methodiaRascal

Streaming Schedule

Cancel this. Apparently me streaming kills the connection here, so I'm not allowed to any more because it stops other people streaming.

That seems to about sum everything up, really.

Choose the next animation (voting)

[EDIT] - The first question was after multiple answers, but was set to accept only 1 reply. It has been changed to accept several options. If you have alrady voted, feel free to go again. Sorry, missed an option while making the form.

https://forms.gle/rSd7B5T9swqh32ev7

So far I've done a bunch of Nick/Judy stuff, and a couple of things with the wolf. I think it's about time I gave you guys some...

Wolf Milking

https://e621.net/posts/2729935

I think I'm pretty much done with this wolf for now. He's been through a lot.

This is the first result of my unemployment. Started it yesterday morning with the old wolf model. Removed the image-based fur and gave him some proper fur around the key areas, trying to blend it in with the existing textures. Then I had a look at his underbits. The model was pretty decent, but the test...

Oh well.

To confirm what I already knew, I'm so fucking useless at my job that we lost all our clients and I no longer have a job.

So I guess I have more time to work on this then.

Demo Thing

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1sGpoW3x125tvZl1aN9gLJKAFh6w5tFv6/view?usp=sharing

Surprise, another post.

Figured I'd sort of try to make up the whole "forgetting to post the last project here" thing with some new stuff.

This is a WIP scene from the next episode of The Wilderness. It's 100% spoilers, so if you don't want hints about what's going to happ...

I may have messed up a little...

Excuses first, as is customary.

I got tunnel vision. In the last post I mentioned that I was struggling to get a simulation to work for way longer than I should have. I kept on it for even more time than that, and once it was done I realised the final full product was crap. So I went back, gave it better background, cos I'd concentrated too much on the character and his actions and had left everything around him blank and looking like no effort had gone into it.

So I spent another...

So, about that Wednesday thing...

I seem to remember going "wednesday evenings seems to be the perfect time to release an animation, people are online to see it!".

Yeah, turns out that is pretty much the opposite of reality. It's kind of disappointing that this one is probably the lowest rated one so far. Fuck. Never mind, guess there's a lesson to learn there. Somewhere. 

In other news, Scotland is now less lockdowned, I've been out over the weekend doing stuff that you can't do indoors. About time. I've als...

Kyn: What about Efa? (V2)

VOTING ===>> https://forms.gle/d5Yf1ZLwP4HBrkxh7 <<=== GNITOV

Sorry for a second attempt. Big thanks to Dargon for pointing out a load of things I completely missed. I've fixed nearly all the stuff they spotted, but unfortunately, I've managed to already lose the original version of the final scene, and don't want to be redoing the whole scene, so apologies for the last part.

This will properly...

Kyn: What about Efa?

VOTING ===>> https://forms.gle/d5Yf1ZLwP4HBrkxh7 <<=== GNITOV

Got it done, will release it properly tomorrow. If you see any errors, let me know and I'll try to fix them. It's quite a large file. Need to fix that too!

=======================================================

You are Kyn.

Let's be honest. When you answered your messages, literally the last thing you expected...

One to go...

Another quick one.

Unexpectedly getting a long Easter weekend off has given me a bunch of time to sink into this, and we are now down to one scene left to go. Part of it is already animated, but the more complex bits are still to be done, then a render.

The other 2 later scenes have had a bit of a learning curve. It took me a while to figure out how to transition between 2 NLA strips smoothly, and ended up with an extreme jump in position for Kyn, which managed to almost get misse...

Problem solving

I think in the last post I mentioned issues with Kyns fur not rendering correctly and how I was sure I'd fixed it.

I had not.

It took 4 days and 4 failed overnight renders, all with the same shitty fur result. I tried everything. Baking the fur simulation, recombing all of it, regenerating the fur and redoing it in the scene, even removing all hair dynamics. Nothing worked.

Then, on  my way into work, I realised there was another particle simulation in the scene that ha...

Preview of next episode

Well, I say "Preview" it's more 8 seconds of shitty footage that took all night to render before I found Kyns fur was going absolutely batshit mental. It's taken all day to figure out what might have been causing it, and I'm still not going to be certain I fixed it until tomorrow morning.

So, enjoy 8 seconds of out of context failure footage!

Quick Update - Progress Made! (21/3/21)

Kyn is done.

Update over.

Update recommences.

Kyn is finally done again. He took a bit longer than expected cos I started getting properly into his rigging. I wanted to fix the mistakes I'd made with Efas new rig, which I need to re-do again because it has some pretty awful fuckups in it. Her fingers don't bend the right way...

Kyn has some neat Shapes attached, so now I can do facial expressions through his rig, w...

Update 14-3-21

Let's be straight about this. I hate 99% of all the stuff I do. I can spend ages working on something, then the second I press that Submit button, I hate it. I could have done more, or tweaked it extra or improved skills or processes or...

I fucking love what is currently rendering. It gets me excited again. It is also completely out of context, so good luck guessing what exactly is going on here. So, this here is a sneak peek.

Working through what is left to do for this episode:&...

A bunch of Efas and also Kyn I guess

There's a chance there might be some confusion over Efa versions. The one I released the other day is labelled as V2. That is correct for free versions. The Readme contains the version numbers. Both of them.

So, while Efa V2 is actually Efa V5, most of those V's are little changes or fixes or simple things like getting rid of stuff like clothes. I'm not good at versioning.

Technically, the Efa I completed this time is Efa V5.5. The only real difference is a new rig, genital remova...

Efa V2 Model - Free download!

Surprise! It's Efa.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1hCujL4osHMBt2WQn-CLLGFVgd93pO8Tq/view?usp=sharing

As is standard, now that I've updated my Efa model and moved to a new version, it's time to release the old version into the wild.

