With the animation so close to being finished, that might be all of the screenshots I’ll show until it’s released. I may decide to release one or two more at the most, but we’ll see what happens. That’s all I’ve got for this post. I might be making another post soon about what’s been going on with my life, such as Valentine’s Day and other things. Stay tuned if you’re interested in that. Please leave a comment and let me know what you guys think of the screenshots. Catch you next time!

After using the Create for a few days, I can see that it’s also the case with this tablet. One side of the nib that I’ve been drawing on is already starting to flatten slightly. You can barely tell, but it’s there. I’m not sure how long one nib will last me, but after the three additional nibs that come with the Create wear out, I’ll have to buy new ones. It all depends on how often you draw and how hard you press down. That’s probably the only downfall with Wacom’s newer tablets, but you have to deal with it because just about all of their older models have been discontinued. The reason they wear so fast is because of the new textured surfaces of the tablets themselves. It’s not very noticeable with the touch of your hand, but when you draw it gives it a more realistic feel, as if you’re actually drawing on paper. That’s the good thing about the newer models. However, aside from the nibs issue I’ve been enjoying the tablet a lot. As I’ve mentioned, it has a much better feel and grip when drawing to help you produce better quality lines. I’ve definitely noticed a difference with the sensitivity and pressure levels since switching from my Graphire4. I’m able to draw thinner lines using lighter strokes much easier than I could with the Graphire4. This makes drawing a lot easier and it feels more natural. Overall, the Bamboo Create is certainly a great upgrade that I would recommend to anyone who’s looking for a high quality tablet. It might not have as many pressure levels as the Intuos4, but with a smaller price tag, you get what you pay for and more.

As for the Alan Wake Tribute, progress is still going smoothly. The animation is now 80% complete. It’s getting close and it feels great. I’d really like to have it done by the end of this month, but we’ll see how that goes. I don’t want to make any promises until I’m absolutely sure. For the next Alan Wake Tribute post, I’ll try to show off some screenshots and give more details about the status of it. Until then, I hope you guys enjoyed reading my thoughts on the Bamboo Create. Let me know what you think! I’ll catch you later.

As far as Christmas goes, I had a really great one. I got lots of cool gifts from Abby and my family, and had lots of fun spending time with everyone. I also got a surprise gift from Kohl’s (where I work) a few days after Christmas. I came into work to find out that my name was drawn for an associate appreciation contest we had for the entire district. You were entered into the contest if you worked the two days after Christmas. I worked both days, so my name was entered twice. Three winners were chosen with a prize of either a $500, $200, or $100 Visa card. I was in disbelief when they told me that I had won the $500 Visa card. Needless to say, I had an amazing day after hearing that. I’ve already managed to spend $100 of it on two pairs of Vans shoes. Me and Abby went to an outlet mall yesterday and today to shop around, where there’s a Vans outlet. Money well spent? Probably not.

In other news, I’m finally back on track with animating the Alan Wake Tribute. I admit, I was getting lazy with it there for a little while. School was over and I was just looking forward to the holidays. I actually got my head into gear and started working on it again before Christmas even arrived. If you’ve been following me on Twitter, you might know some of the details already. The storyboard is now completely finished and I’ve started to work on the final scenes of the animation. With the storyboard complete, I can now properly calculate how much of the animation is finished. As of right now, the animation is 69% complete. (You can check out the image of this post for a screenshot of a newly completed scene.) It doesn’t sound like a whole lot, but I practically have this whole week off of work. I only work again on Tuesday for a small shift and school starts again for me next Monday. During this week, I’ll try my best to get a good chunk of work done. I stopped working for a while, but I’m gonna try to keep working on it as the days go by. I would really like to have it finished by February or March at the latest. As always, we’ll see what happens. Past “hope” release dates haven’t been so smooth, but I’ll try my best.

Anyway, I hope you guys enjoyed reading this wall of text if you actually made it through the whole thing. I’m sorry for the lack of posts, but I’m also gonna try to manage that a little better as well. So expect more posts as I’m wrapping up the animation for the Alan Wake Tribute. If you want additional details on anything I’m doing, I usually update my Twitter more than anything else. You can follow me on there if you like. That’s all I’ve got for now, guys. Catch you later!

If you didn’t read my previous post, I talked about how I was going to storyboard the rest of the animation before I actually work on completing it. That’s all I’ve been doing lately. I have to say that it’s really turning out great and storyboarding is definitely helpful. I’m also getting plenty of work done for the final product, considering I’m working on syncing the storyboard to the music and adding sounds. By the time I’m finished with the storyboard, everything will be planned out and all of the audio should be synced and complete.

Right now, I’m about forty seconds into the storyboard, which is actually a good majority of the final scenes. Everything before that is done. It shouldn’t be much longer until the storyboard is complete and I can actually work on completing and polishing the final animation. Hopefully within the week. We’ll see how that turns out. Also, for anyone who is interested, I’ll be releasing the storyboard for the action sequence after the animation is finally released. I figured it would be interesting for anyone who likes that sort of thing. That’s all I’ve got for now. Until next time, I’ll catch you guys later!

(I should have another post up shortly about other things, so be sure to check that out too!)

As always, let me know what you guys think and please subscribe to my channel if you’re interested in seeing more videos like this. I’ll try to work on more as I progress with the animation. Until next time, I’ll catch you guys later!

In other news, my girlfriend just recently made a Tumblr and convinced me to get one too. If any of you have a Tumblr, you can visit mine here and I would love to have some new followers. I’ll be sure to return the favor. Anyway, that’s all I’ve got for this short post. Please check out the updated explosion test and my Tumblr page. Let me know what you think of everything. I’ll catch you guys next time!

Moving onto the actual update, most of the work that has been completed lately is mainly polish work. Due to work and school keeping me busy, I’ve mainly only had the time to work on polishing the animation. Updating graphics and adjusting, or converting the backgrounds to images to make the animation perform better. I’ve done a small bit of animating for some of the later scenes, which some of that can be seen in the new teaser if you haven’t checked that out yet. Other than a tiny bit of actual animating, I’ve just been making the animation look a lot sharper and perform way better. Some of the things I’ve worked on is the background for the loading screen and the entire opening shot of the animation. A lot of that has been touched up on or added to, making it all look way better than it previously was. I’m still working on the animation in that sense, I just want everything to look as good as possible before it’s released. I always love improving things as I move along. Now that everything complete has been polished, I can focus primarily on finishing the rest of the animation. My goal for right now is to try and make a solid storyboard for the ending so I have everything planned ahead of time. This will make the animation process a lot smoother and easier. When I get that done, hopefully animating and getting it finished shouldn’t take that long. I still plan to try and have this released by the end of this year. It shouldn’t be too much longer, but I’m definitely not rushing anything. I still have to actually write and figure out how the animation will end. I have a general idea, but nothing really specific.

Anyway, I’m very proud of you if you made it through that wall of text. I’m going to try and start working on the storyboard for the ending pretty soon. Once I get that done, I’ll be sure to make another update and let you all know. It should be nothing but smooth sailing from there. Until then, I’ll be trying to manage my time and get the storyboard complete. I hope you guys are still excited for this. I can’t wait to show you the final product. Let me know what you think of everything so far. I’ll catch you next time!

In other news, I should have another Alan Wake Tribute update coming soon. I believe I said that back in the Warped Tour post, but it definitely should be my next post. I’ve been working on it a lot since the last update, so there’s plenty to talk about. In fact, me and my amazing girlfriend Abby were hanging out today and I touched up on some animation I did for it recently while she sat next to me scrapbooking. It was a really awesome day. Keep an eye out for that update soon. Until then, I’ll catch you guys later!