UGC / Fashion

I really like making ugc for Roblox. It's a lot of fun and it can be challenging due to the 4000 triangle limit. I love figuring out how to balance conservative geometry with as much detail and proper mobility as possible, while trying to be ✨fashion focused ✨

Until recently, I never had much of a fashion sense in the real world, so my escape to Roblox's fashion scene has been quite satisfactory and fulfilling.

Here's some recent stuff I've made and am working on.

Fluffy Christmas/Winter Style Neck Cowl with a Ribbon

This MF is a personal challenge to address dynamic heads.

The eyes are meant to move inside of empty sockets. The eyelashes, brows and mouth are mesh and will dynamically move as well. I'm gonna make the damn thing work as personal vindication.

I'm also going to make some other stylized heads because drawing faces is fun. I've always liked it. I just hope other people do too lol.

Oversized Off-shoulder Sweater

This coat I'm going to take and make work with the fluff today.

Hopefully it comes out looking good.

Denim Vests with Fur Lining

I like fur and fluffy things okay and I think I'm pretty okay at it.

Cozy Bear Pajama Sweater

Off Shoulder Shirt/Skirt Combos

also made as standalone shirts

I contribute to Online Angel with a couple friends.
Check it out, because my friends are talented in their own right and deserve much praise as well.

Lots more I'm working on and experimenting with - I can't wait to add it here.

💙

Blurp

I feel like that's the sound this guy is making as he pulses in his idle animation.

My Big Baby Bear Dog

This dog is my favorite.
I love him so much so if you've found your way here lucky you because you get to see and read about his majestic beastliness.

Just look at that meat head. Beautiful.

His name is Hiroto. It means 'big boy' in Japanese and he truly embodies it. He is a purebred Akita Inu. His mom was purer white than him and his father was a brindle. You can see black furs here and there if you look closely and there are gentle red markings that are really pronounced if you see him against a pure white snow environment.  His gorgeous mane genuinely makes him look like a wolf at full stature and his fur shimmers in the light like a fake vampire. 

He's sooooooo amazing, the best ever. I'll fight anyone about him.

He loves going in the car, or anywhere really, and hates to be left behind so I really try to take him with us whenever possible. In the summer of 2024, my family rented out an officer's house on the shore of Sandy Hook that let us bring him. Every morning as the sun rose, I'd sneak out with just him and walk somewhere new on the peninsula for him to discover all new sights and smells. He hates the ocean or at least being in it, I think. We only took him with us swimming once early in the week we stayed and he nearly refused to stick his big baby paws in the ocean. Perhaps he hated the sinking feeling as the waves on the shore washed away the sand under them. It happened once and then he was like ✌️ bruv. Dummy sat with me eating mussels in the sand while the boys went in the water.

He tips the scale at just under or over 100lbs, which is average-ish for all Akita, but he's genuinely a big guy even among his littermates. Neither of his parents touched near that but the vet routinely insists that while he is certainly pleasantly plump he is in perfect health and stature. I (and I believe his breeder) genuinely expected and hoped for a 65-70lb dog tops but all of our friends and family were like 🤔 them paws is huge and he is going to be massive. 

As a teenager, I really dug the idea of having a shibe after following menswear dog for years. I love the doge shibe and I've been a general japanophile my whole life. Everything I and my family loves probably came from Japan and while unintentional, it lead to the shibe love... but shibes are psychos and I don't need that kind of chaos in my life, but I DID need a dog finally. I worked on an Akita Inu for Second Life and fell madly in love with the idea of this royal protector that could take down a bear but also is basically a house lump and looked like a majestic wolf. I did a ton of research while working on the digital version and decided it was time and this was gonna be my boy. 

He loves exploring new places so I make an effort to at least twice a week get lost somewhere in the woods or walking around with him in the city somewhere. You can tell how happy he is when he swings his big, silly head from side to side with his tongue swinging wildly as we walk down a trail and he gets a whiff of some other dog's piss to shove his snout in. And he always has to shit down a hill sideways. I'm told that's for ergonomic comfort.

Anyway, that's my dog. He's my second son and animal familiar. More importantly, I'm his willing human servant. I'm so grateful to get to spend part of my life with him in it.

Blabbing about Hokusai

One of my favorite parts of the trip my family recently made to Japan was coming across the Creative Museum Tokyo and happening upon their exhibition featuring Hokusai. 

It felt like fate as the words coming through the headset made it clear that this was not just about observing the art this legend of a man had created but his processes, his literal invention of the foundation of Japanese manga art direction. Further impressive was that this man would typically challenge himself past whatever limitations existed in his physical tools for carving and painting by effectively forcing insane hard mode on himself, with many of his directional pieces emphasizing organic, flowing movement with the strict use of only a single, unbreaking line to make the whole figure. 

