Category: Second Life

Supporting World Animal Protection in Second Life

Posted on by Inara Pey
Mysterious Paradise event: merchant stands

I received noticed of the second Mysterious Paradise Event in support of World Animal Protection (WAP) that is taking place in Second Life.

Running through until Sunday, November 4th, 2018, the event features shopping opportunities and an entire region to explore, with a day devoted entirely to entertainment to support the fund-raising, on Friday, 26th October, 2018, to raise funds for WAP, although visitors can donate to the cause throughout  the duration of the event, via the landing point kiosk.

This is something of a short-notice event, the organisers explaining:

As it’s Glen’s [g13n, the director of the event] real life 30th birthday, instead of having a general party, he wanted to do something meaningful by actually making a difference and helping real-life animals affected by recent earthquakes, major storms, etc.

The first event held by the organisers on behalf of WAP in March 2018 raised L$60,000, and they are hoping to exceed that total this time around.

The event region is richly decorated in a tropical theme, with both above ground and undersea areas to explore, opportunities for photography or to simply chill out and appreciate the tropical theme of the setting – and of course shop and raise money for WAP.

The merchants participating in the event and / or sponsoring it are: Anarchy, Blueberry, Cerridwen’s Cauldron, Evhah, Figure 8, Havana, Grandeur Décor, Love Lace Designs, Love Nature (landscaping by Felix VonKotwitz), Mysterious Designs, Patron (Eliza Weirwright), PopSugar, Sources, Surfer’s Bay, The Boardwalk, T | L | C,  and 3D Trees.

Each is offering selected items for sale with 100% of proceeds going directly to the fund-raising total, or have donated gift cards that will be handed to those making significant donations through the main event day. In addition, some creators have also items that are included in the random gift giver to be found within the Mysterious Paradise region.

Event Schedule

At the time of going to press, the schedule for the core event day on Friday, October 26th, 2018, was as follows – but please refer to the event board in-world for updates / changes. All times SLT:

  • 12:00 noon: DJ Brave – Trance
  • 13:00: DJ Balla – Jackin House and Funky Tunes
  • 14:00: DJ Bray – Latin
  • 15:00: DJ Brit – Electro Swing
  • 16:00: DJ Omen – DJ Choice
  • 17:00: DJ Mike – Reggae
  • 18:00: Live Singer – Dude
  • 19:00: DJ Cypher – Break Beats Trap & Dub Step
  • 20:00: DJ David Steele – Soft Pop
  • 21:00: Dj Love – Pop Rock Mix
  • 22:00: Dj JaaJaa- DJ Mix
  • 23:00: Surprise!
Mysterious Paradise event: underwater location

Madpea Halloween Hunt

Mysterious Paradise is participating in the MadPea Halloween Hunt, so if you’re taking part in that event, please consider showing your support for WAP while visiting the region.

About WAP

World Animal Protection seeks to improve the welfare of animals around the globe – wild or domesticated – through public awareness, education, animal protection, animal rescue, animal welfare, and more. Based in Australia as a registered charity, WAP operates a number of region hubs across the world, in Africa, Asia-Pacific, Europe, North America and Latin America. From these they are able to mount a range of campaigns to support and protect animals, which include better education in matters of animal welfare and husbandry, vaccination programmes, support for government programmes for more humane means of animal care and the treatment of disease (such encouraging the management of dog populations through anti-rabies vaccination and through neutering programmes, rather than annual dog cullings), and ensuring animals are provided and cared for as a result of, or the event of, a natural or other disaster.

Note: the organisers of Mysterious Paradise are not directly involved with WAP or represent it directly in-world. However, the event is entirely non-profit, with 100% of all funds raised to go to WAP, and proof of payment to the charity, etc., will be provided after the event, via the Mysterious Paradise web page.

Mysterious Paradise event: a region to explore while helping raise money for World Animal Protection

SLurl and URL Details

Loss and life in Second Life

Posted on by Inara Pey
Nitroglobus Roof Gallery: How Isolde Got Lost

Opening on October 25th, 2018 at Nitroglobus Roof Gallery is How Isolde Got Lost, by Arete of Cyrene (AretevanCyrene). It is a complex piece, a story in 14 part;, a story in images dealing with the complex subject of love, loss and healing.

Narrative in art is not unusual; I’ve often referenced it when writing about exhibitions in these pages. But with this particular exhibition, the story is presented through the chronological order in which the pieces are presented, the start indicated by the sign The Story Begins Here, located on one of the inside walls of the gallery space, then progressing from there in a clockwise direction.

