"Christobel" - Released Today

Finally managed to finish the new necklace & earrings set I blogged about before. I called it 'Christobel' in honour of the season ;) and it looks great with the strappy dresses that you'll be wearing (if you're female; if you're male... well, let's not go there!) to all the xmas parties!

I'd made this entirely out of prims, and it weighed in at around 250. That's a little extravagent even for me, so I took pictures of some of the chains and redid them as textures instead. Now it's a much more reasonable 100ish prims.

I finally made a diamond texture that I'm really happy with (that's been bugging me for months now!) and so Christobel comes in diamond, ruby, emerald, opal and aquamarine. I can do others if you ask nicely *grins*

Christobel comes in Modify/Transfer, and so is perfect for xmas presents. I can also make Modify/Copy versions if you'd prefer.

On to the pictures! Main pic is the diamond version, box pic is the ruby. Hair by Lost, skin & eyes by Sin Skins.
Available now from SLBoutique, SLExchange, and inworld at my Butsu store.

Today's Preview

So, while the grid is down, I'm attending to my neglected blog :) I've been working on a new necklace set, carefully storing away 57 backup copies before logging out for the update. Here's a pic in progress:

You can get some idea of the way I work looking at this. I plonk Cai on a posing stand, take off all her attachments (anyone peeking in my workshop while I build will see a bald elf, not a pretty sight) and then I start placing the main stones around her neck. Once I've got them more or less where I want, I'll swivel the camera around and adjust stones for the curve of her neckline. Then I'll start adding in all the teeny tiny chain prims (usually in groups of three or four otherwise I'd go insane). When all the chains are done, I'll take Cai off the stand so I can see the whole necklace, tweak any wobbly bits of chain, then I'll link it all together. After that, I'll drag a copy, turn it silver to see how it looks, adjust the textures if needed... and then I start making different gem versions. I've built up a huge library of different gem textures in various shapes, so I can just drag a few out and see how they look.

It's all very absorbing work, and I really have to be in the right frame of mind to do it. But when it happens, I can work for hours without noticing the time passing. It took maybe two hours from the start to get to the pic above, it would have been longer but I reused shapes from a previous necklace. Why reinvent the wheel? *grins*

It's that time again!

It's Wednesday, so it must be update day! The grid hasn't recovered from the last one and yet here's a new update to create more havok ^H^H^H^H fix all those annoying bugs.

My personal favourites:

• The missing water. Cute though he is, my poor dolphin looks a little lost without his river to splash around in.
• The 'why are all my attachments in my crotch?' bug after teleporting. Most amusing.
• And while we're on the subject of teleports... tp'ing between estates is still borked.
• Group IMs failing. While sometimes I appreciate the peace and quiet, I'd rather use busy mode for that. I'm paranoid that no-one wants to talk to me.
  
• The skintight trousers (pants) look. So Flashdance, so 80's, so not attractive!
  

*Sigh* I could go on... but I won't. For all it's quirks, I still love SL. After nearly four years I've learnt to shrug off all the annoyances and quibbles and smile quietly to myself - the day they really get to me will be the day I go out and buy WOW :)

Meanwhile, back in SL...

... the creative urge has vanished. Again. I've made a few rings, but I'm not happy enough with them to loose them on the world. So in my inventory they will stay. On a more positive note, Jaqueline <3 persuaded me to redo the store (it didn't take much persuasion, I haven't really been happy with the way it looks) - I didn't rebuild, but I just retextured. It's made a hell of a difference! Hopefully more expensive/exclusive looking - I am trying to sell jewellery here after all :)

I'm much happier with this look! (In the background, you can just see one of Lash Xevious's fabby statues, great view from the doorway) I think I'm going to lose the bargain basement - I'm running out of prims, and I'm not sure how useful it is anymore. I'll probably make a bumper box of clothes for L$1 or something, same with all the old jewellery that's down there. We'll see, I won't worry about it until I'm desperate for prims again.

Bah, Humbug

It's December 7th, less than three weeks to Christmas. Usually by now I'd be full of the festive spirit, walking round humming carols and annoying the hell out of everyone. This year though.. I dunno what it is, I just can't get that feeling. Maybe it's because I'm out of work this year, and I'm ready to start talking to the walls. Maybe because my friend was in a horrible accident a couple of weeks ago and is only just starting to recover. Maybe because I can't put the Christmas tree up until our new carpet has been delivered and fitted. All my presents are bought, hopefully I'll start feeling more festive when I wrap them. I'll chuck the xmas CD in the player, get the mulled wine going and force myself to be Christmasy!

Until then, I can amuse myself with this.. The worst xmas carol evah! And I really do mean it... make sure you listen right to the end, it's.. undescribable! Thanks to The Sneeze, one of my favourite blogs!