Fluid simulations of doom

It's been a few weeks since the last update. Mostly a combination of work being hectic and involving a lot of driving around recently, so getting back late. It's also been because of minimal progress with fluid simulations in the episode.

At this point, it's just a case of tweaking parameters, baking particles, watching them explode again then go back to tweaking again. Parameters that produce a result the first time produce a completely different result the second with no rhyme or reason.

Up until now, I'd probably give it a few days of work, find something that looks acceptable then hope nobody notices. When it's literally the climax of several episodes, it HAS to look good.

When I get fed up of the endless sims, I continue working on the other bits. I have evertything up until that point rendered out. I have the key motion set up and just needing final tweaks and fluid to complete. Even the next scene has the bulk of it's animation complete and waiting for tweaking and a minor fluidsim to continue with, but I can't finalise that until this major fluid is working, so I know what sort of distribution is needed for continuity.

I want this episode finished this year. I really would prefer it before christmas, but not sure if I even have time to render everything in that timescale if it was already animated and simulated. Right now I'm placing the period between christmas and New Year as the most likely time to get this completed, cos I know I get a few extra days off work, but it's also a brief bit of time where lockdown restrictions are supposedly being eased, so I might be able to actually get somewhere to exercise for a window of a few days while everyone else is christmassing.

We'll see how it goes, and I'd really like to release some videos of the failed fluid simulations, because some of them are pretty funny. I'll have to wait until after the episode is released though because they are spoilers.