Stick with one avatar? I don't think so.......

[Fennet]

Ok, it;s true that I am an immature SL child. I haven't been long enough  to be set in my virtual ways, but I can't even imagine finding one permanent look; one that you're stuck with, like in real life?

I started out trying to develop an avatar I'd feel comfortable running around in. Unfortunately, I really don't want to be an enormous-chested, heavily made-up sex kitten. I don't particularly want a male identity, either, so I was kind of stuck with what Linden had to offer, at first.

My first attempt looked way too much like my RL sister, but with a little tweaking I was able to make a more athletic version of my happiest, healthiest real-life me. Remember the Glory days? Hah! Here you can have them back, and then some. Why on virtual earth would I want to recreate life with all its limitations? But I do "feel" most comfortable running around in an avatar I can recognize as me, so to speak

Then, out of the blue, I was thrown a curve. I was sent the most gorgeous skin by a wonderful artist who probably didn't realize I was deliberately toning it down, glamour-wise. Of course, it would have been impolite not to wear the exquisite present, and once I had it on I found it irresistible.

Which isn't to say that I have quit looking for the real-me avatar; I'm just going to have to take the time to pull my downloaded templates into photoshop and mess around until I get what I really want.

Shapes are a different matter altogether. I'm not happy with the blocky look of the modest shapes I can manipulate inworld, and I haven't seen one yet I'm willing to spend the big Lindens on, so unless I can  learn the ins and outs of sculpting in Blender, I'm not going to be satisfied anytime soon.

Any tips on relatively easy avatar sculpting for a fairly well-versed 2D graphic artist would be appreciated. Oh, and I desperately want to sculpt insane shoes, too, so I could use some help there as well.

Yesterday I hit the jackpot of freebie avatar collections, and promptly spent several hours trying on Furries, (yuck!), aliens, (some good, some wretched, some hilarious), and nice male avatars. A couple of people came up and pushed me around in the sandbox where I was opening my packages, which prompted a brainstorm of ways in which these exotic shapes and some fancy quick-change artistry could be used as a defense mechanism to ward off those who might see me as a potential noob victim, nya ha ha! Got some great kick fighting and more obscene animations that should come in useful as well.

Is this turning into a blog? Chastise me if you're offended; otherwise, I'd love to hear your thoughts on the subject of avatars and change.

I picked a nice male avatar, (looks a lot like my brother, go figure), and I spent the morning running or rather skydiving around in him, which is great fun for now. Splat! Such a gruesome sound it makes when the ^%$^%#$@#^  L$0 chute doesn't open!

I still plan to find the perfectly imperfect, somewhat-less-than-well-endowed, mammaliarily speaking, ME, for my everyday activities. But limit myself when I have the entire digital universe in my sights? Never!

[WADE1 Jya]

Thanks for sharing your story Fennet! It can be tricky to find the perfect look that also feels to be really you.

After playing Second Life for almost 5 years now I've settled into one main human look. She only really changes her hair & outfits now.... but I also often play as a cat... forgetting about human things for weeks at a time, and much more occassionally as a few other random assorted characters that I enjoy playing from time to time.

If you end up playing one avatar for too long you might end up stuck like me & feel afterwards that other avatars are just not you, even if you enjoy the new avatar's looks better! Changing avatars and playing around with new looks is always fun though!

[Charolotte Caxton]

Good one, Fennet. I haven't been able to take my skin off since the day I got it, and my shape is no mod so I never even attempted to change it until recently. I dove into Second Life head first and was looking the way I looked before I even realized what happened. The few times I've tried to change my looks, well, I felt less than Charolotte, so for me this is me, until I stumble upon something I like better. I used to wish I could change some features about myself, back when I was new. I spent some big bucks on shapes recently and tried on a ton of skins, and I feel what you say, why be stuck in one look when the virtual world is yours for the taking, right? I look forward to seeing what you come up with.

 

Charolotte Caxton

[WeeWillian Wylie]

Absolutely..I change my look regularly-actually to the point where no one comments on a new look at all, which can be bad if you are looking for feed back..

