SweetCanvas Update (August 2023) (Patreon)

Will be approaching this update specifically from the perspective of the demo release, since that's what I'm currently working towards, so keep that in mind! There's more that I could share, but it's all stuff that goes further than the demo will be.

There will be SPOILERS, pretty much by necessity since I want this to be the most comprehensive update so far.

Anyway, let's get straight into it, starting off with what's actually been completed since the last update and then moving into what my current plans are and what I still need in order to accomplish them:

Character Sprites

Note that on top of keeping things focused on what will be in the demo, I also won't be including any sprites that aren't "presentable," meaning that there are more sprites and variants that may exist (mostly with regards to Kana and Io). They're just further away from being complete than the Kana sprites on the left seen below, and so they've been left out.

Kana

Starting off with Kana, going from right to left (in sets) since they're ordered from least complete to most complete and I want to highlight the finished things first:

• All uniform sprites are fully rendered.
• All sprites that require the mall outfit are fully rendered.
• Three out of four sprites for the karaoke outfit are ready to be painted.
• Museum outfit is ready to be painted for the default sprite.
• Arcade outfit is ready to be painted for the default sprite.

Peal

• All of peal's sprites are fully rendered.

Alys

Again, going from right to left in sets:

• All uniform sprites are fully rendered.
• All mall outfit sprites are fully rendered.
• One of the three sprites for the karaoke outfit is fully rendered and the second is ready to be painted.
• Planting outfit is fully rendered for the default sprite.
• Movie outfit is nearly fully rendered for the default sprite.

Io

Once again, from right to left in sets:

• All sprites that require the day 2 outfit are fully rendered.
• Two out of four of the day 1 sprites are fully rendered, with another one being nearly complete, and the last being mostly painted and in need of final render.
• Day 3 outfit is nearly fully rendered for the default sprite.
• Day 4 outfit is nearly fully rendered for the default sprite.
• Day 7 outfit is in the middle of being painted for the default sprite.
• Day 8 outfit is ready to be painted for the default sprite.
• Day 8 date outfit is ready to be painted for the default sprite.

Kaela

Last one going right to left:

• Kaela's uniform sprites are all fully rendered.
• Kaela's studying outfit is fully rendered for the default sprite.

Kyt

• Both of Kyt's sprites are fully rendered.

Ilse

• Both of Ilse's sprites are fully rendered.

Torin

• Torin's default sprite is fully rendered.
• Torin's second sprite is mostly painted and ready to be rendered.

BB

• Two of BB's sprites are fully rendered.
• The third is fully painted and ready to be rendered.

Hau

• Hau has a new alt sprite that is almost fully painted.

With everything that's been completed sprite wise out of the way, let's wrap up this section with what I still need for each character with regards to the demo:

Kana

• As mentioned, one of her sprites needs the Karaoke outfit. It's been drawn but needs flats, and then, it of course will be painted and rendered along with the rest of them.
• More expressions on each sprite (this will be something of a constant across most of the girls, so I'll only say it this once)

Alys

• One of her sprites needs the Karaoke outfit. Like Kana, it has been drawn but needs flats, and will then be painted and rendered along with her second sprite.
• Two of her sprites need the planting outfit
• Two of her sprites need the movie outfit

Io

• Two of her day 1 sprites need to be rendered
• Two of her sprites need her outfits for days 3, 4, 7 and 8. Days 3 and 4 have been drawn across both missing sprites, but need flats etc.
• Six more outfits are needed for the three days of Io's route left in the demo build. Two of them have been drawn for the base sprite, but require flats etc.

Io is and always has been the character that will be the biggest hurdle towards the completion of the VN as a whole, considering that every day that you see her she wears a different outfit, on top of changing outfits whenever that feels like it would be a natural thing for her to do; Such as when her and Isa go on dates, or when they're both staying in and she changes into her loungewear, etc.

This is balanced out by the fact that outside of her route, she just rarely shows up, but since you get to play a bit of her route on the demo, it's still necessary for me to get through a bunch of these outfits.

Some of you may have noticed that there are outfits that you've seen her in before that aren't a part of the image that I posted, and that's because I've also drawn, painted and rendered a bunch of outfits that only show up further into the VN. Unfortunately I can't just reuse those for the demo, since they take the weather into account and everything (she isn't going to wear long sleeves or a coat on a hot day, for example), so yeah.

