Hello everyone,
Last week was tougher than I expected, but I still kind of came out on top.
In the previous devlog, I said I’d close that LEWD scene in about 5 to 6 days and move on to DAY 2 of this update. But my dumb ass decided to try animating kissing with the new stuff I’ve learned over the last few weeks, and I spent way more time than I should have on kissing renders and animations. Even worse, I kept adding extra animations, which meant extra renders, and I ended up making the whole scene about a third bigger than it was supposed to be.
So yeah, what I’m trying to say behind all those excuses is: I’m not done with that scene, I’ll prepare for seppuku.
On a more serious note, the scene is already sitting at around 170 renders and 20 animations, so it’s… kind of a chunky one. Last night I posed the last animation. What’s left is polishing work: genitals, breasts, balls and ass bounce, some different expressions, plus a couple of camera angles before I call it done. It should only be about 2 to 3 hours of work today. Then I’ll finish the scene, the cuddles, the conversation, and finally put an end to this first DAY of Episode 5.
Not going to lie, these past couple of weeks have been tough. I’m juggling animation fatigue, plus some random tough headaches here and there. I’m very active in the gym, and unfortunately it’s cutting season, which means I’m more tired, I sleep even worse than usual, and I’m guessing that’s part of it. I’m going to give my body more time to adapt before I change anything. Productivity hasn’t really been hit overall, except from Thursday to Saturday where I was very, very slow.
Contrary to what I’m saying though, my render queues keep increasing. I’ve got almost 30 animations queued, and over 110 renders waiting right now. When I came back from my trip those queues were empty, so I must be doing something right. It did bring up something I didn’t think I’d have to deal with anymore, but it’s been in the back of my mind for a few days: bottlenecks.
Some upcoming scenes will have a lot of characters, especially in the background, and optimizing only goes so far. Renders will need more time to properly… well, get rendered. I’m already rocking two rendering rigs with 4090s, plus working on another rig with a 4090, so getting another 4090 is obviously not a good idea.
No, instead, I got a 5090. Silly me.
Lemon and Bat, two friends of mine, also have 5090s and they keep saying those cards are absolute monsters, so switching one 4090 in one of the rendering rigs for a 5090 should help. It also makes me feel a lot better knowing I’ve got a spare card in case one dies. For now it’ll be retired, but maybe when I get my own place I’ll run a double 4090 workstation for more performance while I’m actively working on 3D scenes.
On top of that, I also got a new desk and a new lutrawide monitor, so my workflow will change a little. I’ll spend a full day on the 27th of this month installing everything, but it should help productivity overall, so I’m really excited for it.
Anyway, enough blabbering. Let’s talk numbers:
Static renders: 1,304
Animations: 67
Story content: 27 scenes written (22,650 words)
That’s an extra 124 renders and 20 animations since last week. On paper it isn’t bad at all, but that Thursday to Saturday lazy phase really bothered me, because it could’ve been much better.
Other than that, we keep it rocking.
Today and tomorrow I’ll finish the LEWD scene, and then I’ll get to work with Elsa, my first scene with her since her last one in Episode 4, so I’m really happy about that.
Now, I mentioned last week there was something special I wanted to talk about. I’ll be brief because I don’t like opening up.
Five years ago I started MisterMaya, and it genuinely changed my life. It ended up being the best thing I’ve ever done. I’m not going to sit here and get all mushy about it, but it is a big deal to me. I’m grateful I’m still here doing this, and I don’t take your support for granted. I promised myself back then I’d go all in, and I’m still keeping it. You can count on me to keep pushing and to work as hard as I possibly can.
So I wanted to toast to this journey, to you, and to another five years.
Coincidentally enough, my friend Lem Lem is also celebrating five years as Mister Classy. We figured it’d be funny to create a render each with our girls, so here’s mine. Keep an eye out for his too, because it looks great.
Sincerely, thanks a lot, and I’ll see you next week.
MisterMax