Chasing the 3D Dream
“Five hundred a month? That’d make you rich. This is huge. Got it…” I wanted to ask what kind of work it was, but I didn’t type anything in chat. Right now my urge to play games was stronger, so I just swallowed the question.
“What should we do? What’s Tom and Jerry? Is that fun? Defend the Peninsula? Hmm… hold on, everyone. Let’s try them one by one.”
The requests were pouring in. I downloaded every map they asked for and started playing. Defend the Peninsula… was brutally hard. With my skill level I couldn’t protect the peninsula no matter what, and I ended up frustrated. Next they kept telling me to play Elect the President. People called it a classic, but I didn’t find it all that entertaining.
I spent over three hours just browsing custom maps.
“StarCraft… is tough.”
Blocking the entrance. That was a nightmare from the very first step. I wondered if the map was even meant to be cleared. The more I played, the more I realized… this was really hard.
After more than ten rounds I still couldn’t clear stage one and gave up. Unfortunately, none of the maps clicked with me. Singing? I didn’t know any songs. Current events quiz? Obviously empty-headed and boring. Blocking the entrance? I already tried that!! It was so hard I couldn’t even beat stage one.
“That was really fun today. Yep. I’ll be back tomorrow. Let’s wrap it up!! I’m ending a little early today!!”
I ended the stream at eight in the evening. Today I was running on bank hours… Banks close their shutters at four, but that doesn’t mean the employees inside get to go home. Back when I didn’t know any better I used to think banks were such nice places. The moment four o’clock hit, they’d kick all the customers out and leave… or so I thought. Turns out that’s when the real work begins behind the scenes. I’m in the same situation. Just because the stream is over doesn’t mean my work is done. It’s only just starting.
Do I have something to do today? Yeah. I have to come up with my own content. Anything goes. I just have to try something.
“Hmm…” I spun my chair in circles while thinking. “What should I do tomorrow? Ugh… dizzy.” I’d spun too much. I stopped and checked what the others were streaming. Scrolling down the list, I saw League of Legends dominating the top spots, with the occasional new release mixed in. I watched their streams for a while, but no brilliant ideas came to me, so I switched to YouTube. As expected, it was an idea goldmine. The ultimate warehouse of every kind of content… BigTube.
While looking for content ideas, I got curious about what the original Japanese VTubers were doing. Their scale was completely different. Some of them were holding actual 3D concerts. Not virtual ones on the internet, but real concerts where fans bought tickets and showed up in person…!! Just like how singers perform on stage and fans come to watch, VTubers were doing the same thing. I couldn’t quite wrap my head around it, so I tried to picture it again.
“So, Seon-a… you know what an idol concert is, right? Your little sister goes to them all the time, so you’ve seen the ticket wars and everything. That’s what they’re doing. Right now, with their fans… you get it? I’ll just say it straight. The virtual talents use some kind of skill at the concert hall so everyone can watch together. They have to be good at singing, obviously.”
Hmm… singing was the most important part. Dancing well mattered too. But… yeah. This was going to be difficult. Dancing already sounded exhausting, and I learned slower than most people, so I’d probably fall behind. That wasn’t all. I knew by now that I couldn’t sing well either. Still, singing wasn’t so bad. It actually felt pretty good when I did it. Going to karaoke with friends had always been a dream of mine… but I’d never managed it. I should suggest it to the crew later. No, wait. I was getting sidetracked again!!
In times like this…!! I immediately called Pyeong.
“Hello?”
“Yes~ I got your call.”
“Pyeong-nim, what do you think about 3D?”
“All of a sudden?” Pyeong sounded extremely flustered. Well, it wasn’t like this was the first or second time I’d done something impulsive. When I wanted something, I just went for it… dummy!!
“Yeah, all of a sudden. But I have a reason. A really logical one!!”
“Um… okay.”
“What do you think it would be like if I did it?”
“It’d probably be fun?”
“Oh… what kind of content could I make with it? I saw a concert, actually. What do you think?”
“A concert??!!” Pyeong’s voice cracked like she’d jumped an octave. She must have been really surprised, but I wondered if it was that shocking.
“Yeah…!! What do you think?”
“Well… you’d have to be good at singing.”
“I’m good at singing. I’ve been practicing.”
“Uh… you’d also have to dance.”
“That one… I’m not great at. I’ll just be a ballad singer. Ballad singers close their eyes and sing anyway.”
I didn’t have to become the kind of idol who danced all the time, right? I’d be a ballad singer. I just needed to move people emotionally and make them cry.
