Shoot and Counter-Shoot

Alysa and I had a relaxing Sunday afternoon, enjoying doing photo shoots of each other. We work well together and often anticipate what the other needs, so it was an easy shoot and it was nice. I had a great time shooting, and have been continuing to edit the shots in the last few days. Attached are a few pictures!

The Gallery

Alysa and I have been talking about redesigning The Missing Image Gallery for a while. We were inspired into action after seeing our friend Kaiju's work.

We spent Saturday making the structures and moving half of the art in place, and Sunday we moved the rest of the art, set up teleporters and opened for business. We'll be adding some furniture here and there to make it homey, soon. Oh, and we dropped the prices on our art to just 150L!

We ended up using slightly fewer prims than before, and have a smaller gallery which holds more pictures effectively, and makes browsing easier! We're both happy with the results. There is the lobby area which we hope will display the works of other artists, soon... our special exhibit area for special rotating displays... a Travelogue exhibit... our famous Futanari gallery, and a photo studio.

We welcome all to check it out! You'll find it in the Cataclysm sim off the square in the south of the sim, on the west side.

The Sofa, Part 2

Today I helped Alysa with a second sofa at the bar. Mostly I just sat where she asked me to, so she could adjust poses. But it turned out she used a texture I made, so I had a hand in it!

I coaxed her on the cuddle pose so that I could take a pic for the blog. Of course, the pic I took is all about her bum and you can hardly see (or notice) the bit of sofa in the frame!

The Sofa

The Sofa

After a long time talking about it i finally got myself to make a new sofa. Seeing i was really looking against to place the poses in the prims and adjust them i took the easy way out, i bought a whole bunch of cuddles at Pillow. And making the sofa was easy. Only thing that took time was to adjust all the cuddles and poses. But now we got 10 cuddles and 9 individual poses. The carpet has 5 poses in it, two pillows at the backseat and the c

age on the little table. And it looks like this..

I'm famous?

Koinup contacted me a couple of weeks ago and asked if I would allow the use of some of my images for a mobile wallpaper app, and for promotion of this app. I agreed. The first banner ad came out today, and I am front and center. Whee.

More info on the app is here:

http://www.koinup.com/3d-wallpapers/

Ave Maria

At the wonderful sim Ave Maria, created by the most talented Lucia Cyr. She made a grand castle with so many places to discover i got lost in the process. In the sky you find her shop, Lost Haven with some awesome fantasy gear. Wearing: Lost Haven Red Midnight Sorceress

If you never been here before you should go. Just search in Second Life on Lost Haven or Ave Maria.

Snow Leopard photo shoot

I did a photoshoot yesterday with myself as a model. I'm so easy to work with! Two shots are here. Others are in the gallery. Check them out at the Missing Image Gallery in Cataclysm.

CuddleHumps!

Dark Sacrifice

Alysa and I did a quick, dark shoot in Insilico. Here is one of the shots.

New little project done.. Me!

I been working on some new pictures and i placed them up at our Gallery for you to view, but here is one picture.

One garden down! One garden up!

We been thinking and considering more gardens in our town. It took some time because we had a great little forest and we didn't wanted to remove it. But today we took a closer look at it. Shye already had picked a rooftop for it and we first started to just place prims and try out different ideas. We had a lot of ideas but some just didn't worked or didn't worked with other ideas. In the end we managed to make something out of it. We bought a little stream, seeing we both can't make sculpties and the water looks really nice. And while we where there we also got a little pond.

So after we had the first drawing and the first build (second picture) we went to dismantle to forest in the sky to get the needed resources. It was a shame to do it but the forest was so far away from the town it didn't make part of it. Now we got a garden in the middle.. or rather at the top of the city.

The last picture shows the end result for now. You can not see everything. Most flowers and plants don't really show, a like other small stuff. There are a few nice cuddles and seats, it became an excellent place to relax and hang with a friend.

We hope you all will enjoy it as much we do.

Two Years Together

Tonight marked two years since Alysa and I partnered in Second Life. That's an eternity in SL! And it has been a great two years. Of course, like any "couple" we have had our down moments, but they are always cast aside with the realization of what awesome virtual friends we are.

