Need avatar customization help

[Rowan Amore]

check your IM

[MandyOsho]

So, in case anyone is interested (okay if not lol) Rowan Amore was nice enough to walk me thru the absolute basics of putting the body, the head and the skin(s) together.

I'm checking out a few more vids in youtube that I saw, other than the one suggested previously. I am going to assess, looking at it from the pov of someone who doesn't know ANYthing about SL, whether they could actually manage to get thru the 50 some odd mouse clicks that Rowan walked me thru (click only on this, don't click on that, you don't need that, "upscaled" = HUD, blah blah blah) without being walked thru it, or with any/all of the available info there is out there.

I suspect that that will still be the case (highly improbable someone could just figure it out on their own). But I will check out those other videos.

Following that, I will put together my own instructional video which CAN take someone with no knowledge whatsoever of SL and show them how to change from their brand-new default avatar, to one that looks good. And then there will be at least ONE freaking video of that type in the universe.

(Unless one of those other vids does in fact show every detail of the process, step-by-step, in order, from start to finish. Then I'll admit that it was indeed out there.)

[Skell Dagger]

11 hours ago, MandyOsho said:

I will put together my own instructional video which CAN take someone with no knowledge whatsoever of SL and show them how to change from their brand-new default avatar, to one that looks good. And then there will be at least ONE freaking video of that type in the universe.

Speaking as someone who invests hours and hours creating fully illustrated (including shortform videos explaining specific steps) blog posts about this kind of thing (and yes, some of those posts can take days to write and re-write, fine-tuning them to be as understandable as possible to the widest possible range of people, from newbies to old hands to returnees who may not have encountered mesh at all to those who arrived during the applier era and have no idea what BoM is) I wish you luck in this venture.

I trust that you'll be covering the process for each major brand of mesh head and body? Because every one of them is different, and requires working in different ways.

Just a few minor examples among the myriad possibilities that need to be considered when you're creating a tutorial:

• BoM is enabled differently on each head and body, so you'd need to cover each major brand's way of enabling BoM (and even within the same brand there can be multiple methods for enabling BoM)
• why some heads and bodies will turn red and others turn invisible when BoM is used (this will tie further in to whether you can or can't use alpha layers under clothing with BoM; some bodies don't have that ability and you need to continue using the alpha cuts in the body's HUD), plus specific uses of alpha layers while working with BoM
• each combination of head and body brand can require different fitting at the neck, depending on which brands are being put together (and, again, there can be different fitting options within brands, e.g. Lelutka Evo and Evo X heads require a different neck fit with Maitreya than Lelutka Origins heads; the same with Catwa Bento and pre-Bento versus Catwa HDPRO, etc)
• the difference between basic mesh heads, Bento mesh heads, HD mesh heads (and the now-multiple variants of HD mesh heads, sometimes within the same brand) and how to work with each type
• understanding and use of appliers, both for HD and non-HD heads as well as bodies, and also the explanation of Omega and how it works

Then, obviously, there is the difference between male and female in all of this. What works for female heads and bodies may not work for male. The basics are usually the same, but the smaller (and often more important) details like neck fits? Nope.

Example: Would you know which version of the body in a Signature Gianni folder should be used with a Lelutka Evo head and which needs to be used with a Lelutka Origins head? Or what causes one specific and very common neck issue on Belleza Jake, and how to fix it?

Everything is so head/body specific that creating one single video that covers the putting-together of a full mesh avatar from start to finish is only going to be possible if you only cover the absolute basics and don't touch on the specifics of what mesh head or body is in use (for a caveat to that if you touch on the 'basics' of BoM/alphas, see the second bullet point in my above list), or if you say something like "This video works specifically for female avatars using Lelutka Origins heads and Maitreya Lara body" etc. Because if someone watches your video and they have Catwa HDPRO and Meshbody Legacy, or they have Genus Strong and Belleza Freya the advice that you give regarding neck fitting and enabling BoM will not help them.

Edited March 29, 2021 by Skell Dagger

[Chic Aeon]

12 minutes ago, Skell Dagger said:

Speaking as someone who invests hours and hours creating fully illustrated (including shortform videos explaining specific steps) blog posts about this kind of thing (and yes, some of those posts can take days to write and re-write, fine-tuning them to be as understandable as possible to the widest possible range of people, from newbies to old hands to returnees who may not have encountered mesh at all to those who arrived during the applier era and have no idea what BoM is) I wish you luck in this venture.

