“Things do not change; we change.” ~ Henry David Thoreau

Mesh has rekindled my love of shopping for pretty things in SL. Although, as a consumer I am concerned about some of the practices mesh seems to be bringing with it, the quality and performance of the products tickles my pixel vanity in all those yummy little spots that make me squee.

Since mesh clothing cannot currently be fitted, I have been doing a lot of tweaking to my avatar and about two weeks ago I did an evaluation of lil miss Salome. It turned out that I hadn’t made any major adjustments to my shape since May of 2007; I had been wearing the same skin since March of 2009, and I’d been wearing the same textured eyes since July of 2006. I wasn’t using any of the prim or cosmetic enhancement accessories that are available today and my customization of the base of my avatar was downright skimpy.

This was clearly not acceptable.

Partly for fun and partly because prissy girls loathe a rut when they recognize one, I decided to update my shape, my skin, and my “body accessories.”

The Shape

When I first started SL, Salome was much shorter, to reflect my RL height. I spent at least a month tweaking the facial settings the way I wanted them. After getting tired of being asked if I was a hobbit and having trouble fitting my clothing, I adjusted her shape to be taller. Although I kept my face settings, I went to Colette’s Body Shop (Colette Meiji’s store at the time) and let her do the hard work and math regarding the shape and proportions, (to be honest I even tweaked those body sliders so much they had very little in common with what I first purchased). Once Linden Lifestyles got popular and we were getting hundreds of items a day, I tailored my shape to fit the SL shopping norms for quick try-ons and product evaluation. After May of 2007 “Salome” was established and her shape hadn’t really been touched.

Now that I no longer have the obligation to go through hundreds of items per day and I don’t care about taking some extra time to fit things, I feel comfortable going back to a “me” that is shorter than the 6′ tall lanky lass I’ve been wandering about in for so long. I had a friend help me with scaling things like arm length and other math challenged settings. The result was exactly what I wanted and closer to what I’d first created back in my earliest SL days.

The face was a different story. Part of me wanted to keep Salome’s face exactly the same, but for one thing — the mouth. I used to enjoy the toonish mouth with the upturned corner smile lines and thin upper lip. But I created this exaggerated expression during the LL days for a PR purpose; it seemed a good choice for posting my image over and over with my oft-cranky writing. I felt the friendlier avatar would convey that the majority of my grumblings are intended without bite. But I have oft longed for fuller, more realistic, pout-a-lucious lips. It was easier than I had thought (or maybe I’m just getting to that age where having a little work done doesn’t seem like such an offensive idea).

The bottom line: Salome-sized has now become slightly shorter, a tiny bit plumper and, as ever, downright lippy.

Salome-Sized: The New "Me"

The Skin

For reasons no fashion-addicted creature should be able to fathom, I always been inexplicably loyal to certain skin lines. It’s not because of any connection with the creator. For a great deal of my SL life, I wore “Quad Brat” skins and there was certainly no love lost between me and the creator of them — but what I like, I like, and if a creator’s products are high quality I have a hard time accepting less.

I have really only worn three skins long-term in SL:

Celestial Studios (Passport) > Celestial Studios (Vogue) > LAQ (Elin/Fair)

I reviewed skins and would even, on occasion, try an odd one out just to see if I could get used to it. I love Gala/Curio, for example, but they just never felt right on me. And, as much as I have delighted in being an LAQ girl for the last two years, I didn’t want to just accept a new LAQ skin as my only option.

So I flitted around and collected demos for all the pale skins that looked halfway decent in their ads. I went to every store mentioned in the blogs I read and asked friends for their favorites. At the end of the harvest I had just under forty demos. Forty. Fucking. Demos. It took two days to whittle the contestants down, but I had two sets of criteria to help with the culling — the “Non-Negotiable” factors and the “Preferences” factors.

Non-Negotiable:
A. Nice highlight and shading without over-exaggeration or “muddy” shadows;
B. A clean face without heavy make-up;
C. Healthy body definition and details;
D. Professional blending of photo-realism and airbrush without too much of either;
E. Light, creamy, pale shade.

Preferences:
A. Auburn brows and hairbase;
B. Bald kitty without any vulgar emphasis on bits or rough looking bits;
C. Larger, darker areolae.