“A ballad singer? Uh… umm…”
“Wouldn’t making a 3D model be fun anyway?”
“It would be fun. There’s a lot you could do with it.”
“Then should we make one?”
“Well… how exactly would you like to go about it? Do you have something in mind? Like the face shape or anything?”
“Oh!! First, black hair. Twin tails. Sharp eyes. What do you think?”
“That… that…” Pyeong trailed off. A long silence followed… then I heard the sound of typing through the phone.
“Do you have any references? Are you not planning to make a 2D model? For 3D, would you be using the shared avatar customization here? Or making something completely new?”
“Ah… let’s make it new. This one can’t move the way I want. I’m talking about something that can actually walk and move like a real person.”
“I see. So you want to convert what you’re currently using into 3D…”
“New. Completely new.”
The cardboard cutout I was using now was a shared avatar. If I was going to change it, I might as well change everything. New era, new wine? Whatever. If I was going to do something new, I’d do it all the way.
“Then could you send me some references? I’ll put together a quote for you.”
“Ooh!! Got it. Reference means copying, right?”
“No, no. Not copying. It’s reference material. Just reference material.”
“Oh!! So it’s different from copying?”
“Yes. Completely different. One hundred percent different.”
“Gotcha.”
References. Reference material… the kind of thing you could just Google. A question popped into my head. If I wanted avatar A, and someone else was already using it, would that count as copying? Or referencing? Was I allowed to ask for it or not?
“Oh!! Question.”
“Yes~?”
“If I give you avatar A as a reference, will you make it exactly like avatar A?”
“No. We’ll use everything as reference and create something new.”
“Ah… okay, I get it. I’ll make some references and send them!! I just Google them, right?”
“Google works, and there’s also Pinterest. You can look there too.”
“Pin… Pin-what?”
Being an editor really wasn’t for just anyone. I’d never even heard of it in my life…? No. Wait. I had. Hold on. I was pretty sure it was in my bookmarks.
“Oh!! It’s there. I have it bookmarked.”
“Since you draw, you probably would…”
“Ah. Right, drawing!! I’ll go look. Got it. So basically, you take the model, clothes, and every little detail from reference images and make something new. Is that it?”
“Pretty much.”
“Okay. I got it. I’ll find some and send them!!”
“Alright… but are you really going to do this? 3D costs a lot more than you’d think.”
The sudden mention of money made me swallow without thinking. I knew it was expensive. That was why most people didn’t even consider it… I was aware of that.
“How much are we talking?”
“Depending on quality… if you want motion capture, facial tracking, the whole package, and concert-level production, you’re looking at at least ten to twenty million won. That’s the minimum. And since it would be original, it’ll probably cost even more. Oh! And if you actually want to hold a concert like you mentioned, you’d have to rent a venue too, so that adds up fast.”
“Ten…? Ten million won? Really?”
“Yes. I looked into it before for VR stuff… and it was around that range.”
“Uh… huh?”
At most, Tteok and Raming probably spent around four to five million. Since I wasn’t aiming that high, maybe I could get away with one or two million? Haha. I couldn’t even close my mouth at the ridiculous number.
“Should we still look into it?”
“Uh… first, what about just making an original 2D avatar?”
“That’s also very expensive. If you want high quality, you’ll have to spend quite a bit.”
Okay, I could accept that. Yeah, how long was I going to keep using a cheap cardboard cutout? I needed to make an original avatar at some point. That much I had to do. But… the moving 3D version could wait.
“Then let me summarize, Pyeong-nim. We’ll go ahead with making an original 2D avatar… and put the 3D concert stuff on hold for later.”
“Understood. I’ll look into it and get back to you!!”
“Yep!! I’ll go find those references then. Talk to you later!!”
“Sure~”
Smart people used GPT well. Because they asked good questions. If you asked good questions, you got the answers you wanted. But I wasn’t good at asking questions, so I probably wouldn’t find anything useful. I should just take pictures of the character I wanted myself. That would be fastest.
First, I needed to think about the pose I wanted. Twin tails!! That was very important. All my favorite characters had twin tails. I just liked them. They were cute!! My avatar had to have twin tails too. But I didn’t know how to tie them. Don’t worry. In times like this…!! YouTube would have the answer. There was nothing to worry about.
After watching YouTube for over two hours and liking videos, I saved them to my watch later list. Then I texted Pyeong.
‘Taking reference photos tomorrow’
It was already eleven. Ugh, I was tired. Since I was tired, the rest could wait until tomorrow.