February mini-set ready!

Hey. This month’s Patreon mini-set is done and it features Karen and one of her higher paying female clients (and friend), so expect some fun and playful lesbian stuff. (Karen hasn’t gotten any screen time in RTL so I figured she needed another mini-set at least; I think Lucia has had two since RTL started as well.) This preview also showcases some fancier items from my library as well as a working mirror, which I had been prohibited from using before this new machine due to the horrible render slowdowns it caused. A preview image is below, and it and the other five images (so six total right now; but again that may go up) will be sent out to my $15+ patreon patrons after payments clear next month. Side note, I hope to get the DA content done around the end of the week; a bit later than I had hoped but whatever. That other thing I mentioned at the beginning of the month will likely happen later this week too; just a heads up for those of you that read this far into the paragraphs here. As usual, if you like this preview image and want to get access to these Patreon mini-sets, and/or early access to my regular main story sets, maybe even other assorted bonuses, or perhaps you just want to support my work and help me make more and/or better content, check out my Patreon page! Anything and/or everything donated really helps! My Patreon page has just been updated to the new version as well!

https://www.patreon.com/redleatherart

New Salune walking animation!

Hi again. The basic walking animation for the month is done, a preview gif is below as before. This animation features Salune walking in a short looping gif. Though not as involved as the previous animation due to there being less items to animate, I think this one turned out better overall due to me having more of an idea of what to do this time around. (I think both the video file and the gif are smoother this time around; there is a slight stutter at the end of the video file again but I think it is from the quick repeat looping when playing it as the stutter disappears in the gif made from that file.)

Unfortunately, the gif maker tool that I use has been neutered somewhat since the last time I used it and I can’t easily make HQ gifs with it currently. I either need something to crop the video file that I use to make the gif or find a new tool to make the gifs with; unfortunately cropping videos in Videostudio X7 is a complete mess that I have yet to fully understand and I know of no other easy to use video to gif converters at this time. I hope to get that figured out by the end of the month to get a HQ gif made for my $15+ patrons, but even if I can’t the original HQ video file included anyway so it shouldn’t make too big a difference. Anyway, here it is; comments and/or feedback welcome.

Patreon rewards sent, RTL 8 previews updated.

Hey. As the title says, rewards for my paying patrons for last month have been sent out. On that topic, I did update the preview images in the earlier post for RTL 8 but waited to mention in it hopes that I would have the first animation done by now. (No huge differences, but still worth mentioning I thought.) However, due mostly to assorted real life stuff that needed done the past few days it is not done yet; so I will just mention the details of the final/updated RTL 8 and some other little things. I did not give a final count in the original post, as I thought that I was going to try and fix it still. (I have since updated that post to include the final total as well.) Little did I know how much I was going to end up fixing; but that just means more images again. The final set is 42 images, each with a clean and story version as usual.

In other news, I did fiddle around with some of the higher end content that I have for poser on my new machine and so far, things look pretty good. I have re-planned the next story set to attempt to include some higher quality content that my old machine could not handle; we will see how that works out next month. In any case, more votes in the polls would be appreciated and I hope to have this animation done by the end of this week.

February plans, old poll results, new polls up!

Hey again. So the old polls are done and two new polls are up now! One polls asks how you feel about established characters changing outfits. The second poll asks if I should take a break from main story arcs after RTL is done (likely in about 3-5 more sets) and make some random other image and/or story sets instead, work on a game, attempt some complex animation, or if I should just start the next story arc. My patrons have seen the special patreon early previews from a while back for two of the upcoming characters in the next story arc, (there will be others though) so they may have some better insight here but it is hard to say. Also, for those of you that actually read this far into the paragraphs here, RTL 6 is also scheduled for a free release this month sometime; I am not going to say when exactly so just keep checking back for that. There will likely be another Patreon-exclusive poll in the coming months, possibly relating to what to do when RTL is done. I have no idea when exactly this will be yet. As for the results from the last polls, people clearly want me to do the two month plan; and most people seem to prefer story sets and animations, which is fine. Games were only two votes behind animations though, and likely in April I will try to get on that in some way. I have too much to try and finish this month to do a game right now. However, as noted last month, I have been looking into this and working on ironing out problems that I had way back whenever.

