Gauntlet Musings

Just a bit more on this project get it off my chest. There’s something about it that felt significant to me, and I think I just need to start writing to see what comes up. This is one of those projects that, “either you get it, or you don’t,” due in no small part to it’s somewhat obscure source material that only real video game geeks would know (this game is 40 years old!), coupled with the deep amount of personalization and reimagining I injected into it.

Motivations & Inspirations

The creative process is really something. The journey of manifesting something–even if only on a screen, using your computer–is a real voyage deep into your psyche, where you’re meeting and greeting parts of yourself you’d long forgotten about. Incantation, really. And those spirits, they need a home, a place to stay. Somewhere they can do their thing, offer you their gifts, help animate the body. You’ll hear things in your life, words of both encouragement and criticism, both challenges in their own right, either of which can spark movement. Not everything you make will resonate with everyone, that’s just a given, but I did hear the critique that my stuff was a bit “too simple” for some, and I wanted to take up that challenge to add more fidelity and see how it goes.

I’d also noticed these past few years that I was never satisfied with 3D unless I was constantly learning something new. With this project I wanted to explore a few things I’d been wary of in the past:

1. Lighting
2. Sculpting
3. Environments
4. Women
5. Greater detail
6. More use of texture
7. Something other than just cutesy/gross/funny stuff

So I got to work on sketching out some ideas I had floating in my head, and not worrying too much about making plump & juicy lips and big chiclet teeth, or a simple “Super Mario, But Kinda Gross” style. I figured I’d just relax and see what comes out.

“Michael Needs Healing, Badly”

Getting into the right headspace to create this was a real journey in and of itself. I’d mentioned in a previous post, this whole process of healing I had to go through over the summer of 2024. I hadn’t realized how much of a mess I was inside (do we ever, really?), and how many crappy habits I’d adopted were really wearing out their welcome and crumbling apart. Ever since I arrived in Chiang Mai, I’ve made it a point to do some of that deep inner work, particularly after losing both my closest friend and my own father. These aren’t things I often discuss, as, quite honestly, nobody really wants to hear about it, it’s just too much, but I got the opportunity to open up a bit and really let all that pent-up stuff out. Around February 2024, away from everyone and everything I knew, I was off on an island, sketching to my heart’s content (see above).

With all the sketching/concepting done by end of March (earlier than that, really. I had moved onto another project), I visited home in April, and came back to CM ready to blast off on this project. Only thing was, CM had different plans for me. It was healing time! Major, major healing time. And no more faking it anymore, it was time to get deep. A few months of rain and pain, bouts of loneliness, insomnia, you name it, and I came out the end of summer with an intensive Qigong/Hermetics course under my belt, feeling a bit like a new person. Next up, a work trip that reinvigorated me and I hit the ground running in October, making big strides in the 3D space with newfound passion.

“The Zone”

Once I got all the bad stuff out of me (not all of it, mind you, but enough to get the pent-up energy firing), I was blasting away on this project while juggling my actual jobs at the same time. Boundless energy and focus, that place we all want to be. Super grateful I was prepared for it, with all that pre-pro work I’d done earlier in the year.

There were moments where my focus even shocked me. Nothing else in the world really mattered to me, other than getting this vision manifested. I still saw friends, went out, did my job, fulfilled my responsibilities, the whole nine, but with such laser-sharp focus and calm, like something I really have never experienced before. With a bit of pressure and up against a challenge, I was able to really lock in and start getting the results I wanted. Oh, I also made it a goal of mine to make something that could sell, like an image that could be printed out and hung on a wall, if someone wanted that. That really helped inform a lot of the design decisions I hade, as I started to treat everything like a promotional poster, something you’d see for a movie.

Honestly, there were a few times where I was dipping into some seriously surreal/mystical headspaces while I was hyper-focused. I can’t get into details right now, but I did come to conclusion that we get by with a little help from our friends, and our friends are right there, just out of sight, but never out of reach.

Where To Now?

I had wanted to share the project much earlier than April, as it was technically finished in early March. What I really planned on doing was getting these ready to be printed on demand, but the samples kept coming back bad, and I had to send them back and try again. The costs really add up, and because I’m in Thailand, you have to pay customs fees with every delivery. The last batch from the print on demand service was so disappointing, not at all what I’d sent them, that I honestly felt a little defeated. I’m still on the fence with whether or not I want to do another round of testing, as it’s just getting annoying at this point. (I’ll probably end up doing it)

So, for now, this project will live on my website, and somewhere on social media (it’s currently up on my Instagram, while all the behind-the-scenes stuff lives here). I was very excited to share it, and I think it resonated with those who saw it, but to be frank, it landed like a bit of a wet fart. Is it the style? The unrelatable subject matter? Or was it just another case of me vs. The Algorithm? Maybe all of the above. Either way, no regrets on my end, as I learned a LOT about…everything, with this one. I’ve already begun pre-production on the next, and while it’s definitely a more familiar piece of fan art…let’s just say, I really can’t help myself. I just have to make it mine. Hint below.

Thanks for reading all of this, if you made it this far.