Behind the scenes, anyone?
Sep. 8th, 2009 08:34 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
katrisimsI've been meaning to post some behind the scenes material and other picspam for a while, but haven't felt up for it. Now, rather than start up my game, I felt like I could type up some behind the scenes. I finally get to talk about some of these things. (In the end find some regular picspam, too.) So here we go, be forewarned, this picspam is going to be huge!
I'll start with possibly the most spoilery stuff of the whole post. Cyrus. Him being a vampire was my ultimate goal in this double chapter. It's essential for a future plot I have in mind, and yes, I do intend to score the "entered and graduated college as a vampire" point. Not that I minded the undead scholarship, either.
But how did I do this? Well, it's one of the more complex scenes I've done so far, but still nothing overly difficult. I simply played things twice. First, I cheated Sal on the lot, placed him and Cyrus where I needed them, kept everyone else out of the way with free will off and move_objects on when needed. Then I exited and played again to really get Cyrus into a vampire. Rather simple.
Sal, of course, was the one to do it, for plotty reasons again. By the way, I really like this picture of him for some reason. It doesn't quite fit the mood in the scene it appears in, but it was the best I had for that purpose. Plus it's a nice picture.
Another cool, pointless Sal shot.
Cyrus' transformation looks pretty much the way it's supposed to from this angle, but from above where I originally pictured him, he looks way too happy:
You can probably guess why this one didn't make it in the update, can you? =D A slightly pathetic little vampire I have there.
Those were all from the staged scene. The actual vamping, the second time, took place inside, because I needed to up their relationship a bit and they were getting cold.
This is how they originally met: I lured them both into Marsha's hot tub.
This is another little quit without saving -trick. I needed Cyrus to stay a vamp and drink the potion, so the easiest option was to quit without saving. I first wanted George to be the one to take Cyrus to the potion and he was supposed to be present in the picture, too, but I couldn't position him the way I wanted to, and I ran out of patience:
I also tried first with the turn on/off potion, to avoid extra tricks, the glow was not similar. I also would have wanted a shot where he's just drinking the potion, but he kept showing the bottle through his eye, so I gave up on that, too. I think the final pic is quite okay.
Now that I've mentioned George, I might as well talk about him a bit more. Yes, he's currently dating count Pao, and is very happy with that. I've actually thought I should see if those two hit it off like the moment I saw what kind of a replacement Curty got. And they did, no surprise, as they're both pleasure, and George share's Authors turn ons (I originally thought Curty had red hair, as the brown looks kinds reddish brown on my screen, and when I realized it wasn't really red, I just never got around to changind the turn on). And well, in my head George has been gay much longer than Bill, for example. Don't know why, he just has. I'm really happy to have found him someone, a fellow immortal who'd love to give him those fifty dream dates he desires. Current situation: two done, 48 to go.
They really, really hit it off. I totally adore them. Oh, and if anyone has a very good memory, they might guess that I'll probably be getting at least a minor plot twist out of this relationship. =)
I'm happy that count Pao turned up for another reason. George seemed to be getting a little desperate, and that scared the customers. No, I didn't make it up, it really happened! So hopefully he's a happy camper now.
Moving on to the single perhaps most interesting character in this double update, at least for me: Aadam.
Aadam has been under some changes for a long time, and I felt that I needed to finally make those changes final. He's been increasingly disillusioned for a long time, but he still needed the last straw, and basically the repetition of what happened with Rebecca was the perfect chance for me to fo that. Only when I was writing the chapters I realized the similarity of this episode with the one that happened a long time ago. It bothered me for a little while, but then I decided that in order to get things go as I wanted them to, a little repeating myself was acceptable. One of the most important points was, after all, to show Aadam's final pick of side.
For that I needed to use Beth and Marsha. That also nicely made the point about the strength of their friendship. By the way, this shows how I fail at photographing: only when I'd spent quite a substantial amount of time getting just the right expression of horror and disbelief on Beth's face and have happily exited the game, I find out that I've forgotten to put the roof up. Oh well, that's me.
This was perhaps the most challenging scene for me to set, with the most sims to place. Especially this shot was difficult:
From whichever angle I looked at it, something was slightly wrong. Bailey would cover Marsha, Aadam or Arthur from sight. Bailey's swimtrunks would show in the picture, or the watercircles around his neck though he's supposed to be in the air. Marsha would swim out of the picture when I was positioning the others. And so on, and so on. This one isn't perfect, but I think it gets the point through.
Not that all the actors of the scene were co-operating all the time, either. =)
This shot I'm proud of. I wanted to get it through the window, to show that Sal and Aadam are being spied on and that Marsha's behaviour seems surprising to Bailey. Unlike it says in the chapter, the window shots are actually all taken through the living room window. The bedroom window is too far, and it was difficult enough to get everyone show in the picture with the window frames interfering.
