Creating-Beginners

[Lovyi]

Hello! I am new, Of course. Nice to meet you.

     I came from IMVU and I had dabbed into creating on there.  I have questions Coming out of my..BEEP! But my first question is. What would be a good starting point on creating? For example. Hair, eyes, makeup, Furniture. another one I have is. What do you use? I had used Gimp like a Loser for years on imvu. lol. I heard it all the time People saying to me ''PS is way better''..(photoshop) ... mmhm, yup. I got ya, Totally get it.🤭The list can go and on. I will tell you. I did read on how to get Started and when I say "Started" I mean. Going to marketplace and create shop and restart SL and all that Fun stuff. Can I just build up on creating Stuff then open my "Shop" or is that not even a thing? God, I don't know Crap! haha. if there is a Awesome person out there that will LOVE to ANSWER my questions. That would be so Cool of you. 

      Thank you for taking the time to Read this.

                                                                                    Lovyi ♥

[Mollymews]

start with creating things that you personally would like

coming from IMVU creating, then SL avatar textures are a good place to start.  Like start with makeup for example which you would wear yourself. Then onto other types of tattoo texture layers

once you have the hang of SL texturing then move on to texturing mesh clothing. We can buy full permissions creator mesh clothing models from the SL marketplace to practice on and wear ourselves. Then move on to making your own mesh models, texturing and scripting them

at each stage in your learning, put the things you make up on SL marketplace and try to sell them

then when that's all going well think about opening your own inworld location

basically grow a little business by in the first instance focusing on the creative skills needed to make stuff

[Lindal Kidd]

Hi, @Lovyi!  Welcome to SL, and kudos for wanting to create!

The easiest way to make things is with the in world building tools.  If you have zero experience with them, do this:

• Go to a place where you can rez things...a public sandbox, for example.
• Right click the ground, choose Build.  Your cursor changes to a magic wand.
• Click on the ground again.  A plywood cube magically appears!

The Ivory Tower Library of Primitives has a whole set of self-paced tutorials on using these building tools.

However...

Almost no one who makes things for sale uses these creation tools these days.  Everything is modeled in an external program and uploaded.  We call these items "mesh" to distinguish them from the older prim types of objects.  Blender is free, and very popular.  If you have a ton of money, Maya is also good.  Any 3D modeling program has a steep learning curve.  But the popular ones have loads of courses, tutorials, etc. to help you learn...just like for GIMP or Photoshop.

You will also need to have some skills with one of those programs too, to texture your models.  In fact, lots of creators buy untextured models from other creators, then texture them and re-sell the resulting products.

You can set up your Marketplace store at any time.  It's free.  But give some thought to it...each SL account can have one, and only one, Marketplace store.  Bear in mind, though, that you can have more than one SL account.  So you could have one account for your store, and your creating...and another one just for fun, or experimenting.

[Lovyi]

15 hours ago, Mollymews said:

start with creating things that you personally would like

coming from IMVU creating, then SL avatar textures are a good place to start.  Like start with makeup for example which you would wear yourself. Then onto other types of tattoo texture layers

once you have the hang of SL texturing then move on to texturing mesh clothing. We can buy full permissions creator mesh clothing models from the SL marketplace to practice on and wear ourselves. Then move on to making your own mesh models, texturing and scripting them

at each stage in your learning, put the things you make up on SL marketplace and try to sell them

then when that's all going well think about opening your own inworld location

basically grow a little business by in the first instance focusing on the creative skills needed to make stuff

 

15 hours ago, Mollymews said:

start with creating things that you personally would like

coming from IMVU creating, then SL avatar textures are a good place to start.  Like start with makeup for example which you would wear yourself. Then onto other types of tattoo texture layers

once you have the hang of SL texturing then move on to texturing mesh clothing. We can buy full permissions creator mesh clothing models from the SL marketplace to practice on and wear ourselves. Then move on to making your own mesh models, texturing and scripting them

at each stage in your learning, put the things you make up on SL marketplace and try to sell them

then when that's all going well think about opening your own inworld location

basically grow a little business by in the first instance focusing on the creative skills needed to make stuff

How would I go about With makeup? I Bought the Cawta mesh head. where do I go to get the Mesh? would I be looking for "Developer Kit" ? Is there a youtube video, maybe? Do you know who I can look up? lol sorry. so many questions.  Thank you for helping me in advance I appreciate it. 