As someone who wrote instructional manuals in real life for a couple of decades I can "second" your comments. No matter how many times you rewrite SOMEONE won't understand. Too many words, not enough words -- too fast or too slow in video etc.  I went through your Catwa male head tutorial (and linked to it from my Queen blog post) and thought it was very clear and well thought out.  Granted I didn't change much from the default; my biggest issue was finding the BOM button which turns out to be RIGHT under where the closed panes go when minimized (well duh!).  But I found that with the help of your tutorial -- so it WORKS.  

 

There are also some body-head combos that are all in ones (I can think of three right off). There just isn't an EASY way to tackle this. It took me a day and a half and watching a few videos AND asking questions just to figure out how BOM works. NOW -- it seems simple. THEN it did not.  

 

It is a really tough road for the actually NEW folks. I figured that out this month when I went through the process of creating a new avatar (first in 7 or 8 years).  So people REALLY need to want to stay in SL.   We have talked about this for-e-ver and it doesn't look likely that it will ever change.

 

Happily there are folks like you -- and others -- who help out with knowledge.  Thanks. 

 

[MandyOsho]

Skell - I appreciate the intent of your sentiments (and your tutorials are very good btw), but I'm not that concerned about the aspect of all those variations. The primary intent of the video that I would make is not to address all of those. It would be to cover one or two basic combos of things (the only way I have even considered varying it would be to have everything else the same and show the use of a Lelutka head vs a Genus head, since those seem to be 2 of the most popular head choices at the moment, from what I gather).

The basic BIG issue I'm trying to address is that even me, someone who used SL for 10 years fairly extensively up until 2015 or 2016, when it came to creating a new account now and sitting there with one of the basic, default avatars, had NO CONCEPT WHATSOEVER what it took now, 6 years later, to simply accomplish the one task that most people will want to do the moment they get off of Orientation Island - ditching that default avatar and creating a nice-looking custom avatar. (Realize that the last time I did that was back in 2005!)

When it was me, I looked around a little bit, initially with the idea of just refreshing myself with some fundamentals, but noticed very quickly from looking at all the info out there that the process of creating avatars, shapes, bodies, heads etc etc seemed to have radically changed since 2016 (note that I did create several custom avatars back in 2015 time frame). And, when I tried to go through the process of replacing my default avatar with a custom one, even me, with a LOT of prior SL experience, couldn't make it happen.

So I got pretty frustrated about that, as you can imagine, but of course it also made me think, if **I** can't do what one would THINK should be a fairly straightforward and simple thing to do in a VR world that touts itself as being a great 'ol place for everyone to come on down to and do all manner of socializin' and schmoozin' - simply upgrading how good-looking your avatar is - then what chance would the average person who has never even seen SL before but wants to give it a try, have?

Not a very good chance, it seems to me. And given that, I thought of all those people who have tried over the last few years and will try over the next few years ad infinitum, and simply had no idea how to go about it because of its (as you so amply demonstrated in your post) almost ridiculous complexity?

And I thought, wouldn't it be great to at least cover the absolute basics - starting with ok y'all you need to 1) get yourself a body, 2) a body "skin", 3) a head, and 4) a head "skin"... and here, watch me go to some actual stores and what it looks like to buy all 4 of those things, and put them together. Yes, using one particular set of all of the possibilities, but at least the "noob" would be able to, by following the exact, detailed instructions for that particular set of those 4 components, see what the big picture is and how they fit together, ending up with a really (in the female case) pretty custom avatar.

Which would then give them a successful task under their belt, boosting their confidence, and giving them a good starting point for subsequently learning more of those different products, variations and combinations (not to mention having a pretty avatar). INSTEAD of not having a clue as how to even attempt creating a custom avatar, or in a lot of cases, I would wager, trying and miserably failing and saying, stuff this.

THAT'S the objective.

It's like when you have any other complicated thing that you want to teach someone and you start with the basics. Basics, which, in THIS particular case of Second Life custom avatar creation (unlike maybe some of those other complicated "thing" examples), are in and of ITSELF pretty gory and near impossible to grok by people who are absolute beginners.

What is needed for the absolute beginner, especially, if you want to look at that way, is a limited amount of information to start, but yet that are complete, comprehensive, start to finish, detailed (every single step, every single mouse click) instructions accompanied with a sprinkling of concepts and general-idea-here-is-what-is-happening, "quick start" or "fast path" video that they can follow along with to SUCCESSFULLY create a custom avatar. That even someone who has never seen SL before might at least have a shot at actually following and completing, instead of miserably failing trying to figure it out on their own.