As Arete states in her liner notes, mourning is a deeply personal experience, influenced by a number of factors: our closeness to the lost one; their place within our circle of family and friends and how they react to the loss; religious and social factors, and so on. In her book On Death and Dying, Elisabeth Kübler-Ross outlined what she saw as the five stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. A sixth was later added, in the form of shock, preceding the other five. But as Arete also notes from her own experience the stages of loss can be more complex and can extend beyond just six stages.

Nitroglobus Roof Gallery: How Isolde Got Lost

In particular, the images here have not only been specifically created for the exhibition, they chart Arete’s on experience with loss (one of which also touches on Dido’s story, notably in She Found a New Home….). Nevertheless, the story here in one that is going to resonate with anyone who has suffered loss and grief.  Through them, we travel not only through the six acknowledged stages of grief, but also through the situations and actions that can both move us through them – or return us to one of them.

In this, Arete presents a simple, but forgotten fact of mourning: by labelling loss in terms of 6 “stages”, we tend to look at them as a linear progression: a series of steps from shock to acceptance by way of the other stages, all neatly in order. But the reality is, beyond shock, while we may well initially travel through the remaining stages in the order they are offered, we might also travel back to different stages of grieving. This can be as a result of a number of factors; perhaps as a result of finally packing possessions away, or clearing a closet of clothes that will no longer be worn, or simply witnessing something unexpected through the course of everyday life.

Nitroglobus Roof Gallery: How Isolde Got Lost

The healing process can also be found within the images, the return to “everyday” life; the support of family and friends; the taking up of new activities and filling the void as best we can. Given the personal nature of the images, and the nature of loss, singling out individual pieces in the series isn’t easy. However, it is the smaller, personal aspects of the story – such as Boxes – or the need to talk to the one now gone (which can be a vital part of the healing process: acknowledging that while a loved one might be physically gone, we can still keep them with us through memory as an integral part of us), that particularly struck a chord with me.

Love, listen.

To understand death, she so often talked with him to find spiritual acceptance.

Her words send to address unknown:

“Love listen, I must go on…but when I laugh, I feel guilty. When I forget you in a moment, I feel guilty. Please, try to understand, I love you and miss you so much but I have to let go of that guilt. Love listen, walk with me each day and we make that day together. Sleep with me each dark hour and share my dreams till we walk on the same soil.”

– Arete of Cyrene, How Isolde Got Lost

Nitroglobus Roof Gallery: How Isolde Got Lost

There is more here as well; the images are not only unique to this story and exhibition, they are wonderfully constructed in 3D. To see the intricate layering of this, I recommend enabling Advanced Lighting Model and setting graphics to at least High. Also, do make note that the story can also be followed through a website created by Arete, and accessed by clicking the first image in the series for a link.

An exhibition of enormous depth and message, How Isolde Got Lost is a must see. And please note that while individual image are available for sale, all proceeds will go to The Catboat in Amsterdam, the only animal sanctuary that literally floats, sited on a canal. A tip jar for the charity is also available in the gallery.

SLurl Details

The natural beauty of Cold Ash in Second Life

Posted on by Inara Pey

Cold Ash; Inara Pey, October 2018, on FlickrCold Ash – click any image for full size

Leaf (Peyton Darmoset) and Julz (Juliette Rainfall) are among my favourite region designers. Their region designs of Erebos Harbor (read more here), Cloudbreak (read more here) and Ash Falls (read more here) is among the best natural settings to be found in Second Life. So when I received an invitation to pay a visit to their latest creation, I made sure I had the opportunity to spend a fair about of time visiting, and hopped over to take a look.

Cold Ash is the in-world home for the Cold Ash brand of menswear, and the latest iteration of the region has been fabulously designed by Leaf and Julz as both the home of the store and a photogenic place to visit and appreciate.

Cold Ash; Inara Pey, October 2018, on FlickrCold Ash

Visitors arrive, appropriately, at the store itself, located towards the north-east corner of the region. This sits on a large plateau that is typical of the rugged nature of the island and resembles a large, converted warehouse. A railway track runs past the front of the store, separated from it can a broad gravel road that narrows into a winding footpath. Both the path and the railway track form an integral part of the region’s design.

Running from a tunnel on the northern extreme of the island, the tracks to where a metal framed truss bridge spans a watery gulf to reach a southern island. The gravel path gently curves its way down the slope alongside the bridge to also span the water, this time via a low-sided cement bridge, before curling up the slope of the second island, passing under the railway bridge as it does so.