I started out on the common male freebies-black hair, dirty biker I think it was called,and a skin and shape from a freebie stop that made me look less like the frankenstein monster I had created. After a month or so I transferred into a beefy blond and went crazy with hair, still change hair styles daily..And went through regular tinkering with my shape and even buying different shapes and amalgamating different features into one.

Skins improved and the market exploded with more "realistic" skins and I jumped on several that produced a nice look that went untouched for about 5 months until recently when I got a good shape I really liked in the Menstuff hunt and went back and bought it so I could make proportion adjustments for height. And now I got a great "ginger" skin in the seasons hunt that has me totally remaking my look again...

I doubt I'll ever establish a "final and forever" look. One of the assets of SL is to constantly evolve yourself.

 

 

[Fennet]

Hi there, Wade!

I love the cat avatars! I have a tiny, but it's just so small, I can hardly find myself. I've taken to flying with the tiger lately, but that will probably loose it's charm quickly.

I've been getting braver and actually went looking for the raptors. Luckily I didn't find any, .

I've been trying to reduce lag, and have been leaving my kitten behind when I travel. I miss having her on my shoulder, though. As soon as I get the system and its quirks figured out, she's riding with me again.

I got a spectacular fire-breathing metallic dragon avatar that I'm planning to break  out soon. Maybe the dragon will come to LoLo and hunt!

Good to hear from you!

 

[Fennet]

You  have a lovely, subtle modern-girl look; I like it a lot! Nice to meet you!

 

[Fennet]

Beautiful avatar, BTW, and very unique, like your "island". I love your photo and the glowing white hair on you and the cat.

[Innula Zenovka]

This article (by an RL graphic artist) on proportions and SL shapes is worth reading.  

[Astringofcharacters]

Great post. You're obviously capable of creating some subtle and interesting looks.
I've often had a dozen versions of myself taking turns inworld (sometimes two at a time, thanks to multiple viewers). Most of them were more or less straight off the rack, with a few basic adjustments. Once I got a hairstyle and clothes that suited them, they remained unchanged. I have spent hours unsuccessfully tweaking some avatars (mostly male) before discarding them as "just not me."
Like most noobs, I was given a lot of glamorous skins by well meaning and generous residents who couldn't understand why I wanted to look so plain, and I had to try them all on out of politeness. Then run away and delete them as soon as I could. Many of them were really nice of course, and I ended up being given one that simply defined me, in spite of myself. Among all my experimental alts, I remained the most comfortable in one that was just handed to me. Tammy, in her "Scarlett skin for beginners," was my main for a year.  Her avatar did go through changes, as she grew younger and older according to the whims of her typist, but she was always recognizably the same sweet, rather wholesome beauty.
She's gone now (that's another story) and my present avatar is an only child (so to speak) and a work-in-progress. I'm sticking with her/him ... for now, at least.

[Pussycat Catnap]

 

---

Fennet wrote:

Yesterday I hit the jackpot of freebie avatar collections, and promptly spent several hours trying on Furries, (yuck!),

---

 

Furry avatars have a wide range of quality.

Look at some of the reviews here:

http://www.slarf.org/

The free ones are often free for a reason, and its usually not a good reason when it comes to furries.

 

[Emma Krokus]

WOW!!!! (capitals are intentional)

 

I love your badge - it moves... that's amazing - Id love to know how you did that...

 

And as for avies... well, it took me 2 years to stop shape shifting on an hourly basis:smileyvery-happy: It's about once a day now... and why not? This is SL!

 

(To those worried: I rarely use my man avies now)

 

[Jo Yardley]

I have tried to make my avatar look as much as RL me as possible and once I got there I never changed her again.

She barely changes clothes, hair or any of those things.

I like her the way she is.

I do have an alt, but mostly to check on perms, animations and other stuff I make.

[Wildcat Furse]

I stick with Wildcat, she is 1/2 cat 1/2 human, '2in1' or 'best of both worlds', low complexity and maintenance guaranteed .......:smileywink: *meows*

[Venus Petrov]

Your world. Your imagination.

There is no reason you must stick with one avatar when you can make as many as you desire.  Venus has been 'me' from the start.  While I've modified her shape and change her hair often (I wish I could buy shares in Truth Hair!), I am happy making her my voice in SL.  I have one alt but she does not do much other than help me get that extra 10% sqm of property in our group.