A little over two years ago, on New Years Eve, we spent a long night together in Second Life. First, seeing a live music show with Sojurn Rossini, then we _______, and then we rang in her new year, and then we ______, and then we rang in my new year... I'll leave you to fill in the blanks. It was the most memorable time I have had in Second Life, before or since. For me, it was the night that led to our partnership less than a week later.

http://lostinthoughts.web-log.nl/second_life/2008/01/a_new_year_a_ne.html

So, when I saw that Sojurn Rossini was playing in SL on our "anniversary", I thought it was perfect! Except..... he canceled.

So we ended up some other place, listening to some other performer. We danced, and chatted, and listened to music. It wasn't what I planned, but it was a nice evening with my partner.

After two years, I still love you, Alysa. Thanks for being here for me!

The Scrap Hut!

The Scrap Hut is a great little shop at Cataclysm. The owner is Darcy Foxtrot and besides making clothing she also makes cool items like frames you can wear in Second Life so you can make a snapshot with a frame around you! Little bags and she can make such awesome pictures which she makes very special and one of a kind. That is something you have to see for yourself. I am not sure if she still makes though as she has changed her shop recently, but you can find a LM giver to her main store. So check it out!

http://slurl.com/secondlife/Cataclysm/126/184/40

Blacklists New Year Gift

I sort of made a keychain, i can't take credit to have made the sculpties, but i did ensemble it. That is something!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!

She and Alysa in the Light

Shye been posting all these pics of her and me or me alone, so i thought to post one as well. This one i made, we even had a small photo shoot for it and it was fun. I don't make as much pictures from us or Shye as Shye does. Not sure why...

Sheep on Ice

With the winter Shye and i decorated the sim lightly. We placed some snow down and some other things. One of those things is an ice ring at the square of Blacklist at the main entrance. It's a simple but nice build. As i went down for a sheep alert i saw four sheep skating on the ice! All dressed up as little white wooly reindeers. It's hilarious.

We got to thank Sindy Tsure for this sheepevil action, she always messes with them. Thank you Sindy!

Dancing at Blacklist

Happy Holidays from Alysa and Shye!

Snapshot: Lovely Dancer

It's been a while since our last post. I've not much to say... other than we have another FLF coming this Saturday!

And, I just snapped this pic of Alysa, dancing at The Blacklist.

~Shye~

Sudden Photo Shoot

We had a sudden and unexpected photo shoot today. It was nice. Here's some pixels for proof!

~Shye~

Linden Labs Pulls a Boner

Linden Labs makes it harder to share items for free, among residents, in a blatant money-grab.

https://blogs.secondlife.com/community/commerce/blog/2009/11/18/roadmap--managing-freebies-on-xstreet-sl

The response:

https://blogs.secondlife.com/thread/4902

And my two cents there:

I wonder, how many Lindens stay up how many hours trying to think up ways to make Second Life *less* useful and *less* user friendly for the residents? And how serious are the Lindens about getting accurate and valuable feedback when the only time one can give feedback that counts are in "office hours" in-world? My First Life is busy. When I am in Second Life, I am not usually on the lookout for "office hours". Synchronous feedback channels that have limited seating room for changes in policy that affect residents from time zones around the planet is just a stupid means of collecting serious feedback - unless that is the point. The feedback you're getting here should hold as much weight. Or more.

There are *lots* of freebies that are not marketing ploys in XStreet. There are a *lot* of residents who do not have shops and do not want to sell things... they make something cool and want to share it with other residents in a very open-sourcey kind of way. Linden Lab's money grab is closing down that channel of the true community sharing spirit that is Second Life.

Thanks, Linden Labs!

Relaxing

Every so often, people need a little break from Second Life. Sometimes you have real life things that you want to tend to, or need to tend to, and sometimes you just want to reduce your immersion in the pixels for a few days. Sometimes it's both!

Alysa has been offline for a few days, and will be off for a couple more... doing real life things with her real life time and enjoying herself, deservedly so. And I am taking advantage of her absence, and focusing less on pixels, and more on real life. Just for a few days.

