All the cool kids wear hightops!

IDG is honored to be included as one of the 'top' websites concerning virtual worlds at Alltop.com, You can see us way at the bottom of this page here.

Alltop is pretty neat, it's a very homegrown effort, but that makes it nice and unique, and I don't mean homegrown in a bad way, it's slick, functional, lots of fun and they take a real interest in what they do and don't put on their site, you should go check them out now. O, their banner is down there on the right. I could have chosen other banners too.... some examples behind the one I chose below.

Torley talks Consultant and Useability - what I believe.

Go read Torley's article here.... I'll wait.

OK. So, much of what Torley is talking about is very good, and if you read the comments you can see that people have chimed in talking about money and standards. I thought I'd point out a couple of things so that you know how I do business concerning this:

Much of what I do is project management and consulting in Second Life. Yes I sell prefabs, but honestly I love realizing the idea of other people. I script, I build, I help people find the resources that make their dreams come true. I also take the time to establish relationships and 'hire' designers and scripters to make all this work for my clients. My designs are reworked until they work well for the intended client, or the client's customers. 

That's the essence of usability to me.

Now, having said that - standards become a thorny issue when dealing with art, which much of design in Second Life can be classified under. One client may want something that I disagree with. (As the Endless Nights people about our discussions around this.) My job as a professional person is to state why, offer options, and then do what the client wants after discussing pros and cons. That is what Project Manager's call, "pleasing the primary stakeholder". This is what your job is, not building, not scripting... pleasing your client and giving them the information to make an informed decision. Then being gracious and professional if they ask for something you can't or won't do. There are lines of course, I won't make or script sim nukes to take an extreme example, but if you run into this problem you aren't doing enough pre-sale exploration of what someone needs to know that you are going to have this problem.

Speaking of that, my job begins way before anyone hands me any money. On most sim builds I spend a good number of hours talking about concept, art, and 'similar but not quite' examples before I ever see a dime. My usual method of working includes doing a small scale mock up of what I am thinking they want so they can see it, a gentle guiding of the often chaotic creative process, and an estimate of time and cost before anyone ever signs a contract or hands me money. This is stuff I enjoy doing, and hopefully I eventually get paid for it, but it is something I do as part of my job before I get paid. It's making sure you understand the proposal before you dive in. This is seriously lacking in Second Life, too many people who say they do any kind of work, don't investigate, they take the money and run, then provide shoddy product. Another way to increase your professionalism in Second Life, is to communicate and be on time! This is a 'game' to too many people who also try and be 'workers'. I understand that this is a game for many, but if I hire you to do something do it by the time you say you will, or tell me ahead of time, way ahead of time, that you won't make it and why. Usually it's not a problem, but it will increase your percieved professionalism a ton, as so many flake off in Second Life.

Now Money. This is the other thing that holds many people back inside the virtual world. For pennies people can hire dancers, hostesses, escorts... you name it. However... if you want custom work by someone who knows what they are doing and is going to make sure you are happy for something that you are either going to make money with or enjoy for a long period you should expect to pay for it. Now then, having said that. The way I usually work is to try and make win/win situations. I usually 'pay' my designers by doing some kind of split of sales with them, while absorbing the costs myself. They end up winning when their designs sell, I get a better product line and situation, have friends I trust and can work with, and create resources we can all use for the big job. However, too many times I get people asking me for money just because I happen to 'own' a sim or run a business. I'll be perfectly honest. I don't make anything doing this.... yet. I hope to some day, I take care of my workers, but business owners and most good consultants in this world, as in any. Have EXPENSES. Not understanding that about the people you're working with is a good way to make them ignore your project and dreams.


This turned into a bit of a rant, I didn't mean it to, I hope this comes off as friendly advice, some learning opportunities to the people starting out, a glimpse into my attitude of collaboration and service and maybe even some food for thought. If you have a project you want me to look at for any reason, I script, do graphic design, sim building, creative thought process guidance.... *keeps talking as the tape runs out*

Live Music @ Natalis - Damian Carbenell this Sunday!