One by one, demos were deleted. I was surprised at how many skins today still over-glam everything with baked on cosmetics that included exaggerated blush on even more exaggerated cheekbones and hooker-lined fish lips. There is so much tattoo make-up on the grid to help customize; any skin that doesn’t have a clean face “base” version in their packs shouldn’t even be considered by a consumer. Frankly I think skin makers today would be smart to only sell their base skin and then put up a mountain of cosmetic options, but I am not yet queen. Also, the faces on many skins are too tight for my liking; when using their included brow settings, they have that pissed off model look I can’t stand. Other skin makers need to learn that “pale” doesn’t equal “slightly less tan.” Still more had horrible shading on the bum and under-breast areas or that over-airbrushed wet-paint spray-tan look that is too shiny in all the wrong places. A few had great body work, but cringe-worthy facial lighting that seemed like they’d tried to bake on highlights while the model was holding a flashbulb in her teeth.

The list goes on, but at the end of the day I had narrowed it to two: LAQ‘s Ebba in the new Ivory tone option and Gala Phoenix’s Visitor in Moonbeam. I liked the Gala a lot, but I just liked the LAQ slightly more. And, it must be said, that as a consumer, I prefer LAQ‘s pricing practices over Gala‘s (although I disapprove of some of the tactics LAQ employs to make their brows only work on their skins, etc). I think part of it was also that I’ve just been so happy with LAQ for so long that I felt they deserved the extra tilt with everything else being even.

Forty demos. Two days of trying on and looking in different light settings. Still, I ended up where I started – an LAQ skin. Go figure.

Old Sal | New Sal | Newer Sal

Body Accessories

With multiple attach points and tattoo layers, avatar customization in SL is sweeter candy now more than ever for a virtual paper doll addict like me. Why haven’t I been taking advantage of this? No clue. But with my shape and skin decided, I went all happy crazy with accessories.

Eyes. I have love, love, loved my E’s Handpainted eyes, but their quality level is from 2006 and there are oodles of new eyes with more impressive detail work. I switched from brown eyes to grey sometime in 2007 and since then I’ve purchased pretty much every pair of grey eyes I’ve run across just to see if anything would please me. But I’ve found most eyes are too small; I prefer larger irises and pupils. As fate would have it, while at Curio picking up Gala skin demos, I noticed the Tragic eyes. Not only did I fall head over heels for the Light Grey, but I finally found prim eyes that are easy to fit and provide a hint of luster without being too shiny. My peepers are happy campers. You may have heard the squee in your remote corners of the grid.

Hair/Brows. I had already decided to go more auburn than brown, bumping my hair habit from Truth‘s Pecan in the Browns pack to Jupiter in the Gingers pack. LAQ already had brows for Ebba which I snagged and the Red 1 is a nice red brow with a little darker shade than the 2 or 3. Since I don’t care for the Truth hairbases and LAQ didn’t have hers out yet, I scooted over to Amacci and found out their hairbases on tattoo layers are now FREE (Amacci‘s Henna is the counterpart of Truth‘s Jupiter, btw). So full of win. I am a little disappointed that League doesn’t have red hairbases because I really admire their hairbases, but I’ll survive for the time being. Someone eventually has to come out with a nice widow’s peak.

Lashes. As lashes go, I had put off the prim lash revolution for the simple reason that fitting them was, in my experience, a particularly ornery breed of bitch. So I bit the bullet, asked random strangers for their preferences and did some experimentation. What I finally decided was that I wanted to use a combination of both alpha and non-alpha lashes. For alpha lashes, Redgrave has a nice selection and the Luscious lashes were perfect for my needs. They come with an alpha layer that hides your system lashes. Yay. I’ve only been trying to do that since 2005. To those I added the LeLutka “Curl” full prim lashes, and this combo seemed to give me the zazazoo I was going for. I’m still tweaking here and there, but we’re definitely cooking with gas.

Make-Up. There is an obscenely wonderful selection of tattoo cosmetics on the grid. How much do I love not having to buy a new skin every time I want to change my lip stick? Yes. THAT FRAKKIN’ MUCH. First I ran over to PixelDolls which is soon to be no more, and snagged all her L$50 cosmetic eye shadow sets. The one I’m wearing in the far right photo is from the Rocket Fuel pack and the shade I’m wearing is Ashes. Its perfect for a nice, bold, smoky eye. For the lips, I’ve been taking advantage of Hush‘s Juicy lipstick colors, and what you see in the right photo is one of the tattoos from their reds pack. Because I wanted a beauty mark, I did a lot of looking around and finally clicked with a little mouth mole from Launa Fauna. Yes. My tattoo layers have tattoo layers.