[Lovyi]

15 hours ago, Lindal Kidd said:

Hi, @Lovyi!  Welcome to SL, and kudos for wanting to create!

The easiest way to make things is with the in world building tools.  If you have zero experience with them, do this:

• Go to a place where you can rez things...a public sandbox, for example.
• Right click the ground, choose Build.  Your cursor changes to a magic wand.
• Click on the ground again.  A plywood cube magically appears!

The Ivory Tower Library of Primitives has a whole set of self-paced tutorials on using these building tools.

However...

Almost no one who makes things for sale uses these creation tools these days.  Everything is modeled in an external program and uploaded.  We call these items "mesh" to distinguish them from the older prim types of objects.  Blender is free, and very popular.  If you have a ton of money, Maya is also good.  Any 3D modeling program has a steep learning curve.  But the popular ones have loads of courses, tutorials, etc. to help you learn...just like for GIMP or Photoshop.

You will also need to have some skills with one of those programs too, to texture your models.  In fact, lots of creators buy untextured models from other creators, then texture them and re-sell the resulting products.

You can set up your Marketplace store at any time.  It's free.  But give some thought to it...each SL account can have one, and only one, Marketplace store.  Bear in mind, though, that you can have more than one SL account.  So you could have one account for your store, and your creating...and another one just for fun, or experimenting.

Thank you for The Tips and congratulating me on Finding something. lol. I think I downloaded Blender at one point. I will give it ago again. When I First downloaded it. I was trying to make "avatars" well, on here there called AO's  I Will get this.  (CHEERS)

[Lindal Kidd]

3 minutes ago, Lovyi said:

Thank you for The Tips and congratulating me on Finding something. lol. I think I downloaded Blender at one point. I will give it ago again. When I First downloaded it. I was trying to make "avatars" well, on here there called AO's  I Will get this.  (CHEERS)

No, an "AO" is an animation overrider.  It's a device that provides your avatar with different stands, sits, walks, and other animations.

[Lovyi]

8 minutes ago, Lindal Kidd said:

No, an "AO" is an animation overrider.  It's a device that provides your avatar with different stands, sits, walks, and other animations.

oh, The more I know Now I see it.😊 👍 cool

[Mollymews]

3 hours ago, Lovyi said:

 

How would I go about With makeup? I Bought the Cawta mesh head. where do I go to get the Mesh? would I be looking for "Developer Kit" ?

i don't have a Catwa head, but yes you need a developer kit to make appliers.  Most of the major head and body makers have their own websites where you can find out about their products

this said, more and more head and body makers are moving to Bake-On-Mesh.  Which is skin / tattoo layers that can be combined by the user/wearer.  To make tattoo layers then best to start with the classic avatar UV templates. Good versions of these can be found here:  https://www.robinwood.com/Catalog/Technical/SL-Tuts/SLPages/AVUVTemplates.html

 

Edited April 6, 2020 by Mollymews

[Skell Dagger]

On 4/6/2020 at 5:43 PM, Lovyi said:

I Bought the Cawta mesh head. where do I go to get the Mesh? would I be looking for "Developer Kit" ?

Depending on which Catwa head you bought (Bento or non-Bento) the developer kit will either be included in the head's folder (for the Bento heads) or free beside the head's ad board in the store (for non-Bento heads). It includes a notecard explaining how to use it.

[Lovyi]

(holding back my Excitement) Thank you😁 I am checking it out right now. WOOT! I want to party, going to be Learning Stuff TODAY!