And as far as what Chic said (hi Chic!), I think it is entirely possible to create a limited-option, quickstart type of video showing that (purposely) limited scenario click by click, and that there would be many people who would be able to follow along. Of course I'll make the observations about, hey I'm using the default SL viewer. There are other viewers and if you decide to use one of those, you may not be able to get this tutorial successfully. Blah blah. But the point is that, with any software or tutorial about software one can only do the best that one can do.

And my contention is that the LACK of a video of the type I am describing is NOT doing the best that can be done for SL noobies. Now of course such a video needs to be kept current such that if things change in SL that invalidate specific instructions in the video (remembering it's limited focus, for one thing, but...) I am willing to sign on to review my video several times a month to make sure that I make any edits to it in accordance with such changes.

Will THAT turn out to be too big a job to deal with on an ongoing basis? Hopefully not. But even if that did happen and I gave up on it after awhile and even pulled the video, at least it would have helped a lot of people get over that initial hump in SL while it was up.

End of book

Edited March 29, 2021 by MandyOsho

[MandyOsho]

30 minutes ago, MandyOsho said:

(the only way I have even considered varying it would be to have everything else the same and show the use of a Lelutka head vs a Genus head, since those seem to be 2 of the most popular head choices at the moment, from what I gather)

Aha. Just got some advice from someone who is fairly knowledgeable, with respect to the Genus heads. Won't go into detail about that advice, but in any case I'm canning that idea and keeping the video even simpler from the standpoint of just showing the usage of the Lelutka head.

Edited March 29, 2021 by MandyOsho

[karenx0]

On 3/29/2021 at 12:18 AM, MandyOsho said:

I went away from SL for 4-5 years after having used it a lot for at least 10 years before that. And I'm starting over with a new account and avatar and I wanted to create myself one of those absolutely beautiful looking female avatars I see running around all over the place.

And I must confess that I find it completely impossible to figure out how to do anything. I remember that it was difficult to figure out how to buy and wear avatar shapes/skins and accessories back in circa 2006 or so, but not completely impossible the way it seems now.

I have come to the conclusion that I just need to have someone walk me through both the shopping process (what shops actually have the best / most beautiful avatars/shapes?) and the entire avatar customization process, or I will just give up on SL at this point. But I have noticed in a few other discussions that I researched, that whenever someone asks for personal help/teaching like this, there seems to be a lot of people who jump all over the person asking ("you need to learn how to do it yourself" blah blah blah).

Honestly, I just want to establish a really pretty-looking avatar and then I'll probably never even change it again (when I took a break from SL before after 10 years, I had an avatar that I had been using for about the last 9 years of that 10 years, that I was completely happy with and never changed). And if I DO need to change one or two small aspects of the overall look, maybe THAT will at least not be beyond my intellectual capacity 

So the question becomes, is there anyone out there who is an expert at how to put together a great looking female avatar? I will pay $10,000 lindens/hour for someone to spend up to a couple of hours working with me in real time via zoom screensharing to get this done. Otherwise (after buying something from one shop and having no freaking clue as to what to do next) I will probably just give up on my reboot of SL.

If I should be putting this request in the classified ads section of SL rather than in here, I apologize.

Mandy

I will help you out, you don't have to pay lindens to me  Let me IM you in-world.

[Kathlen Onyx]

Perhaps making a video for the very basics could be a good thing however, the video I posted walks you though the very basics IMO.  You had said that you didn't watch it all because you knew how to do the things in the beginning of the video, yet you didn't even know what ways there were to unpack a box.  What I would warn against is trying to make a educational video for absolute new people with the knowledge that you possess now.  You have some very basic knowledge of how to put together a mesh avatar however you are missing very important details in your understanding of how it all works and I think it will just confuse people more.  As Skell pointed out it's not as easy as just getting a body, head, skin and shape. What about only just having a mesh body and not a head? You can go mesh for the body and keep your head as classic as well.  

If you had even bothered to look you would know that there are a plethora of videos from the very basic to the very complicated already out there.  I'm actually a bit surprised someone who had been in SL for 10 years before and only left for four years didn't retain a lot of the information you are saying you don't understand. 

