RFL

The Raglan Historical Society presents..., originally uploaded by Bear Silvershade.

Here's a fabulous picture of the rather fabulous tiny-centric build put up for the SL Relay For Life event.

I was very honoured to be asked to contribute to the development of this build, but disappointed that my contribution extended to little more than six cubes.

The biggest problem was that when I finally got access to the sims, the build was about 90% completed; when something is that far advanced and you can see how someone else's vision has come together and where's it's going, one isn't really in a position to change it or significantly contribute. I know my six prims were used though and I guess every prim counts in the end!

SL9B Opening - Saffia & Tinies!

SL9B Opening - Saffia, originally uploaded by Victor1st Mornington.

So SL9B gets torn down this week! If you haven't been over yet reader, I suggest you do so before 11.59pm on the 27th! If you can't, feast your eyes on the wonder that it was in this amazing Flickr picture pool.

I thought it was a really great event, one of the best ever birthday events that truly captured all that is good about Second Life and the creative possibilities it presents.

Maybe it was the lack of involvement of the Lindens (and the lack of red-tape and political correctness that follows them), maybe it was the theme that united all of these different communities, maybe it was the incredible psychedelic 8-bit themed main-stage...or maybe that it was packed full of tinies from the very start?

I'm going with that last one.

Shroom With A View

SL9B has begun!

Yes, despite Linden Lab's attempt to ensure another one of its big community events didn't happen, the residents have successfully risen to the challenge and have made this year's event their own; in truth, the Lab suggested a 'community' theme should be handled by the community, so less attempted sabotage by the Lindens and more just general laziness on their part.

The annual birthday celebration kicked off at 11am SLT yesterday (Monday), and after Saffia's impassioned opening speech, the tinies were representin' in force with at least a dozen riverdancers making a whole lotta noise!

Our plot is on Jamboree, one of 20 sims given over to this year's event, and in some cases with up to 36 plots on each sim, that's a whole lot of exploring to be done! In keeping with the feel of Raglan as a whole, the Shire SL9B plot is made up of overgrown natural elements - primarily three giant mushrooms, upon which we (myself, Etheria Parrott and Panacea Pangaea) have put out different creative elements from the community. I won't give too much away in that hope that you, reader, get the opportunity to go and visit the plot and play around at it!

The info hut and the community picture display.

The mushroom-head picnic tables.

On the smallest shroom sits three picnic tables (with waffles), where we invite tinies to gather and chat; a ladder above that is our Poetry Slam shroom, where a small circle of mushrooms each hold a poem written by a different member of our community; and an Anywhere Door journey above that is our sundial of events.

The Poetry Slam shroom circle: when clicked, a shroom reads the poem contained within it.

As I said in my previous blog entry, it felt imperative to me that as many tinies from Raglan contributed to the build as we could involve. Although we were limited by the small amount of people who were allowed access to the sims in the building stage, we put out a plea to the group to contribute pictures, poems and free gifts, and it didn't go unheard - we were sent dozens of pictures and a good number of poems.

The Event Sundial: when touched, the dial turns to a specific month with details about that months event.

We've already had a number of other SL9B participants come around and compliment us on our build, which is incredibly kind and generous, especially for a build that developed organically - my only idea when we got our plot was 'it should be on platforms'. I love seeing builds you can interact with and explore, and given that each plot covers a relatively small ground area, the best way to develop that interaction was to go high.

I'm exceptionally pleased with how the build has turned out, and that really is a testament to the community; my own contribution to the development of the build was very minimal - I rezzed a couple of things, sent out a couple of notices asking for stuff - so it really has been the generosity of others that has injected the plot with life. It's fun, colourful, cute and different - exactly how life as a tiny can be! Visit it at this SLURL!

Polly Ellsmere (left) and Bree Himmel explore the plot.

I should really start thinking about SL10B. Or would it be SLXB?

Through The Lens

Snapshot of Through The Lens Of Dreams, taken by Pyewacket Bellman

Although the surreal majesty of Alien Isles has now departed the Grid, the brilliant creative minds of those behind it - Madcow Cosmos and Lorin Tone - have found a new sim upon which to collaborate and unleash their own unique brand of fairytale-esque craftsmanship.

Through The Lens Of Dreams is the name of their new art installation across the sim of Art Screamer. It's a rich assortment of Madcow's trademark wide-eyed monsters and toothy beings scored by a cacophony of Lorin's chirps and whistles, and again represents just how limitless Second Life can be for an imaginative soul. Arriving at a small floating platform and dropping down onto a cushion suspended in the mouths of giant caterpillars is just the first step you'll take on the incredible adventure that awaits: you'll find the vast grassy banks littered with a sprinkling of tiny blue flowers, through which hordes of cute cycloptic critters amble; the trees laugh from under their giant leafy hats as you wander past, each given their own distinct look and sound; the sky is filled with oversized insects and airborne pieces of fruit; giant bamboo-framed bikes ferry about miniature potted gardens.

