It's been a while since I've posted a journal update about what's going on in my life, but I figure that more people are here for my artwork or SFM hacks than what's going down with me. But for those that keep in touch with my Twitter and Tumblr (which I post or am more active in), there's a lot of great things 2016 has brought me, and only as 2016 is basically a month away to wrapping up is when I really sort of sit back and realize "wow, I've come a long way". While I wish I could have had more time for personal projects, there was a lot of opportunities that were presented to me that I don't think I otherwise would have gotten if not for the support of everybody to help me keep doing what I love doing.

Here's a few of the opportunities, both Source Filmmaker and beyond, that I've had the pleasure to do that I haven't really had a chance to talk about:



PC Gamer commissioned me a while back for three Source Filmmaker splash artworks for their web-based podcast, The PC Gamer show, which covers a range of updates and events going on in the world of online video gaming. It was fun mixing and matching a bunch of characters from different games together in one place at one time, I don't usually do it very often but this was a good way to practice and see what sort of things were ported over to Source!



While Valve's iteration of competitive TF2 as well as their support for it is very questionable, the community's iteration of it that has long stood over trials and tribulations as the esports that paved way for many glorious opportunities. For DreamHack Summer, I did some Source Filmmaker animations and promotional material in a similar vein to DreamHack Winter & i55, as well as flew out to Jonkoping, Sweden to do photography and videography. Shame we were kicked out before the Grand Finals since we were in the Exhibition Hall.

 
The Insomnia LAN series are no exception for competitive TF2's showcasing. This year me and teamed up again to do 100+ TF2 retextures and Source Filmmaker promtional work for i58's top Team Fortress 2 teams from all over the world, from America to Europe to even Australia! I also flew out there to Birmingham in the United Kingdom to help out with production, particularly videography with my co-photographers/video people, who absolutely helped me out during that time since it was a rough period and an uncertain LAN due to technical issues. 


The biggest SFM accomplishment for me this year was Blizzard Entertainment commissioning me for some Source Filmmaker posters for some cross-promotion work: the first was their Overwatch cups/headsets campaign with Taco Bell, and the second was for the release of the Warcraft movie. It was an absolute pleasure to collect some awesome people I knew to help me represent the SFM community for such a big game! At the time, the cease-and-desists were popping up for Source Filmmaker ports and I was also sorting those out too, so I'm glad that Blizzard has given their blessing on those! (The SFW ones, that is. I'm looking at you, SFMLab.)

  
TF2's biggest cancer charity livestream event, Tip of the Hats, brought me on again this year to do their Source Filmmaker promotional work, as well as pre-segment Source Filmmaker intros. I wouldn't have been able to do it without my SFM + modeling team, who I owe everything to. I also flew out to the live event in Chicago in the USA to perform SFM segments live with my SFM partner-in-crime and fellow TotH animator, Krunkidile. We tried out some new things this year such as show our animation workflow as well as had 10-minute speed SFM posters for donations. It's always a pleasure to help them and help One Step Camp; it's tough being reminded constantly of your disease but causes like this help kids remember they're the same as any other kid. Overall, Tip of the Hats has managed to raise half a million dollars for One Step Camp!

 
My roots are in graphic design before I started in SFM. I helped out with some commissioned website designs & branding for some esports organizations and teams such as i58's Full Tilt, as well as the overlays and scoreboards of Teamfortress.tv's latest stream overlay from i58, and InSight Casts' stream overlay from our gig with iBUYPOWER a few months back. The gig landed a few of our casters and crew some work with some Overwatch communities, including our stream producer getting a gig at Blizzcon's Overwatch World Cup.