Maybe it's really not a noobie issue but a you issue.  After all most avatar I see in-world managed to get out of their noobie look rather quickly.  

What you are proposing is already out there 10 times over. You just have to look.

[Quistess Alpha]

maybe you have the patience and time to sift through a 2 hour video in a loose conversational style, but I certainly don't. a 10-20 minute video (or series of videos) that's well scripted and concise would add a lot of value IMO. I'm not really the intended audience though (technical enough to be able to read the poorly written manuals and or just try everything until I understand what it does)  . . .

[MandyOsho]

10 hours ago, Sam1 Bellisserian said:

Perhaps making a video for the very basics could be a good thing however, the video I posted walks you though the very basics IMO.  You had said that you didn't watch it all because you knew how to do the things in the beginning of the video, yet you didn't even know what ways there were to unpack a box.  What I would warn against is trying to make a educational video for absolute new people with the knowledge that you possess now.  You have some very basic knowledge of how to put together a mesh avatar however you are missing very important details in your understanding of how it all works and I think it will just confuse people more.  As Skell pointed out it's not as easy as just getting a body, head, skin and shape. What about only just having a mesh body and not a head? You can go mesh for the body and keep your head as classic as well.  

If you had even bothered to look you would know that there are a plethora of videos from the very basic to the very complicated already out there.  I'm actually a bit surprised someone who had been in SL for 10 years before and only left for four years didn't retain a lot of the information you are saying you don't understand. 

Maybe it's really not a noobie issue but a you issue.  After all most avatar I see in-world managed to get out of their noobie look rather quickly.  

What you are proposing is already out there 10 times over. You just have to look.

Hi Sam, I think you have a lot of things wrong in terms of how you assess what my experience is. Not sure what the box thing is about, I'm pretty familiar with that. Maybe you misinterpreted something I said.

In any case, you seem to have a pretty negative and hostile attitude in relation to what I'm trying to do where my only motivation and goal is to produce something that will help what I suspect is many new SL users who are unable to either initially, or in a lot of cases probably, even in a longer term, figure out how to make themselves a really good looking custom avatar, or at least a first version of something that looks amazing compared to their initial default avatar.

I would disagree on a couple of points, first I honestly think that more people have a lot of trouble with this. Do I have proof? No. It's not like I have conducted a scientific survey, or a marketing survey or a focus group exercise blah blah. I'm just basing my feeling about this on my own experience. I imagine a scenario in which Linden Labs did conduct a focus group exercise where they took 10 random people (but who expressed some interest in learning a VR game) and put them in front of computers, had them sign up for Second Life, then after they have finished the exercises on Orientation Island, said to them, "OK now we're going to have you create yourself a custom avatar so that you don't have to tool around with this really basic default avatar. But we want to see how you do trying to figure that out on your own. So go ahead and use everything at your disposal - google search, youtube, all the help facilities within SL, etc but you can't have someone, such as your fellow students here, or other people you could contact online, help you in real time. We might suggest you start by googling the phrase "Second Life custom avatar" and doing ctrl-f within SL and searching for "avatars". Ready, go!"

And the focus group starts Monday morning and goes from 9am to 5pm the whole week. Then, on Friday afternoon, the focus group leader goes around to each student and sees how much progress they've made. I'd be willing to bet that at most 5 or 6 of the group would have been able to figure out how to actually create a good-looking custom avatar. And, most importantly, that there would be 3 or 4 of the group that would have "tapped out" at some point and completely given up.

That 30 to 40 percent of the people is who I'm targeting what I'm doing to.

"After all most avatar I see in-world managed to get out of their noobie look rather quickly." On this particular point I just wanted to make the observation, yes but how many people do you not see who are no longer in SL because they gave up trying to create their custom avatars and quit SL?  : )

I also disagree that there is something exactly like what I am going to produce, already out there. But we will have a really good metric for that after I actually get it done and you are able to check it out. Sometimes it's hard to see what someone is aiming at doing, and if I haven't done a good enough job of explaining it I apologize. We each of us forget that people can't read our minds and see all the little cogs turning.

If I didn't mention it before, yes I have bothered to look for other youtube videos. There are a handful that do something similar to this but I just feel that I can make a more comprehensive and detailed, yet still concise and focused version of this type of thing that is much better than what is out there already. In addition to being in the tech industry, I have done a fair amount of actual classroom teaching on the side at the community college / tech school level; there is a real art to producing an instructional video/tutorial for stuff like this and I think I'm really good at that (have done some other youtube videos in the past on some tech topics).