Damian Carbenell is playing a one hour set monthly for us and it's this weekend on Sunday August 3rd at 7pm! Please come hear this talented singer songwriter and support his continued success. Encourage him to make us a weekly event!

Guitarist/vocalist Damian Carbenell picked up the guitar at age ten and added the keyboards soon after. He began to write his own music at age 15 and now has an extensive collection of originals and cover songs under his belt. A typical Damian performance might include the Eagles, Green Day, Jack Johnson , Bon Jovi, John Mayer, Rob Thomas, or even Garth Brooks and Toby Keith. His wide variety in music style is sure to please everyone. His MySpace page is here.

Endless Nights Preview - the Township

Here you have the township, actually you have alot more of a view then just the town. In the top picture the church in the center of the sim is in the foreground, with the townhall in the back. These pictures were taken during the day, which is fine, but you don't really get all the atmosphere and lighting I've been working so hard on. The streetlights in the bottom picture can be seen but with the region settings of midnight all the time they really glow. The sim is really coming together well. I'll do some detail pictures in the next few days.

Projected finish date is the 15th, Are you ready for Endless Nights?

Watch my mouth - My Mom could see...

So I get this email today from my Mom, normal stuff which is none of your business but at the end she says:

Hey, I like your blog about others builds - it really shows who you are and I am proud of you!

Love ya,
Mom.

So.... apologies to Mom when I sometimes talk about the more adult aspects of Second Life, though if you knew my mother you'd be surprised, growing up with 3 sisters will educate you fast. Second, my Mom is proud of me, so nuts to all of you who aren't. And Finally, I made my Mom famous on the Internets.


Hi Mom, love ya too.


Noel.

BTW, this is the post she's talking about here.

Update:: My Mom is way more famous then me.... compare google search results:

Results 1 - 10 of about 45,100 for (My Mom's Real Name and Workplace)

compared to:

Results 1 - 10 of about 747 for Noelyci Ingmann, Ingmann Design Group.

Reminder - Contest!

Reminder - we're currently running a contest with 2000L in prizes. Only two entries thus far so you have little competition, details here. Contest ends on August 1st so get those entries to me.

Endless Nights Preview - Mutant Lair

And here's your sneak peek at the Mutant's hiding ground. Located deep beneath the streets of the township portion of Endless Nights this glowing sewage flows over the ground from a massive pipe, something lives in there, but nobody knows quite what. The drips from the broken pipes above are constant and it's astounding that the noise doesn't drive the residents mad.

Goodbye to Massively, Hello to NWN!

OK, so if you're incredibly observant, you notice that a few days ago I changed one of the sidebar feeds. I removed Massively and put in New World Notes. The fact of the matter is that Massively has not been focusing on Second Life nearly as much since they merged from what used to be SecondLifeInsider. I still enjoy reading people like Akela Talamasca and Tateru Nino but I feel that the smart people who read my blog are better served by the seeing the headlines as a snapshot of Second Life that Hamlet Au and the group at NWN gives. In my opinion they are THE place to go for Second Life news.

Why I won't tell you if someone else's stuff is crap.

So, I was talking to one of my clients, someone extremely happy with my builds and who is becoming a good friend as well as a client. They shared with me that they were talking to someone who calls themselves a builder and mentioned that they were happy with me because I have some of the most low lag, efficient, well designed pre-fabs that they had ever seen. The other person involved in the conversation, the so-called builder, stated that my builds were horribly laggy, badly designed, and basically crap. Now, it's a blessing that this person trusts me and likes my stuff.

It prompted me at first to think, "Well, this is horrible, I'm upset." but on further reflection I'm going to take it as a compliment. First off, I must be popular enough that someone feels they have to put me down in order to increase their market share. Second off, people pay attention to my builds. It also prompted me to think about how I want and have wanted to do business, so, my dear readers, here's my soapbox statement.

