It's been a while since I've done a BTS post with any kind of substance behind it. I'm not one for huge picspam posts, mostly because my computer can't handle me making LJ entries with more than about 40 pictures in it without moving reeeeeeally slowly and occasionally locking up. I have yet to figure out why this is so.
First of all, I should probably briefly mention my method of making this chapter. The bulk of it was shot in a dummy 'hood containing the laboratory, Theo's apartment building, the tiki bar and a few other buildings for scenery and other, unrelated, photoshoots. Only the very end scenes were shot in Veronaville proper. For the rest of the time, Rissa was played by two doubles - one in the lab/tiki bar, and one at the apartment.
This meant that keeping my stories straight was problematic. I'd already shot scenes with Rissa in red hair at the lab, and realised halfway through shooting her scene with Theo that oops, her hair was blue. I've lost count of how many scenes I've had to reshoot for this exact reason.
And then there were times when my fake Rissa was just plain uncooperative. I used a LOT of poseboxes, which naturally led to Sims snapping out of poses weirdly when I forgot to turn Free Will off.
When I was shooting that particular scene, I had to make my fake Rissa throw up without the risk of her giving me a baby bump if I mistimed things. So she genuinely did have food poisoning for that scene.
And of course, both doubles had to be geniuinely pregnant, too. InSim got fairly heavy use over in this 'hood.
But, y'know, it led to this adorableness. I don't care that this is a double, this is still squee-worthy.
I am ridiculously excited to be at this part of the story. I have been waiting for SO LONG to get to gen eight, oh my gosh, you have no idea how excited I am about Rissa spawn making their appearance.
Rhys was a lot of fun to work with. He gave me perfect facial expressions, and even this gem when I was shooting outside his door and otherwise mostly ignoring him. I wasn't expecting him to be so accomodating, really.
Barbara's protesting was totally a show. Behind the scenes, she was swooning and heartfarting him every five seconds.
And the two of them had this habit of sneaking off when I wasn't paying attention and being adorable. This particular animation seems to be very popular with the couples in my 'hoods - you'll see a bit more of this later.
I don't think I ever shared photos of the remodeled lab. The original plan got scrapped mostly because I hated it and wanted something better, hehe.
So up in the to left corner is Rissa and Theo's lab. The big bit in the middle is the break room/archive, which was mostly Barbara's territory. The equipment room is up on the top right, and there's a greenhouse out back that was never shown. Rhys' office is the tiny little box under the equipment room, and reception is in front. The change rooms and toilets were never shown, though I did entertain the notion of using it a couple times *evil grin*.
And up on the second floor was *supposed* to be Rhys' lab, but since it was never used, it got turned into The Floor On Which I Hide Everything. Poseboxes, letterboxes, tattoo boxes, you name it.
Another building that I don't think I've shown is the tiki bar.
The interior was pretty simple. Bar, neon flamingos, big room hiding everything behind the bar. For some reason the environment score of the main bar was hugely low, so everyone was freaking out every five minutes if they didn't have anything better to do.
I did have a second floor, because I was originally planning to use an exterior shot for the chapter, but that never happened. Again, it's fairly basic and very tacky. I had entirely too much fun with this building. :D
Interestingly, I also shot that picture of Rissa on the plane here. I added an extra floor, pulled the extras who'd been in the bar up as well, and changed Rissa's hair and outfit.
Here's the original shot. In Photoshop, I lowered the windows and cut in a real picture of a view from the window of a plane, as well as removing the green from the windows, for purely aesthetic reasons.
Also from the bar. Rhys is not shy about his feelings, not one little bit.
Neither is Rissa. Man, I love that girl.
Random shot of Fake!Rissa and Fake!Theo being adorable. I really wanted to use this shot, but couldn't fit it in.
So what was the real Rissa doing all this time? She graduated, of course.
I cheated Rissa through college using the College Adjustor. She transitioned into this outfit. Not awful, but totally not Rissa. The hair made me do a bit of a double-take - I'd almost forgotten that she's a natural blonde under all that. :-P
So she was sent home to do what I needed her to for the story - namely, get pregnant. :D
She was only too happy to oblige once Theo was invited around and given a bit of a spruce-up.
They were successful on their first try. This is the real Rissa's baby bump. *EXCITED*
Meanwhile, her parents seized their chance while unobserved and did a bit of stargazing on the porch. Never mind that there's a roof directly above them. o_O
During filming, Rissa got a visit from her great-great-great-something-grandmother Holly. Rissa was totally unfazed.
"Look, lady, I've got a kid on the way. That is way scarier than you can ever hope to be, kay?" *eyeroll*
Back at SSU, I needed an extra to be the fifth victim. I picked Opal Stevens, mostly because I liked her name and it wasn't something really Maxis-ish like Goopy or Sandy.
Fun fact: Four of the five victims also had cameos in
rosefyre 's part of the Boolpropian Round Robin. William Williamson had a bit part as one of the dormies; Matthew Hart was briefly shown in a party scene as one of the frat boys; Opal here was the head of the Secret Society, and Lora... well. Lora was Rose's main villainess Rosalie. All totally unintentional uses.
Besides, Lora is nothing like her RR counterpart, heh. She and Matt were nauseatingly adorable the whole time I was shooting in the lot.
Did someone mention shooting? That gun was a total pain to use. I needed a gun with a silencer, otherwise our gormless security guard would be alerted to the fact that there would be gunfire in the building. (Yes, it's a nitpick. Yes, I am insanely attentive to minor details.) The only one I could find was a functional gun that was only good for one shot. Instead of trying to work around that, I just got creative with OMSPs. It wasn't a perfect solution, but it meant I could be a bit more flexible with Fury's posing.
The security guard was played by Julien Cooke, who I pulled in randomly with the summoner and fixed up with a uniform and such for the task. He did pretty well as a gormless idiot, IMO.
And just to round things up, this is the alternate cover I designed for the chapter. I was having a bit of fun with CC and things kind of went from there. It's not really meant to mean anything, it's just a contrast between the main players in this chapter. Because it could be perceived as having a meaning (and because Rissa would never whiten her hair like that deliberately), I scrapped it, but not without running it by an objective audience (thanks,
regacylady !)
That's pretty much all there was for 7.8. I'll probably have lots from 7.9 (read: OBLIGATORY CUTE BABY PICTURES.)