A Thank You & What's Next (Extended)

UPDATE: Decided to simply update this post to include the extra paragraphs about Susan that people have been requesting! It is situated down below.

After nearly 10 years, Susan’s story finally reaches its end...

It’s odd to think about, given how she was the second main character of the roster which I made in the very same year I began this 3D endeavor. What started out as a simple slice of life with a gal trying to get by despite her bust, ended up as a 116 (more if you count the extra’s) entry-long story about the hardships and joys Susan experiences on the road of life, eventually becoming a mother.

The story itself is far from perfect, I was (and still am) figuring out how to best tell a story while still having plenty of engaging imagery. I do feel her story has been lacking in that regard, especially near the end (not enough lactation scenes, nothing lewd or explicit despite both of them living out their fantasy and the lack of Emi😭) but this will be a lesson for the future. And if I ever do feel like revisiting it, I most definitely could.

I also offer my sincerest gratitude for letting me indulge in this character-heavy story in a community that primarily enjoys the growth. And I hope that everyone who’s read it- or just the images have enjoyed it to some extent! For me that is my greatest joy out of all this, inspiring folks and making them happier. As I once was inspired by artists who were creating amazing stuff even before I started, all I can hope is to do the same for others.

With that out of the way, some might wonder what is up next now that Susan’s story has finished?

My plan is to first do some touch-ups on existing characters, ones that had their story started but never had closure. Expansion stories are a bit weird in not necessarily requiring an ending? But despite that there are a few characters that I feel deserve an ending- or at least tie up anything left untied.

After that, I aim to have a bit of a reset. A new cast of characters, a new generation of folks with different stories. The exact details are still a secret, but one hint I can give away is that some existing characters will still be around one way or another. ;)

Accompanied by this are some internal changes that I want to start applying, mainly the optimizing of each of the character’s file. Halving the file size and in some cases tripling the FPS when posing a character. 3ds Max isn’t necessarily a great program, especially with how Blender is looking lately, but I have made a lot of mistakes that ended up severely slowing down the process. So with this reset I aim to rectify that.

With all of this said however... I recently got a job that will start in May, so my free time will be significantly reduced after this point. This is especially important for Patrons, who have been amazing in their support. I suspect early on, the output of content will be significantly reduced while I get used to this new chapter in my life. I still fully intend on keeping this as a hobby, but only time will tell if that will actually happen and if I can balance that with a full-time job.

This whole post used to be way longer, where I rambled on about the details of what her story meant for me and such. But I decided against it, though if you are curious let me know. For now, this is me thanking you for being along on the ride, as well as sharing my general plans for the coming future. I don’t know how quickly I’ll get through the touch-ups, but I hope you’ll be there to see it!

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So some were interested in more of my Susan ramblings, so here we go! If the flow seems jarring parts of this were lifted over from the original journal/post.

In a way... writing her story and reaching her conclusion was a bit of self-therapy for me, and it also allowed me to just figure out what the hell I wanted to do with this account.

In those years I had trouble sticking to characters, often driven by sparks of motivation before they fizzle out. But not Susan, I kept chipping away at her story no matter what happened. Why might that be? I believe it was mainly due to my personal investment to her.

In the past I have mentioned that she has a lot of my traits, even the trauma I experienced myself was something I utilized to write hers. Of course the reasons for said trauma and how she sees herself couldn’t be more different, but what we still share is the journey of finding ourselves and accepting who we are. It is quite corny, but I’m not sure how else to put it. And that somehow ended up inside a BE romance story, and from there both her and Nathan became their own person.

So that kept pushing me to continue her story, despite her ever-changing future. Remember Becca, her aunt? Well, Susan was supposed to be a surrogate to her. I was this close to implementing it proper, even introducing Becca, before I ultimately decided against it (after long discussions with friends) and that it would be better to utilize timeskips and have Susan experience a pregnancy as her own, for her own family.

All of this was supported by how much her story was character-focused, vs growth-focused. There was less risk of me getting bored of a given size, as there always was a story beat I was looking forward to achieving. And if I did get bored, I’d just sneak in a growth spurt!

Something that might also be interesting to point out is Nathan. I tried to make him less of an self-insert, an actual defined character with flaws of his own. Additionally I didn’t want to follow the same old ‘oh big boobs girl meets guy who’s into big boobs’. There’s nothing wrong with that, it can be really effective but back then, I wanted to try out something different. Obviously they shared their interest in pregnancy, but before that point he was more so intimidated by her breasts. But as time passed and their relationship blossomed, they really ‘grew’ on him (sorry).

All in all, I’ve learned a lot by writing this story. How to handle story beats, proper building up of any developments for the payoff later, all kinds of storytelling techniques. And I really do hope to bring that to the characters of the ‘next generation’, that reset I mentioned above. Broaden and deepen the scope without feeling too overwhelming but still giving the impression that a lot of stuff is going on.

Juggling a story involving growth and everything around it... I think it’s my favorite part about all of this. Hence why I’m so keen on doing this again with new characters. And because these characters are already special to me, I think I’ll have less trouble keeping that train going vs other characters. :D