Anyway, Aadam. I've been sorry for him for how things have gone for him in the plot for a long time. This had been the situation for ages, and he had to be frustrated and depressed. The pictures didn't quite capture what I had in mind, but he had been living in that gloomy house and that small bedroom for quite a long time, with very limited contact with his loved ones and constant fear that something bad might happen to them.
In reality, Aadam's been living together with Joy and the girls for a long time, and I've only summoned him to the Chamcha household for plottyness. (Recently, he wanted a puppy, so I gave him that, because my Aadam gets what he wants.) He and Joy rolled slightly manipulated but nevertheless surprising wants to get married to each other, and I locked the wants. They'd been locked for a couple of rotations at least, to wait until it best suited the plot.
So it was about time.
I really, really wanted to show some true happiness for Aadam, and this was the best thing I could imagine happening to him.
I wanted to show that his family was present and cheering for him, but didn't really have the perfect spot in the letter for that. Plus Adrian didn't make it for the ceremony, I think he was in the bathroom.
And well, this didn't feel like the perfect shot to put in the update. =)
Everyone enjoyed the occasion, though.
Even in Aadam's happiness, though, there needed to be a wistful tone. I don't think this could have ended in any other way. I don't really see Sal as a bad guy necessarily, despite of the things he's done, but he is obsessed rather than in love with Author, and sinking deeper and deeper in his own plots and schemes. He may not realize this himself - if he did, I'd lose a villain - but at some point Aadam had to. He can't save his father, but maybe he can still save himself and the rest of the family.
This picture is not exactly as it was in the update. I first had the idea of this picture in my head, and felt I needed to have it in the update, even though the exact happenings in the situation are not clear in my head. After I shot this, I realized someone was missing - if someone, Joy would absolutely want to be included. So I played until she became Criminal Mastermind (and permaplat) and reshot the picture. I'm not perfectly happy with how it turned out technically, but I think the message is loud and clear.
Marsha is another character who reached a sort of a closure this chapter. I see her as somewhat too trusting and slightly naive, but I still couldn't keep things as they were forever. Sal had to do something to brutally use her sooner rather than later, because otherwise Aadam would surely get a chance to properly warn her at some point or another, and what would the fun in that have been? Besides, Marsha, too, was so close to Salahuddin learning in any other way than the hard way would have been impossible. She now takes it as a personal insult that she fell for the man's tricks.
Oh, and as you could also see from the group shot, she did make it into Captain Hero.
Finally, I have some other, non-spoilery picspam for you, around the neighborhood. Beth, Sean and Carl got a holiday:
Beth and Sean also got some action:
I had to help them a little there. Their ACR timers went off, and while in the hotel, they tried to use the beds in the other rooms, with no success. They didn't have the money to book the whole hotel, and were apparently feeling shy on community lots, so I initiated this one to keep them from constantly trying to use the hotel beds. They've been actually trying for a second child regularly, but are pretty old already and have rolled high.
Sean also got some action. The vacation townie whom the matchmaker threw him some time ago, came across him again on Twikkii, so they got another date and had a fun time together. From this picture, it'd seem that the blonde guy is stalking Carl's date.
That assumption would be wrong.
In the Thayer-Fairchild household, little Cliff was a toddler this rotation. He was quite a sweetie.
His grandpa Arthur quite adored the tyke. He was visiting, and all Cliff had to do was ask for attention once, and then he got attention for the rest of the night. I had to get Sandy and Bill to tell him to go when it was time to go to bed. The tossing didn't go all correct, but Cliff didn't seem to mind.
Cliff also grew up, still cute.
I accidentally got a wolf inside by greeting everyone. He tried to detroy our flowervase, so he got scolded.
The Custer household has had the usual fuzz. The ever fertile Barry and Laura had their fourth daughter, Christa. The bathroom was quite packed, and Barry felt the need to mop the floor while his wife was giving birth. Little Christa is the favorite playbuddy of the family.
Christa grew up into a toddler, one who likes to jam to the music. Well, who doesn't, especially in this household?
The teens also got some teenage fun, by inviting over some buddies. Calista liked playing the guitar so much se maxed creativity. Which is I guess good, since she wants to become Rock God.
Corinna, the eldest, also got a date since she'd had her first kiss want locked for a while. That want was fulfilled, by Gordon Nott. He seems a sweet guy.
Corinna wasn't the only one popping a lock. In the Mendoza household, Barbara had also wanted a first kiss for a while, so she got a date. This young lady was originally randomized as straight, but she didn't seem to object to having a girlfriend instead of a boyfriend. Barbara was happy. Though I'm sure she'd like to have another, too. Beatrice hasn't shown huge interest in romance yet, but well, she's popularity anyway.