Cold Ash; Inara Pey, October 2018, on FlickrCold Ash

Both track and path lead the way to a lumber yard that takes up the larger part of the second island, the land falling gently on the north side, where the trunks of felled trees lie, already stripped of their branches. Wooden steps run down the slope as well, offering a way down to the single beach running along the coast. This arcs back to another set of steps leading back up to the gravel footpath, offering a small loop around this part of the island.

Which is not to say this is all there is to see on the island. The lumber yard includes a workshop where the logs from cut trees can be cut and worked, prior to being loaded onto rail cars outside. A car workshop sits alongside the lumber shed, looking perhaps a little incongruous given there are no open roads here, but it does actually work within the setting, lending further character to the region.

Cold Ash; Inara Pey, October 2018, on FlickrCold Ash

The main island also offers routes down to the coast. The first is another winding path reached via a crossing over the railway tracks close to the store.

Two more are to be found to the water’s edge, both wooden walkways. The first commences close to the rail bridge and passes under it to reach the eastern coast. The second is hidden from view up-slope from the tracks. However, while it offers a way down to the western waters and provides a view back along the channel between the two island, it also leads to a private residence. Be aware the security orb guarding the house is on a short fuse, so keeping a distance is recommended.

Cold Ash; Inara Pey, October 2018, on FlickrCold Ash

Walk along the eastern coast of the main island, and you’ll find a little hideaway made from a converted railcar doubling as a little warehouse, a wooden porch offering a place to sit.

Carefully married with its sim surround, with a balanced soundscape and a subtle use of wildlife – such as the gulls flying between the two islands – this is another marvellous setting, richly photogenic. With the look of a coastal headland thanks to the way it joins with the surround peaks, Cold Ash is another truly eye-catching design by Leaf and Julz, one that should be visited and appreciated, whether or not you’re looking for apparel; and for the men, it offers the perfect excuse to try out new clothes while enjoying a walk around the islands.

Cold Ash; Inara Pey, October 2018, on FlickrCold Ash

SLurl Details

Blip Mumfuzz at Black Label in Second Life

Posted on by Inara Pey
Blip Mumfuzz: Photographs

Now open at the Black Label gallery is a new exhibition of art by Blip Mumfuzz.  Located in a sky gallery area reached via teleport from the gallery’s landing point, the exhibition can be found both indoors and out, within a large warehouse-like building in keeping with the gallery’s ground level facilities, on its outside walls and across the street. Also note that one of the “backdrops” to the setting is also one of Blip’s pieces.

Blip’s photography started as a means of recording her travels through Second Life in order to help her revisit them through memory. However, as she states in her liner notes for the exhibition, the focus of Blip’s images gradually shifted from capturing settings to capturing individual scenes or objects. In doing so, she started looking at potential subject from a variety of angles – and even as spaces between them to discover the stories they might offer.

Blip Mumfuzz: Photographs

I found that once I found saw something interesting I’d start moving the camera around. Looking over and under, behind and between. I began looking less at the things themselves…but at the visual and spatial relationships between things.

I am an improviser by nature…in life and in my art. My images are typically the result of an unplanned, spontaneous interaction with my environment. Some of the images in this exhibit, however, are more narrative.

– Blip Mumfuzz discussing her art

Blip Mumfuzz: Photographs

All of this is reflected throughout this exhibition, which Blip has opted to simply call Photographs.  Several are what might be called “conventional” images of places Blip has been: Ashemi Reprise, Keleland, Takeuti Town; while others are beautiful abstraction on locations, such as Kekeland Abstract 9, The Last Forever, BL Abstract and Drapes, to name but three.

It is these latter style of image, coupled with Blip’s vibrant use of colour, that perhaps tend to grab the observer’s attention, drawing the eye into them through the richness of colour and unusual perspective.  These show their location through an unusual perspective or offer a remarkable perception of space through their panoramic presentation, marking them as attention-taking pieces. However, among the bright paintings are a number that are more muted, their softer tones contrasting strongly with the bolder pieces. This gives the exhibition an added layering of effect; it is as if the brighter images are the loud extroverts at a gathering, demanding their presence is witnessed and their story heard. Meanwhile the softer toned images scattered among them come across as the introverts; they try to pass unnoticed, content to allow the other make all the noise – but their story is no less compelling when heard.

Blip Mumfuzz: Photographs

I’m not actually clear on when the exhibition closes; I assume it will be around mid-November, given it opened on October 13th. However, I do recommend taking the time to see it before then.