 
Done with TF2 yet? Not quite, and this might be my biggest project. I'm directing a Team Fortress 2 narrative called Ready Up: Competitive Team Fortress 2, a look into the esports side of TF2 and what trials and tribulations they needed to go through in order to achieve what they wanted, or what they attempted to achieve that seemed smaller in comparison to the bigger esports such as CS:GO and Overwatch. The project is being funded for and produced by Marketplace.tf, and is slated to be released mid-to-late 2017. We've traveled all around the world for this one including New York for ESL NYC, and California for Blizzcon. We've managed to get some wonderful interviews with so many great people, from journalist Sideshow and pro player/streamer Seagull of the Overwatch/TF2 scenes to ReDeYe, one of the biggest esports hosts & personalities for events such as Dota 2's The International.

  
While the Saxxy Awards 2016 this year might have come and gone as of recently, I've had the pleasure of working on a pilot for a Team Fortress 2 machinima series called Family Fortress with some massively talented people, including Krunkidile once again and a person I always have the pleasure of working with, . We missed the deadline but the finished pilot episode, now no longer with a 5-minute cram limit, will be released either early 2017 or this December around the holiday season starring RED Team's off days out of the battlefield. Our team will do our best!

 
I also had the privilege of going out to California for Blizzcon to not only film interviews for the narrative, but support InSight Casts' producer doing some observing for the Overwatch World Cup! It was an amazing convention experience like no other, and it was awesome meeting everybody there, such as the other Overwatch observing crew (pictured right, yes that's Jeff Kaplan!), the Heroes of the Storm drafting admins and devs, and the Blizzard devs - particularly the one who had commissioned me in the first place for the Overwatch SFM work, who shook my hand and bought me a drink and made me feel right at home like never before. The experience I had there was nothing short of welcoming and touching, and I felt happy to finally meet these people and see how much they invest into their craft.  

- - - - -

It's crazy how far I've come. deviantArt was the first community sharing site next to Tumblr that helped me get started. A lot of people know me as that person who does Source Filmmaker crap - and to be honest, I'm okay with that. I would love to do more and plan to do more because I don't think it'll last forever. There's a lot more graphic design, concept art, and videography/photography that I really want to do. But it's kind of surreal when I sit back and really think about it. There's been times people have asked me if I was too blind to see my journey would end sticking with Team Fortress 2 and Source Filmmaker crap. And to be honest? I don't see my journey ending anytime soon; I only see it beginning. I cannot believe myself that so much has come my way from starting off as a TF2 SFM artist - but I don't bullshit around. I do my best no matter what the medium, and I'm always grateful when even the biggest names in the world can see that, considering those two things have gotten me to where I am as I expand upon new horizons.

Thank you to everybody once again who has followed my journey this far as well. I work hard at what I do, I hope people like what I do, and I'm glad that up until now, people are supporting what I do. Thank you very much, and I wouldn't have gotten this far without your guys' kind words and thoughts.

Ever since God said "let there be light", humans and hair have co-existed together in harmony. Then, everything changed when the Witcher promo items for TF2 attacked.

It's no secret to people who have kept up with me that my biggest gripe with the Hero's Tail is how it's basically overly detailed for a TF2 hat, or TF2 hair. It literally looks as though they took Geralt's hair off his model, re-positioned and scaled it a little to fit Scout's tiny head, and called it done. I just do not like it. However, a lot of people do like it or are indifferent to it. Some people even say that it was the only option they had that matched what they wanted - that there were not enough hair options around to change that. (By extension - pun fully intended - the Brutal Bouffant is a very overused hair model due to how it's long hair. It's not modeled very well, not textured very well, it doesn't have any bones, and it looks like a banana when you paint it yellow.)

Today's journal is not only a downwards spiral into using more TF2 bases for your OCs, but an offering of alternate hairdos - not only Scout hair, but everybody's hair. I basically sat down, scoured the TF2/SFM/GMod workshop, Gamebanana, mods.tf, the Emporium, and TF2Mods for a bunch of wigs to slap onto your OC do not steal's head. I also looked outside of the TF2 spectrum for some other wigs to slap onto your characters. 