The Outfit

I wanted something simple and non mesh for this entry as clothes go. There is still a lot of great stuff on the grid that isn’t mesh, and I think we’re finally to a point in avatar customization where the options for attractive, immersive products are the norm rather than the exception. For dresses, skirts, and body supplements (like toes) it will likely be mesh or nothing, but for tops and pants, there is still a lot that texturing and sculpts have to offer.

Exhibit A. If you do not have this delicately feminine Seashell Blouse from League you need to go now. It is a non-optional necessity which I cannot stop wearing. The whispery nature of this textured on treat is utterly irresistible and comes on all three top layers (as you would expect) in oodles of colors. So often in SL “sexy” is really just “trashy” but this top is sweet and feminine as well as dripping with smexy.

The jeans are my favorite old school staples from Plastik. As far as I know, however, these Vigos are only available on the marketplace in a huge fatpack. You get a baker’s dozen of colors and each of those comes in loose, skinny, capri, shorts, and jean skirt options with prim sculpted cuffs and hobo flares. I know that mesh pants are all the rage just now, but I’m finding most of these first offerings too…rubbery. I still find a lot of value in fabric textured items to mingle with my mesh (at least until mesh pants stop looking like liquid latex).

The shoes are a delightful little pair of cork wedges from Duh!. When you just need a casual kick-around pair of Espadrilles you can’t really knock these for their price. They have their issues out-of-box, but they are mod, include alpha layers for 2.0+ viewers and are cheap cheap cheap, so I won’t pick them apart. They’re darling for what they are.

So if you’re wandering about and you happen to see a shorter, paler, more red-headed version of me, you needn’t worry about virtual alien abduction. I’m still here, I just changed my ribbons an wrapping paper.

Where Does She Get Those Wonderful Toys:

Skin: LAQ – Ebba in Ivory 5Pack – L$990 (Brows L$290)
Lashes: Redgrave – Luscious Alpha Lashes (L$90) and LeLutka Curl Prim Lashes (L$180)
Lips: Hush – Juicy Lips Red Pack- L$125
Eyes: Curio – Tragic Eyes in Light Grey – L$125
Eye Liner / Shadow: PixelDolls – Rocket Fuel 8Pack – L$50
Mole: Launa Fauna, Bayonetta – L$7 / L$15
Hair: Truth – Jolie in Jupiter – L$250 (Gingers Color Pack)

Blouse: League – Seashell Blouse – L$115
Jeans: Plastik – Vigos Jeans Fatpack – L$599
Shoes: Duh! - Women’s Espadrilles – L$60 (For the Fat Pack. Not even kidding)

It is about to become a felony to engage in what a big company thinks should be considered copyright infringement. The people who support SOPA insist that the law is not intended to go after small time offenders but there’s nothing in the text of the law to support that. This is the same reasoning that says child porn laws are only about going after the worst criminals. So why do teenagers get busted for sending half-dressed photos of themselves to their boyfriends and girlfriends?

If the middle men at movie and music studios want to bully those outside of US borders, then let them use the billions they’ve made inflating the copyright laws of the US to do it. They don’t need a law that allows them to cry wolf at any search engine or website that links to something they don’t like.

These are people who have been on the wrong side of history for decades. They fought the invention of television and radio. They fought digital goods until they had no choice. These are not the innovators protecting discovery and innovation. These are the old, rich, no-talent middle men who want to drag technology out as long as possible so they can milk the system of every drop because they have no skill except buying talent cheap and selling it at a huge mark up to consumers.

If we give it to them, we’re going to get exactly what we deserve. Their world. Bought and packaged. For them.

“Pies, para que los necesito si tengo alas para volar?” ~ Frida Kahlo

Although the holiday season might seem like an odd time to be talking about bare feet, the opportunity is simply too tasty to ignore.

Recently, Slink came out with their rigged mesh bare feet and mesh static feet which are a direct competitor to Maitreya‘s sculpted feet. Of all the things I have been awaiting since the launch of mesh, bare feet are near the top. J’s started the prim foot revolution and several other worthy lines have taken that innovation to the next level (it’s worth noting that J’s still has their own offerings). In my opinion the front runners of sculpted feet /shoes have been Maitreya, Slink and Pixel Mode. I’m sure there are others who feel passionate about other brands, but I consider those three to be the ones currently worth watching. I hope that GOS, Ennui, and Zaara will be making open-toe offerings into this arena soon and the oldbie in me is always hoping Fally throws her buckles back into the basket. So far, however, when it comes to prim toes and open-toe mules, the big three I mentioned still hold. (In the interests of fairness, I suppose I should mention, Stiletto Moody‘s store is still out there with those heart-vandalized stripper shoes, so if that’s your thing, don’t forget those).

