Janet Voxel

Wow! That looks really awesome! I’m really tempted to get it just because of how photogenic it looks.

The best thing to do is to have the kit available to grab right from the mainstore. I don't know why some creators make this hard and have to go through a weird process just to get a kit. Successful creators make kits freely available. Often it's not the creator you have to deal with to get the kit, its another content creator who may or may not be the best content creator and it's in their best interests for competition NOT to have the kit. This happened to me years ago with a Slink CSR. 1) It streamlines the process and you don't have to wait for someone to be online and review your application. 2) Only people that want to make something would even be interested in the kit, so why not just let them?

The amount of choices are OK for Belleza. The problem usually lies with events like fairs. There’s been a couple times I went to a big fair like Collabor8 and 90% of the clothing was only for Maitreya. Usually though I don’t have that problem but it has happened. There are a couple of designers that I can’t wear because they are maitreya exclusive. Emory, Erratic and Foxes come to mind. But they all make things I can find elsewhere, so I do. The designer in me understands why so many designers only make clothing for one or two bodies. If you’re designing clothing by yourself modeling and rigging one item is time consuming enough. Let alone making adjustments for two or more other bodies, burnout is on the horizon. And let’s face it, putting out new items is how you stay relevant in SL. So I think designers stick with the popular choice. There are some fairs like one of those Fantasy fairs, the costumes are almost always for Maitreya. So you know what? I stopped going to those. And you know what else? Those fairs that cater to one body never seem as full as the other ones that cater to all the bodies. I think designers have keyed in on that for the most part. I think surveys have started this problem. One thing about surveys is they never take a sample of all of SL. They take a sample of people that tend to read blogs and those users tend to wear Maitreya because most bloggers tend to wear it. I blame surveys for this situation to begin with.

Ah ok, I got you.

I didn’t know we could list stores or I would have. I think since the op is a novice at avi making they should start with a shape. Since redbone can mean anything from light skinned black woman to mixed black woman there’s a lot of looks they could do. I can’t think of that many shape makers off hand, but the one that I do remember is Unified. Unified does shapes for all of the major bodies: maitreya, slink and Belleza. The only thing is her style cards don’t really tell you which skin she used, but op would have a good basis to work with and skin choice can really alter an avatar’s appearance. As far as skins, Itgirls is definitely a good choice. There’s also The Skinnery, Insol, Pumec, Milan. There are a lot of lesser known skin makers that make good skins for a redbone. As for bodies, I’d suggest Slink Hourglass or Belleza Freya. Those two would probably allow for what I think OP is looking for in a body type. Theres a thousand bloggers op could look at for style. I’d suggest someone like Volupturaptor Pearl or Coco Ranks. Its hard helping someone with their avi when you aren’t sure what they want. But OP should have a lot of choices from these suggestions. Good luck!

You guys are something else. Op’s post is a little confusing, but looking at the tags they’re talking about Redbone= a light skinned black woman. Op my suggestion is to look on market place for a shape and face you like, pick one that says it has a style card. Use the style card as your guide. Also be aware of what kind head they’re using too or if they’re using a mesh head at all. But a good shape maker will tell you what skin They used in the style card. The description should tell you what kind of body the shape is for.