1. I build things as best I can, if you aren't happy with it I will take reasonable steps to make sure you are. I have spent weeks to make one person happy with my best seller and will happily do so for you or explain why I can't.
2. I use techniques that very few other people use yes. However, my builds are known for low prim and low lag. Anybody who is telling you different, ask them to prove it, I have a demo rezzer and I'll put my build down on your land so you can see performance and looks for yourself.
3. I will not put another builder down. I actively teach and help in Second Life and I encourage people to learn and grow here. The more builders, the more use the more this world we all enjoy becomes an amazing place. I will tell you if you ask me to build something whether I can do it or not, the most I will say about another design in Second Life is, "You can do better." I do not seek to put down or affect anyone's business through negativity.
4. I rely on word of mouth for my sales, the reason I don't use bots or camping chairs is because I do not want to artificically inflate numbers to 'suck' someone in. You either like my builds and customer service or you don't, it won't bother me. In fact if you don't like mine I will actively tell you who has great builds that I respect. I'll send you to them. Because my goal isn't to sell you something, my goal is to help you be happy, to create a relationship you remember when you're ready to buy again, to maybe afford that custom, or have a change of pace and grab that one that wasn't quite right. This is my goal, to be available and helpful, even if I don't get paid for it.

Builders I love who I recommend actively if my stuff dosen't suit you and you don't want to get a custom from me (which I love doing and are probably cheaper then you think.):

Serra Anasasi - Not just an amazing landlady and person, but a very good builder who I miss and adore. She has several smaller size gothic and medieval type builds.

Inksky Jedburgh - The man for gothic castles. My style is different but he taught me and gave me my first castle textures. This is the guy I refuse to compete with. If you want a traditional castle and mine don't fit your needs but you like the flavor, do yourself a favor and look at his stuff.

Desari Deladda - Amazing texture queen. I have been graced with her friendship ever since I ordered one of her customs. She is the one I learned from for doing contract and custom work in Second Life and she probably dosen't even know it. Very high end but you will absolutely not be dissapointed with the end product if you have the land to host such beautiful designs.

So there you go, if you don't like my stuff that's fine, but don't expect me to get in an argument over who's builds are better. It's something I'd rather completely sidestep and ask what makes you, the client, happy. If I can do that wonderful, if not I'll send you to people I think can. That's how I want to do business.

I'll get off my soapbox now,

~Noel.

Land Use

It's always nice to see Second Life through new eyes. One of my long time friends is relatively new to our virtual world and so the questions make me think about how much there is to learn. One of the things that is essential to learn as a builder in Second Life is management of resources. What do I mean?

There are several resources you have to pay attention to, the first of which is size. But this is closely tied to prims. The amount of virtual land you have gives you your limit on the amount of prims you can host. It's like paying for storage on a server. If you pay for a full sim, you can use all the resources of that sim as you see fit. If you pay for less you can have less 'content'. Premium members get the ability to not pay extra monthly for their first 512 square meters on the mainland and it's possible to live simply and well that way. However most people quickly expand to more. The limits on how many prims per parcel amount is here. Become familiar with it.

The third resource, which isn't nearly as easy to keep track of or manage is script resources.... and that's a whole nother post.

Endless Nights.

My current project.... I'll let my client tell you....



From Neit (pronounced night):

4. Along with a group of incredibly gifted and fun people, I am helping to create a new roleplay sim - Endless Nights. The sim name will be changed soon, but you can find it in my profile if you want to look at the build. Noelyci Ingmann, of IDG Designs, is creating the entire build using some of his incredible builds. Illyana Menges is the primary driving force for the sim, with her indepth knowledge of roleplay and amazing list of friends. She's just a joy to work with. Anyanka Bisiani will be guiding the sim-wide RP, Kooky Jetaime will be setting up and hosting the webpages for staff and citizens (and helping with Da Roolz - he is the Roolz Nazi!), Stevo Arkin will be involved in all aspects of the sim. We're counting on help from many of our old (and new) friends to establish a low-lag, fair and fun place to play. It'll happen soon - we're shooting for a grand opening by the end of this month.

