Fashion

Second Life: Bento Wings Kit

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Everyone is excited by the new Bento heads. They are pretty neat. I am also excited about Bento Wings. I have a collection of prim/sculpty wings in my inventory. Some are way gorgeous. But, they are mostly just there, when worn. Project Bento is going to change that. We will be able to animate the Bento Wings in ways not before possible.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpGUKowqim8

Damien Fate has a Bento Wings Kit out. See: FATEplay – Animated Wings Template. This is one of those Full Perm with an agreement type things where all the mesh and animation stuff is done. You only need to supply textures.

These show some of what can be done with Bento Wings. I expect some really impressive wings to start appearing.

Second Life: Another Bento Head

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Strawberry Singh recently revealed a test Bento Head made by Akeruka. Now the site Honey Junkie has an article showing a Catwa made Bento Head. See: Catwa Bento!

These heads are using the viewer’s shape panel to adjust the head’s shape. Daeberethwen Arbenlow has the thought that we will likely need multiple heads. I pretty much agree in the sense that we can’t deviate too much from the base look without getting distortions.

As you watch these reviews you’ll notice that some shape sliders don’t work. That is probably a metter of how the designers has weighted the head. I’ll point out the under bite slider not doing much is an on going source of problems. If you watch the Project Bento user group meetings you know teeth and lower lip overlaps have been an animation problem.

First Bento Head Released

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I’m surprised someone already has a Bento head out. And they are selling it, L$99. You have to join a group to get it. Also, it’s not a final version, at least I suspect it isn’t.

Strawberry Singh has a video showing the head and writes a bit about the project. See: Project Bento Mesh Head Preview from Akeruka. Nice head and looks well done.

Having a soft heart in a cruel world is courage , not weakness
Having a soft heart in a cruel world is courage , not weakness

Strawberry is guessing we may see Bento merged into the main viewer soon, she is in the 1 to 4 week range. I’m guessing too but, I’m in the 4 to 8 week range. I am pretty sure we will see the project viewer advance to RC Viewer status very soon, 1 to 2 week range. Then it takes some time to get through the RC stage. Also the Lindens want to soak up some feedback from a larger group of users. The more they want the longer it takes.

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Second Life Scams

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A basic idea in the free market and civilization in general is theft and misrepresentation are bad things. I suppose that is why we love politicians.  So, when we find a place where theft and lying are harming people many of us will step up and say something. So, Strawberry Singh has spoken in Full Perm Marketplace Scams. Yay, girl!

Marketplace Scams
Marketplace Scams

Check her article to get the full story.

I think we need better tools to help us in our battles against the ethically and morally challenged of Second Life™. There is also the problem of how much time can we ask the Lab to spend on devising those tools when we have much more fun stuff that they need to be working on? 

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Mesh Body ACI Values Compared

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Mesh Body Addicts is a fun and informative site. The recent article AC and Jellydolls: Tutorial and Popular Bodies list took some effort. The list gives the ACI for each of the mesh bodies being marketed in Second Life™. There are some brands I was unaware of. So, that is a plus too.

JellyDoll and Fully Rendered Avatar.
JellyDoll and Fully Rendered Avatar.

The list at Mesh Body Addict’s site is alphabetical. Handy for finding your body. I wanted the list arranged in order of ACI so I could see the best, lowest ACI, and worst, highest ACI, for lag. So, I resorted the list: 

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