In the middle of this short, casual break, we were to do a photo shoot. It was unexpectedly canceled. So we found ourselves in a warm cuddle for the whole evening, just the two of us. A wonderful chat about what we've been up to for the last several days, and what our plans are for the next few, before our pixels meet again.

I cherish these relaxing moments... the moments when Second Life and First Life mix together for a short time - at once sitting alone in an easy chair with a laptop in real life, and also in a close embrace with my pixel partner on the screen, talking about a mix of Second Life things, and First Life things... appreciating not only the pixely partnership, but also the depth of our friendship.

Religion, Fear, Closed Minds, Apathy and Sexuality in Real Life

A note about Real Life, for a change.

My real life physical pixels walked into the voting booth yesterday. It's an off year... no president, senators or representatives to vote for. But here in Maine, where I live, there was a Big Question on the ballot.

It was a "People's Veto". You see... earlier this year, the legislature in the state of Maine passed a bill making it legal for same sex couples to marry. The Governor of Maine signed the bill into law.

The law never went into effect. A group of out of state interests with deep pockets, coupled with religious groups within Maine, initiated a People's Veto, getting the question on the ballot for a public vote. Opening the issue up for a vote sounds good, in theory. It is what a democratic society is all about. In practice, it doesn't always reflect the feelings of the majority. Religious zealots, fear-mongerers, and apathy among young eligible voters served to doom this law from the start.

Those who know me in Second Life know that I am, at least, open-minded on issues of sex, gender, and sexuality. It is obvious by the role I play and how I explore these issues in Second Life. The truth is, I am about as open-minded as one can be. One's gender and sexual orientation are barely on the list of attributes of a person that I consider important when getting to know them, or to love them, in Second Life or in Real Life.

So it always annoys me when I encounter a closed mind.

Back to the Big Question. The Question, itself, was closed-minded, and designed to illicit a fear response on the part of the voter.

Question 1: People's Veto

An Act To End Discrimination in Civil Marriage and Affirm Religious Freedom

"Do you want to reject the new law that lets same-sex couples marry and allows individuals and religious groups to refuse to perform these marriages?"

Do you get it? A rejection of a law that rejects discrimination of same sex couples ends discrimination and affirms religious freedom. While it would be hard for anyone not entering the voting booth in Maine to not be aware of the issue and what a yes or a no vote meant, given the advertising going on for the last three months, the question is framed in a way as to mislead the voter.

By voting "Yes", you will "end discrimination in Civil Marriage". How is that, exactly, when a Yes vote revokes the law allowing same sex marriage in a civil ceremony? By voting "Yes", you will affirm religious freedom. Only, the law that ever so briefly allowed same sex marriage in Maine never had anything to do with religion or religious freedom. The laws separating church and state allowed a religious practitioner to reject a religious marriage in the church.

It wasn't just the question on the ballot that promoted fear. The advertising promised that if the law allowing same sex marriage was allowed to remain, that "they" would be "teaching gay marriage in the schools!"

First off, I see nothing wrong with teaching that. But even if I did, it's a crock. There is no curriculum in schools that "teach" heterosexual marriage in the schools. Why would there be a curriculum designed to "teach" gay marriage? Scare tactics were used, showing covers of children's books like "Heather Has Two Mommies" and using them to promote the fear that a curriculum would be designed around them. Hogwash.

Allowing people of the same sex to marry is about equal rights and equal protection under the law. It is not about special privilege. It is not about eroding religious freedom. And it certainly isn't about making our children gay by teaching them how to be gay in school.

In a big election year, Maine sees an impressive 75% or so turnout at the polls. Apathy among voters tends to keep them away on the off years. Apathy among 18-39 year olds is a greater problem than in older voters - and 18-39 year olds are far more in favor of gay marriage than older voters.

Maine could have been the first state to affirm the right to same sex marriage by popular vote.

Question 1 passed 53% - 47%.

I voted "No."

I am not an activist.

I could maybe have been more involved... but at least I voted.

And I removed the "Yes on 1" sign that someone placed in front of my house.

I'm sure Mainers will see this issue up for a vote, again. I hope they will wait until the next presidential election year, when more voices will be heard.