Anyway, moving on:

Kaela

• One of her sprites needs the studying outfit

Kyt

• Her second sprite needs more tail variants

Torin

• His second sprite needs to be rendered

BB

• Her third sprite needs to be rendered

Hau

• Her second sprite needs to be rendered

You can think of that as a mostly complete to-do list of what needs to be done for every single character. So, from now on, whenever I post a sprite update for a specific character you'll know how much closer we're getting to the demo build compared to where we were!

As you can see, lots of things have been completed, but there's still a not insignificant amount of things that need to be done, even if we ignore the Io grind (although it is much less if you ignore the Io grind).

I'll be going over the exact timeline of when I want these things done by at the end.

Backgrounds

Note that these are not all of the backgrounds I have in total, I have way more as well as way way more variants, these are just the ones that will appear in the demo out of those.

Ignoring the time of day variants, there are thirty seven unique backgrounds pictured here, and they will all appear in the demo.

Of course, I was only able to buy them all with your help, since a majority of these existed since well before the Kickstarter was launched, as some of you might remember.

From top to bottom going left to right they are:

Train, Blossom (department store), Joebel (café), Downtown Shopping District, Daito Terminal (arcade), Fruit-full Parlor (parfait place), Kawakyo Plaza (mall), Mikoto Cinema (theater), VALUE (art supply store), Io's Apartment, Convenience Store, Edda Shopping Center (mall), Midtown City Center, Isa's Neighborhood, Midtown Park, Alys's Living Room, Kana's Bedroom, Kana's Living Room, Art Club, Cafeteria, Classroom, Front Entrance (Inside), Front Entrance (outside), Gymnasium, Hallway, Library, Side Passage, Principal's Office, Rooftop, Staircase, Alys's Neighborhood, Arcade, Lorelei Song House (karaoke place), Mina Ward Street (route to school).

That's a lot of places! But keep in mind, the demo itself will be pretty long; By visual novel demo standards anyway.

I've mentioned it before, but it'll cover a full month's worth of SweetCanvas. The entirety of the common route lasts three months before you inevitably have to be on someone's route, just to give you an idea of what that actually means.

Now for what's left. I will have every background that I need for the demo once I get, in order of appearance:

• Isa's Room

Shocking, I know. That might not make immediate sense, considering that it's the main character's room, and the first place you usually see in a visual novel (with SweetCanvas being no exception), but there's a reason that I've been saving it for "last."

Isa's room will consistently change throughout the course of the visual novel, and it will even be different depending on what choices you make, what route you end up on, what happens on that route, etc.

To give an example, he starts off with a pretty bare room filled with boxes, since he had only moved in the night before, with his belongings being delivered ahead of his arrival. As time goes on, he will clear out those boxes and the room will be filled out with his belongings.

That all probably sounds like pretty much what you would expect given that scenario, but it gets more complicated when you realize that I have to buy what are essentially multiple different rooms (since the room with boxes, the room with less boxes and more personal touches, the room with only his personal touches and so on will have to be commissioned as their thing each time), all with their own morning, afternoon, night (lights on and off) variants as well.

So Isa's room ends up being probably the most complicated area, which is why I haven't asked for it yet.

Having explained that now, let's continue on:

• Seiki Academy Staff Room
• Restaurant
• Fitting Room
• Fitting Area (both for the Blossom Department Store)
• Veil Prior (intimates specialty retailer)
• Kana's Neighborhood
• Bookstore
• Sei-fū Museum Exterior
• Museum Interior
• Museum Café
• Museum Bathroom
• Museum Gift Shop
• Alys's Room
• Alys's Trophy Room

And that's all of them for the demo, without mentioning any of the variants that I'll need for these, since I basically always get the background as well as its variants within the same month.

Of these, the restaurant and the bookstore are currently in the works as of this month, leaving only twelve backgrounds + Isa's room left unpurchased.

I will likely get all of the Museum areas in the same month (or however long it takes for Omorphia to finish them, I don't rush him. He's usually done within the month though, regardless), but outside of that, I tend to only get two or at maximum, three backgrounds per month, so as to not overload the artist, meaning that it will take probably four to six more months to get all of these.

So, I'll have all of the backgrounds for the demo either by the end of this year or at the beginning of next year, which falls pretty nicely in line with the rest of my timeline for it, that I'll be going over later.

