The New Skin & Head

After I bought a new skin and a mesh head I was told I that I didn’t look like me, so some pictures were in order. Left to right, the skins are Lumae Adore Aegean, Lumae Iriana, Lumae Eirtae T9 – Java Freck, Lumae Eirtae T7 – Nutmeg Freck. The second one is the newest release from Lumae (see here) and the reason for this post.

The SLink “Hourglass” body is topped with a Utilizator “Normie” mesh head. A quick note about this item: I’ve tried a dozen mesh heads and even bought shapes and appliers in an effort to get one to look like me. The Normie looked enough like me out of the box that I bought one for me and one for Xandah.

Maybe I was wrong. Or the tweaks I did to the head shape weren’t enough. Or, it’s the skin. I’ve had the head for about a week and the person who said I didn’t look like me hadn’t said so before I bought the light blue skin. Let me back up a bit.

Years and years ago, there was a brand called “SinSkins” and everything in the store was marked down to 10$L per item so I bought nearly every skin there for me and for my Zyx characters. Each of the Zyxs started life wearing a blue SinSkin (see here) and continued until mesh bodies were available. Then each switched to the Lumae Aegean you see above, left, the younger Zyx also getting the Lumae T7 Java shown second from right, above. Like me, each also has other skins, almost all from Lumae, but that’s another post or few.

I loved that blue skin so much that I searched long and hard for a few years but only recently did I corner Lumae’s creator, Lumiya Rae, to create one. I even showed her this NSFW pic from Flickr as an example. Little did I know, she had one in the works and she released it (with other skins) at the Mesh Body Addicts Fair (SLurl). After the announcement and 20 minutes of going SQUEEEEEEEEE I picked one up. And it is lovely. After buying a pose and setting up a shot, I showed the pic to a friend and was told it wasn’t me.

The Normie head seems to be based on Second Life’s “classic” or “system” avatar and so it was 98% “ME” out of the box. I tweaked it with several Windlights and even gave my shape to an alt to do an overlap comparison. I got it close, really. But texture on a mesh prim vs. texture on a system head (a form of mesh, but a different kind) will show differences. And I started wearing more makeup when I got the mesh head. But I do have to concede that the skin can make a big difference. When I finally bought a commercial skin a few years into my Second Life I had to adjust my nose. The Curio “Acorn” skin made my nose look so narrow compared to the freebie skin I had been using, and this was before mesh (see here)!

Looks like I still have some tweakery to perform. After a few days with the new head, the eyes are still not quite right. Still adjusting my ears, too. But I’m very happy with the new skin.

Gravity Wins

As you will notice, this blog post is heavy on breasts. There’s a pun there somewhere. It all started when I happened across a “Saggy Breast Deformer” on the Second Life Marketplace. I think it was one of those featured “What Customers are Buying Now” items. And as I’m 30 years old in Real Life now, losing my battle with gravity, I was intrigued enough to show the item to my wife. Who promptly bought it for me. No idea why. But I thought it might make photos more realistic. If you are a busty woman you know what happens when you lay down. With this in mind, I’ve made some comparison photos.

The Maitreya mesh body is common to all the photos, but the body shape varies with the first slider settings for the images with Nifty Bits – Boobies Moundz, an “implant” option I’m fond of lately. The second set of sliders numbers is for an unenhanced Maitreya body:

Moundz- Enhanced Maitreya Body

• 40 Breast Size
• 50 Breast Buoyancy
• 00 Breast Cleavage

Unenhanced Maitreya Body

• 99 Breast Size
• 50 Breast Buoyancy
• 00 Breast Cleavage

Here’s a birds-eye view with Moundz and a fairly mild “3-2” deformer* (top with the deformer; bottom without):

The same view without the Implants (top with the deformer; bottom without):

Examples of the effect from the side aren’t as dramatic but can be seen here (with Moundz) and here (without) on Flickr. Clicking the pictures above will take you to the embiggened ones on Flickr.

Keep in mind that just as important as body sliders and the use of Implants are body physics, pose/animation, and Avatar Physics settings in your viewer. Thus far, I haven’t come up with situations where I would use the deformers every day but the idea of using them for photos is intriguing.

*The deformer pack has four options for cleavage spread and 10 options for gravity sag. Depending on body slider settings and possible use of Implants (on mesh or system bodies) one of the options will be best.

2018 Yearbook

For Strawberry Singh’s 2018 Second Life Yearbook Challenge. I landed on the Main Grid on my real life 18th birthday. Now you do the maths. Click the image to see it embiggened on Flickr. The challenge gallery is here.

What’s in My Closet? A Tux!

Click the image to embiggen it on Flickr

After much hemming and hawing, I bought the new Collabor88 release from r2, the r2: A/D/E Otome set (in gold, as shown, and in black). When I tried he demo with the fatback bonus color (red) it struck me as a no-go for this round. Mind you, I seldom pass up andr2 release. If I don’t get it for me, one of my characters gets it. The price is dynamite and the look really rocks.

