As per usual, this is a crosspost from my website, Hydromecha.website.

I finished a good number of things this past October and made some decent progress on some other things. Outside of the projects I'll be talking about below, I also finished The Day of the Triffids (the book), Black Mesa (I played HL1/2 a few years ago), and also did all of the Scream Fortress contracts with some friends.

Anyways, let's get into things:

The Phage Walker

The giant scratchbuild I posted last month is done! I ended up using this as a submission to the 2023 Newgrounds Halloween Spooktacular.

Website Monitor

I recently did a pretty large overhaul to my website using this new monitor model. I definitely like how this looks over the older 3DCG model. See a before/after comparison below:

Before:

After:

Magma Wyrm WIP

This is the next scratchbuild I'm working on. It's a monster heavily inspired by bobbit worms. I've been recording my progress for making this model, and plan to turn that into a video at some point. Stay tuned for more news on that.

Comic Reader Template

If you've ever wanted to use the comic reader I have on my website on your own page, you now can! I've uploaded a template of how I have things set up to Archive.org in a neat little .zip file. All the files in there are Public Domain so you can do whatever you want with them. Check it out by clicking here or by clicking on Comics (on Hydromecha.website) and scrolling down to Comic Resources.

ANTARCTICA MUST FALL

That's the name of the Doom mod I made those monster models for (I still need to make at least one more). It's still very much early in development, but I figure I might as well explain what it is. It'll be a GZDoom mod that takes place largely in Antarctica. This'll be an interesting learning experience as I've only really messed around with limit-removing mapping for the DBP and DBKs I've contributed to. A friend helped me get started, but from here on out it's a solo project. I'll post more news on this as I make significant progress.

Hazardous Materials - Comic Script Progress

I made some decent progress on the chapter 2 script this past month. I've got a good chunk of the story beats plotted out, but I still need to finish that and then go through and actually write all the dialog and whatnot.

Closing Thoughts

I definitely want to focus more on getting the Hazmat script this month. Outside of the Magma Wyrm I probably won't be making more scratchbuilds for a bit. I still need to design/print those new parts for my Toxitron custom. I've got a pretty large backlog of Transformers customs I wanna make so I need to start knocking those out. I'd also like to try getting the Snowdemon and Surprise Elemental fully functional for Antarctica.

As per usual, this is a crosspost from my website, Hydromecha.website. Check it out to see the website changes I'm talking about with your own eyes.

WIP Stuff, TTRPG Stuff, & Minor Website Updates

September was a pretty busy month for me so I didn't get a chance to work on a lot of stuff. I did get to see Dethklok in concert which was really fun. Anyways, let's get down to business:

Phage Walker WIP

This is another scratchbuild I've been working on. Some kind of bacteriophage biotech walker/tank piloted by a little robot dude. I actually started building this guy before Kaiser Hedd Kannon (check last month's post). Right now the model's just been primed and given a zenithal highlight. I need to cover up a few stray bits of exposed aluminum foil with mod podge or something so paint'll actually stick to it.

Toxitron WIP

I actually started working on this guy before Hasbro revealed their new Toxitron figure. I'm not too big a fan of the Legacy Laser Prime mold so I don't really mind. The painjob on Toxitron here is kinda fucky so far. I need to fix up some spots I messed up on and I definitely put the lime paint on too thick. I also tried brushing on some gloss mod podge as a sealant to see how that would look and it turned out kinda eh. Speaking of messing up, when I tried test fitting some 3d printed weapons into this figure's hands, they got fused together. The mod podge hadn't cured fully at this point so that definitely had something to do with it. So now I need to make some hand replacements. I want to make some nozzles that I can plug blast effects (and those weapons I was trying to use earlier) into. I also wanna try making some toxic sludge claws/blast effects for those nozzles.

Table Knight One-Shot Module

I recently ran a one-shot in the TTRPG system I've been working on (more info on Goblin Base) which was a ton of fun. This was the first time I've played this system in-person and it's also the first time I've done in-person TTRPG stuff since a certain virus sent everyone remote while I was in college. I want to turn this one-shot into a module that you (GM + 3 - 4 players) can play. It'll be posted on the Goblin Base website when it's done.

