TorenCastle is saying goodbye to the past and focusing solely on the future and Digital Media Exploration and Production. While all we have learned from the past may still play an important part in the future, I don't believe it is necessary to keep the archive of old photography and art as the future will be entirely different.
My new focus is on creating animation. I've always dreamed of animation as a way to tell my stories, but never reached the potential to realistically achieve this until now with the advances that Unreal Engine has made. Unreal Engine offers the reality of DIY real-time animation.
My tool of choice was always DAZ3D, and while it will still be in use, animation within Daz was always limited due to the rendering time needed. Precious moments per a single frame add up to an enormous amount of time that was not realistic to spend. The newer engine for DAZ, called Filament, does offer some advances, but at the cost of a decent visual. I do plan to experiment with Filament and see what I can achieve by combining tools to reach a final visual look.
The new TorenCastle will be about DIY production and experimenting with various methods to tell our version of unique stories. I truly hope that if you stumble across our work that you will be entertained and find what we post has some value in your own life. I know I am grateful to all the artists who have posted tutorials and tools for folks like me who strive to learn and grow.
Our first steps are to learn Unreal Engine and strive to improve upon what we learn. We have to put in the time to hit that 10,000 hours to feel like we are truly grasping the technology. Unreal is very complex, but I am confident that with continual exploration, it will become easier to use with each production we create.
There are several other tools that I will be exploring such as After Effects & other Adobe Products, Blender, and a variety of plug-ins and tools. I've learned that the tools are ever-evolving and changing - new tools come in and old ones go out. The media exploration will never end.
My goal and hope is that we deliver good stories. That is the top priority for going through these experiments and exercises. Whether it be a single piece of art or a full-blown production, telling good stories is the dream. It is that simple.