[I don't know what you call it, how do I do this?]

Hey, so idk if anyone is still following this thread?

But to get a skin into the game, does it cost money? Even if you're just checking to see if it looks janky and where it needs fixing/improving? I don't understand it very well yet, lol. I'm still watching tutorials and such. I'm just a little confused. 

EDIT: I now see that 10 linden is like 5 cents lol so $5 American would go a long way but I'm still a bit confused. 

[Help, beginner stuff? (and rant)]

It's been a couple of years since I played and I have no idea what I'm doing at all. 😬

I'm trying to wear the Kemono body without missing parts or a missing HUD, but all of the instructions I find are full of terms I don't recognize anymore. Here's a screenshot of the card that came with it, but I have no idea what Object Detail (LOD) is, or "detatch and rez" on the ground? I remember vaguely doing something like that last time played a few years ago but I don't remember how to do it and I'm having trouble finding any helpful tutorials or instructions. I'm not even really sure what to google search for to help? Like what words? There are just so many terms I don't remember, this is so frustrating I could cry. Even the beginner tutorials on youtube assume you already know how to do some things and use terms without explaining them. 

Also, I remember there's a difference between "wear" and "add" but I don't remember what it is or which to press? 

I wish there were a directory of terms and definitions handy or something. I keep coming back to SL because I love this concept and the creativity is so cool but I feel like I need to devote two weeks of intensive study and sacrifice my first born whenever I want to play. I know SL is knowledge-heavy, I'm just frustrated because I would really like to interact with it in more of an occasional, casual way but I know it's not really meant for that. It's like wanting to interact with proper chocolate making in a casual, occasional way lol. It can be an intense, knowledge-heavy discipline and if you try to do it just for fun on a whim you will 100% end up crying at some point, let me tell you.  

TLDR: I could desperately use some decent beginner tutorials about wearing things and changing bodies? And any other newbie tutorials or advice, really. 

EDIT: I did end up getting the HUD up and I realized that the abdomen was just not selected for some reason? Avatar and HUD are both visible now. I'm still looking for some newbie tutorials and such though. 

[I don't know what you call it, how do I do this?]

8 hours ago, Maitimo said:

You won't be able to look at and re-colour anyone else's skins; one of the features of SL is that creators can control what other users do with their creations and skins are one of those things that nearly every creator limits. You can only use ones where creators have chosen to distribute their files, and these are very rare. That said - the furry community is keen on moddable content and Kemono is very popular with furries, so you will likely find more than you would if you were using a regular human body and skin.

Ahh okay. Thanks for cluing me in. 

[I don't know what you call it, how do I do this?]

5 hours ago, Mollymews said:

if you haven't found already

the link to the resources is contained in the notecard "- Textures and UV maps -" which is in the "Kemono - Bonus Items" box which comes with the body

Thanks! I never really got used to the SL controls and such. ^^'

[I don't know what you call it, how do I do this?]

6 hours ago, RitaCallisto said:

As the Kemono uses it's own custom UV map, the SL UV maps won't help you there. It'll take a bit of experimentation to figure out what is what on the map, but iirc from what I was told back when I first started SL, the Kemono uv map is from the side.. so the right side of the body will be the stomach, left will be the back. I suck at making sense, lol. I didn't end up going with Kemono, but some still use it.

I actually ended up finding a rar of the default skins, so I see what you mean! 

[I don't know what you call it, how do I do this?]

2 hours ago, Maitimo said:

As a starting point I would suggest downloading Eloh Eliot's PSDs - they are very old but still available here: https://sites.google.com/site/another/resources

You can open them in GIMP and you'll be able to see how skins are put together in layers (which makes modifying and adding to them much easier). Once you've got the hang of how they're arranged it's much easier  I've been experimenting with these myself to make body-mods that go with my pre-existing skins. At some point I'll get brave enough to actually make a whole one.

Orwar is right, the hardest part is the seams, especially where you have shading (under the arms for instance). Putting the shading and highlighting on separate layers and setting them to Multiply and Overlay helps ensure that the colour is consistent.  You need to use the template guides, which are included in Eloh's PSD files; they have a grid on them which is colour-coded at the seams, so you can tell where things need to match up. 

ETA: I just spotted you're using Kemono, in which case the Eloh Eliot skins won't fit. You'll need to find Kemono templates. But the principle will be the same so it's worth getting at least one to study.

Thanks! Do I just search "Kemono PSDs"? 

Also, I'm a bit confused. When you have a skin or a body that comes with one, can you not get to the files and see how they did it? Or are they not accessible? I used to paint stuff to use in sims games all the time, usually from in-game content or other people's mods. So I'm used to being able to export and recolor darn near anything lol. 

EDIT: I just peeked at the store. Apparently it came with UV maps! That's good news, now all I have to do is find them, ha.

[I don't know what you call it, how do I do this?]

22 minutes ago, Orwar said:

   Making avatar skins is 'as easy' as downloading the UV maps for the appropriate head and body type, and draw the skin on there, then uploading it into SL and putting the textures in a skin.

