Rei's Work in Progress

WIPdate: 2013 Q2 To Do

As the snow recedes, so too does the freelance contract that keeps me up to my ears in non-furry work.  At about this time of the year, I typically have one or two much smaller contracts to attend to, though Q2 2013 is significantly more quiet for that than years past.

That being said, I’m actually looking forward to a little time of my own to do with as I please, as there’s no shortage of projects I’ve been meaning to take off of the back burner, including finishing up the online run of DSV Nautica, Starting ish.2 of the paperback Nautica, finalizing the script for Private Design, and helping Thallanor with the second year of our local convention Fur-Eh!

If you’ve been following the misadventures of Neesah for the past decade online and keep tabs on me here or on FA, you’re aware that the online canon arc is drawing to a close.  If not, the brief of it is that I’ve wanted to go back and rewrite a lot of the story as it stands; fix a few things, set other things up, and make the story the focus rather than furry-sexytime-in-space.  I’ve gotten a few e-mails over the years from concerned fans who apparently just followed along on the dot-com site, unaware that I had stopped updating there and was posting strictly to FA, due mostly in part to the fact that I don’t have Dreamweaver on my newer machine and what felt to me like a general lack of fan-interest in Nautica as a whole.  I’ll be addressing the dot-com site when the last page is complete.  More likely than otherwise, I’ll be taking the site down as it is.

This makes room for the new canon arc of Nautica in the paperback format.  I still have to do some leg-work on the benefit of self-publishing vs. distribution.  Ideally, I’d rather leave the heavy lifting to a distributor, though I’d really like to be paid for my work in money rather than the ever-popular “Here’s some books, go sell them yourself” method of payment amongst furry comic distributors.  A few artists who distribute their comic work know a few reputable places.  In the meantime, I’ll be working on issue #2 in ink with the possibility of color if the new distributor can accommodate.

Private Design, what was originally going to be an online comic about Jessi, is now far more likely to become an animation project.  I’ve given a lot of thought about how to tell Jessi’s story and from what I’ve scripted so far, I’m convinced that animating it is the best way to get my idea out there.  I’ve been doing comics for a long time.  When I’m not drawing furry smut, I’m doing freelance work which includes quite a bit of graphical animation, and some character animation.  The past decade of version updates to the Adobe suite has moved it to a place where character animation is more than doable.  It’s just a matter of finding the time.  Ideally, I’d have a team working on something this big, but finding that team is difficult: Who wants to work on someone else’s animation project?  There’s plenty of people who I know who would love to help me out, but few with the technical know-how and drive to power through what would likely be more than a year of work with only ass-pats in payment.  Could I sell the finished product and pay my team?  Rarely does that end well in the fandom.  No, it’s probably best that I work it out on my own.  I will however be holding screenings for voices in the animation at some point this year or early next.

Fur-Eh! is fast approaching.  In two weeks my city will play host to a distinctly Canadian convention.  Last year’s (the first year of our con) turned out more than 300 furries, which was considerably more than we had expected.  Based on pre-reg numbers, we’re looking at even more this year, though we’re trying to be conservatively-hopeful.  We’re a bit better prepared this year than last on the technical end, though we were lauded on our preparedness last year; as far as we’re concerned, you can never be too prepared when it comes to furry conventions.  While I doubt I’ll be DJing this year, there’s no shortage of things that need to be attended to at the convention by staff.  We’ve got quite a few more volunteers this year, so hopefully the staff will have a chance to actually sleep between those three crazy days.

So that’s about where I’m at.  If you have any questions or suggestions to any of the above, don’t hesitate to contact me here, on FA or through e-mail.  Thanks for reading!