CGs

Now, fair warning, this is where the real spoilers will start, since I have to go over what I do and don't have on a day by day basis, so if you really really don't want to see, read or just generally, know anything before actually playing the VN yourself, I'd suggest you either call it here, or scroll really really fast down to the next section.

With that being said, like the sprites, I won't be including any "unpresentable" CGs here. Unpresentable meaning this time, any CGs or Panel CGs where the sketch itself is not finished.

Common Route - Week 1

Day 1

Day 2

Day 3

Day 4

Day 5

Week 2

Day 10

Day 11

Day 13

Week 3

Day 15

Day 16

Week 4

Day 23

Day 26

Io Route - Week 2

Day 8

Not every single day of every single week will have a CG or Panel CG, since that would be a ridiculous goal as a one man team, but there are still a lot of CGs and panel CGs that I need (of varying levels of complexity) that I'll detail here, as I've done for every other section.

I won't be mentioning CGs that have sketches but aren't painted, because there's already going to be enough in this section and you already understand that any unpainted CGs need to be painted (although Panel CGs will be less detailed than the proper ones, and therefore faster/easier to do, which is worth noting).

Any full CG will just be a title, while Panel CGs will have that appended to their titles:

Common Route

Week 1

Day 1

• Waking
• Mirror - Panel CG
• Meet Peal (WIP)
• Meet Alys (WIP)
• Alys's Incomplete Drawing - Panel CG
• Book on the Floor - Panel CG
• Art Club Fliers - Panel CG

Day 2

• Meet Kyt
• Contents of Peal's Bento Box - Panel CG
• Karaoke Food - Panel CG (WIP)

Day 4

• Ilse's Plex Search Results Panel CG

Day 6

• Nightmare

Week 2

Day 7

• Lore
• Lore 2
• Lore 3
• Lore 4

The lore CGs are optional. You have a choice of whether or not you want to be exposited to during class. I won't be mentioning every single time a choice determines whether or not you get a certain CG, but I felt like it was warranted here.

Day 8

• Lore
• Lore 2
• Lore 3
• Lore 4

Day 11

• Torin Photo - Panel CG (WIP)
• Kana Burger - Panel CG
• Feeding Kana - Panel CG

Day 12

• Planting

Day 13

• Claw Machine
• Fighting Game

Week 3

Day 17

• Group Studying

Day 18

• Kana's Drawing - Panel CG

Day 19

• MMO - Panel CG

Day 20

• Bathroom Window - Panel CG
• Gift Shop Gift - Panel CG

Week 4

Day 24

• Alys Races Torin - Panel CG

Day 26

• Dream

As you might have noticed, the VN is very front heavy as far as CGs go.

The thought process behind that is pretty simple, to the point where you probably don't need me to tell you, but as you get further and further into a VN, you become more and more invested until eventually you don't need constant visual stimulation to be engaged in the story anymore.

So, in SweetCanvas, the CGs start to taper off a bit as each successive week goes by, with the idea being that the player will instinctively know that they will pick back up again as you near the climaxes of each specific route (since people tend to pick up on pace changes like that, and the normal response is to expect the pace to eventually return to what it had previously been as the story develops).

This response is a huge part of what keeps people reading an action series that might have recently slowed down, to give an example that a lot people would be able to relate to. You're waiting for the previously established pace to reemerge, because it feels like that's what should happen.

Regardless, that's not to say that the visuals will just completely go away (I don't think anyone would think that, but who knows), they'll just start revolving more and more around creative use of the sprites rather than original illustrations, up until original illustrations become strictly necessary for the storytelling again on any given character route.

You obviously won't see the end of a character route in the demo though, so that whole tangent I went on is more relevant to the full release.

To get back to what's relevant to the demo, as you can see, there are a lot of CGs and Panel CGs that I still need. It might even seem like an overwhelming number.

It's not though, trust me. Especially if we consider how much time I'm giving myself to complete all of these things, plus how quickly I tend to complete them when I'm allowed to focus solely on them.

Writing

On to one last short section before I finally go over this timeline that I've been talking about

I don't remember the exact number, but the SweetCanvas script (meaning actual finalized dialogue, monologue and prose) is currently sitting somewhere in the ballpark of 300,000 words right now, rounding up generously. Of those roughly 300k words written so far, 141,776 of them are available in the demo build (so far. Nothing is final until it's out).