In any case, I'm going to continue with this effort because I think I will be able to provide something of value to a goodly number of people. One interesting thing that has happened already is that I have found while pursuing this particular goal I actually have boosted my existing knowledge of SL a lot. That's been nice (something that always happens when you decide to teach any topic, of course). And I've gotten some great help from a couple of people so far, Rowan and Laurel. Kudos to them.

[Kathlen Onyx]

 

[Quistess Alpha]

21 minutes ago, Sam1 Bellisserian said:

Hour and a half long rambling video

maybe there's good info in there, but it's not professional and she's literally receiving help from her livestream while she's explaining. the problem isn't that the info doesn't exist, it's that a lot of people can't parse this sort of thing. people learn in different ways, and what might work fine for you might not work well for someone else.

FWIW if I wanted to get a person to mesh quickly I'd hand them my Ruth2 RC#3 set to bom, and get them to right click - replace current outfit.

[MandyOsho]

Yeah video  uaAKjx0DkYg  isn't bad. As Quistessa noted, could be a bit more focused. Covers a lot of good info though.

I found 2 other videos that I would recommend (other than the one that I might upload at some point : )

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_EpJ4Buqhbk

Of all 3 I'm listing here, that one (_EpJ4Buqhbk) is probably the best in terms of the way the author presents the info.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VdZm93R_U0s

That one is not bad. I love that the author has a very pleasing personality - a very important thing to me just as an aside. However, drawbacks of that video as I see it is that its oriented a bit towards more knowledgeable SL users and with the goal of scrimping on L$. My video will not be concerned with how much L$ are being spent, and instead is purposely oriented with creating a really pretty avatar with cost being no object. I'm sure that aspect of it will rankle some people but the logic is thus: to get a really high-end beautiful look, you'll spend $50-60 USD total maybe. As opposed to spending $10-20 while being focused on spending as little money as possible. I would say, if you really want to tool around in SL for years with a high-end looking avatar, at least for me it's worth a one time up front $60 cost rather than $20. (Especially when you consider the fact that everyone routinely spends anywhere from $40-100 every month just on their cell phones!)

And, for all 3 of the above videos: they all use the genus head. This is why at one point I mentioned earlier that I thought about having two sections in my video, one for the Lelutka head and one for the Genus head. I had already gone through the learning process with Rowan on the Lelutka head and created my avatar's initial version of body/head/skins using it (that I am totally happy with), and then as I was researching saw everybody and their sister using the Genus head.

But now I think it will be just fine to stick with what I've got for my video because it also seems as if the Lelutka head and Legacy body (none of the above 3 videos use the Legacy body either) are fairly popular options. Note that In a way it is quasi-addressing the critiques in terms of, well, you're only doing one combination of components (which these other videos could be criticized about that too, couldn't they?). I.e., I would be adding to the "tutorial video ecosystem" the combination of Lelutka head and Legacy body, which I don't see in any other tutorial videos. And, **I** have already accomplished my own personal goal of creating a beautiful body/head/skins and I really don't even have any interest in taking the time to learn how the Genus head works or any other body. Remember that my goal - like a lot of people who try out SL, I would expect - is not to become an SL guru, but to just get an attractive, polished avatar created and then go hang out and chat and go shopping for clothes with my friends in SL. That's it. Yes I'm taking time to work on this super-duper tutorial video of mine but beyond that, that's all Mandy is going to be up to in SL.

The point still being that my video will be very carefully constructed and tightly focused to being appropriate for people starting without any pre-existing knowledge of SL. After successfully getting through my video, they'll have a glimpse of the "big picture" if you will, and if they then wanted to plow their way through these other videos (perhaps to switch their Lelutka head for a Genus head, for instance), they should totally have the base of knowledge to accomplish that.

**

One final word before I leave this discussion and go about my bidness.

A persistent problem in the tech industry is that people who are tasked with producing tutorial/instructional material about complex subjects, vary widely in their ability to do so, for one reason and one reason only: as an instructor, one needs to have the ability to perform a kind of Jedi mind trick and erase the part of their brain that contains the knowledge that they are trying to teach, so that they can analyze every sentence that comes out of their mouth for how it sounds to someone who doesn't know the subject.