Speaking of that, my plans for this month are as follows:

Patreon mini-set
At least one animation
New DA stuff
Redo/fix my Patreon page
Winning contest entries’ images

Unless there is some other insane weather catastrophe or some other horrific incident that stalls my work somehow (again), I think I should be able to get most of this done this month, if not all of it. The first two items are the basic stuff that I need to do this month and the most important items. I think it has been a few months since I have posted new stuff on DA so I really need to do that after I take care of this month’s base content. The second item says “at least one” animation because I plan to make another simple walking animation, but possibly another, more complex one if the first doesn’t take too long and/or if I finish the contest winner images early. The reason that item number four is up there is that for whatever reason, Patreon is now changing the layout of creator pages; which means that I need to redo some stuff and make a new header image for my Patreon page. Allegedly this new layout goes live at the start of March whether you are ready for it (or even want it) or not, so I should probably just set it all up now and let it activate early. After that is the contest entry images, which will vary in difficulty. The main issue for the month is that I am not sure how long the 10-ish image set for the top contest entry will take, and that will likely be the sticking point here.

The few images for second place and one for third should be rather straightforward, but the first place entry is a bit more involved and should have water in it; which I have been relatively unsuccessful at rendering properly in Octane so far. (Theoretically I know what to set it to, but when I do that it doesn’t look right and either looks really fake or like an oil puddle; hopefully I just have to fiddle around with it some more to get it looking right.) The plan for these is to post all the contest entry images together as one post, so even if the first place entry goes into early next month I will wait to post the others until it is done. I also plan to ask the people who made the entries for basic feedback regarding the images I make before I post them, but I am not going to wait for a response if they do not get back to me in a week or so. (I also make no promises to act upon said feedback, but I likely will if it is reasonable and/or simple to fix.) These contest-related images will all be free for everyone, so that should be nice. In the mean time, check out the new polls and check back for some new content soon-ish.

January Patreon mini-set finished!

Hi again. Here is the public preview for this month’s Patreon mini-set for the applicable tiers. The mini-set is currently six images and it is a bit different than usual as it features these two random hot elven girls getting fucked by a bunch of magical tentacles (although I may add an image or two to that total like last month, no guarantees though). In other news, I sort of figured out at least one part of the lighting problem with RTL 8, but after “fixing” the issue I found, I realized that the way it was is much better in a lot of ways; so I feel much better about how RTL 8 turned out now despite still being very confused. It seems like there is/was just some issue with the scene I used for it that I cannot discern. Anyway, I will post again in a few days with the old poll results discussion, new polls, and my plans for next month. In the mean time, if you like this preview image and want to get access to these Patreon mini-sets, and/or early access to my regular main story sets, maybe even other assorted bonuses, or perhaps you just want to support my work and help me make more and/or better content, check out my Patreon page! Anything and/or everything helps. https://www.patreon.com/redleatherart

RTL chapter eight, “Summoning Magic” done!

Hey. Long story short, it’s been a pretty crappy past few days for a variety of reasons, and my street is still covered in 2-3 feet of snow as it still hasn’t been cleared. (EDIT: Ironically, an hour after I posted this the trucks came to clear the snow; I would have written this days ago if I had known that would happen.) I still have been getting headaches as well; both from the weather and from all sorts of shit in RTL 8 not working right. I haven’t had this many issues rendering a main set in a while, but for some reason the lighting in RTL 8 just was not behaving at all. My best guess is that transferring the scene from one machine to another completely messed with it somehow; I don’t know what else could cause two days worth of issues. I literally spent 3-4 hours earlier just trying to fix the lighting. The current lighting is still not what I was hoping for, but it will have to do since it’s the best I can get in this scene for some reason. I would have just made another scene had I known it would have this many issues at render time.