Table Knight uses a lite version of the full Tablespess system where every player is some kind of knight. It takes a lot of inspiration from Shovel Knight, as well as Doraelous & Associates and Tigtone. I made four knights for players to pick from: Box Knight, Brick Knight, Cannon Knight, and Fixit Knight. If you wanna hear more about this before the module releases, do let me know.

Hazardous Materials Comic Script

I got started on chapter 2's script this past month. Hoping to get that finished up by the end of this month. For more context check out the previous posts talking about the comic.

Website Updates

Only got the chance to make some small changes to the site this time around. I've been looking into some of the cool stuff you can do with CSS, which is why the home page has a typewriter effect on the welcome text. I might implement more stuff like this across the site later.

I moved the backdrop back to starting at the top of the screen since it was getting kinda weird when I had it start from the bottom of the screen previously. I also gave the website a custom cursor and a new favicon. This also includes some new left/right cursors for the comic reader.

Closing Thoughts

That's all for now. I definitely wanna try doing some more touch ups to the site for next month's update. I also need to optimize the comic reader on the site. I've talked about wanting to make a fancy schmancy reader in Godot at some point for HazMat, but I'd like the JS one here to be better in the meanwhile. One of the main culprits behind its suckyness right now is that I'm using way too high resolution images, which take way too long to load even with the preloading methods I've implemented. I may also be hosting or linking to some comics my friends have made in the future.

3D Prints, Painted Models, and New Doom Monster

Here's the stuff I've been working on over the past month or so. As always, this is a crosspost from my personal website, https://hydromecha.website/

Transformers Legacy G2 Jazz Shoulder Adapter

This is a simple adapter I made to mount Jazz's cannons on his shoulders I modeled in Blender and 3D printed. You can get the .stl file on Cults3D.

Dragon Turtle

I printed this model over a year ago and finally got around to painting it recently. Pretty happy with how it turned out. Download link to the model is listed on the art post.

Kaiser Hedd Kannon Scratchbuild

I made this guy for Robot Day! This was my second piece to get frontpaged, and also got an honorable mention. It was pretty fun putting it all together, definitely gonna be doing more scratchbuilds in the future. I need to record my process for one of these to make it into a video or something later.

Surprise Elemental

This funny fella is another monster for the same Mod the Snowdemon (posted with last month's update) is part of. Still gotta render out the sprites for it.

Other Projects

I got caught up with some other stuff so I wasn't able to mess with the website much. I do want to get it working on more displays, but it isn't too big a priority for me. I've made a few small edits for the Hazardous Materials script (see previous updates for more info on that comic) but I need to get cracking on the chapter 2 script this month. I was busy painting those other models so I didn't get a chance to work on my ever-growing backlog of Transformers customs. Hoping to get at least one done this month, but we'll see.

Crossposting from my personal website. Check it out at hydromecha.website.

Website Updates

Made some changes to the website to hopefully optimize loading times a bit. The "monitor" border image has beens shrunk down slightly and split into four different pieces, the static textures I added with the previous update have been cropped/reduced in resolution significantly, and the sidebar buttons now have their highlight variants preloaded (this is done by having 0px x 0px images on the page).

The backdrop image has been made slightly brighter so you can see a bit more of the seafloor environment.

I still need to go through everything and make sure it plays nice with other window/monitor sizes. Right now everything is set up with absolute pixel dimensions so it looks good on my computer, but as you may have noticed already, it doesn't really look good if you aren't using a 1080p screen with windows at full size.

I also moved the copyright message to the bottom of every iframe page, which is why I had go through and update pretty much every single page on the site.

Doom Monster Model

This is the Snowdemon, a monster for a Doom wad I'm making with some friends. The Snowdemon has a pretty nasty blade for a hand and spits out fireballs in volleys of two, angling its second shot upwards. We're mostly making/gathering resources currently, no word on a release window yet. We've all got other things going on on top of this, so it'll take a while. The next monster I'm gonna be working on is called the Surprise Elemental.

Hazardous Materials Comic Update

Hazardous Materials is a comic I've been slowly chipping away at. There's some more info in previous posts on my website. I recently finished the chapter 1 script and have also been working on various character designs/sketches, pictured below. Expect things to look different in the actual comic. I definitely want to change some things with the designs or generally refine them more. To avoid spoilers I'm only gonna show the major characters that appear in the prologue. Check my website for the full res sketches.

