I’ve spent a lot of time learning Blender lately and trying to push my animation and art skills so that I can make anime-like renders in 3D. So there will be more posts like this. I haven’t been good about cross-posting here so I’ll be showing off more of my recent work in the coming days.
This piece was a lot of fun to create and I actually learned a lot while making it. I’m very proud of the result and the music I wrote for it. The piece has since been featured on Blender Nation:
https://www.blendernation.com/2023/04/07/best-of-blender-artists-2023-14/
Take a Break…
I wanted to do something a little bit jazzy for this one, so that’s where I went with the music and I think it turned out alright.
For the animation, I started with the laundromat and then I had this idea for the ceiling tiles to lift up and float away, revealing a starry sky. I started to do that and as I moved things I realized that it looked like the room was shaking/shifting - a bit like being inside one of the washers - so I just kept heading in that direction.
Hope you like it! Thanks for checking it out.
(I want to start by saying thank you to the people who responded to my last post and reached out/reblogged to say such kind things about my last post. I appreciate the support and please don’t worry. Things have gotten better since then. Like most people there are always going to be days of lows, but I’m staying focused on the high points lately and it’s helping a lot.)
After the rough period that was May and the following months, I decided to kick myself back into gear in October with what’s known as “Beatober” on social media. My twist was going to be posting pixel art animations with each beat that I made. I wanted to challenge myself and finally put something OUT. I tried to keep a daily pace, but pretty soon I lost interest in the daily grind aspect and it lead to me just creating pixel art animations with music - which was much more enjoyable!
This was the one that kicked it all off and I still think it’s pretty fun. I feel like it’s hard to make any pixel art skeleton now that doesn’t immediately bring to mind #undertale, but hopefully people aren’t such die-hard Sans fans that they can’t let another happy skeleton boi into their lives.
Thanks again for watching/listening/reading!
In the beginning of May, I wasn’t doing so great. My anxiety was higher than ever. On a night that I was feeling particularly run down, I started messing around with my midi keyboard trying to find some notes to play and I stumbled on something that sounded good. Good…but very very familiar.
My rhythm was off at first so it took me a second to recognize that I was just playing the opening notes to “No Surprises” by Radiohead. I really wanted all of the tracks to be original for these, but I decided to do just a small loop of the beginning (those notes I had been playing) and I put together this piece which was meant to convey what I was looking for: a sense of calm.
It’s not the best thing I’ve ever made and there are issues all over the place with it. I posted it to reddit and someone very politely pointed out how bad it was. Then I posted it to Imgur and people there were thrilled. It was a nice reminder that things are not always as they appear and that one person’s opinion isn’t the end all be all. For the time, this animation was all that it needed to be and that was comforting.
After that, I was able to give myself a bit of a break and sadly I didn’t return to making these for about 4 months. But I’m back now and if you’re seeing this, reading this, and hearing this, and if you’re going through a particularly hard time: hang in there.
Be well.
This piece is part of a series I’ve been doing lately of pixel art animations combined with music I’ve written. Typically I start with the music first and then animate based on the song. This was a strange case where I had actually written the song a while ago and made the animation on its own.
I went through my old tracks and found this little beat and the vibe of it worked so well with the animation that I just made some minor tweaks to each and wrapped it all up.
Thanks for taking a look/listen.
I’ve been making these pixel animations lately where I compose music and animate to the song. They all kicked off with this one back in May.
It was starting to get really warm out, but I needed something calm in my life at the time. I saw someone ask how to make snow on a forum and made this in response. I hope it brings you some peace.
FINAL 48 HOURS! BECOME A BACKER!!!
If you haven’t already, please take a moment to become a backer for my game History of the Demon Girl. Every dollar will help the project hit the goal. There’s only 48 hours left and a lot of ground to cover.
Thank you for anything you can give/do, even if it’s just getting word to the right people. :)
If you’re a follower of mine, please show your support for my indie game company Silhouette Games and help back my first major release History of the Demon Girl.
The campaign is having a Greenlight Special right now in honor of over 500 people voting “Yes” to having the game for sale on Steam. 500 people will be able to pledge $3 and receive a DRM-Free copy of the game on launch and everyone who backs will receive a Steam Key if/when the game is Greenlit.
So head over to the History of the Demon Girl campaign and back the game today!
History of the Demon Girl Demo 1.0 - LAUNCHED!
When I was 8, I knew that I wanted to make my own video games. I played them all the time and I just loved learning about them and thinking about how I could make them better - how my games would be different from the ones that I’d played. It didn’t go away.
When I was in junior high, I started working on making my own games with an engine called VERGE, but when you’re in junior high (and the internet isn’t even really a thing yet), you don’t have a lot of time for things and you rarely have the experience and tools at your disposal to create your own games. That said, I tried - I learned and moved forward.
When I was in high school, I would come home and spend hours tackling Syphon Filter 2 or playing round after round of TimeSplitters Deathmatch with friends or towering like a jerk in Warcraft III. I wasn’t making games, but I was still learning, still thinking: How would I do this? Would I ever get the chance?
During college I played Mario Kart: Double Dash while drunk at parties - lapping people far more sober than I was. I drudged through 50 turn Mario Party 5 games that went for hours and left everyone feeling miserable/amazing. I gasped as I reached the end of Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories and was given the option to play as Riku. Games were everywhere in my life - still affecting me as emotionally as ever. They spoke to me.
They spoke so much that when I finally graduated and got my first real job, it was working at SCEA for a year - helping to perfect the PS3’s backwards compatibility. After that I moved to Los Angeles and got a job with Square Enix where I spent 5 years voicing my opinion on every game that was put in front of me - in some cases making minor changes, in others being the reason they were as good as they were. I even got my childhood nickname (born out of Final Fantasy VI) “Shadow64” included as part of my credited name in Final Fantasy XIII - my gamer life coming full circle; a dream achieved. But was that it? Was that the end?
No.
I’ve spent a lifetime playing and working on games, but nothing was as awesome as when I released my demo on February 19th and started getting feedback and comments from real fans. Not fans of a company I worked for, or a game that I simply had a hand in, but a game that I made entirely myself and a company that is me.
If you have the time, please check out the demo for my game, History of the Demon Girl - it’s existence is a lifetime in the making and it would mean the world to me for you to play it. The game is available for Windows and Mac - and I’m told that if you play the Windows version in Wine (for Linux) it plays great.
Thank you.
