Sintimacy Rocking Lowrise Latex Outfit

I recently purchased a discounted item from Sintimacy - the Rocking Lowrise Latex Outfit in black (only L$99). It's also available at the same price in red. As seems to be normal for the aptly named Sintimacy, the outfit is scorching hawt! Fairly easy to select a subset of items for my outfit, my only complaint was the No Copy boots which needed fitting. Why do designers distribute items that need modification with No Copy permission ? See my rant on this topic.

However, the boots resized and repositioned easily and the dialog menu provided a "delete scripts" button so everything went smoothly. Here's my modelling session in the Rocking Lowrise Latex Outfit:

*BOOM* Halter, Boyshorts and Deck Shoes

Recently I discovered yet another clothing store I love :) *BOOM* is a large shop with an excellent selection of quality items. Here I am modeling the Hibiscus-Green Infinity Halter and Boyshorts with their deck shoes. Cute! The deck shoes are a pain to configure - it's nice they are so detailed with 4 different color areas but each shoe must be configured separately, there are no presets, no way to store presets, and no menu option for deleting the scripts after configuring a pair. I like them anyway!

Email2IM - Practical Kinetic Art

One of the scripted objects I created and sell is Email2IM. This single prim object allows me to respond to IM's via Email when I am not logged in to Second Life. I find it quite useful and a great aid in allowing me to assist my customers. I use it almost daily.

Email2IM requires that the single prim object be rezzed somewhere with scripts enabled. I decided to make it something I would want to have in my home in Second Life so I added some texturing and a variety of geometrical deformations to the script. The Email2IM prim became a kinetic art object that is pleasing to watch and changes continually. Voila, art meets practical!

Here is a video of the Email2IM prim hovering over my house:

 The Email2IM Owner Manual is available in PDF format on Scribd. From the manual's introduction:

The Email2IM object enables the owner to email a message to a Second Life resident.The object acts parses incoming email and relays the body of the message as anInstant Message to the Second Life resident whose name appears in the Subject lineof the email. Owners of the Email2IM system are thus able to respond to forwardedIM's even when not online by simply sending email to the object's address with thename of the resident as the subject line.In addition, the Email2IM object changes shape and texture, acting as an art object soas to be pleasing to the eye while in use.

Email2IM is available on the Second Life Marketplace for L$195

Automatic Facial Animation HUD

I purchased a nice little automatic facial animation HUD made by Outy Banjo. Called "Auto Emote", the HUD consumes a modest amount of screen real estate and provides a fairly extensive set of facial animation and programmable trigger phrases. When not in active use the HUD can be minimized to consume even less screen.

The HUD includes over 300 trigger phrases and operates in 3 modes - automatic, click only, and loop mode allowing you to hold animations indefinitely and combine animations.

From the description on Outy's Second Life Marketplace:

With this HUD, you can mix facial expressions like paint. Great for models who need to hold a pose indefinately, in-world performers who want their mouth to perform dynamic movements during a performance, those who want a timed auto-smile, or even those who just want to make silly or ugly faces(Combining animations can make for some pretty crazy faces).

Auto Emote v2.0 supports 950 phrases, and you can edit them to your liking. The Auto Emote Trigger Phrases notecard contains groups of 50 triggers per facial animation.

Here's a  video I made of me using the Auto Emote HUD:

Available on the Second Life Marketplace for L$500

Machinima of the BURN2 2011 Man Burn

Debbie Trilling and the Burn2 Team have produced a truly awesome machinima of the BURN2 2011 Man burn. From the Info section of the video:

For the third year running, 'The Man' has been created by the team of  Debbie Trilling, Elfod Nemeth and Gypsy Paz on building and scripting,  with Lorin Tone on sound effects.

2011 also sees Aleeta Zelin join the team with a very significant contribution to this year's new build.

'The Man' build comprise 800+ prims and is 71m high at its tallest point.

Best viewed at 720p - Enjoy!

DJ Healer at BURN2

Last night I had a great time at BURN2 listening and dancing to a great set by DJ Healer Ladybird. Lots of Organicans were there as well as a cast of crazies - all dancing wildly. Here's a few snapshots and a couple of videos I took:

Phoenix Rising Risk Vest and Pocket Watch

Phoenix Rising must be going out of business or their minds since everything in the store is L$25 with discount items at L$1. I picked up a few more colors of my favorite vest and pocket watch as well as several nice tops and a gown. Super great sale - I have no idea how long it's going to last.