[Rolig Loon]

I spent my first two years in SL with a modified newbie look, experimenting occasionally with my shape and trying on different skins while I tried to decide what felt like ME.  With the help of a friend, I finally hit on the right shape and homed in on a look that matched my personality in world.  In the couple of years since then, I have built up a small collection of skins that all have the same general feel but express different moods and fit different situations.  I use a couple of alts to help me test scripts and model clothing designs.  Somehow, I feel more comfortable experimenting with their appearance than I do with my own now.  After all, they're not ME.

[Fennet]

I made the background in gimp, but the full version of photoshop is better.

In gimp under filters/ there is an "animation" option, and you choose the number of frames etc. , in a pop-up dialog box. Then you have to save as:GIF, (supports animation). A new menu gives you the choice to "save as animation" or flatten layers. Save as an animation or your picture won't move.

You have to flatten layers Before you animate. Transparency is OK. You can also make a spinning globe, which is fun.

I think it is similar in photoshop, with more options, but I haven't been able to use the program for a while, boo hoo. I really miss it, but the mac is dead.

Then follow the badge instructions here on the forums. Good luck, it's not too hard if you have some graphics experience.

[Fennet]

Oh, yes; I didn't intend to denigrate Furries, apologies!

The free furries I got were horrible! Wretched cartoon characters, and very ugly. I've seen some wonderful furries.

Sorry, and thanks for setting me straight.

The female avatars were terrible as well, but the men were pretty decent.  I've seen a lot worse looking guys on marketplace. 

None of the free avatars were top-notch, but it was fun anyway.

[Pussycat Catnap]

I don't know if she still has it, but the Furry maker 'AnthroXtacy' had/has a box for 1L that includes a lot of her older furry designs.

 

They're only 1/10th as good as her current stuff, but that's still leagues ahead of most free furry avatars. If I recall right, it included an earlier phoenix design, and some canines, and one other bird like creature. The phoenix was not bad, though her current phoenix is just flat out amazing (albeit 'feral' and not furry like her old one - for an amazing furry phoenix you have to go to Tokushi - who only makes PG avatars so they're not as 'popular' in the furry 'night clubs' despite being better than most of what you see. You'll find them on the grid a lot, but not in the 'yiff' places that come up in search - and maybe that's a good thing).

 

Female avatars have some 'issues' in SL. Often way to tall and stretched, or with giant bubble-butts. Males often have the 'Bug Bunny Cartoon Human' look going with the giant pecs and the teenie tiny hands and legs...

- For human avatars the commercial market is often worse than the freebie market. But at the same time the freebie market never comes even close to the better items in the commercial market. But you have to really search to find those better items. My general rule of thimb with marketplace if that if the item is in the promotions / featured list, its probably low quality goods.

With any of them, you've got to see a version of it inworld before you buy. That's helped me avoid some skins with issues before, and also caused my final selection to be one that I'd almost passed over for a not so great listing on marketplace... (I don't have any human alts, but I have some critters that use a human skin for part of their look, like my Faun).

 

 

[Clarissa Lowell]

Not to plug, but they are free, so I'm not sure it would be anyway.

I offer free shapes. While most people tend to go for the best looking model types, I also tried to offer some attractive but realistic looking avatars.  I try to offer a variety of body types, face shapes, and so on. 

I've only done about half of the completed shapes I intend to. But you are welcome to stop by my shop and try some on. It is in my profile pick page.

There is a big busted shape or two, but most are not.

"Shapes are a different matter altogether. I'm not happy with the blocky look of the modest shapes I can manipulate inworld, and I haven't seen one yet I'm willing to spend the big Lindens on, so unless I can  learn the ins and outs of sculpting in Blender, I'm not going to be satisfied anytime soon."

Mine are free. You have little to lose except time or expectations.

If you want to make your own despite this (I'm not sure which you really want), it takes an eye. Just practice and have an image in your head while you work. Look at the shape from all angles, while wearing an AO, and while walking, sitting and going around Second Life for a few days time.

"A couple of people came up and pushed me around in the sandbox where I was opening my packages, "

You don't have to suffer any longer. Just type dressing room or changing room in search. Using a sandbox to change in, is flirting with grief. Using search sometimes will get you what you want.