Amusingly, when I went to get the Slink feet I discovered I had been banned from the SIM. Me. Banned. How hilarious is that?

I assume this is due to bruised ego hijinks that started with this post and ended for me with this one. I have never, to the best of my knowledge, been banned from anywhere, so it took me a few teleports to understand what was happening. Then it took me a little bit of head-scratching to IM a friend and ask them to go purchase the product for me as a gift. The purpose of making me spend 20 extra minutes of someone else’s time to get a product that is available to the open market is anyone’s guess. But it was a unique experience.

I feel that to evaluate the Slink Rigged Mesh vs Maitreya Sculpts, we must explore a couple of factors. First I’ll compare rigged vs static attach points, then I’ll talk about the texture differences and blending methods of the various products before presenting the benefits and downfalls of sculpt vs mesh for feet.

Rigged Mesh Feet vs Sculpted Feet

Rigged mesh, for those who are fuzzy on the term, attaches mesh objects to a fluid skeleton point, enabling more natural posing and positioning that may not be viable with static attachments (including mesh objects that have static attach points).

Take the above examples. The left two show how the feet are positioned with rigged mesh. The center is Maitreya‘s static tip toes and the right is Maitreya‘s static flat feet. All of these use the same poses, but, as you can see, the feet behave very differently. With rigged, the pose decides if the feet are flat or pointed. With static attachments, the attachment is not flexible and holds its shape, regardless of the intentions (and natural flow) of the pose.

Look carefully at the far left pose and compare it with the center tip toes. With rigged, the feet are flat as they should be, but tip toes static positioning overrides the intention of the animation. The same is true with the second image from the left and the pose on the far right. With the rigged mesh, the toes are pointed as they should be. But with the static flat feet attachment, the shape of the feet takes the place of the pose intent.

If all of that has only served to confuse you more – let me make it easy. Rigged attachments will position and move your feet the way they would be if you weren’t wearing prim feet at all. They will conform to the same behavior of your system feet. Static attachment prim feet will stubbornly keep to their own shape which will often go against the intentions of animations and can frequently end up in unnatural positions.

When it comes to wearables — especially hands, feet, and other body-based objects — rigged really has the advantage over static attachment points and the more you move through the virtual world, the more obvious this will be.

Slink Mesh vs Maitreya Sculpt

Okay, now let’s talk about texturing. It will confuse you when I say that the above photo shows the two competing products using the same light settings and both blending into the same skin. They so clearly have different shades, so how can that be?

Well, the processes for blending these products are completely different. Maitreya‘s feet blend directly into the leg, so the RBG value of the bottom of my calf is the same as the one I enter into the foot. For the Slink product, the creator has added an extra step, providing a tattoo blending layer. For the Slink, I used the “light” blending layer and entered the RGB of my calf into the tint of the blending layer which created a slightly more red-based RGB for me to enter into the foot.

Overall, I found the Slink feet, blending layers, etc to be more red-based. This is excellent for people who wear skins from Redgrave and/or Curio et all where the flesh tones have a pinker base. If, however, like me, you prefer LAQ with the more yellow/beige base, you’re going to find your results to be a bit more rosy. It’s unlikely you will notice unless you have them side by side like I do above, and I suspect the results would be more similar if I’d used the white/gray blending layer instead of the light (but I haven’t tried that yet). If you follow the instructions step-by-step, you will be happy with the outcome, and I have it on good authority that the creator does offer help to those who have difficulty with the product (assuming you aren’t banned from her store).

What should be noted, however, is that the texturing on the Slink feet is more airbrush style than Maitreya‘s photo-realistic lean. That is purely a preference. I prefer the Maitreya texturing with the tone variations and highlights. But the smoother airbrushed look of the Slink product is well in keeping with the products preferred by many others I know. I find airbrushed skins and products to appear…rubbery, whereas some people think the more realistic products I prefer are creepy in an uncanny valley sort of way.

That said, there is no comparison to the “physical” benefits of mesh vs sculpts for this kind of product. You may not see the differences in the lighting above, but we do not exist in an SL with only bright studio lighting. Once we introduce shadows, the benefits of mesh become obvious (and, let’s face it — what’s the point of having cute bare feet if you’re not planning on taking a moonlit walk on the beach with someone).