Here I am modelling the Phoenix Rising Risk vest and pocket watch. The pants are included in the package (now only L$25 !!). I'm also wearing a white dress shirt from Connors, Dragoness shoes from Kalnins, nails & rings from Mandala.

Fun Mermaid Ride at BURN2

Maya Paris built a fun ride at BURN2 called SkellyMer. She provides a free skeleton costume to visitors then you just click and ride. The cool music stream is provided by March Macbain. Lots of fun stuff at BURN2 2011 - thanks Maya!

I made a video of me riding the mermaid:

Become A Second Life Video DJ - My Video Playlists

Recently I've laboriously gone through all 26 video playlists I maintain and updated them - revising links that no longer play in Second Life, adding new videos & playlists, and removing videos that are no longer available. There are nearly 500 videos linked in these playlists so the process was tedious but enjoyable since I get to watch a lot of great videos while I revise the lists.

The playlists are formatted for various media devices in Second Life - the NHC Media Center, Damani MediaViewer, and Icarus V2000. These Second Life televisions allow an SL resident to watch YouTube videos, play movies, view streaming video content and web TV shows, etc. I maintain the playlists inworld for my own use, on the Second Life Wiki Media playlists article, and available for purchase on the Second Life Marketplace.

There are playlists for Cake, Evanescence, Green Day, Pink Floyd, Slow Dances, Muse, lots of female artists (e.g. Kat Deluna, Beyonce, Priscilla Ahn, A Fine Frenzy), Lady Gaga, Machinima, Trance, Fractals, Second Life music videos, Tech N9ne, Infected Mushroom, Weezer, U2, AC/DC, Guns N Roses, and much more.

Each playlist is a notecard written in that media device manufacturer's  playlist format. Simply drag the playlists you want to use from your inventory into the Contents tab of your media device. The playlists should then show up on the TV's menu.

What this allows me to do inworld is easily plan and create an audio/video set either for personal use or as a Video DJ. No need for expensive difficult to setup Shoutcast stream server plus you get to watch the video :) Some SL media players allow you to simply click "Play List" and sit back or dance for hours while the TV streams dozens of videos inworld. Others you have to step through the list manually. Some players allow guests at your event to sync their viewers with yours, others only support asynchronous play. I use the NHC Media Center as it is cheap, plays lists, and guests can sync plus it comes with a Media Dome replete with dance floor visuals and a VJ booth.

Let me know if you find any links that need updating, have any requests or suggestions, would like to contribute playlists or links to the wiki, or have any questions about how to set yourself up as a Video DJ.

Here's a video treat from my "Wow Volume 1" playlist:

Five of My Favorite Second Life Blogs

Recently Hamlet Au at New World Notes posted five of his favorite SL blogs. Hey, I can do that too :) I follow dozens of Second Life blogs so these are just 5 I follow. It's a little surprising to me how few people seemingly follow SL blogs since the number and quality is high. I guess Second Life is still primarily an inworld experience but I find a lot of products, clothing, events, and pretty interesting socio-political-wtf drama in the SLogosphere.

Here are 5 blogs I find extremely informative:

1. New World Notes - Hamlet Au was formerly an embedded journalist for Linden Lab and now runs what is arguably the best Second Life news blog or anyway, the one I plurk/tweet most often.

2. Daniel Voyager's Blog - Ok, well, maybe Hamlet's isn't the best SL news blog since Daniel's is arguably better. Daniel is also a contributor to the History of Second Life wiki article. Both of these guys seem to have excellent insider LL connections or anyway they are right on top of official announcements, events, and trends.

3. Living in the Modem World: Thoughts on Virtual Living - Inara Pey maintains one of my favorite technically oriented Second Life blogs. Inara's is not strictly a technical blog - she also posts on fashion, design, devices, events, and more. However, her tech savvy is excellent and she provides detailed easy-to-understand explanations of breaking technical news.

4. StrawberrySingh.com - Berry is another eclectic SL blogger, posting on fashion, tech issues, lifestyle, travel, and providing excellent tutorials. One of SL's best photographers, Berry's posts almost always include stunning pics. I copy her fashion advice often.

5. Shopping Cart Disco - this collaborative fashion and gossip blog is the home of SL Secret and the What I Like series, two of my favorites. SCD is a full service blog with posts on all topics written by a group of bloggers and contributors.

If you find it too time consuming or tedious to visit a bunch of blogs then you might prefer to use an RSS reader. I use Google Reader so that all the blogs I follow are aggregated into a single view inside my reader. It makes clicking through blog posts from all over much easier.