Artemis DevLog CH7

Hey, everyone!

Nothing exciting with development aside from posing and rendering. Last night, I did take time to get the fixed renders finalized for the 0.6.2 patch. Did some last minute tweaks on the 'cooing' sounds. I'm going to be doing a bit more reviewing for 0.6.2 later this week as I prepare it to package it.

Last week, someone left a comment asking about development time and I felt it was a topic worth discussing here. Since it's something that's talked about a lot and feels like developers rarely get a chance to discuss, or at least have the chance to weigh in. Keep in mind though, this is how development is for me.

It's difficult to say how long each update will take. There's two scenes I've put aside for now, while I work on other things, because I'm having a bit of writer's block. I know how I want the scene to play out, but how the characters navigate it with good dialogue is giving me trouble. I could just be sloppy and throw whatever dialogue hits me at the moment, but that's just...bad. But I do try to optimize my time and work on other things, so I can return and maybe even be inspired by something to help whatever creative hurdle I'm trying to leap over.

But it's why my devlogs are structured the way they are. I stopped doing render count a while ago because I just feel some people are too obsessed with it and it's a frivolous metric. It doesn't gauge where you're at in development. I could say there's 2,500 renders so far right now. But I've yet to work on creating a large set-piece which could take time, thus a week or two goes by of creating that set and the number count takes a hit.

It's also why I share what I share. Instead of render count, I share screenshots of assets that I'm importing into DAZ and retexturing, re-modeling to fit the characters, importing and rigging whole cars. It shows the actual work of what it's taking to achieve renders. And very few developers do this, which is why I emphasize it so much and why development sometimes takes time as I'm doing things like this.

It also feels like once you become an AVN dev, you are no longer considered human by some lol. Like we're not vulnerable to things happening to us. As many of you know, I lost my mother last year and it was very difficult trying to stay focused while mourning. A lot of us devs talk amongst each other and we stress when we get sick or something happens because some of us do share that info and know that many will likely not understand. I'm not gonna say that there aren't "milkers" as many call would describe developers, but again it's why I share the stuff I share to separate myself from that. Especially any behind the scenes work that I can. And what I make from Artemis, a lot goes right back into development. Here's a screenshot of some of what I purchased from last year alone on assets

Also, as of Chapter 5. I've been contracted with Universal Production Music to produce the music for Artemis. As you can see the bill for this is quite high, having to set aside $200+ a month to pay it off. Trying to get two updates for each contract term is a goal of mine.

Puggy's my boy. We're good mates, but I still going to pay him for animations I contract to him.

And I don't want anyone to feel this is a rally call for more money, it's not. Again, I'm just emphasizing that what I make goes back into Artemis.

Circling back to my point that we aren't impervious to things happening to us. Things do happen and trust me, I know things can seem sus. For example, I hired Puggy to work on the new main menu animation for CH6. And on the eve of release, my render PC "conveniently" started giving me issues. Now imagine how bad that would sound if I posted an update saying I'm delaying the release because of that? Well, I made the call to push the update without the new main menu because...well it was a stressful time and I really wanted to get the update out. The main menu wasn't integral to the update (well, kind of), so I made the call and packaged it and released the update. Releasing the new main menu later on once I fixed my render PC. Here's the conversation between me and Puggy about that happening.

Shout out to Puggy on his work with the main menu animation. He was really proud of it when he showed me the preview for approval. And I felt real bad having to tell him I'm delaying his animation.

But again, this is just to show that things happen. It may seem "convenient", but they happen. And I know there are some developers out there who take advantage of saying whatever. Though this is why I outline my devlogs the way I do. So you guys can see what's being done and the work put behind each development cycle.

I am trying to optimize my workflow to push for faster updates. But I do a lot of custom work and it does require time. Not to mention each line of dialogue has a unique render and yeah... I can get wordy with my novels. I'm working on better flow of dialogue. As many of you know, I've been jotting notes here and there for my next project after Artemis. Lowering the amount of LIs from ten (yes, Artemis has 10 LIs. I know, I'm stupid.) and only having 5 for my next project I feel is a big step.

Anyways, sorry for the soapbox post. I just felt like we devs really don't get the opportunity to discuss this from our point of view. And this is just MY development. Keep in mind others have their own methods and visions for their works.

Thanks everyone for enduring my TedTalk. And remember to have yourselves a great week.

-digi