Tomato's skinwork: Atomik (01/09/21)

[Tomato]

I'm not familiar with all of the crew. But i'm interested to see who they are and what they look like.

I am too, actually! I know who the final two members are, obviously (Michael Jones and Jack Patillo) but who their characters in the show will be and what form they'll take in the show is still up in the air. They've had a pretty clear Lads vs Gents thing going on so far, so I THINK Jack will be another villain, and Michael will show up as an ally... but I honestly have no idea. 

[Outcast]

Well, that is something to look forward to ain't it? I'll be eagerly anticipating what they'll come up with then and seeing them in the cartoons as well. 

[Podmark]

First: I don't know who these are.

Second: The face work is amazing! And the kilt. Really these are just excellent skins.

Third: did you mesh an eyepatch?! If so I guess I have to add Fury to my list. No other choice.

[Tomato]

Responding to these in reverse order, since the first one requires a bit more explanation. Regarding the eyepatch, I made a request thread for one first, as I had with the kilt (which was from Gren's Malekith mesh) and it turned out SlickAlice had made one for a N52 Deathstroke skin/skope. I manipulated it a bit to suit the skope (and export/reimport it since I work in FF1), but the piece was pretty much exactly what I needed and was a huuuuge help. But yes, had it come to it, I would have probably meshed an eyepatch. The skope is up here.

As for who these are... hooo boy, that's a whole thing. The short answer is that these are the villains for the online animated series "X-Ray and Vav" which just released its third episode. Whole series is up on Rooster Teeth and it's been a fun watch so far. The long answer is that all these characters are based on long running gags from within Achievement Hunter, which I will go into with loving detail in spoilers because I am a nerd like that shut up.

Spoiler

X-Ray and Vav- The X-Ray and Vav thing is probably one of the longest running, and dumbest, in-jokes of Achievement Hunter. In one of their Achievement Guides, Gavin (who is kind of an idiot) called Ray "X-ray" in the middle of the video. They soon started calling each other "X-Ray and Vav" whenever they would do videos together, and eventually decided those were their superhero codenames. Rooster Teeth finally designed costumes for them, which they wore in person during their 2013 convention, RTX, which was where the show was initially announced.

Mad King Ryan- I honestly don't know where to begin with this one. Ryan was originally Achievement Hunter's PC guy, but he started doing Lets Plays with the crew, specifically the popular Minecraft LPs starting with one of my favorites, Capture the Tower. He was kind of bland at first, but he slowly started doing... worrying things. Most notably, he took a cow that for whatever reason just would NOT leave his Minecraft house, built a hole in the ground, and put glass over it. Things got worse with the birth of his second (?) child, as a sleepless Ryan started getting more and more aggressive during lets plays. This culminated in the "Mad King Ryan" two parter. His appearance in X-Ray and Vav is based heavily on his now-standard Minecraft skin, with the addition of a broken crown.

The Corpirate- There really isn't much to say on this one. The Corpirate is a creation of Geoff Ramsey, the founder of Achievement Hunter, a co-founder of Rooster Teeth, voice of long-running Red vs Blue character Grif, and Ray and Gavin's boss. The character was created for the WWE 2013 let's play, and Geoff had enough affection for his creation that the Corpirate returned for WWE 2014 as "Yarrgarita"

[Podmark]

I did see your request after making my post (not keeping up with FR the way I want lately). So thanks to Sick Alice, that is a great eyepatch.

[ghazkul]

Love the series ^^ doing the prof and ORRB?

[Tomato]

I've been holding off on whether to do Hilda and ORF (I'm assuming that's who you were referring to) only because I haven't really been wowed by the two characters yet. Don't get me wrong, I love Barbara's ORF, but Hilda really hasn't wowed me as a character... I love Lindsay (who voices the character) but Hilda just feels more like a plot device than a person so far.

That said, even thinking about it just now has given me a few nifty ideas, so I wouldn't rule them out either. I think part of me has been waiting to see if we get a Mogar to pair with her.

[Tomato]

Sooo... bit of an anti-update for you guys... if any of you have been following my recent exploits on tumblr/facebook, I started having issues with my computer's ability to access wifi. I eventually resorted to rebooting windows (I've done it before) and just reinstalling all my programs. Unfortunately, I tried something a bit new (refreshing, as windows calls it) and it did some things I'm not thrilled about... like wiping my entire program files folder and all my Freedom Force stuff with it.

Granted, it doesn't hurt me as much as it might have (pretty much everything I have is online anyway, including my bases) but it does hurt a LOT, and it probably means I won't be getting back into skinning anytime in the near future. Heck, I don't even know if I have access to my virtual pc+max5 anymore.

[Podmark]

Ouch! That is brutal Tom, I live in fear of things like that.
Any hope of recovering the files? Maybe one of our tech savvy members can help.