Now, as for the Hero's Tail itself: you can keep using it. By all means, I could tell people to stop using it - that's ultimately my opinion. I can't exercise authority over anybody no matter how much I dislike what they're doing (unless it's illegal). Simply because I don't like it (and probably never will) or don't encourage the use of it (also probably will never do this unless it's under freedom of choice), doesn't mean it's a mandatory warrant for you to stop using it. If you feel like it fits better than any of the hair provided, then keep doing what you're doing. 

The closest thing on this list to the Hero's Tail is the Lara Locks. It is by no means perfect and it will require you to move the bangs a little forward or down because it's meant to not fit heads, but it does come with a ponytail. If you are inept with Blender magic like I am because I ragequit on the cube, then with some clever rescaling you could use only the ponytail while using different bangs:



This is part of learning how to recycle assets into different purposes. For more exercises with that, check out the Honey Toast Challenge.
Here's some personal examples of wigs I've utilized in various ways, whether straight or with some tricks and turns:

   

  

1st Row L>R: Lara's Locks, Teenage Dream, Miku's short pigtails.
2nd Row L>R: Teenage Dream rotated + Master's Yellow Belt. Teenage Dream on proper, but with 2nd one as hairbun.
3rd Row L>R: Meatball Head; reskin on the buns, pigtails moved up, tiara clipped behind forehead. Meatball Head + Brutal Bouffant bangs. Lara Locks + Meatball Head. Miku's long hair.

This list will be updated regularly with whatever I manage to find that’s downloadable. Most of these will need to be hexed, see this for how2do. Give these items an upvote too on the workshop if you like 'em. Feel free to help contribute to the list! 

LAST UPDATE: December 23, 2017. Happy Holidays!

Link To List: uberchain.tumblr.com/post/1412…

Welcome to Team Fortress 2. After 8 years after release, who plays this game better - North America, or Europe?

Posters Designed by: 

It’s that time of the year again. The name of the game is Team Fortress 2, and the format is 6v6 - at an intercontinental level. With a prize pool of up to 4 - 5 digits, top ESEA Invite teams Froyotech and Ascent are flying in from North America to tackle on Europe’s top premiership teams - Reason Gaming, nerdRage, and The Last Resort. 

Will Froyotech prove dominant and return as Insomnia champions, or will Ascent finally show Froyotech who the real NA kings are? However, what if the throne belongs to one of the EU teams? One thing’s for certain - we’re in for some good video games this weekend.

Catch us starting 4:00 PM BST / 11:00 AM EST @ twitch.tv/teamfortresstvthis weekend, August Friday 28th - Sunday 30th! 

Want to know more about each team, for curiosity’s sake or for considering your matches carefully for Saloon.tf? Teamfortresstv’s Alkaline has an article written up for you on power rankings + full roster breakdowns right here!

Mad props to Scurvy for the reskinning work as well as the promotional posters! Mad props also to Liz and Jas for helping design concept art for the Reason Gaming and nerdRage jerseys that’ll debut at this year’s i55 TF2 livestream tournament. These ladies did an awesome job and it was great working with them! 

I’ll be flying out this week to do some visual media work as well as some on-site animations for some SFM stuff. Tune in to the stream this weekend to see all your favourite players or some good video games!

Some of you may have seen this on my Tumblr as well as my Youtube, it's long overdue for a dA journal:

A while back, I remember watching Imagine Dragon’s “Warriors” promotional MV for the 2014 LoL World Championship. I thought it was neat in terms of how their videos like Road to the Cup and Warriors were produced and weaved together for that hype factor. I wanted to do a video like that for TF2: ridiculous as all hell, but awesome enough to get people excited. A few weeks ago when it was still then and it still felt out-of-nowhere, Season 18 of ESEA's Invite TF2 league rolled around with LAN right around the corner, and after picking a song and a theme - as well as a week of hard work and sleep deprivation - me, Dashner and Airon managed to put together our secret LAN intro video.