So, I think that's about it for today's behind the scenes & picspam. I'm sorry if the order of things was a little confusing, my train of thought seems to be difficult to follow right now, even for me. =D Must be the tiredness.
I'll start with possibly the most spoilery stuff of the whole post. Cyrus. Him being a vampire was my ultimate goal in this double chapter. It's essential for a future plot I have in mind, and yes, I do intend to score the "entered and graduated college as a vampire" point. Not that I minded the undead scholarship, either.
But how did I do this? Well, it's one of the more complex scenes I've done so far, but still nothing overly difficult. I simply played things twice. First, I cheated Sal on the lot, placed him and Cyrus where I needed them, kept everyone else out of the way with free will off and move_objects on when needed. Then I exited and played again to really get Cyrus into a vampire. Rather simple.
Sal, of course, was the one to do it, for plotty reasons again. By the way, I really like this picture of him for some reason. It doesn't quite fit the mood in the scene it appears in, but it was the best I had for that purpose. Plus it's a nice picture.
Another cool, pointless Sal shot.
Cyrus' transformation looks pretty much the way it's supposed to from this angle, but from above where I originally pictured him, he looks way too happy:
You can probably guess why this one didn't make it in the update, can you? =D A slightly pathetic little vampire I have there.
Those were all from the staged scene. The actual vamping, the second time, took place inside, because I needed to up their relationship a bit and they were getting cold.
This is how they originally met: I lured them both into Marsha's hot tub.
This is another little quit without saving -trick. I needed Cyrus to stay a vamp and drink the potion, so the easiest option was to quit without saving. I first wanted George to be the one to take Cyrus to the potion and he was supposed to be present in the picture, too, but I couldn't position him the way I wanted to, and I ran out of patience:
I also tried first with the turn on/off potion, to avoid extra tricks, the glow was not similar. I also would have wanted a shot where he's just drinking the potion, but he kept showing the bottle through his eye, so I gave up on that, too. I think the final pic is quite okay.
Now that I've mentioned George, I might as well talk about him a bit more. Yes, he's currently dating count Pao, and is very happy with that. I've actually thought I should see if those two hit it off like the moment I saw what kind of a replacement Curty got. And they did, no surprise, as they're both pleasure, and George share's Authors turn ons (I originally thought Curty had red hair, as the brown looks kinds reddish brown on my screen, and when I realized it wasn't really red, I just never got around to changind the turn on). And well, in my head George has been gay much longer than Bill, for example. Don't know why, he just has. I'm really happy to have found him someone, a fellow immortal who'd love to give him those fifty dream dates he desires. Current situation: two done, 48 to go.
They really, really hit it off. I totally adore them. Oh, and if anyone has a very good memory, they might guess that I'll probably be getting at least a minor plot twist out of this relationship. =)
I'm happy that count Pao turned up for another reason. George seemed to be getting a little desperate, and that scared the customers. No, I didn't make it up, it really happened! So hopefully he's a happy camper now.
Moving on to the single perhaps most interesting character in this double update, at least for me: Aadam.
Aadam has been under some changes for a long time, and I felt that I needed to finally make those changes final. He's been increasingly disillusioned for a long time, but he still needed the last straw, and basically the repetition of what happened with Rebecca was the perfect chance for me to fo that. Only when I was writing the chapters I realized the similarity of this episode with the one that happened a long time ago. It bothered me for a little while, but then I decided that in order to get things go as I wanted them to, a little repeating myself was acceptable. One of the most important points was, after all, to show Aadam's final pick of side.
For that I needed to use Beth and Marsha. That also nicely made the point about the strength of their friendship. By the way, this shows how I fail at photographing: only when I'd spent quite a substantial amount of time getting just the right expression of horror and disbelief on Beth's face and have happily exited the game, I find out that I've forgotten to put the roof up. Oh well, that's me.
This was perhaps the most challenging scene for me to set, with the most sims to place. Especially this shot was difficult:
From whichever angle I looked at it, something was slightly wrong. Bailey would cover Marsha, Aadam or Arthur from sight. Bailey's swimtrunks would show in the picture, or the watercircles around his neck though he's supposed to be in the air. Marsha would swim out of the picture when I was positioning the others. And so on, and so on. This one isn't perfect, but I think it gets the point through.
Not that all the actors of the scene were co-operating all the time, either. =)
This shot I'm proud of. I wanted to get it through the window, to show that Sal and Aadam are being spied on and that Marsha's behaviour seems surprising to Bailey. Unlike it says in the chapter, the window shots are actually all taken through the living room window. The bedroom window is too far, and it was difficult enough to get everyone show in the picture with the window frames interfering.