So there you go, this is why I've been running around like a chicken with my head cut off most of the time I'm in sl. I'm getting permission to share pictures, but I'm building a full rp sim for these folks that is low lag, fairly low prim (at least my part of it) and very much a display of the stuff that I do. It's turning out very well and even though I'm using alot of my prior builds (At client request due to speed and the fact that they like them.) everything needs to be tweaked and poked and prodded in to fit and look fairly unique. The sim is currently locked down but should be open to rp soon, if not completely done being tweaked and built.



So if you're a vampire, wearwolf or lycan, neko, human, mage, witch, priest or priestess, mutant, cyborg, demon, angel or something else and you enjoy good roleplay send a message to Illyana Menges and ask how you can help with Endless Nights. I'm excited by this and I'll share more details soon.

I'm a Model, You Know What I Mean?

Guess what? I won! Here's the other honorable mentions.

Go Before It's Too Late!

You must see this, NPH and Nathan Fillion Singing! Joss Whedon goodness! Do not stay here, go now!

Build Contest! Efficient Design.

Announcing the first ever IDG build contest with prizes! I want to see what you all can do, the theme is 'Where I want to live." so here's the rules.

1. No more then 25 prims.
2. No megaprims.
3. Must be original work.
4. Must fit within 20x10 meters - think first land parcel house.
5. Winner chosen and announced on August 1st. Grand prize is $2000L and an invitation to sell the build through IDG if desired.

Winner gets cash and prizes, including the ability to have their design sold by IDG if they so desire. Builder's grant a limited use liscence to display and use the builds and images of for promotion but retain all rights to their build. I reserve the right to award 2nd and 3rd place prizes, as well as honorable mentions.

So what do you think? Can you do a house that looks good in under 25 prims?

Drop the item with the name IDG Contest on Noelyci Ingmann in SL.

Video Link Love - Building and Cam Controls

This is how I learned, by watching lots and lots of tutorials. Here are some I like:



Noob be gone is funny and full of good information, in fact, here's another from them:



And of course, the king of video tutorials, since he's paid by Linden Labs to do so... Torley Linden, all of his videos can be seen here, and I highly recommend surfing through them, but here's his cam control tutorial:

Got Playstation?

Just in case you have a PS3, My gamer tag is down there on the right. I enjoy playing it but I tend to be a solitary gamer, getting my social fix from Second Life. However, feel free to add me to friends list and we can play Rock Band anytime you want.

Link Love - great tutorial on adjusting attachments.

Go here. Ephermeral Creations has created a well written tutorial on adjusting attachments. What's interesting to note and they don't really mention here is that these same skills are what you use for manipulating prims in building. It's absolutely essential that you learn to use camera controls in Second Life if you want to learn to build. Tomorrow I'll link to some video tutorial love.

Library Scripts - Anim Smooth

So back to scripting, the first script we're going to look at in the library, which is what everyone has in Second Life, is anim Smooth. This was written by Doug Linden at Linden Labs and it's a clever little script that has more uses then are first apparent. It's a simple script, basically it does one thing as soon as you rez the object or implement the script and that is to animate the texture on all the sides of the prim making it scroll across them. Here's the script:

// anim SMOOTH Script

// By Doug Linden
//
// If you are interested in scripting, check out
// the Script Help under the help menu.
// The double slash means these lines are comments
// and ignored by the computer.
// All scripts have a default state, this will be
// the first code executed.
default
{

     // state_entry() is an event handler, it executes
     // whenever a state is entered.
      state_entry()
     {


     // llSetTextureAnim() is a function that animates a texture on a face.
     llSetTextureAnim(ANIM_ON SMOOTH LOOP, ALL_SIDES,1,1,1.0, 1,0.25);
     // animate the script to scroll across all the faces.


