Bodak

Angel Corps vs Pirates 22-30

All the weapons effects and blood squibs were done in GIMP. It took me bloody ages.

Angel Corps vs Pirates 11-21

Fawn wanted Angel Elites in the story, rather than the regular white-suited kind. They still die like stormtroopers.

Angel Corps vs Pirates 1-10

So this is the final (so-far) Angel Corps story. It was a commission for Fawn, back in the day when Fetnoir still worked. There's a few elements in here I wouldn't have chosen if it was all my own work, but on the whole she gave me a remarkably free rein.

Scene 12

Scene 11

Elves vs Goblins: 31-34

In the mud, squirming, dying Wood Elves gasp for their last breaths, their blood spilled by Goblin-forged iron, while their still-living sisters send their righteous shafts of retribution back at the invaders- ever seeking to push forwards.

Shrieking, Goblins topple from their towers, picked off one-by-one by superior archery. Still, the weight of Goblin numbers  seems insurmountable: In this contest of skill and courage against sheer mass and malice, it seems that victory, if it i...

Memento Mori

First render for February!

Lasers are a pain

When Jollypops says she likes lasers, you make lasers.

That said; lasers are a pain in Iray. I like to make them using emissives: There are a couple of good beam props on the market that you can buy, but you can make your own using a simple cylinder primitive, scaled long and thin, or two (or more) plane primitives aligned together in a star shape.

Because even slight lighting changes can affect the whole of the render, it becomes impossible to composite multiple scenes together ...

Coming in February

Unsurprisingly, this month has been mainly about the Elves. I'd planned to release four or so of the images per month, and got so excited about the story that I released sixteen.

In February, the pace won't be quite so high: I'll be aiming for about half that, so that I can focus a little more on the Scuba story and the weekly renders. I've almost finished back-filling details in the charge on the gate, and I'm starting to get stuck into the extremely messy and complex fight at the edge...

T8: Danielle

"Got one!" hissed Carrie, with vicious satisfaction in her voice.

Danielle didn't think she'd got anyone yet. All she'd seen so far were small, dark heads silhouetted against a bright blue sky, glimpsed in desperate, furtive glances as she peeped her head nervously up over the banister. A country girl, she'd never liked minimalist architecture, but she was certainly grateful for reassuring solidity of concrete today.

"Come on, keep going," prompted Carrie, and Danielle nodded, hee...

Amazon Ambush

Here's the third Tier 1 render for January 2025! Amazons and arrows in the jungle!

Elves vs Goblins: 29-30

Obedient to their orders, the Rangers press the attack, some pausing to shoot while others advance past the fallen.

Slumped against the wheel of a rough-hewn Goblin cart; collapsed and abandoned in the mud, Tonwen chokes and coughs up her life-blood with an equally rough-hewn Goblin arrow in her breast. She tries to think of the forest; to think of starry autumn nights when the leaves are golden-orange and the forest floor crisp and crunching under the feather-light tread of bare Elven ...

Civil War: Chapter 2

Civil War: Chapter 1

Took a while, but I finally got round to uploading the first and second chapters.

9-12: Landing

Retro boosters burning bright, the assault pods strike alien earth with a thunderous concussion. Smoke and flames billow as the pod doors burst open, spilling their occupants out into the unknown. Lola sees swirling dust, a shadowed settlement ahead, a parched and barren landscape of rocks and bare earth, devoid of cover. She sees blue light, strobing and flickering, seeking and stabbing. One sears past her; she feels its awesome heat through her suit; hotter even than the fires of re-entry t...

Scene 9

"An ambuscade, if promptly discovered and surrounded, will repay the intended mischief with interest." - Vegetius.

Scene 10

Combat Estimate- Question 4: Where and How Can I Best Accomplish Each Action and Effect?

Consider:

-Vital Ground

-Key Terrain

-Killing Areas

Sun Tzu probably said some shit about taking the high ground as well.

Yeungmaidels advance!

If you're not running into tracers, are you even at war?

Render 3 for January is here!

Delivery cage

I also had a think about how the attackers are going to be delivered to the combat area. Initially, I was going to go with them jumping out of a plane or a helicopter into the sea- Thunderball style- but it occurred to me that if they're planning a smash-and-grab raid, they're going to need a method of exfiltration as well.

I decided to go with them arriving in submarines, and came up with the idea that they could jury-rig some sort of deployment bay where the VLS used to be: A flooding...

A fly in the ointment...

There's always a few problems that crop up and need ironing out, and this one is a fairly irritating one, though not insurmountable.

The scuba gear that I liked the look of for the attackers isn't actually very versatile. It's a single prop, and you move the regulator using a morph dial (look on the left of the screen). It doesn't have a great range of movement: As you can see, it's quite a distance from her mouth right now. I can take it off the limiter and go beyond 100%, but then the...

Black Team

I've been beavering away with the attackers too: I've got 19 characters now, which sounds like it won't be enough, but these are just the ones who'll be seen in what I'm thinking of as the 'training montage'. There'll be plenty of other figures as well, but the nature of how I see the fight playing out is that most of those will be seen once, or will be far enough back and obscured enough by their gear and the underwater effects, that you won't really make out much detail with them. I've been...

Getting the environment right

So I've been mainly focused on Wood Elves this last month, for obvious reasons. I haven't entirely been idle on the Scuba front though: I'm still working on getting the underwater effects right- I think right now the missing ingredient is bubbles, and maybe a better caustic light effect. I'm broadly happy with the look of the scenes though, once the combat actually starts.

Oops

I have a short attention span, and get distracted easily- which is why my DAZ library is littered with half-finished scenes, and it can be a month or more before I get around to rendering something that I've worked on. I left this one cooking while I went for a run this morning, and when I came back and looked at the completed render, I remembered that I hadn't finished any of the effects yet: Squibs, impacts, bullet-holes in the dresses, blood... all of that stuff.

It's why I often hav...

Elves vs Goblins 25-28

Goblin missiles fall thick and fast; With bared teeth, Carys bites back a scream as the wickedly barbed head of one rips through her belly, splashing her precious hot blood over the deforestated ground of the wounded forest. Eirianedd cries out and topples back as a jagged arrow punches clean through her chest. She falls back, convulsing with the agony of the brutal wound.

Taking what cover they can, Gwenhwyfar and Prydwen bend their bows to retaliate. The Goblins imagine themselves saf...

Palace guards

Beerman asked about an alternative view of one of the dead girls in the background of the fight, which was easy to do because I'd lifted her directly from a test render when I was exploring the set.

I had this idea of a story involving noble handmaidens guarding a palace against more numerous, less well- equipped and trained enemies.

Unfortunately, despite several attempts, I just couldn't find an outfit for the attackers that I really liked, so the project stayed in my 'to-do' li...

Elves vs Goblins: 23-24

Their ambush sprung, the Goblin archers crowd onto their rickety fighting platforms and fill the skies with their dark little shafts. The missiles fall like rain; hardly accurate, but a punishing hail nevertheless. While braver Rangers like Heulwen shout words of inspiration and encouragement to their sisters, the wounded and the dying cry out their pain and fear.

Still stunned, Aeronwen pulls back the fabric of her vest to stare in shock at the filthy Goblin missile that has pierced he...

Palace Battle

Here's Week 2's render for January 2025: I promised a bit more FvsF combat around the place, so let's start with this.

Bridge too Far: 51-59

Bridge too Far: 41-50

Still going! The hand-to-hand renders look a little bit stilted now I look back on it.

Bridge too Far: 31-40

At the time, this was also the longest story I'd ever attempted. It felt like I was never going to finish the post-work.