Assuming that I'll need anywhere from 500k to 700k words to actually call the story fully complete across all routes (which is consistent with the 50+ hours I mentioned that the final VN would probably need to be originally, just as an aside), then the demo would be roughly 20-30% of the entire VN.

Timeline

That finally brings us to our actual last section, the project's timeline, consisting of my self imposed deadlines.

Sprites

Outside of possibly Io (being lenient with myself) I'm expecting to have all demo relevant sprites completed by the end of October. With Io's sprites tentatively due by the end of the year.

All this recent Patreon stuff might push those dates back a bit, but we'll just to wait and see. I do still need to live, so there's nothing that can be done that would let me solely focus on SweetCanvas, outside of a generous donation of a significant amount of money.

That's not me complaining or anything, I'm very grateful to be in a position where I can think about things like, how much I want to be able to work on my passion project, I'm just being realistic.

Panel CGs

I would also like to have all Panel CGs drawn (emphasis on drawn, not painted) by the end of the year. That might seem ambitious considering how many there are, but realistically it shouldn't (kind of jinxing myself here potentially) take that long to begin with, since there are fifteen left to draw and I have four months to draw them.

Meaning that I should be fine as long as I do at least four per month, and for reference, I started drawing panel CGs (again, I did some a while back that I then redid. I won't be redoing the new ones though, I only redid the old ones because they were from like 2020 and were terrible) in July.

Since July, I have drawn nearly twenty of them (including the ones that I didn't post), so if I can't do four per month, something has gone tragically wrong. Which it could, I guess.

As for coloring them, my deadline for that is the same as my deadline for completing all of the full CGs, which is-

CGs

-The end of next year. This might seem like too much time if you remember how quickly I completed the few CGs that I made for the Kickstarter campaign, and you'd be correct, if not for-

Animation

This is THE time sink.

There won't be very much animation present in the demo, and some of it, mostly the flavor stuff (things like character idles in menus), might just not see the light of day in favor of reaching my deadlines (keeping those things instead for the full release), but the demo will release alongside the animated opening at the very least.

As mentioned previously, I am collaborating with Weilin Zhang (One Piece, Naruto, Pokemon etc.) on the SweetCanvas opening. That being the case, I need to work around his extremely busy schedule.

As of right now, production on the opening is set for early/mid-early 2024, as that's when he'll become available to work on it, and realistically it'll take us until at least the end of the year to finish it.

That's the sole reason why the end of next year is the current release window for the demo. Because the opening might be finished by then.

I could honestly (and might have to, considering the recent Patreon stuff) give myself some more leeway. Assuming that I can only work on the animation for that whole year and nothing else, that might push the entire release of the demo to either early or mid 2025.

However, as of right now, I am going to optimistically say that I will be able to have it out by the end of 2024. Either way, I'll be keeping you all (patrons) consistently updated on the status of that, as well as everything else, so if anything changes, you'll know.

And that's that

That's pretty much everything that I wanted to share and go over today.

I missed out on saying certain things like, "You'll be able to see eleven days worth of Io's route in the demo, as well as the start of both Alys and Kana's routes, and some Peal shenanigans," but that's all stuff I've said in previous updates anyway I believe, so while this is something of a master update for SweetCanvas, there's no need for it to retread old ground that much I think.

My final thoughts on all of this right now after writing all this is that there's definitely a lot to do, as you can all clearly see.

Either way, it'll get done. There hasn't been a single moment so far where I thought to myself "this is not possible for me," and in fact, I would say that I'm even more motivated to work on SweetCanvas now than when I started, or even just a year ago when the Kickstarter was successful. I've been really enjoying putting in the gradual work to get things done and seeing them slowly come to fruition, and I can't see that changing.

But yeah, that's all I really had left to say. I've been writing this post on and off literally all afternoon, so I'm happy that I finished it before midnight I guess, and thank you to anyone who cared enough to read all of it, it means a lot to me, and if you're a patron, it goes without saying that your support in general means a lot to me, I really appreciate the fact that there are so many people who like my little drawings enough to pledge to me here. Thank you all so much!

That's all for now though, so I hope you all have a wonderful rest of your week. I'll be posting another (Patreon exclusive this time, no early access) update next week, and every week from now on, unless I forget or something gets in the way, and on the first of next month the polls will be starting again, so look forward to that and check out the last post I made if you haven't already!

See you all next time!