Dezmall - [INFO] Status Update : Yoruichi Animation and small animation project!

And here it is THE MONTHLY REEEEEEEEEEEEPORT!!!

Of course, the end of last month went completely off the rails, and all of my schedules were successfully launched into the stratosphere by SpaceX to join the rest of the space debris.

But starting with this report, I hope things will finally return to something resembling a stable routine for me. At least until the end of the year.

I decided not to make any additional fancy visuals with other characters for this post, because I spent my free time on other things instead. I’ll talk about those below. But for now — the report!

p.s. I’ll balance out the weather conditions across all the shots before the final release.

p.s 2. Because of the GIF format and the nature of the animation, some of the GIFs may look a bit choppy. The final video release won’t have this issue.

So, last time we talked about our protagonist deciding to let our heroine stay at his place. And for that to happen, we obviously need a few events that naturally lead us there. I’ll repeat myself a little here.

After an unfortunate fall caused by being startled... Yes, yes, even Yoruichi in cat form has all kinds of instincts and, of course, desires... including the instinctive reaction of fear when something unexpected happens.

Still a little shocked, our protagonist runs into the yard of his house and picks up the cat, who honestly didn’t really need his help that much. But nevertheless, he feels that very human urge to help an animal.

And so our characters have finally become extremely close to each other.

Although obviously, this is still nowhere near the limit of how close they can get.

And here it is the cornerstone and probably the simplest way to bring a stray cat home.

Rain.

No ritual dances required to summon it a downpour suddenly begins, and our protagonist quickly hides the cat under his jacket and calmly makes his way home.

And now we’re home!

We’re close. We’re very close, guys!

I’ve started trying to minimize scenes where I need to create an entirely new background, because that often takes more time than the animation itself. So, for example, I decided not to make a scene of the protagonist running through the gate and things like that.

This is everything I’ve already finished.

Now, where am I currently?

I’m working on the scene where the protagonist puts the cat down in the middle of the room, gives her something to eat, and then goes to take a shower.

Where did he get cat food from? Maybe there’s a reason...

It wasn't without reason that I wrote to you saying I was tired of creating scenes and their backgrounds.

For the rest of this animation, I still need to create three more rooms/environments.

The next one is a small section of the room and wall that will show us the bathroom door.

The bathroom itself will be the main environment where a large part of the important events in this animation will take place and also the place where Yoruichi finally reveals her true form.

The third environment is still uncertain, but I think it will probably be the bedroom.

I’m not completely sure yet whether the animation will actually move there, but I found a couple of decent premade environments that would only need some decoration and modification.

Just realizing that soon I won’t have to worry about constantly creating a new background for every camera angle makes me genuinely excited.

I’m really looking forward to the moment when I can finally stop worrying about environments and focus almost entirely on animation.

The moment when I can finally breathe again.

For the bathroom, I already have a couple of possible base environments, but I think I’m going to modify them quite heavily.

I want to create something with the vibe of a cozy Japanese bathhouse, with warm steam filling the room.

I’m still not entirely sure how I’m going to achieve that look, but that’s the plan.

And yes, the scene with the Hollow will also happen in the bathroom.

Right now I’m already animating the current scene. I think I’ll finish it within a couple of days, and after that I’ll start working on the atmospheric background for the next short scene, with a few slightly creepy elements.

The cat looks toward the bathroom door and realizes that something in there isn’t quite right.

And after that, things should get interesting.

There are some fairly complicated scenes planned, but since most of that complexity comes from the animation itself rather than building environments, I think I’ll manage.

Interestingly enough, I’ve noticed that the more interesting and technically difficult a scene is, the easier it often feels for me to work on it.

And that’s basically everything regarding Yoruichi.

Now let’s talk about what I’ve been spending my small amount of free time on.

I decided to improve my skills with nonlinear animation.

Basically, it’s a way of building motion from separate animation clips and then combining, layering, and blending them together.

I’ve used it very rarely before, mostly as a way to add more depth to existing movement — especially in animation sections containing lots of loops — by making those loops feel more unique and less repetitive.

So, for practice, I took one of the scenes from an older character design post and decided to animate it.

I’m going to use this image as the base and simply animate it.

I don’t think I’ll add many other shots to this mini-animation. So it might end up becoming a small bukk\ake scene. With a proper finale. Or maybe I’ll add one more scene. I haven’t decided yet.

I’m only planning to spend one, maximum two days per week on this animation. For now, that’s the format I’m using while working on it. I’ll probably add a few different variations and scenes that fit this pose.

I should also mention that working with five characters in a single scene is something I don’t think I’ve ever really done before. And apparently, I was right to be afraid of it.

Animating this kind of scene is extremely difficult, especially when several characters are physically interacting at the same time.

And as it turned out during my nonlinear animation tests… it becomes even more complicated.

But whatever.

Every time a game fucks me over, I come back stronger. Same logic here.

I’m not setting any release date for this smaller animation. I’m working on it purely as an experimental/test project.

Maybe later I’ll even animate some of the older Robin scenes. And I think I still have some old Harribel project files somewhere from things I made a long time ago.

These ones.

And I think that’s where I’ll end this report.

There’s still a lot of work ahead, but everything is moving forward step by step.

Meanwhile, I’m slowly dissolving into my autumn melancholy, enjoying the sadness in my own way and settling into this strange kind of peaceful calm.

As always, I wish you and your loved ones good health.

Sending you a hug, and letting you go on to a better day.

See you in the next report!