[Tomato]

Honestly, the loss of the files isn't that big of a deal... I lost the high resolution source files for a few skins, and a couple of minor projects I doubt I'd have ever finished anyway. Everything else is available on heroforce where I can redownload it.

The bigger loss, honestly, is the game itself. The copy I had came from steam, which means I can just redownload it, but because its the steam version I have to go through a bunch of extra effort getting the registry settings set up for ffedit, getting all the add-ons reinstalled, etc. That's a ton of effort for a game I'm not making content for anyway, making it harder for me to just jump in when I do get an itch.

Never say never though. Xray and vav season 2 is in the works, and that'll probably get me going again.

[SickAlice]

That bites, sorry about your luck. I'm on purchased disk copy four and I treat that sucker like it's literal Heart Of Existence. It remains in a lock box in my families main house with the rest of the hoard only to ever breathed upon should I need it. Best of luck and godspeed getting everything in order again Tomato.

[UnkoMan]

Tomato, noooo!!
Your skins are so great. So good to see. Yes, I still occasionally lurk.
I hope you get back in. You are a pillar.

[BentonGrey]

Ohh no, man!  That's terrible!  I'm glad that it wasn't too huge a loss.  These were some really nice skins you've been working on lately.

[Tomato]

Never say never though. Xray and vav season 2 is in the works, and that'll probably get me going again.

So Episode one of X-ray and Vav just came out for sponsors, and I'm super happy. I've been slowly working on this since earlier in the week, but I'm finally ready to unveil the first WIP of Hilda (I've started on Mogar as well, but I had to wait until I had a good shot of him to finish it, and I wanted to get Hilda/Orf done first)

[Tomato]

Long story short, with TUE posting a whole bunch of new skins (including what miiiight be an updated Tomato? It looks to me like it is, but I haven't got a copy of his original to check against it), which caused me to go back and look at my old Tomato variants. I saw this one and I realized some of my friends hadn't seen it or the oath before, but OCD fool that I am, I decided to tweak the skin a bit instead of just taking the easy route and just taking a quick screencap.

I'll be honest, I will likely never release this update (it's not even worth reuploading) but I thought ya'll might get a laugh out of it too.

[Podmark]

That's a fun little motto. Great skin too, love the custom logo.

[Tomato]

That's a fun little motto. Great skin too, love the custom logo.

To be fair, the oath is from when I initially posted this skin waaaaaaaay back in 2009. The logo is new, a result of me not really caring for the original logo... it was a bit small and thin and the ring around it really lets it pop out more now. I also tacked on the ring glow and added a mild glow to the green segments to give it a bit of extra pop.

[WyldFyre]

Now you have to skin his archenemy.... That most evil Chocolate Easter Bunny......

Love the preview, and that's a mighty sweet <pun intended> oath.

[deano_ue]

ok first nice seems you haven't missed a beat with your mental humor and skill, and second yes everyone of the stuff i posted is brand new from scratch

[Tomato]

To be fair, the reason I wasnt sure was because he doesn't have a separate image on the thread, and I realized I didn't have the original anymore to check it against (hell, I had to dl my skins from heroforce. Stupid computer reset)

As for skill... Ehhhh. Really, 90% of the skin hasn't changed, I just added an updated symbol and added a few new extras.

[deano_ue]

yes he does

[Tomato]

*beats the thick layer of dust off with a giant broom*



Only got the skope so far and I'm still working out some design details BTS, but the ole' Emerald Archer is coming along decently well. I've been nervous to come back after so long (I even considered asking for someone to help skope just so I could focus on relearning skinning, but I was actually surprised how naturally I fell back into this.

As for why I'm back... as I'm sure DJ can attest, it's all Benton's fault.

[BentonGrey]

Muhahahaha!  Soon, all of FR shall bow down to me and do my DC will!  Muhahaha....err....I mean, what a wonderful surprise! 

Seriously, this is exciting, 'Mato!  I can't wait to see how he comes together!

And DJ, don't lie.  You know working on all this wonderful DC minutia warms the cockles of your cold, dead heart! 

And I will definitely keep bothering all of you awesome, talented retirees!  I can't let y'all rest on your laurels!  There's too much awesome stuff y'all could create! 

[Tomato]

Still very much a WIP. Main body is MOSTLY done, gotta get to work on all the extras (the more brilliant shiny green bits are the C6 ones)

[BentonGrey]

He's coming together great, 'Mato.  Like I said on Discord, I like the choice to give him a darker, grimmer green.

[detourne_me]

That's a sinister grin if I've ever seen one....  I wonder what DG has planned for the Emerald Archer

[daglob]

Nope, sorry, that ain't me. Darn it.

[detourne_me]

oops! BG!

[BentonGrey]

 

[MikeB7]

I dig the hues and expression as well.