Look up, down and all around to see this amazing work

Much of Madcow's work before now was through the careful assembly of cleverly shaped and lovingly textured basic prims but with his extensive use of sculpty prims on this build, his imagination has really run amok. Lorin and Madcow describe it as "an exploration of the transformative nature of dreams, where each new setting may emerge from the last and seems continuous while we're experiencing them." Whilst some dreamscapes tend to be more ethereal and less hallucinatory, this is akin to running through the set of an Aardman animation movie directed by Tim Burton. You can even take away one of Madcow's avatars as a souvenir.

The brains behind the operation

There are some slight issues; I'm not the only person to have gone over there and found a problem with sounds; not necessarily the sounds within the build but system sounds too, which after a while can become a little grating. Madcow and Lorin are both aware of it and they are looking to get the problems resolved, but they believe it's a server side issue. However, turn your volume and your draw distances down and it's a truly wonderful build, well worth visiting and exploring as soon as you can. I would imagine that, very much like a dream, it won't be around for long and when it's gone, will be hard to reimagine.

Reach Art Screamer at the following SLURL: http://slurl.com/secondlife/Art%20Screamer/127/150/80

Looking After The Children

A few blog posts have popped up over the past couple of days about the recent plight of Grendel’s Children.

Treet TV’s Saffia Widdershins has a comprehensive write up of the issues that Flea Bussy and Toady Nakamura have been facing for the past few weeks, which basically amounts to the fact that two of their cluster of sims have been performing so poorly that even after repeated requests to the Lab about trying to rectify the problems, they’ve decided that the best course of action is to dump them entirely.

I know for a fact that this isn’t a decision they’ve taken lightly - I’m very proud of the fact that I can count Toady as a good friend - and I know when she told me about the closures over the weekend that she and Flea were both saddened and angry that it had come to this. It seems the Lab had put in a fix to try and better performance on the sims, but the solution hadn’t lasted beyond a few days and wasn’t followed up on again; it was only when they announced their decision to off-load the sims that someone decided to take notice, immediately flying in to investigate and proudly informing them that performance had massively improved. “Of course it had,” Toady told me, “because there were only 6 prims left on the sim by then.”

It won’t be a massive hit for Grendel’s as a business but it’s a shame for them both as creators; not only do Toady and Flea want to give users a product range but an experience to go along with it, an environment as well-crafted and atmospheric as their avatars are. The sims at ground level are amazing feats of architecture that Toady, Flea and others work so hard at that it’s almost the the suppression of creativity that I feel most saddened about. I've filmed

Hopefully someone at the Lab - or Rodvik himself - will be alerted to the problems that are still haunting the business and, although too late for Grendel’s, does something to ensure that other clusters and communities (and ultimately, revenue for the Lab) don’t slip away unnecessarily or unnoticed. In the meantime, if you’re looking for somewhere to explore, teleport over to the GC store and then find a way outside and hurl yourself down to ground level!

Achamo Paine

Postcard from Second Life., originally uploaded by achamo.

I've only met Achamo Paine - a Japnese tiny - a couple of times in all of my time in SL, but I've followed her Flickr stream for a while and it never ceases to amaze me.

I love seeing the postcards she puts up, and the quality of them is amazing. She makes such a wonderful use of depth-of-field and light and shadow. It's great to see different parts of the Grid through such a good pair of other's eyes!

I would thoroughly recommend adding Achamo to your Flickr contacts.

Tinytanic

During the course of a conversation I was having with a fellow tiny a little earlier this morning, I learned that tinies were banned from the Titanic sim. Unpossible, I hear you cry! Nope, apparently not; after immediately teleporting over, I was greeted with a blue dialogue box quite implicitly stating 'Child avatars/tinies or animal avatars are not allowed'.

Shocking! We're usually welcomed with open arms, allowed to roam and play and spread joy to wherever we go - but not aboard the Titanic, it would seem. I decided at that point that the best course of action was to inform my fellow tinies in the Friends of Raglan Shire group of what I'd discovered, in an attempt to ensure that they were properly educated and didn't accidentally stumble onto this sim and find themselves on the receiving end of a boot. Many of them were equally as stunned and perplexed by my claim and demanded to be teleported in to see the evidence for themselves; so I grabbed another half dozen.

In an effort to try and understand why we may not be allowed to explore this quite incredible and lovingly worked build we clambered aboard; initially to the bow in the hope of recreating a "I'm flying Jack!" moment, before deciding that the ballroom was where we needed to be. After all, we'd all dressed up for the occasion and took to the dancefloor to show off our moves. I even managed to grab a few snapshots as a momento.


I appreciate that some sims and communities strive for accuracy in not only their builds but also trying to achieve 'the feel' of a place or event, but categorically saying that certain avatar types aren't allowed does seem a little blinkered, in my opinion. This whole expedition came about because I'd been told that a friend of mine had been ejected from the Titanic sim when she turned up as a tiny to watch one of her favourite performers do a live show there; that kind of behaviour doesn't benefit anyone, not the resident, the performer or the reputation of the sim. Besides, us being there didn't seem to bother anyone - admittedly, of the 11 people there, eight of them were tiny - and besides ignoring the request of NOT being tiny there, we acted in a wholly respectable manner.

Besides, if the Titanic sim was really striving for accuracy, the sea level would be at its highest level possible, the ship would be wedged into the ground and the build covered in sculpty limpets. I'm just sayin'.