The Power is in the People, not the special interests groups. Let all the voices be heard, next time.

Halloween, continued

I love Halloween more in SL than in RL. We can be so free with the setting and the creativity, and do things not possible in real life. Being creative in making spaces is the biggest draw for me in SL. They don't have to be complicated builds, all custom made. Alysa and I made the Halloween graveyard in a little over an hour, from things we mostly had in our inventories and adding a few custom touches. It was creative, and fun to do together. And, it was a smashing success.

Unfortunately, real life had me away from my keyboard for half of the party, so I couldn't take as many photos as Alysa did. I'm sharing here the one I made of her and me.

Time to start planning the next party!

~Shye~

Halloween 5 - Harpo Live at Blacklist

Halloween is behind us *sobs* but this day will soften the pain and sorrow. The Day of the Dead, a celebration where people go to the graveyard with food and music to honour the dead. Today we got Harpo to do his live music performance and he came in style as you can see at this picture. Skeleton!

Harpo Jedburgh is so great. I'm a fan of him! Besides his original songs and covers, his special voice and the different guitars he uses. I love his own style and the way he is so true, having fun with what he does. Something that keeps amazing me. And today he had such fun song! I forgot the title but he had to do two voices, it was great and hilarious, super well preformed.

We also had a very nice turn up and i hope Harpo's 'marmalade tipjar' got a bit fuller. He's saving up for a new microphone. Thanks for a great show Harpo!

Halloween 4

I already told you Halloween is great, it's great! But i also discovered it has a day in front, Devil's Day, and a day after it, Day of the Dead. I'm not sure how correct that is, and they might be very local but who cares? It's another reason for a party. Shamefully i missed Devil's Day but we got something for Day of the Dead. But now... first Halloween.

We made a big graveyard in the sky and i loved it. Three big isles and a few small ones hovering around, scary trees, gravestones, ghosts and little cute walls. Great work of Shye and me if i might say, simple but effective. And then we had the party and it was great to see how some of them where dressed up. The picture above show Andrea and Feysha, i really liked their costumes. But there where more and i made around 10 pics, shamefully i can't show them all.

Here is Hyang and Belatrix, panting and resting after all the dancing and chatting. Hyang had the first two hours and she had a great set. After that Lectra took over with her amasing oldies, they are so much fun. As last was Yoshi and her first song, self made by her, was great! It was a great party and now we must say goodbye to halloween....

Futa Love Fest '09 - Halloween Edition

Last saturday we had the Futa Love Fest '09. This time the theme was Halloween, on of my personal favorites. Halloween is just too cool as you can dress up as zombie!... or other things for that matter.

Here you see me dressed as a headless waitress and it was a success. At my left in the distance is Shye, she was dressed as an orange panther! It looked rather sexy even more with the set we found for her.

The whole party was great. We had 75 people attending and most stayed around for a hour or more. At some point we had 46 people in the sim, and that's just amazing.

Because of the dressing up, all the people with different clothing, scripts and all the stuff we decided to do the party at the beach. There isn't a heavy build there and with the decorations in the centre of the sim it would be really hard.

I was glad to see many where dressed up. It just gives the whole event something extra i find. Shye and me spend quite some time at these events, this one was rather easy compared to other Futa Love Fests, and though we love putting time and money in it to make it look great, it kind of finishes with the people!

The picture above is the poster i made for the Futa Love Fest. At the left is a small overview picture of the event, to give an idea of how it looked. As you can see not too special, but fun never the less!

Favorite Places...

I said in my last post I would post about interesting places that I see...  aside from my home sim Cataclysm.  I like builds with a sci-fi flair... either to look at or to explore, or both.  You've probably seen Insilico and Wolf's Moon and lots of others that are really cool to explore, and I will probably write about those later.  Now, I want to take you to a different place... one you may not have found on your own.

There isn't a lot to explore, there.... and there aren't a lot of people there, either.  But it's a cool place to see, to wander, and to take some pictures.  It's called Hangars Liquides.

The buildings are nice and unusual, and there are flying taxis!  Check it out!

~Shye~

More pixels to peruse...

