Sion Pearl

Storm Clarence wrote: I thought the assignment was to post the complete avatar that you display in the 'forum' profile. I was never good at assignments, anyway. That's a fair point, actually. Except I've changed my avatar so many times since then... This one, I guess.

Someone mentioned Tron? Funnily enough, only yesterday I did a blog post comparing loads and loads of Tron-themed outfits and did some decent full-figure photos to show them off.

I do leove those Leezu outfits. I love how they're feminine and retro and futuristic all at once.

Recent. I love this outfit.

Hey! They are all completely awesome. Love that last one, Lana. Hilarious. This is not going on one of my store vendors, but I am quite fond of it.

Nice bit of Graves there. Always a crowd-pleaser

I've been clogging up the Vanity Thread and a load of others with my sore-thumb outlandish avatars, and I sort of thought it might be better to have a thread where we (and by we I mean me, but it would be awesome if everyone else could muck in) can show off our pics of our amazing sci-fi and fantasy avatars in our amazing sci-fi and fantasy outfits. Come on. Show me something interstellar! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oo0wr9TbJuo

Free sneakers are good. If I'm not going to be earthly, my man isn't either. Here's Simon. In this one, he is wearing the Elixir Dress Uniform (about L$400 IIRC), with the matching boots (L$350 or thereabouts) modifed, with a cap from Graves ($75). Uniform insignia: model's own. Total, about L$825. It's a man's life in the Royal Space Force. And here, he's in the Sci-Props Desert Runner outfit. L$700. I'll see if I can't get a pic of him in casuals. Unlike me, he actually has some.

Charolotte Caxton wrote: Hi! There is nothing wrong with having a lot of inventory, in fact, compared to what others have posted, your inventory is not that large. Not too long ago I came to the realization that I had amassed a rather large inventory due to shopping, hunts and other miscellaneous hoarding. As far as I know, there are no hidden items in your inventory, but you could have several items in boxes and folders, so the numbers might be larger than what you think you are looking at. What you probably want to do is organize. Torley has a rather nice tutorial on spring cleaning that someone will be posting a link to shortly. Have fun! What, this one? http://community.secondlife.com/t5/Tips-and-Tricks/GUIDE-Spring-Clean-Your-Inventory-for-a-Happier-Second-Life/ba-p/784123

This might be a patronising and obvious question (and I apologise in advance for it), but have you emptied your trash folder? Because that's where all the stuff you delete goes and if you haven't emptied it, it's still in your inventory. Anyway, I know your pain. A couple weeks ago I cleaned out about 13,000 items from my inventory into about eight shiny round prim boxes... I assume you've done the box-stuffing thing? It's an absolute must. Just shove stuff from your inventory into some prims you make for the purpose and delete it (twice) from your inventory. The numbers (and the client-side lag) reduce in seconds.

Yeah, the monkey's shot is ace. Loving that.

Paulyta Miles wrote: its not annoy! some people use malwares viewers, using phoenix or firestorm u can know that =) is for you protection. I appreciate the reasoning behind it, but we're just going to have to differ. I think it's a pain in the arse. I mean, I hated Emerald and Phoenix (no comment on the "malware viewer" gag) and thought I'd try Firestorm because it's V2 based and I was curious. I think I might have another go when it's released.

Mmmmm fresh bread.

I love being impossible, while still looking like an idealised human being. That's the principle, anyway. Mags Indigo wrote: Fabulous avatar Sion - you really have got that edge between reality and fantasy. You look wonderful. Aw, thank you.

We make these friends, right, and then one day they vanish. They're not there. They die in their virtual sleep and more often than not we have no way of knowing what happened where they went. The real person might have moved to a different town, entered a rl relationship, got a job, given it up or maybe even died. We don't know. But they're gone. Very early on I remember having this amazing RP partner. One day she stopped logging on. Never saw her again. But she was brilliant and sometimes I check and see if she ever logged on after November 2009. She never did. I am not sure what I was getting at with this thread. I thought it might be a good place to share experiences of this sort, I guess. Anyone want to chip in?