She's been in use for several episodes now, and has a basic rig, ladybits and a bunch of shape keys for expressions. It's ...

Just a quickie...

Some progress news! THe new Efa is about 95% done. She is now clothed, rigged and has facial animations. The only thing left to do is give her one more accessory, a walk cycle and hand poses. Possibly some syllable poses as well, depending on how I feel about making lipsync work even if there is no speech to sync to.

I think one more session should get her ready to drop into the next scene. Kyn on the other hand, I've not really done much with him so far, but the plus side is that if I ...

Part 1 done & long take self harm

The good news is the first part is done, minus a 15 second bit I still have to work out the dynamics of. Otherwise, we are now up to 2min34s of episode, and this thing is getting split because there is no way this is going to fit within file limits if I don't do it in some smaller parts. I know where to break, and I have an idea for how to do it, so it's all good.

On the subject of length, the 2nd part has now been blocked out. Literally. I haven't got completed models yet, so I've spen...

Another update but this one has a video...

Let's ignore the valentines day thing. Either you're happy about it and don't need no telling, or you're single and don't really want to hear about it. Guess which camp I'm in and totally not bitter about.

Progress has been happening! Efa now has a brand new model, fully clothed. Let's see how long she stays in this outfit, cos she has a pretty poor track record so far. One main reason to redo her is that she needs a hybrid of cloth dynamics and static clothing for one of the upcoming s...

Try some things I guess

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1AnIOqznzf-kT-6haZ2aVq2H4qlYgee62/view?usp=sharing

https://e621.net/posts/2594884

Spent most of the weekend not doing any other work. Last few months I've been prioritising getting my van a bit comfier for living. I needed a weekend off finally, so spent it o...

Efa Dance Party

Quick update, because I managed to glitch Efas animation and it is possibly the best thing I've seen today. So, obviously I needed to share it with other people...

Given the current point in the story, the video is NSFW, but just in a mature way not an adult way.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1q_544UQTYjYUnxOKtw-VnAGkBl0_Y-Ll/view?usp=sharing

Needless ...

Update and preview - 17/1/21

Happy new year.

Just saying it now because I can't remember if I've said that yet. Don't think so, but just to be certain...

As is standard, things have happened to get in the way of animating. For the people who don't know, I'm technically homeless and live in a van I converted for living in. The UK has had a bit of a major cold snap, with snow for the last fortnight where I am. I have a heater, but it's sucking it out of the vans diesel tank, so I've been doing insulation, in an...

Whoops, there goes the PG rating...

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1htvwaAsrymO4DJhTpgWGfdNedh13Vngx/view?usp=sharing

So, I found a nude Nick model. It was not in the right scale, so did a bit of work to it, then had a go at attempting some more fluid movement. Not sure if it's quite there yet. When I have time, I'd like to do some work on his fur to improve it a little.

I was taking this week ...

Efa: Let Kyn take over

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1m10h8kmoCBEFQQR_06FE0guocsorFdHB/view?usp=sharing

Advanced release. Still rendering a smaller version for E621 and elsewhere. It's still 2020. Target met.

Voting ==> https://forms.gle/bp6CprsVWpX55QtU8 

E621 version ==> 2020-12-31 21:37:07 +0000 UTC View Post

Nearly there!

Just a quick update, and I hope that everyone had a christmas.

We're on to the last few bits of animating and then it's just render and edit. And the good news is that there isn't much of either animating or editing.

There's one scene that's partially rendering right now, just needs about 600f@80s/f to complete, some will go overnight, the rest will get the final part animated and should render tomorrow overnight. Finally, there's another fresh 600f scene, but last time I rendered...

Kyn V1 Model!

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ls6vHmf6DyhZ-HMJVJoadLnoMtrak_v_/view?usp=sharing

I said I'd do it a while back, I forgot. I also said I'd be trying to do some christmassy pictures before christmas. They are certainly pictures, but not much christmas in them, so I bunged them back on hold until I have some more free time. Instead, here's the first version of Kyn. 2020-12-25 17:17:39 +0000 UTC View Post

Fur Interaction Demo

Surprise. Two posts in one day.

I've had a breakthrough with the fluid simulation this afternoon, and finally got a result that I feel is adequate for the purpose. I'm just clearing up the last bits to let me start rendering this scene, and should get it running overnight, whihc will be the first proper progress in maybe 2-3 weeks.

In the meantime, some of the interactions between Kyn and Efa look ok when she's touching where he has fur, but the fur itself doesn't respond to conta...

Fluid simulations of doom

It's been a few weeks since the last update. Mostly a combination of work being hectic and involving a lot of driving around recently, so getting back late. It's also been because of minimal progress with fluid simulations in the episode.

At this point, it's just a case of tweaking parameters, baking particles, watching them explode again then go back to tweaking again. Parameters that produce a result the first time produce a completely different result the second with no rhyme or reas...

Update 2/12/20 - Progress!

Things have been a little slow in the progress department recently.

Rendering is underway for the next episode, but hit a problem which needed 8 hours of rendering each time it failed. This would mean tweaks and baking some control bones then trying again. The annoying thing is this stuff doesn't happen when it previews, so it's a case of correlating it with frame numbers once rendered. Anyway, that took ages.

Next, I am ill. But because I don't technically live anywhere, I'm not ...

Weekly update and renderfarms - 15/11/20

Not really much to report on this week, but I want to maintain transparency.

I managed to recover the main project file and get the new Kyn model in and transfer the keyframing across to it, meaning no wasted time. In fact it worked so well, I did a few tweaks to Efa and switched her out as well. I took notice of the complaints about her being too plasticene-y so added a bit of texture to her. First I gave her draconic scales, but they didn't tile too well and the texture had some weird...