I was playing around with a photo effect I saw Alysa do... of course I put my own spin on it.  Most of this effect was done in-world with a background glow prim.  Only some quick filters and channel adjustments in Photoshop to finish it off.  Ain't I purrrrrty?

I do plan to post about some of my favorite places, aside from Cataclysm, soon.  There are so many cool places I've seen... it's good to spread them around.  If they remain my secret, they could just... disappear.  Anyway, look for more posts about that, soon.

The Beach at Cataclysm

I have to disagree, a bit, with Alysa. I love beaches. Beaches in real life, mostly... not the crowded destination beaches, but rather the quiet, secluded beaches where you can feel the sand between your toes and watch the surf and smell the salt air.

Beaches in Second Life obviously are not tactile or odorous... and few are done well... I'll grant you that. But there are some that give you a taste of it. Just a small taste.

The beach at Cataclysm is small, and it will still see improvements. But I like it. And it's a good excuse for a change of scenery during an event. Beach parties are fun. And it's an excuse to get naked! (As if we need any excuses)

And as proof of it... naked dancing at the beach at Cataclysm!

Beach party at Blacklist

This night, well it was night for me, we had our first beach party since we got this new build. And now we officially sort of opened the beach and placed it hopefully on the map.

The party was a good success and i was very happy that Lectra decided to DJ as i love all the oldies she play. Most songs i can almost sing along. After Lectra, Yoshi took over. She has always a good set and she is a great musician in her own field. We from Blacklist are so lucky that she does live sets now and then, she's awesome.

The party went really well, lots of chatting, jokes, funny contests. I'm not a real fan of beaches and even less in Second Life as it's always so cheapish, if you get what i mean. I did slacked a bit on the decoration but we really lacked time and seeing i am not that super enthusiastic with beach parties... But for a next one i do got some new ideas thanks to Angeli.

Cuddles

I love bedtime cuddles with Alysa. It's a time to wind the day down by having a nice chat and connecting a bit beyond the pixels. A few minutes to wish each other pleasant dreams and an easy day the next day, before our pixels meet again. I'll do my best NOT to flood this blog with pictures like this. Alysa will appreciate that, I'm sure! *grins*

High Places

High places seem to be immune from the influences of the Blacklist Witch, who you saw in an earlier post has taken over the town with her magical spells, summoning the forces of nature to do her bidding. The roots and trees and evil natural forces have infested the city at ground level, but so far it seems their reach is limited. Seek high ground. Save yourselves! The high ground is free of this evil infestation.

Halloween 3

Yes i love Halloween. It's something we hardly celebrate where i live and here in Second Life i can go wild with it. Already planning for two nice parties and dressing up. It's so sweet. But before we get there a lot has to be done. Decorating is more my thing then building, i enjoy it more as it goes easier for me. But you also need to build, it saves money and it's great to make your own things. So there... a picture, proof *coughs* of my abilities... I call it... "What is she building?"

Halloween 2

Shye is off to dinner, leaving me alone in this hostile world. It shows what it means... Food > Alysa *winks*. But before she left we did finished a super cool build. It was just awesome how fast it went, except for the texturing, as that was a pain but Shye had a nice solution for one rather tricky spot. Its a little house that is carried around by a tree. Not a full tree, only the bottom, but if the tree would be complete it would had been a big tree! We had the idea to place a house on wooden beams, making it a walking house, but i found some great artwork so it became a tree. I just adore the whole picture and i am really proud of our achievement. Building such things is so much fun!

But now you all got curious and i cou

ld say.. "Go check it out at Blacklist lazy sods!!" but though i normally would do that i just can't help it to show a picture. I am proud to present..... "From the Sea it came", after another shot.. hehehe.

Halloween 1

Last night we started at the big job of transforming Blacklist so it be ready for Halloween. We decided to start early so we could enjoy the work and time we would put in it, and of course we hope you all will like it as much as we do.

The theme of this year is hard to describe, i did made a picture called "It came from the Sea" but it has nothing to do with the sea. But a witch appeared at the beach of Blacklist and started her magic, summoning and growing large roots by her evil magic. She send them into town where they started chaos, overwhelming the place, growing wildly through the town. Not all places are affected, as the battle has just begone!