Divinity: Original Sin 2 Bullshittery - Update #3

Good afternoon folks. Once again, welcome to the weekend. Just to report steady progress for this Divinity bullshittery.

Right now I'm on roughly 5 minutes and 10 seconds finished out of the 19 minute runtime. Making a grindy, but consistent, 60 seconds per day. Usually consisting of 10+ After Effects comps.

A lot of this involves typing up the relevant dialogue, making sure it flows properly and is pleasing to the eye. And then flows in such a way that looks as though it's anchored onto the character speaking. Which is made easier as Divinity often has some pretty excellent points of contrast when it comes to character models versus the background. The auto-tracking can handle a lot of NPC conversations.

This is also the time where I'm making lots of decisions related to formatting. Or planning out consistent animation motifs. It was originally my plan to give the NPC's a distinctly different font. But after some experimentation I decided against it, as it merely added unnecessary confusion. The viewer is quickly able to figure out that it's an NPC doing the talking, without any sort of visual prompting from me.

There is also a text box at the base of the screen, which at first I thought would make the text above heads a little redundant. But since it doesn't move at all it can make the conversation appear a bit...dull.

The motion of text gives the viewer something to focus on. And I can scale the text accordingly to make everything clearer.

Beyond the nitty-gritty of the text animation, I also need to make structural decisions about how I'm going to do the first 5 minutes.

As this is intended to multiple narrative-heavy videos with a credits sequence and nice soundtrack playing out the ending, using custom art I plan to commission, a short intro sequence (or even title screen "Divinity 2) might be prudent. Even though it goes contrary to my usual style.

I feel I have two good options structurally speaking:

 - Option 1 - A narrated introduction sequence when the video-opens, establishing the context of Source, Sourcerers, the Magisters and Fort Joy. In order for the audience to comprehend *why* our party is on the boat. Keeping the bit when the boat is destroyed very brief before washing up at Fort Joy. This is almost identical to how the game does it already.

 - Option 2 - A briefer narrated intro, explaining that dangerous "sourcerors" are being herded onto boats. And then go In medias res to the first 5 minutes of the bullshittery, before having the boat destroyed, sink, fade to darkness. And then an introduction sequence in the darkness of the ocean. Before fading into the shore of Fort Joy.

I'll probably do mocks up for both and decide which one flows better. It'll heavily depend on balance between exposition and soundtrack choices.

As mentioned in prior updates, none of these cinematics are necessarily critical. I'm sure I'll be able to complete a pure bullshittery cut sooner, and present it to you all. Such finishing touches can be ready as-and-when artists are able to complete them, and be part of the public release.

So for now, keyframing on the text and animations continue. And next week I plan to reach the 10 minute mark. So give me another 3 weeks and I should have the bulk of this complete :)