Even now, when the set is basically done, I still need to fix a few small issues in the last scene that I apparently missed on the previous renders, (I noticed the problems during postwork phase) as well as a few other minor things mostly related to the lighting. (I could leave it, but there is no reason not to fix it right now.) However, it has been long enough already so I am posting the previews now; I was not going to use any images from that late in the set for the previews anyway. I cannot give an exact image count of the set yet, (since the last scene needs to be redone a bit) but it is likely going to be 30-something images. [EDIT: Final count is 42 images, each with both clean and story versions.] It features Helenya the succubus “fighting” a magical summoned dire wolf. Below are two story and two clean preview images, I may make minor changes to one of them but I think these images are clear of the issues in the future scenes. I should have a preview of this month’s mini-set posted later this week.

Serious weather issues.

Hey. I am posting this as a small status update and heads up if I don’t post anything over the coming weekend. Today was my last day of physical therapy so hopefully that whole thing is done with; and for the most part I feel better most of the time so I think it probably is. (I hope.) However, this whole past week the weather has been shifting 30 degrees up and down between day and night temperatures, which trigger the weather/pressure related migraines that I have been getting all my life. I haven’t been able to work on this stuff realistically for more than a couple hours each day this week since staring at a screen just makes my head/eyes hurt even worse. (I have been planning through/writing some other things ahead though.) To top all this crap off, now we are expecting a blizzard of possibly record-breaking and/or historical proportions tomorrow and the next day on the US east coast; and I live right in the middle of where it is going to be worst. There have been all sorts of warnings and such about this; but the main one that concerns me is the possibility of losing power due to two feet of snow/wind/ice.

I mainly get the headaches when the weather comes and goes, but while it’s here I am generally fine; so I was hoping to get RTL 8 actually finished over the coming weekend. However, if the power goes out, I obviously have no way to do that. There is also the possibility that I get RTL 8 done but my internet goes out and I have no way to post the previews; essentially anything can happen here and there is no way for me to know until it happens, during which I may have no way of saying anything until after it is fixed. Long story short, I will do the best that I can, (without hurting myself further) as I always try to do; but my one issue has been traded for two others this week, and there is nothing I can do about this. In other news, more votes in the polls would be appreciated so that I have a better idea of what people want from this point forward; since as it stands people seem to just want story sets with some other kind of content on the side. That is totally fine and the poll is rather definitive in terms of votes right now as far as you all seeming to want the above, but there are aren’t that many votes in either poll; so things could still change. Thanks to all who voted though, I do keep the results from the polls in mind when making/planning future stuff.

Status update: 1/11

Hey. Just checking in quickly to note that I am still here and working on everything. My patrons know what to expect from this month’s mini-set and I am still working on RTL 8. Strangely my weekends recently have been busy though, so I haven’t had as much time to work on everything as I’d like. So I am still not totally sure when RTL 8 will get done, but I think I should have a fair bit of time in the next couple of days so we will see how much I can do. However, so far so good as far as my health goes, so things are as good as can be expected right now. (My previous shot wore off around a week ago and I can still move so I am definitely doing better.)

I also spent a few hours looking over the assorted VN-making/game-making stuff I was doing way back whenever; as mentioned in the last post. Just in case it didn’t sink in the first time, these polls are probably among the most important that there have been/will be for quite a while; as it lets me know what people want to see. (Or at least what the people who can read english and/or care enough to vote want, which is what matters.) I also updated my main Patreon page, as apparently the update that I thought I did last month didn’t save somehow.

Anyway, while looking though my old game stuff, I did manage to figure out one thing that had eluded me for weeks way back when I was trying to get a cg gallery working for my original game idea; which is something that I would also want any game I make to have. What I have coded here doesn’t make much sense to me, but it works somehow and that is really all that matters. Long story short, once I get over all this health crap (and get through all the other stuff in my backlog here, such as the short story contest winner renders, making some more stuff for DA, and posting commission info) things are looking good for me do to any and/or most of the things in the one poll. However, I need to know what people want most in order to know what to work on; right now it seems most people prefer my story sets and yet most people also want me to do the two-month plan for additional types of content and less story sets; which doesn’t make much sense. Yes, I realize that I haven’t actually made any full games yet; but given all my released story sets, it shouldn’t be too hard to imagine that in an interactive format. I also realize that people may just currently prefer my story sets but want to see something else as well, but the current results still seem strange. Total votes right now are also rather low, given the high importance of the poll; so check out the polls on the right if you haven’t already.