SLurl Details

Blip Mumfuzz at Black Label Gallery (Eternal Posession, rated; Moderate)

2018 SL UG updates 43/1: Simulator User Group

Posted on by Inara Pey

Ashemi Reprise; Inara Pey, September 2018, August 2018, on FlickrAshemi Reprise – blog post

Server Deployment Plans

As always, please refer to the server deployment thread for the latest news and updates.

  • On Tuesday, October 23rd, the SLS (Main) channel updated to server release 18#18.10.04.520268, comprising internal fixes.
  • On Wednesday, October 24th, 2018, the RC channels should be updated as follows:
    • BlueSteel will apparently remain on server maintenance package 18#18.10.04.520268.
    • Magnum and LeTigre were “TBD” at the time of writing.
    • Note that the deployment information for Snack in the thread (version 18.10.19.520844) is incorrect – see below for more (this may be removed after these notes are published).

SL Viewer

The start of week #43 has seen no change to the current viewer pipelines:

  • Current Release version 5.1.9.519298, dated September 5, promoted September 26. Formerly the Rakomelo Maintenance RC viewer – No change.
  • Release channel cohorts (please see my notes on manually installing RC viewer versions if you wish to install any release candidate(s) yourself):
    • Animesh RC viewer, version 6.0.0.520636, October 18.
    • Spotykach Maintenance RC viewer, version 5.1.10.520444, October 11.
    • Estate Access Management (EAM) RC viewer, version 5.2.0.520057, September 28.
    • BugSplat RC viewer, version 5.1.9.519462, September 10. This viewer is functionally identical to the current release viewer, but uses BugSplat for crash reporting, rather than the Lab’s own Breakpad based crash reporting tools.
    • Love Me Render RC viewer, version 5.1.8.518751, released on August 20.
  • Project viewers:
  • Linux Spur viewer, version 5.0.9.329906, dated November 17, 2017 and promoted to release status 29 November – offered pending a Linux version of the Alex Ivy viewer code.
  • Obsolete platform viewer, version 3.7.28.300847, May 8, 2015 – provided for users on Windows XP and OS X versions below 10.7.

Environmental Enhancement Project – EEP

  • The Snack RC channel has been updated with a new EPP release, 18.10.20.520891, which seems to fix the issue of EEP skies looking weird (black skies, fast-moving clouds) when seen on non-EEP viewers.
  • Rider Linden is now working on adding LSL support to EEP.

Aditi Account Set-up Reminder

Given EEP is available for testing on Aditi, a quick reminder on how to log-in to that grid if you have not done so before or in a long while:

  • File a support ticket requesting access to Aditi.
  • Wait for support to confirm your account has been set-up.
  • Log-in to Aditi. This may not give you a full copy of your inventory, however it will flag your inventory for syncing with Agni.
  • Syncing operations are run daily at roughly 02:00 SLT, so if you wait about 24 hours (depending on the time of your initial log-in to Aditi), your inventory on the beta grid should be synced with your Agni inventory.

The EEP testing region is: secondlife://Aditi/secondlife/EEPTesting/247/44/23.

2018 viewer release summaries, week #42

Posted on by Inara Pey
Logos representative only and should not be seen as an endorsement / preference / recommendation

Updates for the week ending Sunday, October 21st

This summary is generally published on every Monday, and is a list of SL viewer / client releases (official and TPV) made during the previous week. When reading it, please note:

  • It is based on my Current Viewer Releases Page, a list of all Second Life viewers and clients that are in popular use (and of which I am aware), and which are recognised as adhering to the TPV Policy. This page includes comprehensive links to download pages, blog notes, release notes, etc., as well as links to any / all reviews of specific viewers / clients made within this blog.
  • By its nature, this summary presented here will always be in arrears, please refer to the Current Viewer Release Page for more up-to-date information.
  • Note that test viewers, preview / beta viewers / nightly builds are not recorded in these summaries.

Official LL Viewers

  • Current Release version 5.1.9.519298, dated September 5th, promoted September 26th. Formerly the Rakomelo Maintenance RC viewer – No Change.
  • Release channel cohorts (please see my notes on manually installing RC viewer versions if you wish to install any release candidate(s) yourself):
  • Project viewers:
    • Environmental Enhancement Project (EEP) viewer updated to version 5.1.10.520819, on October 19th.

LL Viewer Resources

Third-party Viewers

V5-style

  • No updates.

V1-style

  • Cool VL viewer updated to version 1.26.22.21 on October 20th – release notes.

Mobile / Other Clients

  • MetaChat updated to version 1.2.8010 on October 19th – release notes.

Additional TPV Resources

Related Links