While this was featured near the end of the exhibition, I feel it's appropriate to show first the tools this man and his apprentices used to make the prints that ultimately became the foundation of printed manga.

Like damn, that's HARD CORE AAAAAAA.
And they made not just lines but full printed color pages that fully encapsulate the majesty of what Japanese nature, life, folklore was like in the real world and these men's imagination.

One of my favorite pieces on display was this spider web with a Japanese maple leaf and the spider that calls it home. The way the spider web was interpreted, to me, evokes the feeling of a gentle breeze blowing through it with the way the strands of the web are hastily but still so carefully placed, allowed to be free flowing and random and yet perfectly intentional. It's all framed with a masterful use of negative space and flow that invites the viewer's eye fully around the art to be able to take it all in.

The gesture animals were another point of obsession for me, given my love with nature and animals in general. Negative space corralled by single lines made such movement, mass.

IT WAS MOVING OKAY. I did cry. Several times.

One of the best parts of the exhibition that no one was allowed to photograph or video was the actual 'The Great Wave off Kanagawa'

Since I wasn't able to take a picture, hopefully this stand-in copy and pasted image from Wikipedia will give you at least the sense of how f***ing amazing that was to stand in the presence of.

It was absolutely the best birthday present I could ever imagine, to not only be in Tokyo, Japan for the first time in my life but to get to stand in the presence and bask in the genius of this God-tier legend... I had a hard time controlling myself in public the whole trip with how utterly insanely happy I was but this museum exhibition was something else entirely, like cosmic fate rewarding and healing me for the pain I'd been through or something.

Outside of the exhibition, the museum also had some really cool installations by other artists. The most fascinating of these to me and my husband was a collection of four metal casts made from the recorded path of a hanging metal ball during earthquakes in different parts of Japan. I'll only include one, out of respect of hoping others go check it out in person, too, if you ever can.

The garden terrace of the restaurant by the museum floor was also truly something to behold, at least to me and my family. It was gorgeous and most large buildings in Tokyo featured similar foliage built integral to the building. The plants had name tags with info blurbs about them, as well as some of the insect life they attracted.

My final thought will be a repeat: This was an absolute treat for my soul and only served to reinforce what I desire to do with my life - basically, same Hokusai. Same. Thank you for leaving behind an unmatchable, tear-evoking legacy to inspire others for generations and endless years to come.

The Moon and what's right in front of us

 A random thought I wished to put out into the universe as I sit here on a 13 hour flight to Tokyo:

I was once told that for a business to succeed it must have a "North Star" to guide it. I don't think that thought process was grounded, objective or wise. Sure, you need guiding principles and a voice to siren call your people to follow you but why search for a star so far, far away when the big, beautiful, silver moon exists for us so close by? She's so powerful; Her phases affecting our oceans and our very lives through astrology. The Moon takes the raw, burning, sometimes harmful energy of the sun and translates it to a beautiful reflection that lets the Earth rest and recover at night.

Chasing after stars means you'll end up wandering aimlessly in space, perhaps forever doomed trying to  lust after something unattainable.

Anyway, just a sky-thought.

Figurine Puppy

This is where I am at with my pupper stylizations tonight. 

If you care to see the steps that lead to this, click into the post. 

Lots of drivel.

Toy Dogs

I really don't care for recording myself in a video stream, too much work.
Screenshotting and documenting my thoughts in written words, now that's my language. 🤌

Games Study & Thoughts

Gatekeeping game psychology behind secrets or a $ sign is dumb.

More fun games you make = more fun games for me to play and vice versa, so here is some shit I've noted that I feel is muy importanto while hard core diving into Roblox gameplay study imo the best and only way -  kinesthetically.

If you're a passionate creative looking for ideas and words to help perhaps shape your own direction from that of a possibly insane, over cooked fellow creative, I would love for you to read further.

If you represent a soul-sucking corporation looking to feed off of the blood of the creative and experienced, please fuck all the way off until the end of time.💙

Hi

Hey, I'm Rachel.

Some people know me as Kalia or Bugtrot or Trotswithbugs but under the hood I'm Rachel, an artist a bit too over seasoned who is ready to make something special of her own. I hope to make this blog into a chronicle of my adventures, lessons, strides and struggles for anyone and everyone who might find it interesting or funny. 

I live in Eastern, PA with my big white dog, small brown cat, cute noodle-come-alive snake, favorite son and loving husband. It's a busy life but one full of wonder, fun, imagination, nature and never knowing what will come next. 

And now, I need some self-empowerment.

This is my adventure journal as I dive into the next chapter of creativity - making games I hope to deliver ungodly amounts of serotonin directly into your brain meat with. I'll be starting with a game I've dreamt of only a short while but has been developing like a crystal in my heart for so long it's ready to break out of the geode. Here's hoping Roblox likes puppies.

I'll be back here with more soon. 💙

- Rachel