The Black Canary~Ephemeral

So that's it then. Summer's over. Ugh.

Not that it was really all that great, I mean, the weather here's been really awful. Weatherwise, it could have really been a LOT warmer... seriously. It's felt a little like Autumn for a week already, sooo, just a little depressing.

Of course, Fall has a special place in my heart too. There's Halloween of course! And as much as I LOVE the sun, there's something special about long long crisp nights, with that cool brush of leaves moving against each other. It's spooky and beautiful all at once... so naturally I've been in a sort of 'dark' mood lately.

Perfect timing then to share Morrigan Denimore's 'Ephemeral' from The Black Canary. Another gorgeous primmy look from Morrigan, with some VERY lovely work in the ruffles and textures. Ephemeral was originally TBC's submission for Black Swan, but it's now available to YOU at his new shop location in Necrosis Noctis.

Ephemeral comes complete with skirt, bustle, high collar, stockings, garter and a cute hat (umm... not shown). It's a cinch to mod too, now that Morrigan has started adding that menu driven editing option that seems to be pretty much all over lately. Personally, I love the feature, and it really allows for serious customization especially for some of TBC's more androgynous designs.


So, definitely go and check this out, and DEFINITELY explore Necrosis Noctis if you haven't been there before. There's a LOT of new shops and the feel is definitely gothic.


http://slurl.com/secondlife/Necrosis%20Noctis/113/159/43

Moonshine Designs~Beckon and Winsome

Loving these cute looks from Shelly Toonie!

Summer's not over people! I mean, it's STILL warm out right? It's still good weather for some sun on your shoulders! I know, I know, all the stores have out their candy displays and Halloween themed outfits. I haven't seen a costume aisle yet anywhere thank gawd though.

Don't get me wrong; I LOVE Halloween. I LOVE the Fall. But while it's still warm out, well, let's look at two new looks from Moonshine Designs perfect for a backyard party or a day in the city. Okay, well technically FOUR actually. Beckon and Winsome come in two different skirt options, appropriately named I and II.

Of course, it's Shelly's eye for color and excellent textures that I love most about these looks. The designs are really fun as always, but will you look at that bow on Beckon? Moonshine Designs features some really lovely primwork on all of Shelly's outfits, and she really works to keep her releases fresh and different.



So, I'd pop over there STAT for some really gorgeous designs with a fun, summery feel.

Moonshine Designs

SLink~Sachara Elven Ears

[Sort of a disclaimer here: Last week I posted a review of these totally lovely Sachara Elven ears and erroneously credited them to Faery Sola instead of SLink designer Siddean Munro. While I've never really claimed to be any sort of journalist, I absolutely SHOULD be able to get facts straight. So, apologies were sent round after the error was pointed out, all is well, and this is a repost with all info up to date.]

I've been all about ears lately. I mean, I've always had a little thing for fae fashion and accessories in SL, but lately it's just been nuts. I've been picking out hairs that I know will fit around prim ears, looking for cool weird eyes and basically hanging around in every wooded magical sim I can find. It's a thing, definitely; only the most recent in my long string of obsessions that pretty much define my SL experience. Call it short attention span or whatever, SL is mostly just a series of 'Aha!' moments for me and the latest and most awesome 'Aha!' is Siddean Munro's Sachara Elven Ears from SLink.

These are my first SLink pieces, so I'll definitely need to go back to Siddean's shop to see what else is there, and I really don't have anything to compare these to; so let me just try to distill the basics in a few key points:

1. Lovely shape and texture options. It's the shape options that first struck me. Each pack comes multiple fae styles, from long to 'outy' to short to pointy. One pack, and multiple options to really customize your look. That little fold and whirl in your ear is textured on nicely, which avoids that sometimes 'too smooth' look that some elven ears have.

2. JEWELRY! Okay, so not the first jewelry I've seen on fae ears, BUT, still very lovely. There can be some sizing editing issues, most specifically with the nose-ring version shown above; but, I have sort of a tiny AV and it may have just been me. They're not impossible to edit at all though, and with a little patience moving a few prims around they fit perfectly.

3. Okay, the third thing really can't be put into just one bullet point, mostly because it sort of involves point two too, so let's talk about customization.

Each set of Siddean's ears comes with a HUD customization tool that is one of the most in-depth I've seen ever. Okay, so the basic customization is all there, you can change gem and metal colors on the jewelry with a simple click, we've seen that before, and even skin tones can be changes with some presets that Siddean has loaded into the HUD. BUT, customization doesn't stop there!

This is so cool. There's a notecard included that walks you through matching the Sachara ears to whatever skin tone you're wearing at the time. YES, there's com boxes to click or unclick in preferences while you're doing it, and it might take a little time if you're not familiar 100% with options available to you in the viewer. With a little patience though, you can match your ear skin tone directly to the skin you're in, no matter who the designer. Once you've loaded the skin, you can save it to your HUD as well to be a one-click option for future wears.

Love it love it love it.

I didn't see them at the SLink main store, but you can find these featured at Studio Sidhe here.