Now that might sound elementary to some people, and really difficult to others. But I tend to think that people who are really good teachers/instructors have a kind of natural talent for doing that. IOW it's one of those kinds of things that would be hard to just teach someone how to do.

The second problem is that whether with people who are tasked with producing tutorial/instructional material, or just anyone who is trying to help someone learn something (or someone who is commenting on the topic of people learning something), it is a fairly common aspect of human nature that once someone already knows some topic really well, it becomes really hard for them to do something like the mind-wipe thing, to go back in time and put themselves in the shoes of someone who knows nothing about that topic.

Now I've met a lot of co-workers over the years that were great at explaining stuff about anything to anyone right off the cuff. But we've all also met a lot of people - software developers are famous for this - who are pretty much completely incapable of explaining a technical topic to other developers even, much less technical info to non-technical end users. The type of syndrome where they know it all and it becomes impossible - or, in many cases, they don't have the patience - for them to put themselves in the shoes of someone who doesn't know what they're talking about and teach it to them step by step starting from a state of zero knowledge.

This is something I have specialized in doing many times within company environments and in formal teaching environments. Wanna have a challenging experience? Try teaching a mixed class of 19 - 50 something year old adult learners, who have no prior computer programming experience, Programming Fundamentals in C++ 101. In a night class from 6pm to 9pm, after they've worked a full day of work at their regular jobs. It takes a lot, presenting the material in a particular way, just to keep those students awake, much less teach them a very challenging technical topic in a way that they will understand it.

So just a bit more info on why I think I can do what I am talking about here and produce a video which will add value to the info that is already out there.

At this point I will adjourn from this discussion. Latest news is that it may take considerably longer for me to get this project done, because I was on a sort of break for awhile, but a new job just popped out of the woodwork unexpectedly and I start full time on it on Monday 4/6.

Everyone take care and be well.

Mandy

[karenx0]

6 hours ago, MandyOsho said:

Yeah video  uaAKjx0DkYg  isn't bad. As Quistessa noted, could be a bit more focused. Covers a lot of good info though.

I found 2 other videos that I would recommend (other than the one that I might upload at some point : )

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_EpJ4Buqhbk

Of all 3 I'm listing here, that one (_EpJ4Buqhbk) is probably the best in terms of the way the author presents the info.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VdZm93R_U0s

That one is not bad. I love that the author has a very pleasing personality - a very important thing to me just as an aside. However, drawbacks of that video as I see it is that its oriented a bit towards more knowledgeable SL users and with the goal of scrimping on L$. My video will not be concerned with how much L$ are being spent, and instead is purposely oriented with creating a really pretty avatar with cost being no object. I'm sure that aspect of it will rankle some people but the logic is thus: to get a really high-end beautiful look, you'll spend $50-60 USD total maybe. As opposed to spending $10-20 while being focused on spending as little money as possible. I would say, if you really want to tool around in SL for years with a high-end looking avatar, at least for me it's worth a one time up front $60 cost rather than $20. (Especially when you consider the fact that everyone routinely spends anywhere from $40-100 every month just on their cell phones!)

And, for all 3 of the above videos: they all use the genus head. This is why at one point I mentioned earlier that I thought about having two sections in my video, one for the Lelutka head and one for the Genus head. I had already gone through the learning process with Rowan on the Lelutka head and created my avatar's initial version of body/head/skins using it (that I am totally happy with), and then as I was researching saw everybody and their sister using the Genus head.

But now I think it will be just fine to stick with what I've got for my video because it also seems as if the Lelutka head and Legacy body (none of the above 3 videos use the Legacy body either) are fairly popular options. Note that In a way it is quasi-addressing the critiques in terms of, well, you're only doing one combination of components (which these other videos could be criticized about that too, couldn't they?). I.e., I would be adding to the "tutorial video ecosystem" the combination of Lelutka head and Legacy body, which I don't see in any other tutorial videos. And, **I** have already accomplished my own personal goal of creating a beautiful body/head/skins and I really don't even have any interest in taking the time to learn how the Genus head works or any other body. Remember that my goal - like a lot of people who try out SL, I would expect - is not to become an SL guru, but to just get an attractive, polished avatar created and then go hang out and chat and go shopping for clothes with my friends in SL. That's it. Yes I'm taking time to work on this super-duper tutorial video of mine but beyond that, that's all Mandy is going to be up to in SL.