Since about February 2010, I haven't spent a single penny on SL. Until recently, I had an alt with a store and a premium account, and the store *just about* paid for the premium, the rent on the store and two vendors and my own home rent. I disbanded the store a little while ago, kept Marketplace and one vendor and I am still paying my rent and a little extra for clothes. I started selling my own things this week too. To keep things on an even keel with SL (rent for one vendor, a server and a magic box for my business alt, and a skybox for me), I now need to make L$600.To buy stuff, well. A bit more. I make that easy. I am happy with that arrangement.

My first SL avatar was pretty much exactly like my current one in intention but it was horrible. I was no good at modding but I insisted on creating my own shape and messing with things. Man, she was ugly. This was back in 2009, about a week after my very first experiment with SL. The more I learned, the nicer my avatar started looking. I rarely change the principle -- she's some sort of fantasy or sci-fi girl -- but the execution has changed a lot. Now, my avatar looks like this:

Wildcat Furse wrote: this is "'hyperbeautiful' ..... :smileyvery-happy: *meows* Thank you. :robothappy:

I think ahimsa was actually talking about the lovely feathered choker around the model's neck, though.

I don't think you want *all* the creases gone. The Graves stuff has the tiniest amount of creasing here and there. It makes a lot of difference. Subtlety is everything, really. Sonya Bigboots wrote: Seems the general concensus is "Hyper-real"! Judging from your photo's you like subtle highlights too Sion, I much prefer the subtle highlights to the great big white marks covering most cheap SL latex. Yep. Definitely. But are there people with a chalk fetish out there that really like that look? Somebody must be buying that stuff. What other brands do people like, and why? I hadn't come accross Elixir before, so I'll have to check out their stuff. I have a love-hate relationship with Elixir. Some of their stuff is amazing. Some of it... well. Here's some more pics of me in Elixir: http://www.flickr.com/photos/sianpearl/sets/72157625791313575/ sYs and Ezura have both made decent sci-fi latex suits. Here's me in one of the Ezura ones: And this is me in sYs, which isn't quite as nice, but works: I'm all about the cyber latex. Not all the time, though. There's some horrible cyberpunk latex out there. And importantly for me... what do people want, but just can't find anywhere to buy in SL? That's a really good question. I personally would like to see more latex stuff in silver and chrome (I have a dream of my av wearing chrome latex so shiny it dazzles), and maybe gold. I have never found a satisfactory set of latex opera gloves and stockings in a properly shiny metallic shade, or a basic catsuit for that matter. It's out there, but it's rarely good, or it's got ragged seams and a messy collar, or it's chalktastic, or it's horribly tacky with holes for nipples and girl bits, or it's lovely but so uniquely styled you can't really use it as a generic. I would love to see a catsuit in realistic transparent or translucent latex (the Graves sets have nicely tinted undersuits, but not an actual plain trans latex catsuit - I would love to see one that's like surgical glove material. Or a dress with opera gloves and over-the-knee socks too. Never been able to find that in SL. I would link a real-world example, but I'd never get away with it). But I am hardly representative of the market. What features do people want, or don't want, in their latex clothes? Do people want "street legal" and "risque" versions of the same outfit in the same box, or are they no bothered because they won't be wearing latex in PG sims? Do people want versions with and without the highlights, or do they just want the creator to make that decision for them? What little gripes do you have about latex outfits you already have that you'd like fixing? Does an item of clothing being no-mod put you off buying it? Any replies will probably feed into the work I am doing right now as I create some latex greyscale master templates before creating specific clothes, so any info appreciated. 1. Long gloves and stockings. Nice collar, sleeve, glove and sock seams. Nicely designed underwear with nice scope for cleavage. There are enough kinky nurse/schoolgirl/miss whiplash/tacky streetwalker outfits out there. Please don't make it tacky. I mean, to reference RL latex manufacturers, I see way, way too much Westward Bound in the Marketplace and nowhere near enough Fraulein Ehrhardt (Google them if you don't know, both very NSFW. Ehrhardt has an amazing thick trans latex dress/gloves thing). I know! I'm super-demanding! 2. I won't buy an outfit that only has rude bits. I appreciate being able to cover up. Also, you can get away with more in sci-fi sims. Always include nipple pasties and thongs and bras and stuff. 3. Personally, I'd just be happy with decent highlighting.But I think doing two versions in a set, the super-shiny one and the subtle lighting, might get you more sales. Be a lot of work though. 4. Undefined and ragged seams on the collar, the sleeves, the ends of gloves and socks are the big ones. It's not painted on, I'm wearing it. 5. Only if it's an attachment. I like my attachments to be copy/mod. As for clothing layers, though, I will happily buy no-mod stuff. Elixir sell copy/mod stuff. Graves' attachments are copy/mod but her clothes layers are copy only and that's fine.