 

Complete with mildly self-aware lampshading about the sheer amount of cutting edginess that the whole plot contained, the video revolves around the theme of how TF2 is struggling - but not dying. Even though there’s a lot of familiar faces disappearing or choosing to hang up their hats and put away their guns, that doesn’t mean the game is gone. People come and go and it’s disheartening - if you choose to fight, then fight as hard as you can. Back your team up, support them through times when it seems tough, learn as much as you can, and aim for better. 

Here's the Behind-the-Scenes B&A video of how the above SFM sequences worked: 

Thanks to everybody who liked the intro when it debuted at LAN, I felt like I was at a rock concert! Best of luck to all the Invite teams to fight for the top. Thanks to Dashner for rendering + editing it all together and helping me through it all when I was pressed for time, thanks to Beater for finding the frag ticks that Dashner needed for the sweet frag montage, thanks to Airon (who I’ve worked with on Jewel Escapade) for providing the awesome sound mixing, and thanks to Mana for providing the first cut of the Great Divide. Thanks to tsc for getting me in the production crew in the first place; I’ve enjoyed doing cool things to help out since S17. Also, massive gg to Gecks and Getawhale for their voices; they’ve come so far as casters, we’re glad to have you on board and we’d love to see you make your way to the top. 

Somebody once noticed that the map designer who made Kong King created a bench using two benches instead of making a separate model. A few people thought it was lazy; others recognized it as a creative use of repurposing models and using what you have to make what you need rather than model it and take up more memory or time. 

I don’t know how to model, so I do that a lot in Source Filmmaker: I stare at a model meant for a hat, and I ask myself: “can I use this as something other than a hat?” This makes for elaborate outfits and models, often with a little bit of reskinning as well as some VMT/VTF tricks. I want you guys to try it too. The SFM Honey Toast Challenge will be my challenge to you for practicing rebuilding props that you have or can find around, without having to be forced to model something just to get what you need.

Shibuya Honey/Brick Toast is a popular dessert from Japan that’s become popular in parts of Korea and Taiwan. It’s usually made out of brioche bread with the inside cut up into cubes, buttered and toasted, and then layered with honey, then garnished with fruits, sauces, ice cream and whatever fulfills one’s desires. This is a stack of bread, but with cheating angles as well as models, you can make something that looks good. I’ve made mine with honey, green tea ice cream, chocolate pirouline wafer straws, some strawberries and oranges and a dollop of whipped cream.

In actuality other than the fruit models, I used:

• A rigged and reskinned Triboniophorus Tyrannus for ice cream + honey drip from the SFM Workshop
  
• A reskinned cupcake model clipping into the toast for whipped cream from an MLP prop pack
  
• Reskinned blood pools for the flat honey on the toast and plate from the SFM Beta files
  
• Reskinned soda straws as the pirouline straws from somewhere on the GMod workshop
  

Let’s see how you make your honey toast, and how well you can think outside the box! I want you to dress up these three slices of toast with whatever props you can find, whether TF2 or third-party. You can use food props or reskin things into food, but ultimately you wanna try to work with things that you might not even consider food. You’re encouraged to learn how to use override materials, how to reskin VTFs, how to edit the VMTs with strings like $envmap and $phongboost, while asking yourself these questions:

• If I colour or change the material values of this item, how will it look?
• If I take these jigglebones and stretch/shrink them, will it make this shape?
• Can I take this and use it in a completely different way if I use this part/angle of it?

If you guys wanna try it out and post it up, let me know! Tag your exercises as honeytoastchallenge on deviantArt or tag me in your upload, and I’ll come take a look at what confectioner craving you’ve created, as well as if you learned anything new from it or if it was good practice! 

DMX File Download is HERE! You will have camera1 as your main angle, two lights, and the bread models ready since they’re TF2 files. You will need to put a plate/tray under the toast yourself. Feel free to use additional angles or lights!