December Update: Animatic Preview, Series Update & More in the Works!

Note: You may have received a notification for this post twice. For some reason, Patreon seems to have had a hiccup where it replaced the original post with an old draft and deleted the actual post. No idea what that's about, but apoligies for the clutter anyhow!

Dear Patrons,

Hope you're all doing well! This may be the last update I post before the end of the year, because after this I've got my work cut out for me making the yearly round-up. But there's plenty of good stuff to get through before that, so let's jump into it!

TALES OF ZALE:

Ok, so remember how I was complaining that Denmark is the only country in Europe without tax rebates on animation production and that that makes it really difficult to finance stuff? Well guess what! Now we're getting those in 2026! (Although negotiations as to what form it will actually take for animation is still ongoing).

And remember how I was pessimistic about our prospects with the broadcaster because of the current financial realities? Well guess what! No really, keep guessing, I'm not at liberty to say. Well, conversations are still ongoing, I guess let's leave it at that. There are nuances and I think I may be able to elaborate a bit more once we've had our follow-up meeting in January.

What I can say though, is that I am deep in the writing mines right now and it has been really fun - although it has also disrupted some of the other things I'd planned to do with my time before the next job starts up. That's a bit of a luxury problem though. Here's a spoiler-free view of what the story looks like right now:

I also finished up editing all the rough animation we'd done for the pilot animation! It's going to be screened for a test audience and I look forward to hearing some initial reactions. I hope that I in the new year can keep doing little tests on the side of work, like the one I did last month with the compass. I should be able to share that with you as well like I've previously done.

In other Tales of Zale news, I finished editing #ZaleTrot, as you've probably already seen! It was really cool to see everybody's different takes on Zale's walk cycle!! The video has done particularly well on TikTok with over a million views, so if you contributed or are curious to see reactions, you can check out the very lively comment section over there.

I wanted to do a small challenge for New Years as well, but I can just see that time is running away from me and that I need to focus in on the top priorities right now. I'll come up with some more challenges for the discord server over time - although I think the next couple will probably be a bit smaller in scale.

 Ok and then just oooone more thing! Matthew (the composer on Tales of Zale) and I are cooking up a little something. He's been hard at work on a lofi track for the last little while, and I'm making an animation loop to accompany it. Above you can see some of the initial thumbnail brainstorms I did. Below is the later layout:

 I even got to use a bit of Blender to test out some different compositions before committing to the sketch. So the time I spent experimenting with it in the short film is already paying off! The plan is to make something that works in both the vertical and horizontal format so clips can be uploaded to all platforms. Right now I'm going to focus on animating Zale and Elva. I'm commissioning Nicole Di Fresco, who previously did some of the concept art I've been sharing, to paint the background from here, so it's gonna be a team effort!

REFLECTION: 

Okidoki, speaking of playing around with 3D, the video I've decided to share this month is a little snippet from the short film I've been working on. It's still super rough, needs to be tightened up - and there's one shot in particular that needs a rework asap - but I figured it'd be fun to show anyhow. Since I need to (and finally can) focus all in on ToZ, this project will be left on hold for now. I have the most important thing I needed anyhow: the pitch bible. So it is ready to be worked on further, should the right opportunity arise.

Here are a few pages:

PIPERS:

 Still chipping a bit away at pipers, although the time has come for me to slowly wind down. I'll be finishing the last couple of shots, but at a slow phase.

RUN FROM ROYALTY:

 Speaking of indie projects, this past month Jo Lumaya's Run From Royalty came out! You've probably seen some of the behind-the-scenes that he has posted if you're active on the Discord channel. If you haven't seen the whole film yet, definitely check it out. I animated this little shot with the bats :)

ROUND-UP: 

So we're starting to see some light at the end of the tunnel on multiple fronts, just as the holidays are approaching. That's a pretty neat way to end the year if you ask me. Of course, there are no guarentees for anything in life and we may still see more ups and downs. But I remain hopeful and excited. I hope that you are all having a good December as well, wherever you are and however you celebrate it. Stay safe out there!

All the best,

-Sif