   For free software, I'd suggest Gimp.

   The hard part is . . . Well, skins being hard to paint, and getting it to look good around the seams in the UV maps. I'd suggest looking around YouTube for some tutorials on how UV maps in general work and the tricks for working with them, and then just trying things out as you go.

Thanks! I have the Kemono body and whatever head came with it, should I just Google "Kemono body UV map"? 

And heh yeah, I know it will probably look janky lol. It'll take some practice and maybe some better software eventually, if I really get into it.

Do people here tend to mind if I wanted to start out by just re-coloring the normal Kemono skin? Is that a thing that's possible to do? 

[I don't know what you call it, how do I do this?]

Hello, all. I tried getting into Second Life back in 2018 and it didn't really stick with me. I did buy some avatar stuff though, and I know it's possible to "customize" it. By that I mean, (you guys probably have a proper word or phrase for this) like, get the avatar skin (If that's what you call it?) or clothing items into photoshop or something similar and paint them differently. That's all I would really like to do, just mess around painting avatars lol. But because I don't know what doing that is called, I'm having trouble looking up how to do it. I'm finding some tutorials but they don't show where to find the files to edit in photoshop or how to see what it looks like on, once painted. 

Any advice is super appreciated! Also, if you can recommend any free software for doing this outside of photoshop, I'm always curious about stuff like that. :)

[Is the kemono body good for beginners?]

6 hours ago, Nalates Urriah said:

Things are changing. Probably this year a feature called Bakes On Mesh (BoM) will go live. This will allow us to hande mesh bodies very much like we handle classic bodies. So, you do not need to feel pressured to learn mesh modeling. What you know from the Sims will probably suffice.

So, learning how to make classic or aka 'system' clothes is a good first step. Basically making textures and adding them to system shirts, pants, whatever. No modeling required.

Also, to avoid 3D modeling you can buy full perm mesh kits. These let you upload, say a mesh skirt, included in the kit with textures you made from the included UVMap/template.

Kemono is up to you. I will warn that some region owners ban avatars wearing Kemono on sight. 

Thanks for letting me know, I had no idea! Sounds exciting. 

I would appreciate any tutorials for making textures if anyone knows any! I found a handful on my own, but the ones I've found are focusing on the photoshop aspects which already seem familiar enough to me. I need to know everything else, lol! Specifically, I don't know where the files would be found. Also, in Sims 2, we had something...I think it was called Body Shop if I remember correctly. It was an extra program apart from the Sims 2 that you could use to see what your clothes would look like before using them in the game. In video tutorials I was seeing people painting in photoshop in one window and then checking what it would look like in the game in another window but I don't know how they were doing that. It didn't seem like they were closing out of SL, editing in photoshop, and re-opening SL each time but I'm not really sure. Could have been the video editing? 

I guess you're uploading the mesh skirt form the kit? 

I'll definitely look into the forum topics about that. I was planning on being a somewhat childish looking avatar myself. Not particularly human, but more human-looking than furry-looking. I wasn't planning on looking sexual though, which was ironically part of why I was drawn to that body type. (I thought, surely! No chest, not even really human, I wouldn't have a problem! Oh well.) Should I be worried about the way I'll be perceived? 

6 hours ago, MegaRose said:

The Kemono huds are pretty simple and it has a lot of support, but nearly every human body mod is going to be incompatible. 

There are $1L bodies by eBody and free bodies by Altamura, none of them will let you retexture but they'll give you something to familiarize yourself with. 

For retexturing you can do that with the classic avatar until you get the hang of it.

For free furry bodies (which also have unique UV maps) you can also play around with the Happy Paws Cabbit, the Bladencat, and the Krankhaus Luxx.

Do you mean like, hair and clothes for humans or are there other mods? A lot of the hair I've seen on Kemono avatars so far looks like anime hairstyles. I was hoping to get something different. 

Are there things I should be familiar with about mesh bodies besides retexturing? 

Again, I would appreciate any very basic tutorials for retexturing! I've looked through tutorials for making skin specifically because that's one of the main things I'd like to do, but I'm having the same problems I mentioned above. 

Thanks for the advice about modding the Kemono. That sounds like it would have been and interesting discovery lol. 

Thanks, those are interesting! Can you switch the heads on these free bodies? Can you change or get rid of the tail? 

I hope I don't sound like an endless pit of questions! I appreciate the help from all of you. 

 

[Is the kemono body good for beginners?]

I've been playing Second Life for about a week. I really like the little feet and body shape of the kemono body and I think I'd like to get one, but I only understand about half of what I read about it because I'm still unfamiliar with a lot of the jargon here. I have some specific ideas about how I want to have my avatar, so I would like to be able to customize without getting in over my head. Would  this be a good starter body, or would it be too complicated for someone who's just starting out?  

For reference, I have some experience with modding for The Sims but I've only retextured things, I never learned about meshes. I needed to have a very, very basic understanding of meshes to be able to paint on them but that's all. Judging by the tutorials I've found so far, the retexturing process seems similar here but it's still all pretty mysterious to me lol.