[Fennet]

Interestingly enough, it was while changing in a dressing room that I experienced the most invasion. I don't know if there are any that lock, but these didn't and some ghouls peeped and came in and followed me around until I teleported away.

I got pushed around in the box opening area of a market. I just called it a sandbox for lack of a better term. After the initial shock of being pushed the first time. It doesn't really bother me any more. I see it as kind of a challenge to devise humorous ways to counterattack.

I'm thinking about learning to make the body shapes from scratch with a program like Blender, or Maya if I win the lottery. I have Poser, but haven't seen much about that program on the forums. I don't know if it's even capable of making SL avatars.  I'm a sculptor in the real world, so I have a definite interest in sculpting digitally as well. I'll be sure to check your shapes out, though, when I get the chance.

[Carole Franizzi]

Not entirely sure what the question was, if there was one. Seems you're dissatisfied with shapes, in a generic sense. I can't say I feel too limited. I make my own - bought only one in my entire time here only because I fell in love with a face and when I tried to make the shape for that particular skin, I was forced to admit defeat. Just couldn't get it looking the same. Apart from that episode, a series of tweaking interventions usually gets me where I want to go - plus I think the right AO makes all the difference - it softens the body and creates movement and curves.

One look? Oh no, me neither. That would be like asking me to eat the same thing day after day while surrounded by dish after dish of scrumptious food. And, since the avatar goes hand in hand with the "lifestyle", a change of avatar look is a way of experiencing SL from a completely new point of view.

[Luc Starsider]

I have basically stuck with the same avatar since the beginning; human male. It took about half a year of looking for, and trying on, skins - demos and freebies - before I found one I was happy with, that I bought. Since I've added another one for a grand total of two I'm often looking at and trying on new skin demos, but so far I have not found any that were right. I'm always on the lookout for that perfect one that I know I'll be completely happy with, but I'm in no hurry.

One of the first thing I did after my rezday was going in to edit my shape. Since I've never looked at shapes for sale. I enjoy tinkering with the sliders and finding how the different values play together. My main shape - I have a few variations but use one almost exclusively - goes through a few tweeks every week, but only slight changes to one or two of the different sliders (often just by by one number, and often ending with going back to the number it was on the week before). I frequently create new shapes just so I can play around with the sliders, but I invariably end up deleting the result.

Whenever I can find a hair I like, I buy it. It is, I think, difficult to find hair of the quality and style I like, so it does not happen all that often. Possibly not often enough.

Still, I am very happy with how my avatar looks. I believe he represents me rather well in different ways, and I think, rather boringly perhaps, that I will continue my SLife as a human male for the foreseeable future.

- Luc -

[carirubi21]

i'm new and I'm trying to figure out how i can change my clothes and how to keep moving on I want tomake friends but i dont know how

 

[Bree Giffen]

carirubi you may be stuck in basic mode if you cannot change clothes...

 

How do I switch between Basic mode and Advanced mode?

You can select Basic or Advanced mode from the login screen:

1. If you're currently logged in, close the Second Life Viewer to log out.
2. Open the Second Life Viewer.
3. Select Basic or Advanced from the Mode dropdown.
4. Click Quit.
5. Open the Second Life Viewer again. The Mode now shows your selection.
6. Log in with your username and password.



[Kascha Matova]

My avie looks a lot like me, though with one added ethnic variation. I pretty much came here intending it to be that way, or if not actually "intending", simply finding that everything sort of flowed that way naturally and with much more ease.

I did create an alt for purposes of a group, but I must have only logged her on twice since '07 and I don't think I ever even expanded her look beyond the default.

As time has gone on, my main avie has only become more synonymous with SL participation. I find myself unable to imagine being in-world as someone else. In fact, I find myself quickly uncomfortable with changing skins for example to one of my faarie skins, for any length of time. It just doesn't feel like me anymore.

I don't know how much of that has to do with basic familiarity versus not being able to endure putting away a skin and shape I spent a considerable amount of money commissioning from scratch, but whichever it is, I am quite content with exploring the world of fashion and hairstyles to reinvent or evolve.