Random Arma Bullshittery - Update #4 (Patreon)

Good afternoon dear Patrons. I just wanted to start with a sincere thank you for your patronage. To those who have stuck with me this long and to new patrons having joined recently. Thank you for letting me spend my time fiddling with words and stuff whilst wearing one sock and sitting in my underpants. Rather than having to put on a suit, sit in an office and say things. It's very generous of you all and I could never thank you enough!

Now then, on the Random Arma 3 bullshittery front. It's the midpoint of week three and here's how things are going.

The full video is approximately 15-16 minutes long and I should be around the 8:00 minute mark in terms of total editing. I'm actually cruising around the 6:20 minute mark, meaning I'm falling behind.

The reasons are:

a.) the Arma footage has a habit of having an inconsistent frame-rate, meaning lots of keyframes are needed to sell the illusion of the text being attached to people. Otherwise they sort of slide around smoothly whilst the associated model is moving out of sync. And the whole aesthetic is lost. Each clip is simply requiring more effort upfront.

b.) Some of the recent scenes have been quite technically complicated, involving lots of different pews doing different things, in such a way that you sort of need to eye-ball and cannot automate.

c.) The summer heat in this flat has been making things difficult insofar as concentration is concerned. I've got a fan going full pelt. But at the height of the afternoon, with the sun streaming in, it can be difficult to concentrate.

d.) Rather selfishly, I've also got an exam for an unrelated thing first thing next week (which I'll tell you about soon. It's a tad hush hush for the moment). Therefore I've been cheekily stealing away the odd hour or so each day to revise more. Apologies for that. I'm hoping by Tuesday that'll all be out of the way.

Now insofar as the episode is concerned, everything is coming along swimmingly. The Antistasi footage is shaping up to be very funny and I've been pondering the use of something I've not tried before - a framing device.

I was initially playing with the idea of having newsreel footage in the style of Splinter Cell, telling the story of a rebellion on Altis from the perspective of outside media sources. But now I'm leaning towards having some sort of 'Resistance Jingle', with associated graphics that are supposed to inspire rebel fighters to join the cause. But then over the course of the video the lyrics become increasingly absurd as our actions are explained/justified. Until it's clear that...we're just terrorists...making excuses for being terrorists. And our eventual comeuppance (err...spoiler warning?) is entirely justified.

Anyway, so the work continues! Once again, thank you sincerely for your generous support xx