I found my password!

Now I can start blogging again. Yay!

Primmy Little Thang

I've always been a fan of prim enhanced clothing. I've been playing around with making a jacket completely out of prims. So far it works fairly well if you are just standing or sitting. When dancing or flying the arms will occasionally show through the prims. I made a glitch jacket that is worn underneath and that seems to completely remove that problem. Just debating on whether I should actually sell this thing as everyone has a different shape and it would be a bitch to adjust.


This is the shortened version. The original jacket has a lower portion that goes down to the waist. I've tried both an open and a closed jacket. Open looks better. I even tried making it go down to the legs using flexi. Doesn't really work that well. Will this come out in the future? Maybe. Need to work on some of my shoes first.

Heliconia Shoes has arrived!

I did it! I made my first store in Second Life and it's called Heliconia. Named after a tropical plant that has these large clawlike things that the flowers come out of. I don't know what they are I'm not a botanist.

Heliconia has lots of shoes! Women's shoes! Ok well maybe not that much but I plan to keep adding new shoes and maybe taking down ones that don't sell.

Let me see if I can list these with a small description.

• canvas flats - basically canvas slip ons for very casual times.
  
• sharp heels - high heeled with metallic accents.
  
• wrap clogs - nice chunky clogs with a ribbon tied around your ankles.
  
• high clogs - a nice alternative to regular high heels these are high heeled clogs.
  
• curve heels - trying to make something original these have nice curving lines.
  
• harp heels - inspired by harps and bridges these shoes are possible in second life.
  
• strap stilletos - some very basic stilleto heels.
  
• neon lights - attention grabbing neon high heels.
  
• neon trio - three rows of neon lights wrapped around the heels.
  
• stilleto pumps - the most natural looking pumps I could make.
  
• heeled boots - high heeled and reaching up to your knees.
  
• rider boots - a chunky and very masculine design.
  
• sleek boots - fashionable boots that go with everything. Did I mention the spurs?

Please come and visit! I've also placed some of my old slexchange items in the store too! Just look at the inside front wall.

Click on this link to go to my store in Second Life:

HELICONIA

How to make a 'holding handbag' pose for Second Life

This is the first time I've used blogger so forgive me if I don't do things right. This tutorial is on creating a handbag pose for Second Life. This pose will make it seem that your avatar is holding a shoulder bag. There are several programs that can be used to create an animation but we will use qavimator.

1. Get qavimator.

http://qavimator.org/

Download and install qavimator.

2. Launch qavimator.

This is the main window for qavimator. The left half has the 3d figure that you manipulate to produce animations. The right half has the selection tools, the rotation and position tools. At the bottom is the timeline and the frames control.

To view the figure from different angles you need to click on the ground and drag your mouse. This allows you to rotate around the figure. Holding down the shift moves the camera up and down. Holding alt allows you to rotate and zoom. Holding ctrl doesn't seem to affect the camera.

There are many different points on the figure that you can rotate in order to produce an animation or pose. The handbag pose only involves four of these points. The shoulder, the upper arm, the lower arm, and the hand. You can make one for the left or right side. I will be doing the left side.


3. Set frames to 2


For this step, set the number of frames from '30' to '2' . This is the typical setting for poses.


4. Rotate the Shoulder/Collar


Now to start animating! In the 3d figure window click on the left shoulder. It should turn red ( or darker pink ) and you will see red, green and blue circles. On the right side you will see rotation sliders. Each slider rotates the selected point along a different axis. Move the Z Rotation slider and you will see the shoulder move. Move the Z rotation just a little. Why? Because we don't really want to rotate the shoulder but we DO want to lock it in place. If you don't do this, the arm will possibly flap around as the shoulder moves.

5. Move the upper arm


Here is where you are really setting the pose for the arm. Select the upper arm. Rotate the arm away from the body by adjusting the Z rotation slider. In Second Life, the arm normally hangs straight down. When you wear a bag it looks like your arm is hangin down and passing through the bag. Very unnatural.

6. Move the upper arm some more


With the same upper arm selected, rotate it backward using the Y rotation slider. When you are holding something in your hand and try to lift it up your elbow naturally swings backwards.

7. Move the forearm


Select the forearm. Try rotating it using the X, Y, and Z sliders. Pick a pose that looks natural for the forearm. Remember we are trying to make it look like it's holding a bag or at least hanging against a bag.

8. Move the hand


Same deal with the hand. Try to make it look natural and consistent with the type of bag you will be holding.

9. Save the pose


Once you've finished moving everything go back and try viewing the arm from different angles to see if it looks ok. Make adjustments if needed. Go up to file and choose save. The save window will say 'Untitled.avm'. Type in a new name and be sure to make it end with '.bvh'. For example, you can use 'baghold.bvh'.

10. Upload pose to Second Life


Load Second Life and get to where you can see your avatar. I recommend going to place with low lag. Go to the file menu and choose 'upload animation'. It will cost 10 lindens to upload. You will see the animation upload screen. The red arrows in the image above show you what you need to look at.

Priority. Set it to 4. This will cause your bag holding pose to override any animation or pose of lesser priority. I'm not sure how Second Life decides what to play when two animations of the same priority occur. (I'm told SL will play the last animation started. ~thanks Crystal)

Loop. Check the box. If you don't select loop the pose will only play for one instance which last for less than a second. You want the pose to play continuously.

Hand pose. Relaxed. I prefer making the hands look relaxed. There is a problem with Second Life where the hand pose settings get ignored. This may change later on but just know that your hands may behave badly.

Preview window. Press the play button and see that your pose looks correct. You can rotate and zoom in the preview window as well.

When everything looks good click on the upload button.


11. Check for the animation in your inventory


The new pose should appear in your 'animations' folder. If you double-click on the animation it will bring up a new window with two buttons 'play in world' and 'play locally'.


12. Check animation with your avatar


Click on 'play in world' and check out the animation on your avatar. It should look like what you saw in the upload preview and what you saw in qavimator. If it doesn't look right... you might need to go back into qavimator, change some rotations and re-upload.

13. Not really a step but try testing the pose with your bag. Or build a bag around it. You might notice that this pose doesn't look exactly like the the pose I had in qavimator. I decided to lower the forearm a little bit to make it seem that the arm is wrapped around the bag.



And that's the tutorial! My very first! I hope everything is correct. Please let me know if it isn't. Good luck on making your own bag holding poses!