Nightshade Designs~Charmant

So, I managed to accidentally permanently delete a good portion of my inventory.

ugh...

I thought I'd be smart, sort of clean everything out in bits and pieces. So, to start, I sorted by the word 'demo' and just started sweeping through. Lots of 'shift' then click sort of thing. Apparently, some of my folders must have been caught up in everything coz now they're just gone.

So NOW I have to go to all the designers I bought stuff from and ask for them to replace them.

HA. No, I'm just kidding. This one's on me I guess, just being stupid.

ANYWAY, luckily, something that was NOT deleted was Belladonna Mureaux's Charmant dress from Nightshade Designs. Nightshade has been one of my fave goth shops in SL for a while, and once you see Bella's well made skins, hairs and most definitely her darkish sexy designs I think you'll know why.


Charmont is one of Bella's latest, and I think you can snap this up in her riotvend at her mainshop in Necrosis still. Simple, yes, but with little lovely touches in the fabric textures to give these cute lolita styles just the right touch of realism and substance. I really love this look, with its muted shades and lace edges... so cute.

Anyway, I've got to get back to see how much damage I've done to my inventory. You should head over to Nightshade in the meantime. We might even run into each other whilst I scramble to replace a few things.

xoxoxo

Nightshade Designs

[Gauze] Shiva!

Absolutely gorgeous.

Every once in a while someone pipes up with that whole phrase about 'if you can't find it in Second Life just make it yourself..' which is great, sure, but not terribly realistic for a lot of us. For me, well, I know I could probably learn a lot of the tools and tricks that go into making cool stuff, but I just don't have the $$ for all those software programs and whatever that it takes to actually build something. I'm a consumer, plain and simple, and until something else changes, well, that's pretty much the way it will be.

So, those of us who can't build...well... we hope. Hope feels like the right word. Those little wish lists we keep in the back of our minds. All those items in our inventory that make us go 'AWESOME... now I just need to find something like...'. It can be frustrating sometimes, maybe you find a hair designer with perfect textures and really nice construction but ugh, just not the style you were looking for. Maybe you find a little shop full of gorgeous clothes but 'full' just means 3 or 4 outfits. We want MORE! It's the nature of the beast, the curse of consumerism. We sit at our keyboard staring intently, trying to telepathically (or sometimes just dropping a card in the suggestion box) send our wish list to that designer, that builder... whoever.

Usually it's an exercise in frustration. Usually we just have to adapt our wishes a little bit, maybe accept the fact that we can't always get what we want and all that. Sometimes though, sometimes our little telepathic daggers hit the mark...


Okay, so I can't take ALL the responsibility for Yukio Ida releasing more skins from his Shiva release.

Um.. honestly, actually I guess I can't take any credit at all, BUT, well, I'm very happy.

We first saw Shiva at the Harajukubox Skin Fair a few weeks back. There were just two tones then, and Yukio hinted that there might be more on the way, but I had no idea how soon. Cue Jedi Mind Trick. Ahhh, 5 new tones released for Shiva, and since the HBox fair skins aren't available to the public anymore, these are an awesome opportunity to grab some of Yuki's best skin work ever.

Covered with weirdly gorgeous tattoos, Shiva features new bases from Gauze that are really lovely, and hold up well under scrutiny. I've always loved Yukio's design style, and while I think his clothes have always reflected his talent and creativity, I know skins can be challenging and his latest I think truly put him in a higher level for interesting, bizarre, beautiful and artistic design in Second Life.

To sum up:

1. Shiva~awesome skins from one of the most interesting and creative designers in SL.

2. Telepathy~maybe it works.

Now of course the problem is that when you really really wish for something and you finally get it... well, for me that just makes me want MORE.

Coz I'm spoiled.

So, the rest of you go check out [Gauze], I'm going to drink some more coffee and practice mind control.

Illuminati [Gauze]

xoxoxo

Oh, and by the way... you MUST check out Truthseeker Young's 'Voices:Orion's Arm' art installation at Extropia Odyssey... it's absolutely gorgeous and not a horrible way to spend some time in Second Life...

We wouldn't trash the classroom if they hadn't built the school...

So I've been kinda busy lately.

I think, sometimes, change is good. I mean, it's ALWAYS good, mostly. Okay, maybe not ALL the time, change isn't always good, I take back what I said before. Well, not the FIRST thing, because that's got 'sometimes' in it... so yah, sometimes change IS good.

It's good when you decide you need it, anyway, and I think I've needed to change a few things in my SL. It's important to keep the whole experience, um, stimulating, right? Of course, having had the chance to meet and feature some of the best talent in SL keeps everything pretty positive here at Purely Visual. Still, sometimes you've got to just go and do something. For me, well, it was all about land.

