Loss, life and strength, Alone in Second Life

Posted on by Inara Pey
Nitroglobus Roof Gallery: Mihailsk
There are moments in life when you feel like you are losing everything; the laughter, the joy, in short the colour disappears from your life. You are ALONE, nude, mourning about what you lost. You have to find the strength to stand on your own feet again and find the light in the darkness that surrounds you.

– Mihailsk, June 2022

With these words, Greek photographer-artist and observer of life Mihailsk introduces guests to his exhibition Alone, which forms the June exhibit at Dido Haas’s Nitroglobus Roof Gallery. As might be gathered from his intro, this is an exhibition that leans into darker feelings and emotions: loss and loneliness, depression and hurt, whilst also offering a sense of hope beyond the shadow and pain.

The fourteen pieces Mihailsk presents are extraordinary in the depth of life they each offer. All are finished in black and white, using deep shadow and nudity to tremendous effect. But while nudity is present, it is not excessively NSFW, (although caution might be best employed with a couple of the pieces). Nor is its presence in any way gratuitous; rather, it is essential to the exhibition’s theme and tone.

Nitroglobus Roof Gallery: Mihailsk

This is because – as Mihailsk notes – nudity is the most physical manifestation of helplessness / being alone. When nude, we have nothing by which to hide our condition; we are literally and metaphorically laid bare to the world and our scars are openly visible; scars that are not necessarily physical, but certainly emotional (and represented here by the tattoos, marks and drawings present on Mihailsk’s torso and face). Thus its use within these images is a literal expression of naked emotion.

Similarly, the use of shadow and monochrome project feeling and mood. The shadows are perhaps most obviously representative of depression, feelings of darkness, loss and being lost. At the same time, the use of shadows to obscure eyes (together with eyes being closed) speaks again to sorrow, loss, and emptiness.

Contrasting with this is the use of light, both directed and visible. Through the pieces, whether indirect and lighting Mihailsk’s body and face, or direct in the form of beams of light falling across him or the presence of a ceiling light, give a sense hope for the future, and happier times will come again. More particularly, its presence within the images literally pushes back against the darkness, bathing Mihailsk in a sense of warmth, a visual reference to the fact that bad times do come to an end and that – to borrow from another expression – our darkest times come just before the brightest.

Nitroglobus Roof Gallery: Mihailsk

This hope is further expressed through pose. Nowhere is the figure slumped or huddled; instead, the poses all contain one or more suggestions of strength: a muscular outstretched arm, a seated back that is straight, not curved in defeat; the fluid movement of dance, and so on. Thus, they further add to the sense of hope for the future, that our inner strength will allow us to survive and to move forward as we seek the light of better times.

Accompanying the art are two quotes from Greek writer and poet Anastasios-Pandeleïmon Leivaditis and Belgian poet and novelist Eleanore Marie Sarton, both of which perfectly encapsulate the spirit of the exhibition. This can be found on the gallery wall, while lighting by Adwehe has been provided to add further atmosphere to the piece (make sure Advanced Lighting Model is enabled).

Rich in metaphor, meaning and very real emotion, Alone is an exhibition of enormous personal depth, but which offers a richness of feeling that it resonates strongly with anyone who has experienced one or more periods of loss and / or darkness.

SLurl Details

This week with Seanchai Library – June 6th-10th

Posted on by Inara Pey
Seanchai Library

It’s time to highlight another week of storytelling in Voice by the staff and volunteers at the Seanchai Library. As always, all times SLT, and events are held at the Library’s home in Nowhereville, unless otherwise indicated. Note that the schedule below may be subject to change during the week, please refer to the Seanchai Library website for the latest information through the week.

Monday, June 6th, 19:00 Dandelion Wine

The inventor who almost took the pleasure out of life by building a Happiness Machine; the young reporter who fell in love with an alluring lady of ninety; the old gentleman whose last act was listening to the clang of a green trolley car going round a corner, two thousand miles away.

