Leaving on a Jet Ski October 15, 2009

During Zombiefest I got some nice things from “Rotten Toe” and decided to visit Elsa Liebknecht’s store to check out the rest of her range. I left not only with a bunch of outfits, torn stockings and free skull rain boots, but also with this awesome avatar. She is called “Pigface Nelly” but I renamed her “Nelly Pigface” because everybody needs a proper surname.

I have written about the island “Las Arenas Rosadas” in the past and only realised recently that it is part of a whole island group. Therefore I decided to take Nelly on a summer holiday to Las Rocas.

Windlight Settings: Surreal September 15, 2009

A couple of months ago I wrote a post about experimenting with Windlight and now I have finally managed to upload the files for sharing them with you. With these presets it is possible to achieve very graphic and colourful effects, which fascinates me everytime I decide to use them. Just give it a go and also try to use them in different locations to see how they change your environment. 🙂 Sometimes it might be necessary to adjust the Sun/Moon position or East Angle in the Advanced Sky Settings for optimal lighting of your avatar or object of interest. Also do play around with the other sliders and see what happens. 🙂

Windlight Settings: Fairy September 13, 2009

For a while now I have been playing with the thought to offer some of the Windlight settings used in my pictures as downloads. Finally I got organised and remembered to actually save some of the settings while taking photos for this post in Elvenforest . This is the first time I am trying this so please let me know if the downloads or anything else does not work. 🙂 For a guide on how to install Windlight settings, please take a look at this tutorial written by Torley Linden. I would be more than happy if you would link back to this blog if you use any of them – mainly so that other people can download them too and because I am very curious on how others might use them. But I do know how difficult it can be to remember which settings were used during a photo shoot and that it isn’t always feasible. Therefore it isn’t a requirement for use. 🙂

Experimenting with Windlight July 14, 2009

Windlight (aka advanced sky settings) is one of the main reasons I love Second Life so much. In virtual reality we can put together any motive and scenery our imagination (and SL resources) allow. With Windlight we can paint the sky, move the clouds and create unique moods. Even more interesting is the possibility to go beyond realistic and natural settings and push Windlight to its extremes – with alien skies, dark gloomy cities or fairytale forests. Playing around with the settings one day I found that it was even possible to produce very graphic, almost expressionistic images, with very clear lines and a few bright colours. “Solitude” (shown below) is one of my favourite pictures, created purely in SL. I am still fascinated by this effect and therefore decided to write a small tutorial on how to achieve it.