FWIW, I started in lated 2009 with 1.23. I tried Emerald for a bit, on the recommendation of friends and couldn't get on with it (and none of the extra features were things I had uses for). I guess I'd been in SL for six months when v2 came out and I remember about an hour after downloading the Beta and poking about with it, thinking "I am never going back." Most of the new things added then or since — outfit links, tattoos, multiple layer support, working multiple attachments, display names, favourites on the login screen — are all things that have excited me and made the experience more fun for me. Similarly anecdotally, I have a RL friend who I got into SL who couldn't manage 1.23, but grasped the basics with v2 almost immediately (there's a very good reason why people call it the "noob viewer", and it's not always disparaging). I realise that out of the people who post on these forums, she and I are in a tiny minority. I can't tell you why I prefer v.2 so much. I mean, I can tell you what I like about it, but that's different. Like people said, horses for courses. I guess that I'm the sort of person who Linden Labs were thinking of when they started the project. Void Singer wrote: that big chat window that repeats local chat is known as the history window (v2 has it as well). ctrl+h should open and close it. No, I know about that. It's much, much bigger in Firestorm and has all your IMs in it too. I mean, you can undock the IMs, but you can't minimise them. When someone has IMed you, the huge great window pops up and it takes several clicks to make it go away. Having said that, Firestorm isn't a bust at all, and I'm still messing with it. Like I managed to get my sidebar back, made the viewer UI a nice pale blue colour, can take the home tab off the sidebar and make it go away for good. Now if I can only get rid of the client tags, I might be able to deal with the bloody great chat window.

Jean Horten wrote: Sion Pearl wrote: I hate the way there's this huge chat window that won't go away, by the way. I wonder if you can disable that thing. Are you talking about the unified chat window in Firestorm ot the multiple, cluttered communication windows in LL V2? I'd propose to reduce the overal GUI size if the windows are too big, a bigger Monitor might also be helpful.... Jeannie I'm talking about the big chat window in firestorm. I really don't like it, particularly that you can't seem to get rid of it. I don't like that it duplicates local chat. I did actually prefer that you can minimise the individual chat windows down to the little graphics at the bottom right. I would really much rather have one open at a time.I am aware that pretty much everything in Phoenix/Firestorm is designed because of market research with the folks who hated v2, but a lot of the things that some people seem to think of as improvements drive me mental. I know, I know. I'm some sort of a freak. I mean, I hated Emerald as soon as I tried it (after loads of people were like, "it's awesome") and preferred V2 to 1.23 from the moment the first Beta came out. Go figure. And no, Linden Lab aren't paying me. I actually genuinely like v2 better, pretty much across the board.

I hate the way there's this huge chat window that won't go away, by the way. I wonder if you can disable that thing.

Ishtara Rothschild wrote: In the old 1.x based Phoenix viewers, you can disable this in the Preferences under Phoenix --> Page 1 --> Tags --> Display client tags. I haven't tried the Firestorm viewer myself yet, and won't do so until LL decide to cut 1.x based viewers off from search or the entire grid. But I could imagine that the preferences look similar. There isn't a page 2 for Firestorm preferences. But "tags" - I'll look for that next time I log in.

Oh no! Then I might have to talk to the Phoenix developers! :robotsurprised: But yeah, It's a fair point. I actually went and registered on the Phoenix forums, but they haven't moderated me in yet. I thought I might have a chance here, given that the people here are nicer on the whole, and a lot of people seem to use Phoenix and that.