     }
}

So this script basically does the one function llSetTextureAnim. Taking a look at the lsl wiki, or hovering our mouse over the command in the script window if you are in Second Life gives us the arguments for the function:

llSetTextureAnim(integer mode, integer side, integer x_frames, integer y_frames, float start, float length, float rate);

So, we can do some interesting things with this, the first part that I messed with was the rate, which in the script of the library is the final 0.25 number. Changing that to .05 and using a water texture gives a very nice effect of waves moving across the prim, very basic but effective. Changing the ALL_SIDES parameter lets you choose which side of your prim actually has animation which can also be extremely helpful. So right away we have some decent uses for this script, but what about exploring further into possibilities. If you look at the wiki it give you all sorts of options. You can rotate the script, which is great for a steaming culdron effect and I've used to make witches pots over fires for halloween. You can make it zoom in and out. If you're really clever you can even make true animations by using the old flip book trick. This is much more advanced requiring you to make a texture divided into multiple parts with each frame of animation right above one another and I'm not going to get into it here. My point is that the resources for very advanced content creation is given to all of us if we explore a bit.

 

Other parts of the library can be equally as fun, check it out yourself.

I claim this blog for....wait...

OK, so lame title to the post aside, I planted a new banner at the top of the page. I kind of like the whole, avatar's creating worlds theme I tried to indicate there. If you like it let me know, if you don't... let me know. I wanted to extend the orange-black gradiant over the background of the blog but the stylesheet is not cooperating with me... so I'll have to kick at the tires a bit more and see. I'll have some more info on the library scripts later this week and I want to talk a bit about my current project. Thanks everyone for continuing to read.

Blogged!

OK, so in an effort to be more web 2.0.... (Even though I work to create content in Web 3.0 or whatever version Second Life is.) I joined blogged. If you like the blog, please take a moment to go here and rate the blog, increase my standing in the world of bloggers, because I know you really care about me. After all you're smart and wonderful caring people. Thanks.

Impressions of SL & Lively from a non-using geek.

Manny is a friend of mine, not in Second Life per se, but a great mind at tech and business and someone who keeps up on the news, I was having a discussion with him online about Lively and Second Life among other things and these were his reactions...
Noel: Can you read and critique for me?
Noel: http://www.ingmanndesign.com/

manny: the question about lively is, how do they sell text ads on it?

Noel: I'm sure they will, the question is whether or not they will allow some form of revenue generation for the people using/developing for it.
Noel: It makes sense for google, completely.

manny: well, it might be a bit like adwords, where you get a % of the clickthru
manny: but really, google is an advertising distribution company

Noel: Yeah most likely. What did you think about my analysis?

manny: not a search company
manny: i'm reading it now. interesting, but you're right: linden, tho, is more than a hosting company

Noel: That's true it is, but that's their revenue model is as a hosting company.

manny: user-generated content is hard to manage, which is why most places don't do it
manny: WoW, for example, makes millions
manny: w/o user creation

Noel: But that's also why WoW will never be a communication medium that replaces the web.

manny: but I agree, that's probably where the future is
manny: exactly - but it makes bazillions of dollars

Noel: True, and if that's what you're going for it's a great way to do it.
Noel: But you can't claim it's the 'future'
Noel: lol

manny: they (linden) do more than host, actually
manny: they maintain the world & tools, which is probably an unbelievable amount of work
manny: but in the long run, the experience they get will allow them to do more stuff down the road

Noel: Of course they do, I am not claiming that really, but that dosen't directly make them revenue.

