Making a Simmer

SLFJ Creative

By Brooklyn Mayhem

Hello readers! My name is Brooklyn Mayhem. I had the priviledge to get to know an amazing artist within our huge community of over 10 million active sim players. Believe me, I googled it myself. She has embraced us with her wonderful sinful dark blender scenes, deco Sims, sexual/ intimate render photos as well as poses and amazing stories. None other than SLFJ Creative. I just want to thank you all ahead of time for joining us on SIM Mag! I hope you enjoy this as much as I did during the interview. Let’s get started. Most interviews start with how long have you been playing Sims? But in your case, during our AMAZING conversation, I learned that you just started playing again during the pandemic. Can you recall how that day happened? What made you pick Sims 4 to play?

I love watching game Let’s Plays and walkthroughs and Sims 4 videos kept popping up and so I ended up watching a lot of them. Working from home left me with more time on my hands so I bought Sims 4 in June 2020 and started playing again.

You mentioned to me that you used to make CC’s for Sims 2. Which one was the hardest, making CC’s or blender? Why?

I’d say making CC is harder for me. I did pretty simple makeup and clothing recolors for Sims 2 back in the day. I’m not as good with making meshes and texturing them, as I am playing with lighting and building scenes in Blender now. I do miss making CC, but I’m content with just using it instead.

How was the transition from working on Machinima’s to Blender (Rendering)?

I was so used to using animations and filming movement, that switching to storytelling with pictures was a huge change for me. At first it

was a lot faster and I posted a lot every day. But once I switched to Blender, I found posts take a lot longer to make. Rendering Animations in Blender is a whole other ball game so I haven’t done much of that yet.

I love that the Lost Soul story isn’t your typical Happily Ever After storytelling. What made you choose that path instead?

Love is tough. It isn’t always easy. So although most of my stories revolve around soulmates and destiny, I don’t make the path to true love easy for my characters. Heartache is prevalent and important and helps them grow and realize what’s really in their hearts.

What inspired you to start making poses and blender scenes? And for future references, Will there be Plus Size Simmers poses?

Since I spent a year making machinimas, I used animations instead of poses. When I switched to IG storytelling, I still used game animations, custom animations and a few poses here and there. But when I made the huge step of making Lost Souls in Blender, I found I could edit and adjust poses in real time. Something we can’t do in the game. I started saving the poses as I made them and now I actually spend most of my time making poses more than anything else. I figured I’d share what I spent time on and sometimes turn them into posepacks.

The characters you created in your story, “Lost Souls”, who do you relate to more if you HAD to choose ONLY one? And why?

Felix. His whole vibe, his taste in music, decor, attitude - totally me.

Tell us about this HUGE Event for this month? Will it be compatible for Blender Users as well as Ingame/PNG access?

My very first story post was on August 5th 2021. So coming up on one year I thought it’d be fun to do something to celebrate one-year of the story and to thank those who read and enjoy it. I’ve been preparing a car show/concert scene

that a few characters will be going to in the story, and it’s been so much work that I thought it’d be perfect for an anniversary party! I’m still working on in-game ideas for players to participate, but the scene will be available for Blender users, and the characters will be part of the scene as posed objects, ready for some fun pics with those who want to join!

Are we expecting any new characters for Lost Souls?

Always! I love throwing new characters into the mix to make things interesting or get in the way of what readers think will happen. I do have at least one new character already planned to be joining very soon.

You have another popular story called Jay and Cole. I was Beyond Thankful, Beyond Appreciative that you chose a LGBTQA Couple, sharing their trials and tribulations. I praise you for that, truly. What made you choose to put Jay in the spotlight compared to the other characters in his original story back then?

Jay and Cole are from the machinima series I was still running, called Barnstormer, and when I switched to IG storytelling, I wanted to give Sims RP (roleplay) a go. And I picked Jay because in Barnstormer, his storyline was just starting to pick up. I’d revealed some things about him that I hadn’t been able to really dive into. So, I brought Jay to IG and his story unfolded with an RP partner. Now, he’s living his dream with Cole and how they wound up together is told through renders and a video on his IG account.

I am very random and have wild thoughts. That’s when it hits me. I had to ask you the funniest question but for my IC moment, if you had to choose to Kiss/NSFW, marry or kill/fake kill. Who would you pick? Why? And we both came to an agreement, we prefer fake kill one because we just love them too much. You mentioned in this order:

NSFW with Orion; Marry Tao; “fake” kill Efrain.

Why these 3 over any of the other ones?

I say NSFW with Orion because well, look at him. I’d marry Tao because he’s level-headed, caring, straightforward and respectful. And I’d “fake” kill Efrain because he’s spiralling and has become a danger to everyone. And I say “fake kill” because I can’t bring myself to kill my characters. Yet.

Not a lot of people understand the long process of making renders, especially renders as yours. I bless you for your patience because sometimes I lose it and promise myself that I won’t bother with Blender ever again. Then 3o minutes later, I am on it again. Do you have a team to help you with your work? If yes, what are their parts in it?

I don’t, no. I do everything myself, in my free time after work. A typical Lost Story render post (10 slides) takes about 4-5 hours roughly. Machinimas episodes (15-20 min) took about 40+ hours to complete. Rendering is not fast and it’s not always easy, but I do enjoy the process, the lighting, learning more and more as I go, and seeing my story and characters come to life in Blender was so much fun.

What are your goals/plans that you want to accomplish next? I can see Greatness in you and your work. You put your all into it. As I read your stories, there are moments where I can connect on another level of that experience.

I would eventually like to invest in a PC powerful to handle faster rendering times, especially when it comes to animations and videos. Machinimas in blender are on a whole new level, and maybe if I don’t ever actually go back to making full machinima episodes, I’d love to see the Lost Boys characters come to life more in videos.

As I was checking out your page, I saw that you made a Gift Box for blender and in-game play. Is this a hint that we should be looking out for CC’s as well?

I’m still learning how to make custom content, but I have ideas for some fun “merch”, if you want to call it that, for the story. Little bits of memorabilia from certain moments and characters. I think that would be a lot of fun. As far as just creating game CC, I don’t have plans for that. Creating things and sharing them for Blender is a lot easier than creating files the game can handle, and that work properly.

Comments from the simmers that is inspired by your craft: “Life Changing; Dark Elegance; Impressive; Grown and Sexy gameplay; Amazing; unique” And honestly, it was hard for them to even think of one word. Hearing some of these comments, did you expect to have that much of an influence on our community?

No, I didn’t expect that at all. “Grown and sexy gameplay” speaks right to my heart. I know NSFW content isn’t for everyone and is still, sadly taboo, but it’s my favorite to create and there’s so much that can be told solely through passion between characters. The fact someone said that’s how they see my content is incredible. I had no idea people thought this of a Sim story, especially mine.

Any spoilers you can share with your Fan Followers, including myself?

Only spoiler I can give is that I don’t plan far ahead. At all. (lol)

My info

Linktree: https://linktr.ee/SLFJProductions Name: Jen (used to be known as simlifeforjen on twitter, and SLFJ Productions on YT (machinimas) )

How to read Lost Souls on IG: From the beginning (bottom of the IG feed), or via the Highlights at the top of the profile. NOTE: I started this story in-game and switched to Blender starting at Chapter 11.

All Posts have been (and will continue to be) added to Highlights, in order. If you just want to follow along with or catch up on certain characters, now you can!

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Where fashion meets Gaming