The point still being that my video will be very carefully constructed and tightly focused to being appropriate for people starting without any pre-existing knowledge of SL. After successfully getting through my video, they'll have a glimpse of the "big picture" if you will, and if they then wanted to plow their way through these other videos (perhaps to switch their Lelutka head for a Genus head, for instance), they should totally have the base of knowledge to accomplish that.

**

One final word before I leave this discussion and go about my bidness.

A persistent problem in the tech industry is that people who are tasked with producing tutorial/instructional material about complex subjects, vary widely in their ability to do so, for one reason and one reason only: as an instructor, one needs to have the ability to perform a kind of Jedi mind trick and erase the part of their brain that contains the knowledge that they are trying to teach, so that they can analyze every sentence that comes out of their mouth for how it sounds to someone who doesn't know the subject.

Now that might sound elementary to some people, and really difficult to others. But I tend to think that people who are really good teachers/instructors have a kind of natural talent for doing that. IOW it's one of those kinds of things that would be hard to just teach someone how to do.

The second problem is that whether with people who are tasked with producing tutorial/instructional material, or just anyone who is trying to help someone learn something (or someone who is commenting on the topic of people learning something), it is a fairly common aspect of human nature that once someone already knows some topic really well, it becomes really hard for them to do something like the mind-wipe thing, to go back in time and put themselves in the shoes of someone who knows nothing about that topic.

Now I've met a lot of co-workers over the years that were great at explaining stuff about anything to anyone right off the cuff. But we've all also met a lot of people - software developers are famous for this - who are pretty much completely incapable of explaining a technical topic to other developers even, much less technical info to non-technical end users. The type of syndrome where they know it all and it becomes impossible - or, in many cases, they don't have the patience - for them to put themselves in the shoes of someone who doesn't know what they're talking about and teach it to them step by step starting from a state of zero knowledge.

This is something I have specialized in doing many times within company environments and in formal teaching environments. Wanna have a challenging experience? Try teaching a mixed class of 19 - 50 something year old adult learners, who have no prior computer programming experience, Programming Fundamentals in C++ 101. In a night class from 6pm to 9pm, after they've worked a full day of work at their regular jobs. It takes a lot, presenting the material in a particular way, just to keep those students awake, much less teach them a very challenging technical topic in a way that they will understand it.

So just a bit more info on why I think I can do what I am talking about here and produce a video which will add value to the info that is already out there.

At this point I will adjourn from this discussion. Latest news is that it may take considerably longer for me to get this project done, because I was on a sort of break for awhile, but a new job just popped out of the woodwork unexpectedly and I start full time on it on Monday 4/6.

Everyone take care and be well.

Mandy

Hey Mandy, if you are still struggling with it, let me help you out. I will sit with you, and explain and answer all of your questions regarding the upgrade. You don't have to pay me anything, I just want to help you from the bottom of my heart 😄 I have sent you an IM in-world, if you haven't received it, you can IM @karenx0  😄 And don't listen to people if they call you a noob or something, everyone was a noob at some point of time, heck there are people with 15+ years in SL but still doesn't know most of it, and then there are people with only 6 months or 1 year, and they know most of it. Plus there's a first time for everything. If they calling you noob, it's okay to be a noob, you get to learn and experience about it in a new way, so you help out the next generation as well =D

[Kathlen Onyx]

On 3/30/2021 at 10:18 PM, MandyOsho said:

That one is not bad. I love that the author has a very pleasing personality - a very important thing to me just as an aside. However, drawbacks of that video as I see it is that its oriented a bit towards more knowledgeable SL users and with the goal of scrimping on L$. My video will not be concerned with how much L$ are being spent, and instead is purposely oriented with creating a really pretty avatar with cost being no object. I'm sure that aspect of it will rankle some people but the logic is thus: to get a really high-end beautiful look, you'll spend $50-60 USD total maybe. As opposed to spending $10-20 while being focused on spending as little money as possible. I would say, if you really want to tool around in SL for years with a high-end looking avatar, at least for me it's worth a one time up front $60 cost rather than $20. (Especially when you consider the fact that everyone routinely spends anywhere from $40-100 every month just on their cell phones!)

 

This avatar pic was posted in another thread. Maybe it's just me but I find her look to be very high end and beautiful and the cost was FREE. Not saying that spending more $L won't get you a high end avatar but it CAN be done without spending a dime. (in case any newbies are reading this and thinking that a nice avatar can't be done without spending money)

 

Edited April 1, 2021 by Sam1 Bellisserian
Added thoughts