Noel: They have to do that to support the hosting that provides their revenue.

manny: True, but the infrastructure enables that - it's what makes them different
manny: well, it's a market differentiator
manny: plus, it lets other minds work on stuff
manny: You can only do so much as a company. by unleashing your users, you allow your creation(s) to go places that you might never have thought of

Noel: Absolutely.
Noel: I'm downloading Lively now, lol
Noel: Just so I can reserve my name(s)

manny: The difference between Linden and Google is:
manny: Linden Labs: how can we help you make neat stuff and money
manny: Google: how can you help us make money?

Noel: Rofl
Noel: Want to be famous on my blog?

mannyveloso: sure!

Noel: I may just post this whole conversation, lol



So there's the conversation, and Manny is absolutely right about one thing, Linden Labs isn't just a hosting company, but they are a company, they aren't just interested in making me money and neat stuff, that's a side effect of how they chose to populate their world and create their revenue stream. It's one I think is worthwhile and incredibly cool, it's why I think they are the best first stab at the 'future' of the internet. Much of the discrepency between blog posts from me where I love Linden Labs and where I dislike them comes from their dual nature as a beneficial thing and a company that needs to maintain it's existance and bottom line. It makes it hard to love them, but one thing I always admire and respect is what they are trying to do. If that isn't clear from my continued virtual existance and the tone of this blog I owe them an apology.

Lively Doom....

Script discussions will have to wait. For those of you who don't know and rely on only me for your Second Life news (if that's the case I'm flattered but I'm not strictly a news site, I recommend New World Notes for that) Google launched thier version of a virtual world in the preceding days called Lively. Gwyn has this to say about the experience (full article here):

"As a 3D-chatroom-embedded-on-the-web, it falls behind almost every other product and application I have tried in the past 4 years, no matter where you wish to find something good. The animations are goofy and cartoonish, to the point of extreme irritability. The interface is not obvious, but then again, SL suffers from the same problem, and it’s just a question of getting used to it. There is no content creation at all; no way to integrate it with anything; no programming/scripting; no chat tools (even GTalk, known to have the least features just after SL’s chat system, has far more!). And, more important: no support..."

You really should read her full article and I'm quoting liberally, because Gwyn speaks what I am thinking most of the time. She's a brilliantly clear thinker on the future of Second Life. She continues to summarize her article by saying:

"Abruptly, since yesterday, a huge fracture was opened (we had signs that it would be coming) between what a “virtual world” ought to be (a fully immersive 3D environment where the desktop is replaced by a 3D viewer) and what Google now defines it to be (disconnected rooms, associated with websites, where a small amount of people come to visit what’s going on in it and interact by chatting). The lower the quality of Lively, the better for Google. If you read the comments on many blogs and comments you’ll see how everybody is over-emphasising the ability to put a Lively room on a social website’s profile, and how little importance is being given to usability, user-generated content, a contiguous landscape, programmability, or even mashups with other technologies. As long as you can embed a 3D room inside a blog post with the same ease you can place an YouTube video in it, people are happy.


And I’m pretty sure that’s exactly what Google intends."

Once again you really should read her full article, however to be clear here are some of my thoughts:

There is a battle between tech companies, and all companies really, that can be very polite at times but it's all about market share and the bottom line. Linden Labs has done an amazing thing with the creation and nurturing of Second Life, and they are truly ahead of their time with the liberal thinking that allows someone like me to own the content I create. This is the thing that brought me to Second Life and keeps me there. Of course Google is creating something, as is every other tech company on the planet, or partnering with someone who is, if they aren't they aren't being responsible to their shareholders and they will end up like the other buggy whip makers. It's no surprise to me that there are other players joining the market of virtual worlds. What surprises me is that the idea of user generated content hasn't caught on in this space. Of course finding a model that causes a company with such liberal policies on content to make money isn't easy, but the lessons of youtube, ning.com, livejournal, and even google pages should not be lost on anybody looking to enter the sector. Essentially Linden Labs has thousands upon thousands of content developers working for pennies to create for users and we love doing it. Youtube exists and is seen as a valuable web property, and it's associated headaches with copyright content and user generated content are moderated and taken care of. There's no reason Google can't figure this out in a virtual world space.

