#visual photography

[kcrust]

💾 I hacked into Arasaka just to copy a set of Goro’s ID photos.

[retrowondergirl]

I tried out the new protoframes Gemini emotes and honestly Vena’s has me going feral over how it makes Lyon look. Also Ryoku’s is just super cool that it gives some captura ideas.

[floeity]

Clair // Obscur

I started a new coe33 playthrough so no one can spoil Verso’s Drafts for me but I’m going way too slow, on account of my pausing every ten seconds to make a photo.

[celesenova]

Leilah Lavellan

Finally got to test out these Neve animations in VG. I want to try the others but I ran out of time today.

[lutethebodies]

VP Progress Tracker

I was tagged by @arcanearcherayz here (thank you!) and I'll preface all of this with a reminder that I play BG3 on a Mac, so I got mods late and Photo Mode even later. Weigh any VP you see on this blog against that. Also this goes long but I'm proud of my progress, so no Readmore link!

Another point worth making: while I've never been a photographer, I was a designer for 20 years, and have art-directed my fair share of product or portrait shoots, so that might count almost as much as the trivial stuff I learned in one semester of 12th-grade elective photography 30 years ago.

I've mentioned many times about how I got sucked into BG3 because of perfect-storm circumstances, so since this is nominally about VP I won't get into all that again. I like playing as my OCs (instead of companions) and I love how VP helps me tell their (5e-originated) stories outside the vanilla BG3 plot framework.

Without Photo Mode, the best imagery I could do was passable, but I had to develop an itchy trigger finger for cutscene screenshots (which now clog my laptop and external drive to an alarming degree). Some of my luckiest shots were capturing my OCs seemingly breaking the fourth wall, or indeed doing anything different than Standard Stoic Tav poses.

Initially though, my very first BG3 run in Fall 2023 was laughably newbie in all ways—as perhaps it should have been—including that trigger finger, which only captured my beloved 5e bard Cannor as Cringe-Boring John Baldursgate. However I soon got better at it, with lots of lucky screencaps that I could then adjust a bit in Photoshop (which I've been using since like 2002, a few years before I became a professional designer). Perhaps predictably, Minthara—the companion that most attracted me—benefitted from this immensely:

I think the recent shot of Isobel below might be one of my best cutscene-screencaps, though. There's no way I could set up subtle shadow and lighting like that on my own.

When I finally got access to Photo Mode on Mac, I still only had the basics—no pose pack mods, no Lighty Lights (which I still can't use), no nothing—and I had to dust off some old brain cells to try and remember that high-school-era photography elective class. In my first attempt, Shadowheart and Zafraia (from her canon "make them all worse" solo run) were Not Impressed With My Shit:

However, the tide began to turn when I realized I could create my own faux-Lighty Lights by setting up spellcasting shots in dark places, and got some iconic Cannor and Minthara shots that way. I think magical effects or character ability effects (like the Silvanus statue or Karlach raging) will always yield compellingly contrasty pieces.

Eventually I got better with gimbal and focus, and learned how to avoid needless fish-eye stretchiness. I also sort of do poses technically wrong—say, for intimacy scenes—because I often pair up mismatched sets. Tav Romance pose A doesn't always look good with its corresponding Companion Romance Pose B, for example. I once joked about how "I'm not into this to make Basic Artsy Nudes" but then I ended up doing just that in many instances (albeit with some boundaries/self-imposed standards). I guess it's a good thing that as a Mac user I can't deploy Script Extender mods like BG3SX or whatever. You all would find me insufferable, surely. Either that or Tumblr moderation would ban me.

Anyway I've noticed that I prefer to focus on faces, and closeups of faces for the sake of expressing emotion, over almost anything else in VP—with one exception: shapes. If I find a compelling shape or shapes that can dictate composition I'll almost always default to that in favor of conventional perspective or whatever other best practice. It's mildly troublesome if that shape just happens to be part of a nude body, but whatever. Vanity is more of a sin of mine than lust (though not by much).

The only thing I've found myself rushing through sometimes, and thus getting "meh" results, are the sort of "what's happening in this scene" illustrative shots for my game journals like this one. I too often seem to settle for quick go-to settings on depth of field, light/shadow, and subject, when maybe I shouldn't. Or rather I forget how rewarding, quality-wise, it can be to take time to make something better. Well, that and accept when I don't and won't have it, and should try again later.

I still don't really consider myself a VP "expert" though, because I can't work with the full array of what others can do with apps I'm unable to use. I'm pretty good at what I do have to work with, when I give myself time to refine whatever I'm making. I wouldn't call myself "skilled" in this, the way I feel with design or writing or song lyrics (though I'm probably only a proficient musician and not skilled per se).

However I predict that very soon, most of my BG3 time will be taken up by VP instead of regular gameplay. Gameplay itself feels less passive than, say, watching TV, but working with VP certainly feels as mentally active as time spent on any of my pro or hobby design work or audio projects. BG3 is no longer a video game for me; it's an art-project tool. It's can glaze my faves, sure, but more importantly it's a great way to keep bringing my own characters to life and have them exist outside of my head.

Thanks to my tagger and consider this another passive, LTB-style open tag. Pick it up and run with it, veepers.

[arcanearcherayz]

VP Progress Tracker

Joining the open tag from @mein-liebling <3

I did this on my laptop cause fuck the 10pic limit on the app

The beginning:

I was taking screenshots way before photo mode was a thing.

When I felt brave enough I decided to mod the game and add Native Camera Tweaks so I could zoom in closer.

Then photo mode came!

I really like taking candid shots so I tried to make my shots look active.

My VPs now

Lighty lights and QSAT are my fave mods for VPs now. Lots more movement and better lighting.

My fave shots during combat ^

I'm truly having the time of my life with VP. I'm kinda annoyed that it interrupts my game play wanting to take pics every few moments but I really love the creativity of this game and I'm excited to see where it goes 😊

Tagging all my friends cause their vps are cool as fuck and should show them off ♥️: @riddlerosehearts @starlightweave @emmyandthetieflings @lutethebodies @staywild-wolfchild @mogruith @wasteful-sam @gibdethethirteenth @funniestbitchinfaerun @met-in-a-tavern

[gunshyghostss]