Hi Sig,
I think it’s coming along well and the next steps you laid out sound good. I’m not sure how close you’re trying to replicate Lucie’s, but here’s a rough side by side that can give some insights.
One thing I noticed was that Lucie’s starts with a strong emissive and fades to black, while yours loses the black about halfway through and fades the emissive all throughout the effect.
Something else you might consider is how you fade out. Alpha erosion might give a more interesting look and feel then a regular fade. This thread has great info: What is your Alpha/Opacity Mask/Clip/Erode Animation workflow like? - #33 by Zihao_Feng
edit: “but he’s a rough side by side” to “but here’s a rough side by side”