Background

Every character in Hazardous Materials is named after, resembles, and retains the properties of something inanimate. The protagonists are Asbestos and Coal Dust, hence the name of the comic. Asbestos and Coal Dust work for Platinum, gathering important pieces of literature for the Rockopolis Archive. Asbestos hates her job. Coal Dust seems alright with it.

Asbestos

I want to have every character have a unique eye and pupil shape. Asbestos's pupils are made of vertical lines since Asbestos is a fibrous material. I've also been messing with different hairstyles for the character. Asbestos used to have lines running along her body to make her look like she's made of fibrous stuff, but I didn't like the way it looked. Maybe if I have an extreme closeup somewhere it'll be visible then.

Coal Dust

Coal Dust's pupils are based off of hexagonal Carbon rings found in Coal and a bunch of other compounds that have Carbon in them. Coal Dust is made of particulates suspended in the air so she has to wear an exosuit if she doesn't want to be dissipated by the wind. Other characters made of similar fluid stuff like liquids will also be in funny suits.

Gold

Gold is Platinum's assistant. Gold's mouth was sealed shut in a recent welding accident. You'll find out why that happened in the prologue. The characters in this comic don't actually need to eat or breathe. They can see, feel, and hear, but can't taste or smell. They get energy from Money, which nobody actually knows the origin of.

Platinum

Platinum's pupils are designed to resemble the crystal structure of Platinum and her hair tube things are supposed to look like ingots. Platinum and Gold were initially designed by a friend. There'll be other characters also designed by friends that you'll see later.

Other Projects

Last time I said I was working on some more Transformers customs. I did get some progress done on them this past month, but I still need to finish them.

I also got some good progress on painting a 3D printed Dragon Turtle model I've been putting off for nearly a year. Expect that and maybe one of the Transformers done by the end of August.

Just updated my personal website with a total overhaul to its design. See the screenshots below for a before & after or see the website firsthand by clicking here. All the new assets were made using Blender. The website is designed for desktop displays, so it probably won't look the best on mobile. I'll need to go through and try to optimize things better later. Right now the site uses a few 1920x1080 renders for things that I could probably shrink down or crop better so they'd load faster.

Before

After

Crossposting stuff from my personal website, not including some more website-specific things. You can see the full contents here: https://hydromecha.website/#6/4/2023

Cursed Watch Story

I recently finished a short story for a writing contest I'm holding with some friends. Each story in the contest has to include a cursed watch that can grant you something instantly, costing you your time somehow. You can check out what I wrote on my website here.

Generic Alphabet Minis

I needed some generic miniatures for a tabletop game I'm gonna be GMing, so I made these alphabet minis using the Tye Spices font from Font Monkey and Blender. You can find the files on Printables, Cults3D, and Thingiverse.

Future Projects & Other News

I've got some more custom Transformers parts and paintjobs in the works. I've done a custom part for Beast Wars Wolfang as well as a Marvel paintjob for Siege Megatron. One thing I'm planning on doing is turning Earthrise Airwave into Cybertron Metroplex (with some artistic liberties, of course).

I want to get back to painting things this month, whether that's Transformers customs or some other models/scratchbuilds I've been meaning to finish. I've also been putting off actually rigging/posing that Hydromecha model I posted to my website a couple months ago. I'll try to get that done for the next month's update to my website so I can finally replace that old model/render on the About page.

Updated my personal website with some projects I've been working on. Major ones are the Tankman action figure I did (which you can just go see on Newgrounds anyways) and the Doom mod I contributed to that recently released. Check it out here: https://hydromecha.website/#5/7/2023

Updated my website to show off some stuff I worked on last month. Check it out here: https://hydromecha.website/#4/2/2023

Here's a couple pics from the post:

Got some news on Hazardous Materials (comic I'm working on) plus some other stuff I've been doing on my website here: https://hydromecha.website/#3/5/2023

If the 3D printed action figure stuff I'm doing goes well I might try making a Tankman fig for Pico Day.

Last time I made a news post I teased a comic called Hazardous Materials. It's still happening, but it'll be a while before I release the first chapter. I've got some more info on my website here: https://hydromecha.website/#2/3/2023