Lighting Used For Examples

I used three different lighting settings to demonstrate the differences of mesh vs sculpts when it comes to SL lighting. The above photo shows the overall effects of these settings which are, from left to right:

AnaLu *studio* 5 | AnaLu – outdoor city | Midday 4

I recommend using AnaLu *studio* 5 or a similar light setting when going through the process of blending your feet tones to your skin. Using a brightly lit setting that mimics natural light will give you a far more dependable outcome. This will provide more consistent results no matter what kind of atmosphere you find your avatar in.

Now that we’ve established control with the light settings, let’s see what shadows do to these different offerings.

Slink Mesh Feet - Various Light Settings

Above are the Slink rigged mesh feet. As you can see, if you follow the directions, the seam is near-invisible in the studio lighting, and even with shadow play, the seams are only visible if you are zoomed in and looking for them. But the important thing is that the seams only exist where the product combines with the calf. There are no seams where the toes meet the foot because they are part of a solid, fluid single prim.

And if you’re really worried about the seams on the calves, just go anklet shopping. Earthstones has their darling little Christmas bell anklets out, so that’ll cover you for December.

Maitreya Sculpted Feet - Various Light Settings

As you can see in the above photo, this is why sculpted feet are doomed to die a horrible death in the wake of mesh. If we skipped through a fantasy world that only consisted of bright studio lighting, sculpts might still be competitive. But shadows are unforgiving things. Not only do they highlight with hideous intensity the areas where the prim ankles meet the system leg, but also where the toe sculpts tuck into the foot sculpts. Yee-ouch. They also betray the places where the sculpts warp at their vertices, creating the unnatural blurring and twisting that textures do across sculpted objects in areas where the shape has been abused into the desired mold like so much silly putty.

This is a killer for me. I prefer Maitreya‘s style of texturing. I prefer their square toe nails to the round ones so often found in prim feet. But sculpts are the past where wearables are concerned and my toes will currently be all Slinky. A good mesh product that I mostly like has full advantage over an outstanding sculpted object I would otherwise love.

There really isn’t any contest here. If you’re looking for the best prim foot, Slink‘s rigged mesh are the high mark to beat for all competitors to come.

As far as other considerations, they’re about even. You can’t resize meshes yet, so you may have to slightly alter your leg muscle settings for the Slink‘s, but they come in five sizes, so you’re likely to be very close to one of them (I seem to be a small/medium in most mesh products). The nail-tinting options are pretty even. The Slink nail tinting is a two part process and as such might seem a little more complicated to newbies.

Neither of these have a good stocking feet option. Hopefully with mesh someone is working on that.

Stellar Mesh Schoolgirl Skirt & Boho Baku Blouse

Oh, and if you’re at all interested in the outfit I’m wearing, the tartan skirt is from Stellar and is the Schoolgirl mesh skirt in red (dear designers: it’s the holidays, will you get your butts in gear on the red tartan offerings, please?). This mesh skirt comes in two sizes (which basically means how big do you want your ass to be) and provides the necessary alpha layer. It is partnered with a forgettable top and a nice shrug. The shrug has a sculpted turtleneck collar and sleeves and even a cute little sculpted necktie if you’re looking for that sort of outfit.

I opted for a sweet little texture-only blouse from Boho Baku called the lil lace boho crop top. In this day and age its lack of prim collar, sleeves, ties, etc make it a bit of a throwback, but the texturing is delicate, feminine and charming. I recommend it highly for something to wear under a prim sweater or jacket.

Where Does She Get Those Wonderful Toys:

Womens Natural Barefeet (Mesh Rigged) – L$675
Slink
Creator: Siddean Munro

http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Sanctum/84/94/503

Maitreya Gold Bare Feet (Flat or Tip Toes) – L$675 each
Maitreya
Creator: Onyx LeShelle

http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Maitreya%20Isle/207/165/26

Schoolgirl – Mesh skirt – L$299
Stellar
Creator: Lexi Morgan

http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Rigby/163/211/24

Lil lace boho crop top – L$124
Boho Baku
Creator: Twill Tymets

http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Kierman/215/219/21

“I am my own heroine.” ~ Marie Bashkirtseff

Fantasy Heroines

I have a friend who has long made the case that Twilight is an abstinence-supporting conspiracy to turn young girls into brooding, swooning extras from 80s horror movies that trip over tree branches while running from the serial killer as punishment for having dared to have sex.

I don’t know about that. But I do know the chick in the movies isn’t my model of a fantasy heroine. By a long shot.

“The idea of copyright did not exist in ancient times, when authors frequently copied other authors at length in works of non-fiction. This practice was useful, and is the only way many authors’ works have survived even in part.” ~ Richard Stallman