Hair fair 2009 review

When I arrived I couldn't see the relationship between hair and sweets (candies). The landscape was a bold display of sweets and candies, the stalls displaying the hair were gingerbread houses, cake shops and bun shops. There were buns with large textures and sculpties to get the shapes of squirted cream and other unecessary confectionary that all created lag, without helping to show off the hair.

I didn't get to see much of the hair as the landscape had soaked up all the bandwidth and prims, leaving most of the hair displays showing gray.

I bought a lag pack at the Hair fair that suggested I remove all attachments and all scripts to reduce lag. I thought it should have said "We don't give a toss about your lag because our sim looks so freaking cool."

This is a list of things I would consider.

• People will want to come back to some shops, so allow them to create landmarks. Hair Fair stopped you from noting where shops were or passing on landmarks to friends.
• Allow people to teleport anywhere so they can go back to a shop.
• Split the sims with walls to reduce view distances.
• Add some landmark feautures for people to navigate by.

*** ADDED 30JUL09 ****
Alpha Aur gave a longer review and post at Not Possible IRL. I was at the hair fair...

Pristeen - body shape

I finally mangaged to put another body shape on sale. This is the Pristeen shape and hase been used by Pristeen Barbosa for over a month during which we improved the face. Her overall look comes from her sense of style and skill at choosing accessories, but she does look good in whatever she chooses.

I started the shape by copying the body and face of a slavic model. During the copying I make many adjustments so the body shape and face will look good in Second Life.

I check how the body moves by walking round and also how it sits and lies down. The body shape can make some clothes and movement look bad.
The places that mess up are:-

1. deep wrinkles round the nose.
2. black shadows under the breasts
3. black shadows round the buttocks
4. poor facial animation.
   
5. straps at the top of the breasts that wrinkle when moving.
6. scalp that pokes through the hair.
7. stomachs that fold
8. shoulders that dislocate when rasing arms
   
9. hips that dislocate when sitting

For the first four checks I set my daylight setting to Noon. The noon lighting in SL is harsh with light coming from one direction and it shows up creases in the face or shadows on the body. I check the facial animation with the smile and wink gestures.
Hair is checked with three different makes; ETD Ponytail without bangs, Adam and Eve Glamour and Cake.
To check the top of the breasts you need vertically and horizontaly striped tops, preferably not by a good maker. A good maker knows about the problems of distortion and you will find that the pattern and cut avoids the problem areas which are the tops of breasts and just below the ribs. When the avatar poses you cannot get rid of distortion but it can certainly be reduced with good body design.
To check for distortion around the shoulders, stomach and hips I use the free karta and bara animations.

Pristeen is shown with House Jiang Pristeen body shape, Canimal Fetish Uberlight skin, ETD The Bob hair and !WRONG look 1 clothing.

The Body Shape is available from House Jiang in Tanglia.

Momoko Body

I opened my new shop House Jiang today. It sells a Japanese/Asian body-shape, hair, eyes and clothes.
Shown here is the body-shape including, hair, eyes and clothes by Antilo; All available from my store in Whitefish 32/96.
(The skin is a free skin from Tete a Pied).

My new business

I help my friends get the looks they want, acting as body maker and personal shopper. I have created a Dita Von Tees lookalike, Japanese Manga style and several bodies based on real-life models. I enjoy making body shapes, its like sculpting but using sliders to add or remove parts of the body.

I have always know which designer or style will give the looks they want, but it takes ages collecting the skin, hair, eyes, clothes and accessories from the different stores scattered around Second Life. My store will sell everything you need in one place with everything matched and co-ordinated. No need to adjust the prims on your hair or alter belt sizes to fit.

My first shop sells the Momoko Japanese/Asian body-shape and is a one stop shop for everything you need; look for House Jiang in SL Classifieds or on SL Boutique. Also go to Whitefish (32/96).

(The clothes are ready but not for sale yet)