When I saw it in black, though, I thought “Tuxedo!” and tried my various colors of skin with it. Then I thought more. And I tried the other outfit colors, consulting with friends at each step, with nearly all my skins. Everyone agreed the gold looked great with my Lumae Eirtae Yrlissa skin (shown here). Immediately I bought the black option. And thought more. After, I bought the gold, too.

Some cheap earrings, some body sparkles, a nice updo hair, added some other jewelry, wore out my fingers for 20+ minutes figuring out makeup, and then made a bow tie out of bits I had in my Inventory. In terms of actual components, this is a simple outfit, but it took me about an hour. Twice as long as I’ve spent on other outfits. So tired now.

By the way, the shadow on the bridge of my nose doesn’t appear in-world or in the snap I shot for my Profile feed.

What’s in My Closet – BiB

For a Not A Fashion blog, I tend to post more than a few fashion items, such as this “Back In Black” set. This one of those outfits that started out completely different but wound up to be mostly the same. For example, the leggings started as bikini-style denim shorts. The cuffs were pewter bangles. The skin was my other blue Lumae skin, “Nyx.”

Click any image above to see it embiggened on Flickr. I tried to frame the shots so the issued wouldn’t show, such as the leg harness cutting into my thigh in certain poses, the leggings fighting with the boots, and etc. Below is the list of clothes you can use to make a similar outfit. Obviously, you can’t clearly see the nipples listed, the alphas aren’t listed at all, and I’m just too plain lazy to type in links for each item for your shopping convenience. Little tweaks such as a special shadow “tattoo” on my face and changing the lenses on the sunglasses shant be mentioned so stop reading now,

July 4th Topless Tuesday

Happy 4th of July Topless Tuesday, America! That’s right, this sacred event is a celebration of freedom. Women should be able to dress the same way men dress if they should choose to do so. Slacks, yes. There have been times women could not wear pants but were required to wear dresses. Shirtless, yes, but that is still limited.

There are fewer limitations on women in this respect in real life, however, than there are in Second Life. If I had wanted to attend the holiday fireworks without a shirt, I had the legal right (the fact that I was in bed, fast asleep this year not withstanding). I may window-shop downtown sans shirt should I wish (though stores are within their right to refuse admittance to anyone without a shirt),

In this picture, though, I’m breaking a Second Life law. I am in a G-rated region with my breasts exposed. This is a no-no for no good reason.

One day, when I have the time, I’m going to ask someone official at The Lab about this. Until then, I’m going to go topless wherever I wish to, risking whatever punishment is (not) merited.

It is called freedom.

Location: maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Shamon/62/79/35

Topless Tuesday Shopping

Okay, please ignore the vagaries of the poses. I had no control over the stranger’s hand inside his body and no time to make adjustments to where my limbs showed up. Think of this as a guerrilla protest opportunity. Carpe potestatem, as it were.

There I was, wandering the SL14B Shop Till You Drop event ( SLurl ) and noticed that the regions were G-rated. “What a great place for Topless Tuesday,” I thought. And there was a guy being AFK right at a bench. Interestingly, he moved away when he “woke up.” Never before had that reaction from men when I’ve been topless.

Back to the point. Women should be allowed to be topless anywhere that men can be be topless, but while composing this picture, I believe that I came up with the rationale for women covering themselves.

Men can’t control themselves. The men who made this silly rule know that when visually stimulated by a bounteous bosom, they will give into their Id and start fondling the women they see. Men may be topless because women have such self-control that men won’t be molested by feminine hands on bare male chests.

Am I right?

Topless Tuesday Vacation

Happy Topless Tuesday!

 

Click to see the image embiggened on Flickr.

 

A few days vacation in (so called) Real Life means I have time to just relax in Second Life for a bit. Having received a boat as a gift, I’ve been cruising the Blake Sea and parked at Siren’s Isle for today’s picture. Yes, the region does allow topless women but not all the places I visited were Mature rated so I broke the law a few times.

One of my plans while off work is to visit the real life USS Albacore, a retired submarine in nearby Portsmouth, NH. Legally, I could be topless while visiting, subject to arrest only if a disturbance breaks out or if asked to leave by the group that runs the facility (it is privately owned, I believe). Men can visit sans shirt, too, though they aren’t likely to be escorted off. But I’ll likely go with a sweatshirt as I’ll be alone and I’m still not confident enough to be bold around people in the flesh, so to speak. When some of the area’s various topless protests happen this Summer, though, I’m of a mind to go.

Topless Tuesday First

Angela, my wife, started celebrating Topless Tuesday before me!

But I quickly joined in and we celebrated together!

See this embiggened on Flickr!

Happy Topless Tuesday from Tori

My friend Tori (ToriMatsuda Resident) dropped by for Topless Tuesday!!