For that matter there's no reason Google should be trying to reinvent the virtual world. Can you imagine what would happen if Google jumped on the standards that Linden Labs has started to pull together with IBM? If Google really wanted to enter the virtual space, they could create OpenSims in a huge way, beyond anything Linden Labs has the resources to match. With their supporting revenue they could undercut prices, create true hosting circumstances instantly acceptable to the majority of web users and create the new way of hosting sucn content right out from under Linden Lab. Their size would nearly guarantee their success.

Because all told, that's what this is, Hosting. Linden Labs hosts content we make, for ourselves and others. They are hosting the new form of the web. Why this dosen't make sense to other people confuses me... but then again, I'm not that smart. I won't be joining Lively until I can own the content I make there. The fun part for me is trying to make me and my partners successful. Yes I enjoy creating, but without an audience and a goal in mind it's just doodling in a sketch pad. I want to see if people like it and the only way that really get's demonstrated is if people choose to host it on their land, or pay me to create something special for them. I hope that Linden Labs dosen't lose their sight of this uniqueness and I hope other companies like Google adopt it. Otherwise I don't see a future for anything but corporate takeover of the 'new' web.

Enough doom and gloom.... come to Natalis and enjoy the beach.

Explorations in the Library.... scripts.

So I thought it'd be a good idea to take a look at the default stuff Linden Labs includes when you first start Second Life as a brand new avatar. They occasionally change and update this stuff but everyone has it. It's called the library and it's a seperate folder in your inventory underneath your main inventory. You can't change anything in it but you can make a copy and make changes to that and save it in your main inventory. The part that most people in the blogosphere (Geez, what a word.) have neglected to talk about is the scripts. Maybe that's because there are only three. However they are incredibly useful little scripts, especially from the standpoint of seeing how certain things happen. In fact, remember when I couldn't find the merry-go-round that I wanted to point to as an example of how I got the Codex Scope to spin? The rotation script in the library is how you do that. Over the next few posts I hope I get a chance to look at these scripts in a bit more detail and show how they apply to what you can build. However, it's a great idea to really look at everything in the library because it's a great starting point, it's a bit basic sure, but you get to see how things have been built and there's no reason not to learn from people who've already invented the wheel.

Making Waves.... Natalis now sounds and looks better.

So this is almost a toy post, but not quite. I'd spotted a couple posts about the waves created by Naiman Broome on the blogroll. (Which is longer then what I share here.) I had to go see for myself. I've always wanted to do waves on Natalis but there are a couple of concerns with lag and such. So I bit the bullet and went to take a look. They are brilliant and you really should go check out the video that Bettina Tizzy did to highlight them here. They've really changed the character of the beach at Natalis for the better. The sound is pleasant and not too loud and it looks like a real beach now with surf flowing over the sand and back into the water.

When looking at the lag they only add 0.009 ms (miliseconds) to the script operating time of the sim per wave. That's the lowest I've ever seen for a wave. No they aren't surfable but they do help the ambiance. Now as far as what they are from a build perspective they are very clever. What Naiman has done is create a sculpty (Remember them?) which turns back and forth on itself. This makes the texture on the waves, when animated bunch up and crash and flow at different rates. The script itself, as far as I can tell, is the classic animation smooth script which every resident has in their inventory as part of the library. (Remind me to talk about the library soon.) This is a brilliant application, it makes the waves foam and shift and seem to change shape when the texture is just flowing across them. It's an extremely clever achievement that I wish I'd thought of. Credit where credit is due. If you're looking for great waves and something clever, this is what I'd recommend. He sells them at his island here. If you're just looking to enjoy the ambiance, come play with the jukebox on the beach at Natalis and enjoy the sound of them hitting the beach.

