Ivanova Shostakovich

I've learned that I won't actually go insane if I don't have periods of time wherein I can be truly alone. However, I did just get some over-ear, noise canceling headphones that I often use for SL and/or listening to music. More data may be necessary.

BoM bakes all the currently worn system skin, system underwear, system clothing, and system tattoos into one set of flat textures, which are then applied to a mesh body and/or head. The system avatar body is then hidden by the baking service, obviating the need for wearing alphas. In fact, wearing alpha layers interferes with the process. It might help to think of that this way: The baking service needs to see the system avatar textures, if it can't, because alpha layers hide it, then it can't bake those textures for the mesh avatar. The usefulness of BoM is going to depend on the user, and their particular needs. If one has an older system avatar skin that they really like, and its creator is not producing an applier, BoM allows them to apply that skin to their mesh body. Similarly, if one has tattoos that are not being updated with appliers by their creator(s) One can have them on their mesh body through BoM. I found it to be very helpful when trying mesh head demos. It had been very difficult to judge whether a particular mesh head model would achieve a look similar to what I had settled into over the years. Having a BoM enabled demo head allowed me to tweak the shape with my skin, my face, applied to it, allowing a fast and relatively easy demo process. BoM does exactly what it's supposed to. That being said, there are some disadvantages. The baked textures will be applied to the skin layer of the mesh body, following all its curves, just as system clothing fits the system avatar and very much unlike mesh clothing. There are some body manufactures providing additional adjunct attachments with their bodies now that mitigate this problem, applying the textures instead to surfaces that bridge gaps, and/or other body features. Additionally, there is a small amount a variation in the UV mapping between the various bodies and heads, relative to the system body UV map. Another benefit to BoM that I use is applying certain underwear types. Mesh bodies have layers witch accept the textures of underwear, tattoos, and clothing articles. When I have tried wearing both an underwear layer and, for instance, a separate pair of stockings on a clothing layer, the two interfere with each other, blanking one out entirely, or making the other partially disappear. BoM stockings, applied by the baking service, become part of a non-alpha texture, thus obviating the problem. Anyway, I've been writing this for a bit, and I have plans I must go attend to. I hope all this helps.

Many hugs Maddy. You continue to be in my thoughts.

I was shoe shopping a few days ago. There was one shop wherein almost all the vendor images for the different shoes displayed the bottom halves of models in undies. Just shoes and undies. I found it distracting, and not in a good way. What's wrong with having jeans or at least shorts on them? I got fairly annoyed by it and left before I'd seen everything. Maybe it's just me, or maybe I'm more easily annoyed by everything just lately.

Just playing around with color and new clothes.

When I still had only my first daughter, and she was almost three, I was invited to attend a school musical in which the daughter of some friends was participating. Her parents were both unable to attend that time due to work. So I went, to represent. I had to spend a little time in the school office when I arrived, to get checked in. As soon as I sat in one of the visitor/waiting chairs, holding my daughter in my lap, I looked across from me. A dad was sitting there with his kid. The poor girl. She had a cold and had green gunk plastered all over her lower face. The guy was just sitting there, seemingly oblivious and doing nothing to clean her up. Two thoughts then dominated my brain as I waited, battling for supremacy. The first one was, 'Please don't want to get down and play with my kid. Please oh please... don't'. The second thought, as I occasionally glanced back at the dad, who was staring blankly at the wall, was, 'What... in the hell is wrong with you?'

Nope. Now, other people's avatars....

The things I gotta do to get a drink around here...

I feel ok. It was nice to get out of the house today. In the park, 22 kids came to my bus and got sack lunches. It helps me to be able to do something.

Costs kisses

This is so nice! I can almost hear the wind in the tall sedges. It's a feel-good photo.

Hawt!!

"There stood the lovely Matti, in shades of cotton candy"

I picked up this frock coat at ContraptioN. With it I worked together some separates. I'm quite happy with the result.

I'm setting up my parcel/house in Bay City for Evers Night. Chaos ensues.

I think your best option, if you can afford it, is to get a different head. That is a way.

Now I'm going to be hunting down all the Feynman videos I can find. I can't make myself believe in things. I either believe something, believe in something, or I don't. I don't know much, but, I can't believe that everything we see came into being spontaneously. I can't believe it all evolved by chance. I can think about the argument "Well, in all the universe, it had to happen somewhere. So it happened here. That we're a part of it is simply concomitant." But it doesn't work, not for me.

Wait! What happened to IPv5?

"Hey! You guys read the entire script? How come I didn't get to read it all? Huh?"

When you're editing anything containing animations, sometimes the names can be a little obscure, not telling you exactly what kind of animation it is. You can right click an animation in an object's inventory, and then choose to open it. You'll get the small window with which you can choose to run that animation on your avatar, locally, or in-world.

I'm going back to some semblance of work on April 1st. Of course, it's not regular route driving. We're going to start delivering meals to kids who have regularly depended on school lunches for their mid-day meals. It's going to feel good getting out of the house, doing something, and helping.

It's chilly, damp and overcast outside. Thank you Beth, for that mental image. I needed a laugh.

/me gives you a few of her cheesecakes. "Because I like you."

I was planning to visit my mother today. But a State "Stay at home. stay healthy" thing made us both reconsider. She's doing ok, apart from having a problem with her Mac. I miss my coworkers, even though I spend less than 30 minutes with any of them on any given day. I'm very glad it's been sunny these last few days. It's mood lifting and feels good when I go for walks, alone. I'm normally very resistant to most forms of negativity. Recently, I've found my defenses to be somewhat lacking. I have several tiny cheesecakes in my freezer.

It would be lovely if he could fix the seating animation in the plane while he's here.