pub. It even has its own stable for a couple of draft horses used to pull flatboats up and down the canal. The Hook family also keep chickens and geese, and even an...

54 - colours

Text edits left to do for these two. ♥

53 - Colours

Colour colour colour~

The great white fish

More Odie stuff! Still illustration by me and animated by Miikka. ♥ Same scene in the comic:

Bounce

Considering combining the Tistow and Tistow WIP tags to make room for a Horsey tag (Patreon only allows 5 at once on the profile). Not sure if that'd make it more confusing. Babies though! Baby hosses~

Odie 2 signing

The covers are finally in Miikka's hands. ♥ I've already signed them and they made it safely to Finland. Can't wait to see them bound!

54 - inks

Walking on to something wee bit more cheerful. Keep having to remind myself how to draw Alfie's boat and keep it consistent ff.

53 - inks

Whei~ It's been fun working on these.

53 - Rough pencils

Whei we're back at this! ♥ Really happy to have the opportunity to continue again.