I think I have a rez-day coming up, maybe that's the thing, I don't know. Anyway, I've gone pretty much my whole SLife without actually owning any property and lately it's been something I wanted to do. I'm not going to go through the whole process I went through, searching land, looking for good prices and do-able prim counts. You've done it, I'm sure, so why bore you. Shopping for a house was pretty much the same thing anyway. The important thing was budget... I mean, I wasn't going to try to set up some sim-wide fashion zone or anything, nope. Starting small. I needed a house big enough to maybe set up a studio and just hang out or whatever.

Blah blah... so I found a good, inexpensive house from Damani. Pretty simple, some locks, security... little tricks like that. It was pretty close to what I was looking for, so I grabbed it.

And then I trashed it.



See? Before and After.

It started with the textures. I like putting together mashup textures, I've used them sometimes for some of my photo shoots. Anyway, I'd just seen Torley Linden's tutorial on uploading transparent textures when I suddenly realized I wanted to make some windows...

Yah, those 5 pane weird things are my first... then I made the clear glass brick (colorful or no) for some floors and doors. All the textures I used I made myself in Gimp, although the floor is a brush I lifted from DeviantArt.

In the end it ended up like wandering around in one of my own photographs. I have to apologize to Damani designer Damanios Thetan for trashing the house though.... Sorry. It's not you, it's me.

BUT, on the other hand, it's a lot of fun... and a change, a good one, for me anyway.


Anyway, maybe I'll have a housewarming party or something. If you happen to be where I was, and maybe looking for some land... well, stop by Damani and check out what they've got for houses too. Oh, or cats... or weather... or furniture...

xoxo

Damani

Moonshine Designs.... hardly basic...

This post took two weeks.

Oh, you'd never really know it, it's not too much different from any of my other blog posts. Scroll through the history, there's a tone, a theme; it's all connected. No, this post won't look too different from what you've seen before, but it still took two weeks to do.

Why?

Honestly, the photography. I couldn't take a decent pic to save my life.

Soooo frustrating. Ugh. It wasn't the clothes, it wasn't the skins or hair. There was always just something, well, off about everything over the last few weeks.

Super frustrating actually, because it's the picture taking that's pretty much my favorite part of Second Life lately. I can't book a vacation and head out to the airport to go places like Bryn Oh's Immersiva or Baron Grayson' Crucible sims. I don't have an album on a bookshelf from my time lounging on beaches while dragons fly overhead anyplace in Real Life. No, it's all in Second Life. All of it. It's like some dream place in a children's book where it's so real to them but the boring grownups don't believe in it at all. I love having photos of those dreams, I love the fact that Second Life has some places and is populated by designers who can add to my little imaginary fantasy.

So, that makes picture taking pretty important. More than that, it's how I try to share cool stuff I've found inworld with all of you. Sometimes, apparently, my brain just won't cooperate with that. Maybe I needed a break. I mean, I DID stop by a few clubs and listen to some awesome music. On the other hand, I spent a ridiculous amount of $L and spent who knows how long constantly changing hairs and whatever. Well, let's just call it a vacation and leave it at that (Wow, so THAT puts a scary thought in my head. How do you take a vacation from a fantasy world? Third Life. Whoa.)

There are a ton of pictures from the last few weeks, stuff I wanted to put on the blog but ended up just deleting at the last minute. Some of it I still have, maybe I'll play with them later, make some screensavers or posters or something. It was an epic struggle, fighting with sliders, changing facelights or removing them altogether, messing with the sun.

Then, the other day, for absolutely no reason I can find... well, it all came together.

Okay, so what was I struggling to share? Well, lots, but the first thing I want to share with you is this simple, sexy and gorgeous top from Moonshine Designs. Shelly Toonie's 'Basic Tanks', well. Ok, I have a serious issue with the name here. 'Basic'? Hmmm, well, call them basic if you want, but they're anything but boring.

I've always loved the texture work Shelly does with fabrics, and while her new tanks might not have any patterns or designs, the texturing is really very gorgeous. The simple wrinkles and folds where the fabric 'stretches' is really nicely done, and subtle while still adding enough to make these a lot of fun to look at (if you're like me and obsessively zoom into fabrics to see how far they go. I'm sure there's a disorder name for it. Whatever.). Oh? and Sexy? YUS, VERRY. With sheer options for each tank, you can show as much or as little as you'd like or just add an interesting accent to another outfit. Gorgeous gorgeous gorgeous.


Worn:

Pic 1

Moonshine Designs Basics Tank Marigold
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Imogen/186/128/2

[Gauze] Elf Ears
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Snatch%20City/228/228/2

Snow Rabbit S@R w003 medium beige skin pink
http://slurl.com/secondlife/tricolore/176/207/36

Pic 2

Moonshine Designs Basics Tank Pitch Sheer

Bizarre Hair Xtreme Messy Blonde
http://slurl.com/secondlife/0031%20Marktplaats/195/248/22

Illusions Abyssal Ears: Elfin
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Carnivale/208/94/33

[Curio] Lumine Juxt
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Curio/128/130/38

Ce Cubic Effect Waist Scroll Khaki
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Chantilly/119/128/29

Tokushi Natural Fae Wings
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Skittle%20Beans/189/189/43