Progress Report - September 23, 2025 (Patreon)

Hello, everyone!

It's been a busy week. I've tried to fit everything I currently have in the shop into one image, but there's honestly even more than all this. So let's break down everything in that image, and the things I couldn't fit in it.

Up top, Frozen: the list shows what all has been rendered out, and what all still has to be rendered out. My render machine has been working bottom-up, and my main machine top-down. Despite the render machine taking nearly 3x as long to render each frame, the fact that it's been rendering 24/7 for the past 2 weeks has given it a notable advantage over the main machine, which only renders overnight. Then throw in the fact that the project files got a lot shorter in their runtime as they increased in scene complexity - Project File 4 is 9359 frames, where Project File 23 is only 1550 frames, for example. The runtime reduction was for memory purposes, but that doesn't correlate cleanly to render-time. I'm not sure if the rendering will finish this week, but it'll be close.

Next up, Pharmmetra: I am still waiting on audio. I have gotten back MidnightDatura's audio for Symmetra, and BordeauxBlack's audio for Pharah. I have yet to hear back from Milly for Mercy. I intend to install what all audio I have and see how it all comes along though, such that when Milly's audio comes in, I can just quickly drop it in, fix up any synchronization issues, and toss the whole four-episode arc off to my sound designer. It's taking a lot longer than I expected just to get the audio for it recorded, but it is what it is.

After that, Marie & Honoka: This is a 7-episode Micro Arc that I have been working on during the Sunday streams over the past few weeks. As if this past Sunday, the first 6 episodes are done and ready for voicing. I need to actually commit to an episode 7 to seal it off, and it is entirely within the realm of possibility that it will be ready for voicing before the Pharmmetra audio even comes back. Which is awkward, because I am eyeballing having Milly, whose voicing Mercy in the Pharmmetra video, voice Honoka in this project. We'll see how that all falls out, though.

Then there's Primordium: All 3 episodes of the Micro Arc adaptation of the short Episode 2 have been planned out conceptually for a while. The first two episodes are fully written out, I still need to finalize the writing for episode 3. The core sex sequence for episode 3, which has three variants, has all been built. I am currently animating the core sex sequence for episode 1, with 2 out of 5 animations built. Episode 2's hasn't been built yet, and is being saved for last because it is the simplest. My plan for this week is to work on Primordium while waiting for Pharmmetra audio. It is similarly entirely possible that Primordium ends up being ready for voicing the same time as Marie & Honoka, and possibly even also Pharmmetra. And this is equally awkward, because Primordium also has Milly as a voice, as Triss. Again, we'll see how it all falls out.

And then finally, there is Marshpricefield: You all thought you escaped the Life is Strange fixation. You thought wrong. I've been mulling over an absolutely massive Life is Strange project since before ya'lls voted the wholesome LIS stuff off the island back in, what, 2023? A lot of moving pieces, with a lot of them figured out, but a lot of them still missing. Adapting the ideas to Micros has been forwardly productive, but with its own challenges, especially since a lot of the ideas I've had for it are more cerebral. And I've discussed the conflict between cerebrality and terseness before, so I won't repeat myself again here.

One of my more recent efforts toward cracking into the behemoth of this megaproject has been exploring smaller projects that are on their surface unrelated and not part of a major cohesive whole, while at the same time laying down the groundwork for eventually uniting them. Rather than one colossal narrative throughline, a bunch of smaller unrelated throughlines.

The most recent (and most successful, though not wholly so) outcome of that effort has been Marshpricefield, which is currently written out as a 5-episode arc of Chloe and Max introducing Kate to the wonderful world of steamy lesbian sex. This particular project is sorta wedged halfway between the high-level conceptual stage and the low-level written stage of preproduction. I have a clear direction in mind for it, but I haven't written it out shot by shot yet.

For this project, I actually put together a reference board with annotations. Here it is in its current totality. You may immediately spot the problem with it, hence the "not wholly successful". If not, I'll explain it below. Hopefully Patreon will let you be able to view it full-screen, so you can actually read it.

You may recall that, when I described the design ethos for Micros previously, they had a fairly strict set of constraints: one sex animation, one finisher animation, simple narrative cohesion, 1-to-3-minute runtime, and "able to put together in one sitting."

And you may be looking at this reference board and seeing that it fails to meet all these constraints. Most apparently, it violates the "one sex animation" constraint, with each episode having at minimum three and the last having a whopping five.

Of course, this isn't the first violation of this rule. Both Marie & Honoka and Primordium violate it as well - Marie & Honoka has two sex animations per episode (one for Marie, one for Honoka); and Primordium has multiple sex animations per episode as well (episode 1 is the biggest offender; episodes 2 and 3 are at least all derivatives of the same core animation).

Marshpricefield also probably violates the "one sitting" constraint, just by the sheer volume of its animations. I know that Primordium Episode 1 has already violated that, with its 5 animations; Episode 3 did not, and I don't expect Episode 2 to either. Marie & Honoka didn't violate it either, at least in the sex-animation department - it did, however, with the narrative requiring more complex animation and setup that ended up spilling out into two sittings for one or two episodes.

As it is right now, I'm not too terribly concerned about the "one sitting" constraint, as the fact I have restructured my schedule such that I spend 2 hours a day on Micros, the concept of "one sitting" really doesn't mean anything anymore. The most important thing about Micros is they don't completely dominate my work schedule, like Shorts were. If a project like Marshpricefield ends up taking longer to produce than other, simpler Micros would, then so be it.

So yeah. That's where we are right now. The Frozen animation is chugging away being rendered out by both computers; Pharmmetra is currently stuck in a holding pattern as I wait for Milly's audio to come in; Primordium is the next Micro Project I intend to actively focus on, and I intend to make progress with over this week; the Marie & Honoka Micro Project is planned to be come after Primordium is actually already largely finished and ready for voicing due to becoming an unplanned on-stream project; and Marshpricefield is a potential Micro Project for after Pharmmetra, Primordium, and Marie & Honoka are done.

I have Pharmmetra, Primordium, and Marie & Honoka hard-set. They are the next 3 Micro projects. After that though, I don't have a schedule set. As of right now, Marshpricefield is the most likely one to be done next. But that isn't a certainty.

I haven't even told you all about the other Micros that are in various stages of preproduction: the Corsair 4-part Micro Arc; the Overwatch Juno Micro Arc that currently has 6 episodes planned out but I want to figure out even more; the Mass Effect Brothel Micro Arc that has 10 episodes planned with 3 more to be figured out; the original Demonseed Micro Series that currently has 38 episodes planned out and split across 7 different Arcs and has historically been quite literally too hot for me to focus on and make progress on; the original Roamer Wanderer Nomad Vagabond Micro Series with a 4-part Micro Arc planned and whose main character hasn't even been fully built yet because I need to find an artist to help with her tattoo design; the completely-unplanned-but-I-really-want-to-do-something-with-them Vault Liz Micros, Claire/Jill Micros, and DVa Micros; as well as the adaptation of Rabbit.Hole Episode 4 into a Micro series, which I haven't done any preproduction on whatsoever yet.

And then none of this is talking about my primary plans, after the Frozen video is done. I'm chomping at the bit to get back to work on Overbreed Episode 1, and then afterwards Blue Star Episode 4.

Once Frozen is finally done and out the door, things will really start moving forward. Having all of this time to write out and work on Micros while I wait for the Frozen animations to finish has been fun and all, but I just really want to get back into the meat of things.

But that's not for another week at least, judging by how the renders have been going.

At any rate, that's all for now. Hope you all enjoyed this update, and are as excited for everything in the pipe as I am.

Until next week, everyone!