Blade Runner 2049 - My *Toughest* Video + Streaming Update

Hello! Thanks for waiting, it’s been a while since I’ve made a big update like this - so there’s a lot to share!!

TLDR

• I've been feeling indecisive about my work, but that's been remedied with wanting to pursue videos that involve me praising stories I enjoy.

• STREAMING ART - I'm happy with how the stream is looking so far.
  

The Next Video

The next video that’s about to go up is about Blade Runner 2049 and how its setting explores oppressive culture, dehumanization. And how. And I like it quite like the end result! I’m proud of what I've made.

Here's a rough cut of it out now
-> https://youtu.be/1qyiYC-AP-M
There's no music or sound of effects so far, but that’s pretty much the video!

But In all my years in making video essays, this felt like the toughest video I made so far. Not necessarily it was a technically difficult script or the software couldn't handle what I was doing (though the latter is true with how much I pushed my computer. But it was the toughest because this is where I felt the most indecisive about my work. And this indecisiveness led me to being afraid of updating people on what I was working on, as it felt like I was committing myself to a promise I can’t keep or deliver on. Specifically when the update is whether I’m working on either the Detroit or Blade Runner video. I used to be certain on what the next video topic was - and next creative thing I want to flex. But that certainty has waned throughout each video.

Maybe it’s because I felt like I was creatively stagnating - specifically on what sorta thesis I wanted to tackle. As enjoyable as making the David Cage videos were, there’s this fear of being redundant in my videos. I spew the same shit, different game/show. Saying something “sucks” over and over again felt emotionally draining after a certain point. 

And I don’t want to box myself in as an ‘anger merchant’, and being performatively angry at things I don’t care about something I don't find interesting. Not to say I never leaned on being angry for the sake of comedy. I loved genuinely dunking on The Quantic Dream games, but making the ‘good sci-fi’ and ‘Disco Elysium’ segments of the Detroit and Heavy Rain videos were my favorite parts to make. 

And this realization hit me the hardest when I was making my Detroit Become Human Manga script, which slowly turned into the Blade Runner video that’s coming out soon. Turns out there I can’t put on my angry criticism on a whim - at least not as easily as I can talk about liking something. And I wanna put more of that energy out. Even if I know hating something brings in the viewers, I don’t want to cultivate an environment where all I do is hate things.

I’m reminded of a time when someone asked me in the Discord server if I was making a Forspoken video. It’s like ‘Am I basically another variant of the Angry Video Game nerd? Am I expected to hate things for the rest of this channel’s existence?’

While not a conscious effort in the front of my mind, I think my recent work reflects a shift in what I’m doing. From Joe Pera, Smiling Friends, to even The Last of Us show video is where I allowed myself to be more open to the idea of being more positive reviews - and the process has been personally rewarding. It’s why the Scott Pilgrim Netflix show is one of my favorite videos I’ve made so far - I feel like it strikes the perfect balance for me. Played up criticism with genuine praise for something that I genuinely adore. 

And I want to keep up that sorta energy. And I rather take my time and make something I like rather than a half assed video about Life is Strange franchise where I basically say the same thing as before.

And there’s nothing inherently wrong with saying the same thing that’s presented differently. Several channels have done this for years. I think I’ve just set high expectations for myself though, since that sorta thing would lead me to burning out quickly. And I hope that the ‘high expectations’ doesn’t get conflated with ‘I’m making THE BEST/MOST IMPORTANT ART IN THE WORLD.’ It’s more so with what I can personally achieve, and what I’m doing as an artist to grow.

This desire to try a new style that suits the subject matter for every video is CRAZY. And I rather not waste that energy on topics where I’m regurgitating something I've said before. Not to say the DBH Manga wasn’t a topic I found interesting, I still think it’s worth talking about, but the topic ended up being better suited for the Blade Runner franchise. Which ended up with me essentially scraping an entire script and rebuilding a topic from the ground up (with the help of the article I’ve used as a foundation of course)!

Will I be making a video on the Detroit Become Human manga still? No promises, but a significant chunk of the script is complete, and I may still go through with it. I’ll let you know when the BR2049 is out on whether or not I wanna commit to it. It just needs a bit of reworking since the BR2049 script is taken from the Manga script.

The BR2409 script has grown into something much more though. The pivot in subject matter has caused me to delve deeper into other subject matters, fact checking, and rabbit holes - giving it a much different approach to how I was gonna do the Detroit Manga video. Which caused things to take much longer than expected. And I apologize for how long the next video is taking - there’s only so much I can say ‘this took longer than expected!’ before it feels redundant and grating. 

And with the latest video being around 23 minutes long - a part of me feels like I'm undelivered in terms of quantity, even though I know this video length is fine! If anything, I should be happy that I’m able to make videos that aren’t always close to an hour long. Quality > Quantity

And I shouldn’t forget the fact a significant chunk of my time has been dedicated to revamping my streaming setup. Speaking off…

STREAMING

I’m planning to get back into streaming. With the streaming space maturing with programs like Streamer.bot and all sorts of plugins surfacing - it has made me gawk in awe with how creative streaming can be. And I wanted to take a stab at it with everything I’ve learnt from video making / graphic design. 

And I personally miss streaming, it was a fun way to connect with the community. I just didn’t know how to make the stream more interesting/rewarding for y’all. I even felt bad when people donated high amounts because I felt like I wasn’t doing enough for them. 

So I hope this new look and way to interact with the stream creates an environment where it shows how accurate my excitement is whenever people support me, whether they give me the moon or just wanna stop by and say hi :) 

And I wanted to share with you the progress I’ve made so far!
Huge shout out to Nims for helping out with this!

Styled like a sidewalk café, the stream layout is divided into three sections, which slide into a different frame depending on what I'm doing. This is two out of the three completed frame so far! None of this is finalised, but this is the general gist!

This is the main storefront / café, for just talking and preamble before the stream.

The Seating Area for drawing streams.

The Hole in the Wall with a big video store besides that'll be used for gaming streams

This also extends to the things that happen when people do donations, subs, gift/subs  and stuff. I've made these little assets for particular stuff that happens on stream!

(EDIT FOR SOME REASON THE IMAGES DIDNT UPLOAD, GIMME A MOMENT)

Here's one for donations / bits - displaying your donation - the currency / bits, and the message you've attached to it. I've given each donation tier to have some food associated with it, so it looks like your 'purchased' a $5 doughnut or something :)

The plan is to make different doodles depending on the donation amount.

This is what the Subbing will look like! It'll display your tier, name, profile pic, streak, and if your resubbing!

And this is what the Gift Subs will look like, displaying name, tier, amount of gifts given, and total amount of gifts given

When in motion, this is how it'll look! Pardon the choppiness, since it's a gif it's not as smooth as seeing it live or on a video.

When someone donates or wants to say something with their chat points, all together it could look something like this!

So yeah that’s what I’ve been working on so far! A lot of time has been spent just learning the programs, but I’m happy with the result! So you look forward to the comeback of the streams :)

–

Anyway that’s it for the update! Thanks for sticking around and being patient with me. I really appreciate the support and I’m happy to be given whatever appreciation is thrown my way. I’ll let you know what I plan on working on next when my mind gets settled on something.

Thanks for reading and all that you've given me, it's been a pleasure :)