Anyway, Aadam. I've been sorry for him for how things have gone for him in the plot for a long time. This had been the situation for ages, and he had to be frustrated and depressed. The pictures didn't quite capture what I had in mind, but he had been living in that gloomy house and that small bedroom for quite a long time, with very limited contact with his loved ones and constant fear that something bad might happen to them.
In reality, Aadam's been living together with Joy and the girls for a long time, and I've only summoned him to the Chamcha household for plottyness. (Recently, he wanted a puppy, so I gave him that, because my Aadam gets what he wants.) He and Joy rolled slightly manipulated but nevertheless surprising wants to get married to each other, and I locked the wants. They'd been locked for a couple of rotations at least, to wait until it best suited the plot.
So it was about time.
I really, really wanted to show some true happiness for Aadam, and this was the best thing I could imagine happening to him.
I wanted to show that his family was present and cheering for him, but didn't really have the perfect spot in the letter for that. Plus Adrian didn't make it for the ceremony, I think he was in the bathroom.
And well, this didn't feel like the perfect shot to put in the update. =)
Everyone enjoyed the occasion, though.
Even in Aadam's happiness, though, there needed to be a wistful tone. I don't think this could have ended in any other way. I don't really see Sal as a bad guy necessarily, despite of the things he's done, but he is obsessed rather than in love with Author, and sinking deeper and deeper in his own plots and schemes. He may not realize this himself - if he did, I'd lose a villain - but at some point Aadam had to. He can't save his father, but maybe he can still save himself and the rest of the family.
This picture is not exactly as it was in the update. I first had the idea of this picture in my head, and felt I needed to have it in the update, even though the exact happenings in the situation are not clear in my head. After I shot this, I realized someone was missing - if someone, Joy would absolutely want to be included. So I played until she became Criminal Mastermind (and permaplat) and reshot the picture. I'm not perfectly happy with how it turned out technically, but I think the message is loud and clear.
Marsha is another character who reached a sort of a closure this chapter. I see her as somewhat too trusting and slightly naive, but I still couldn't keep things as they were forever. Sal had to do something to brutally use her sooner rather than later, because otherwise Aadam would surely get a chance to properly warn her at some point or another, and what would the fun in that have been? Besides, Marsha, too, was so close to Salahuddin learning in any other way than the hard way would have been impossible. She now takes it as a personal insult that she fell for the man's tricks.
Oh, and as you could also see from the group shot, she did make it into Captain Hero.
Finally, I have some other, non-spoilery picspam for you, around the neighborhood. Beth, Sean and Carl got a holiday:
Beth and Sean also got some action:
I had to help them a little there. Their ACR timers went off, and while in the hotel, they tried to use the beds in the other rooms, with no success. They didn't have the money to book the whole hotel, and were apparently feeling shy on community lots, so I initiated this one to keep them from constantly trying to use the hotel beds. They've been actually trying for a second child regularly, but are pretty old already and have rolled high.
Sean also got some action. The vacation townie whom the matchmaker threw him some time ago, came across him again on Twikkii, so they got another date and had a fun time together. From this picture, it'd seem that the blonde guy is stalking Carl's date.
That assumption would be wrong.
In the Thayer-Fairchild household, little Cliff was a toddler this rotation. He was quite a sweetie.
His grandpa Arthur quite adored the tyke. He was visiting, and all Cliff had to do was ask for attention once, and then he got attention for the rest of the night. I had to get Sandy and Bill to tell him to go when it was time to go to bed. The tossing didn't go all correct, but Cliff didn't seem to mind.
Cliff also grew up, still cute.
I accidentally got a wolf inside by greeting everyone. He tried to detroy our flowervase, so he got scolded.
The Custer household has had the usual fuzz. The ever fertile Barry and Laura had their fourth daughter, Christa. The bathroom was quite packed, and Barry felt the need to mop the floor while his wife was giving birth. Little Christa is the favorite playbuddy of the family.
Christa grew up into a toddler, one who likes to jam to the music. Well, who doesn't, especially in this household?
The teens also got some teenage fun, by inviting over some buddies. Calista liked playing the guitar so much se maxed creativity. Which is I guess good, since she wants to become Rock God.
Corinna, the eldest, also got a date since she'd had her first kiss want locked for a while. That want was fulfilled, by Gordon Nott. He seems a sweet guy.
Corinna wasn't the only one popping a lock. In the Mendoza household, Barbara had also wanted a first kiss for a while, so she got a date. This young lady was originally randomized as straight, but she didn't seem to object to having a girlfriend instead of a boyfriend. Barbara was happy. Though I'm sure she'd like to have another, too. Beatrice hasn't shown huge interest in romance yet, but well, she's popularity anyway.
So, I think that's about it for today's behind the scenes & picspam. I'm sorry if the order of things was a little confusing, my train of thought seems to be difficult to follow right now, even for me. =D Must be the tiredness.