EDIT 1/15: I got a bit done, but this week was the last one for my twice a week sessions for physical therapy; so after this is when it gets interesting. So far so good, but I do not want to jinx anything; this weekend should be clearer than the previous ones so I will see how the next few days go.

New year, new polls, new plans?

Hey again. Happy new year and all that, if it is a bit late. I had a horrible weekend or I would have posted sooner. Anyway, two new polls are up now which relate to two of the things in the title of this post, but more on that in a bit. Before that, let me review the old polls. One poll asked what type of VN people preferred and most people definitely wanted the standard VN and/or a choose-your-own adventure style VN over the other choices. This is fine, as those were my top two choices/options anyway and will likely happen whenever I can get to that. The other poll was less productive; it asked what type of animation people wanted to see. Votes were low in both polls, but unfortunately this poll was one vote away from a complete three-way tie. So unfortunately I have no real direction in the animation department; but I will likely do at least one more basic walking animation before trying anything more complex. (No guarantees though.)

So all of this leads me to the next main point, and that is the idea I have been considering recently; about keeping my current two-month per main set schedule even once I get over all this health related crap just to give myself time to make other types of content. Since I can do more complex things now, and/or just make animations at all, I could use the offset month to make animations and/or some type of VN/game content. As I have mentioned before, making any type of game or even just working on a game would take time and effort that I used to not give myself back before this whole health fiasco started. I used to try and get out one story set per month back when I could actually work more; but that left no time for anything else.

As things have gone recently, I have needed two months to make a set just due to my physical limitations, which I am desperately hoping are soon coming to an end. So that hopefully being the case, I now have to consider whether or not to try and resume my old schedule in a couple months, or if I should keep things as they are and do other things as well. So the two polls up now are your way of possibly helping me decide this. One poll asks what your favorite type of content is, and the other asks whether or not you agree with my two-month per main set plan. (I.E. One month for making animations, working on games or whatever else, and the second month for the main set; then repeat.) Votes in these polls are rather important and would be greatly appreciated; though unless there is some strange outpouring against it, I currently plan to do the two month thing.

In regard to RTL 8, I am still working on it; but I have a terrible habit of going back to add/fix things which makes it take longer. (And as noted earlier, the past few days have been horrific and totally unproductive.) Also this is the first of what will surely be a few awkward transition sets in terms of me getting used to my new hardware. So just know that this set will not necessarily look like that much of an improvement compared to previous sets, as the main scene was made on my old computer and it seemed too good to throw out by the time the new one was ready. I have used this limited, old machine to make renders for almost nine months now and this new computer will take some getting used to, as many of my old limitations are now substantially higher than before; so I have to get back into my old mindset of actually creating larger scenes and more complex images, which I had been unable to do previously in Octane.

RTL 8 delayed until January; Happy preemptive New Year!

Hi again. As the title says, I have had to delay RTL 8 until next month due to too much lost time this month due to both making my new computer earlier in the month and now having physical therapy twice a week. (The holidays didn’t help either.) It is also nearing the end of the effectiveness time for the shot in my back which may leave me in crippling physical pain again; so there is no way to know when RTL 8 will get done, but sometime in January for sure I would think. Naturally this will push back everything else that I had planned next month, such as the images for the winning contest entries and another thing; but that can’t really be helped at this point. We will just have to see when I can get this done and how it all ends up working out; but theoretically people wanted monsters, so this should be worth the wait. Hopefully all this physical therapy and stuff will pay off in the long term and help me get over this annoying pain in my back and be able to work on things properly again. In other news, Happy late Holidays and Happy early New Year!