Tips for an aspiring designer?

[Rose Bomse]

Ok, I'm trying to get into designing and I have some really great ideas running through my mind, and I thought it would be easy to incorporate those ideas into Second Life, I was wrong T_T I can't do it I simply can't! I've made a few ok dresses, but there not worth ANYTHING I have a little box thing a friend gave me that rezzes the pieces of a flexi skirt so I'm set for that, but I'm not very good at getting textures!

I've tried doing like dresses that are already made in RL and put them onto a template I can't seem to get them right, their the right size, ish, but the damn rainbow lines or whatever, I can't get it to cover them! 

Any tips? I need help :S Also, how can I get design's I have in my mind and put it into second life, since their not already there I don't know how to do it...

[Ry0ta Exonar]

If you've not checked these pages yet,

http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Clothes_design_starter_tips

http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Clothing_Tutorials

You might want to check also related links on them.

[Poenald Palen]

You might like programs that allow you to paint onto the avatar mesh. There are also might like the warp or liquid rescale tools...I can't remember what these are called in PS or paint shop pro. Uh, stuff to warp stuff! I mean, stretch it and line it up with the lines you see in the templates. The templates you can get from chip midnight or Robin soujourner...wow, those names are not spelled right are they? Uh, yeah, you will see them in the tutorials lol.

Pluys, some don't mention painting on the av. There is a program made by a person here that sort of does this. You can use blender for this, I think Domino Marama has a file that is paintable and has the UV maps sort of made for this. But this is a learning curve! it is not so easy as simply loading and clicking a clone brush. You need to project from view the UV and then paint from the image you have onto one of the layers and have this translate it to the SL meshes arrangement....I reccomend blender cookie for projection painting tutorial video if you take this route. Since I can't remember how I did it I can't help much more than pointing to those. But all I got was lines, I was experimenting lol. I paint up parts for stuff and you know it still waves a bit. I can fix some of it with a warp tool in gimp, but sort of didn't mind a bit of it. For clothes though...I imagine you would want to be more critical about it and fix as much as you can. Uh....wow, strange..It is hard to explain projection painting in blender. But tutorials will help you more than me babling here.

[Rose Bomse]

Oh I get that now! But what if I have like a shirt with some sort of hole in it if you get what I mean

EDIT: I made this, it's not to good but it came out alright 

[Lyra Blackthorne]

There are many tutorials and links to a few have already been provided here.

I have also found some on youtube.

In search-events-education you might want to take some of the building, scripting and texuring classes

[Mylar]

as others have said, do tutorials......lots of tutorials. Also keep in mind that your first two dozen or so outfits are going to suck. It's just a fact, make them and get them out of the way.

Don't start with full outfits, start with something simple, like t-shirts. Make lots of t-shirts, then move on to pants or what ever, get some experience under your belt that you can draw on later.

Learn your tools. whether you're using photoshop or gimp, learn how the tool works. Do some tutorials that aren't specifically SL related.

Learn to be self critical. When you create an outfit, ask yourself if you would buy this if you saw it in a shop. If the answer is no, make it better.

Check out the top designers in SL. Look at what they've done. Try to see how they solved the problems you'll likely face. Don't try to copy their style, but try to copy their techniques.

Stick with it. Don't give up after a failure. Some of my best products are the result of a string of failures.

Good luck, I look forward to see your future creations :matte-motes-big-grin:

[Rolig Loon]

Things have become a bit more confusing since the Building forum and the Texturing forum were merged. Then this Fashion forum was added to the mix of Creation forums, so it's not clear at all where to look for help any more.  :smileysad:  If you are just starting out with texturing -- which is 90% of clothing design -- one of the best resources is the set of sticky threads that used to be at the head of the Texturing forum.  You can still read them at http://forums-archive.secondlife.com/109/1.html , but you can't add anything.  They are full of timeless basic information about file formats and sizes, transparency, and handy tips for using Photoshop or other graphics programs.  If you have questions as you try things out, I'd suggest posting them in the Building & Texturing forum.

BTW, I think the #1 best way to get good at making SL clothes (other than having native talent, which would help a lot) is to just keep at it.  I started making clothes over 4 years ago and was rotten at it.  I don't think I sold more than a dozen dresses in my first shop.  I'm still no super designer, but 4 years of practice have taught me a lot and given me a steady if small income ..... and I've had a lot of fun.

[Chelsea Malibu]

Looks like you already have a good start and I like the retro dress.  One thing you will never get right just because no one can are skirts therefore, I'd stay clear of skirt layers and think sculpts instead.

But given what I see here and your drive, you have arrived.  Now you just practice, practice and practice more.  Get some good shadows layers on Marketplace as they will make life much easier and perhaps some sculpt maps for attachments.

If I could show you some of the things I made when I first started, you'd probably not believe I made them as they sucked so bad compared to what I do today but I think most of us where pretty bad back then. 

However,  back then we just got attachable prims, did not have sculpts and the graphics system was no where near where it is today.

And, I used to walk 4 miles in the snow with only a hot potato to keep me warm that I then ate for lunch.  OK, the last part of sort of embellished on but good luck, you will be a good designer in time.

 

[Melita Magic]

That's very cute!

I sure wouldn't mind some tips from people, also. For instance, what programs that allow painting onto the avatar mesh? Can we also download the skirt from the system edit box, and what about making sculpts and shoes?

Has anyone tried painting skins onto the avatar mesh? Which program do you use?

It's great when people share the little tips and tricks they found along the way, but I can understand why some people wouldn't want to share those. The types of things that Natalia shares in The Mermaid Diaries. She goes into step by step detail and it's so much better than fumbling around.

[SadieRose Beaumont]

AV painter is great! Here: https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/AvPainter-SL-Clothes-Design-and-Preview-Tool-Full-Version/166800

Invaluable in using to create clothing! 

As far as textures go, you want all textures seamless, I use this: http://www.imagelys.com/ along with offset in photoshop and a redfield plugin filter that is free, here: http://www.redfieldplugins.com/filterSeamlessWorkshop.htm

The one best tip is to really learn the program you are using to create, photoshop or gimp or whichever you use. There are scads of free tutorials on these programs and once you get down the basics, it is fun!

SOMA has modules to start designing that are free, but continuing clothing modules are $$lindens cost.

Slurl: http://slurl.com/secondlife/Boudoir%20Isle/165/198/752

Website: http://www.somaschoolofdesign.com/

Waves @ Rose!