Tom Jones? Make him feel that way....

I really think this says it all....yes available at my store.

This Evening - Live Music @ Natalis by Damian Carbenell

Damian Carbenell will be taking the main stage (and only stage) at Natalis at 7pm today! Please come hear this talented singer/songwriter and support his continued success. We'd love to have him for a weekly event. By the way gentleman, he packs in the ladies so you have a good chance of finding a date if you show up. The dance floor is open, the tunes are good and the buzz from whatever you imbibed on the fourth should be gone by 7pm. Hope to see you all there.

Happy Rez Day to Someone Special.....

Go give her Rez Day comment spanks at this link! She's one year old today!





By the way, if you come by Natalis, you might catch her with her sufboard...

(She's so going to kill me for posting this pic.)

By the way, this marks my 100th Post to this blog.... took me over a year, but not bad for having several eye surgeries, a couple vacations, a wrecked car and still keeping a sembelence of sanity. I'm glad my 100th post was about a friend. This also marks a whole week of posts at least once a day, so maybe if I'm lucky and keep talking about toys and such we'll reach 200 a whole lot sooner. Thank you to all of you for sticking with me. I don't even know who's reading, but I know you're out there and you're the smartest people I know. As always feedback or well wishes are welcome in the comments.

Happy Fourth of July '08

Happy Independance Day if you live in the USA. Everywhere else, Happy Fourth of July just because. In the States we celebrate this as the day we became a nation and light off massive amounts of fireworks while having our favorite beverage. Here's hoping something exciting and good is happening in your life wherever you are. Enjoy the fireworks.

A three hour tour....more toys.

Wow, this week seems to be the week I talk about toys. This is a toy I've had for awhile but I never really got to play with until this last week. This is my sailing yacht. It's made by Holiday's Modern Yachts and is called the Esprit. It's one of the best vehicles I've ever seen in SL. Many vehicles crash when you cross sim borders but I sailed this for several hours this week and it didn't crash once. Except when I ran into things.

Here you can see it docked at it's home port near my home on Natalis, I think it makes a nice addition to the scenary but I'm still undecided, great picture though.

Here you can see the customizability of the yacht, You can name it as you wish and set it's home port. I named mine AngelDust which on second thought probably isn't wise as that's a street name for a rather nasty drug, I may need to rethink that. Really, I named it that because I used to walk around as an angel, People have blackmail pictures even.

Couple shots of the detailing, you can see the deck and the wheel are very well put together.

And finally me sailing, this thing is easy to sail and gives you a real feeling of accomplishment and freedom. I felt like I was sailing, it was one of the most enjoyable visceral experiences I've ever had in my time in SL. I highly recommend this yacht. If you're on the fence or just want to see more they have a vdeo which I am embedding here.

Swimsuit.... I thought this was a nude beach!?!

Just kidding, here's my submission to this contest. No post processing at all. Taken on the beach at Natalis.

Live Music Search.

Are you a musician looking for that special spot to play in SL? We'd love if you considered Natalis. I had a blast hosting the live music during my opening night and out of that has grown a desire to support the live music scene in SL. It's a win win situation for me as it drives traffic to the sim, I enjoy great artists and you get a venue to play and great fans.

Natalis is a very organic type of sim, no stadium seating, no laggy lights or discos. We have a small stage under a streetlamp. Which is very bluesy/country. But then again I've seen it be rock and roll. The crowd stands in the sand to adore you and the dance floor is on a dock pushing into the water. Usually I set the lighting to sunset and the rays streaming across the listening crowd is a beautiful site to a performer. (Or so I've been told. Since I can't hold a note...I wouldn't know.)

If you're interested, send me a note, email, im or in SL works. If you know of somebody I should approach, let me know as well. Thank you and come to the concert's when I post them here, the teleport link is right over there where it says, visit my store in world.

O, and Damian plays this Sunday, if you hadn't heard.

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