These are just a few of strange and vivid people who entered the secret world of a twelve-year-old boy during one enchanted summer when he discovered the fact that he really was alive…

“The summer of ’28 was a vintage season for a growing boy. A summer of green apple trees, mowed lawns, and new sneakers. Of half-burnt firecrackers, of gathering dandelions, of Grandma’s belly-busting dinner. It was a summer of sorrows and marvels and gold-fuzzed bees. A magical, timeless summer in the life of a twelve-year-old boy named Douglas Spaulding—remembered forever by the incomparable Ray Bradbury.”

 

Tuesday, June 7th

12:00 Noon: Russell Eponym

With music, and poetry in Ceiluradh Glen.

19:00: Beggar’s Day: The Beggar Prince

The Kingdom of Galaway has a law – The Test of Kings –  that every heir to the throne must work a year and a day as a commoner in order to prove they are worthy of being ruler. Not a great law when you are as lazy and indulgent as Prince Larry.

He find that on his day, he must become servant to a former slave, Brishee, as she is conscripted to find the lost artefact, The Shield of Many Uses. However, the evil Percy has other ideas. Via murder and conspiracy, he intends to usurp the throne of King Willy.

Will Larry survive in his role as servant to Brishee? Will she succeed in her quest – and Larry, by extension, succeed in The Test of Kings, or will he be the first to fail, and Percy thus succeed?

The King, meanwhile, has problems of his own: why does Cruith the Crone keep stealing his chickens? Why is she always the first in line to bend his ear on Beggar’s Day?

Caledonia Skytower reads M.J. McGalliard’s first volume in the Beggar’s Day series.

Wednesday, June 8th: Seanchai Flicks

A special for Star Wars month as the Seanchai cinema space plays host to videos and throw popcorn around!

Thursday, June 9th: Thursday Night Science Fiction

With Finn Zeddmore.

2022 viewer release summaries week #22

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

Updates from the week ending Sunday, June 5th, 2022

This summary is generally published 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 for purposes of length, TPV test viewers, preview / beta viewers / nightly builds are generally not recorded in these summaries.

Official LL Viewers

  • Release viewer: version 6.6.0.571939 – formerly the Performance Improvements viewer, dated May 25th – No change.
  • Release channel cohorts:
    • Nomayo Maintenance RC (Maintenance N) viewer, version 6.6.1.572179, June 1.
  • Project viewers:
    • No updates.

LL Viewer Resources

Third-party Viewers

V6-style

  • No updates.

V1-style

Mobile / Other Clients

  • MetaChat updated to version 1.2.9138 on June 4th – release notes.

Additional TPV Resources

Related Links

Making Memories in Second Life

Posted on by Inara Pey
Making Memories, June 2022 – click any image for full size

The last time I visited a region design by Claudia (claudia74a Orsini) was almost five years ago, when I explored ~Neive~, a charming Homestead design (see: Visiting ~Neive~ in Second Life). So when I received a landmark to visit her current design, it struck me as a place I should go and poke my nose into – and I’m glad I did.

Also occupying a Homestead region, Making Memories offers a setting of multiple parts that roll together to form a whole worthy of exploration.

Making Memories, June 2022
To the south there’s a waterfront area with a paved footpath and road curling around the edge of the island, backed by promenades of brightly-coloured façades suggestive of a holiday town. West of this, and facing high off-region mountains across a water channel, sits a beach that flamingos have claimed as their own, backed in part by a small motel before cliffs rise from the grass and march northwards beyond the end of the sands.

These cliffs rise to form the island’s main peak, topped by a fortified tower / house that has a hint of medieval France about it. Rising above the surrounding trees, this house sits a little roughly on the hill’s crown and is fronted by a waterfall, all of which makes reaching it near-impossible – but visiting it is not the point; it sits as a backdrop to the setting’s east side landscaping.

Making Memories, June 2022

It is here, on the island’s lowlands, that there is the most to be found. A pastoral setting of farmhouses, meadows, a stream with a quaint bridge spanning it to carry the local (foot) traffic, and more, it is where both the landing point can be found and the attention to detail is the greatest, offering plenty of opportunities for photography.

A short walk from the landing point sits the main farmhouse:  a large single-stories, singled room structure that has a balcony along two sides and a cosy, homely interior design ready to welcome visitors. South of this over the bridge sits a barn which has been converted into an equally cosy summer house. A games room / bar occupies its upper floor – although given one side is open to the elements, an excess of imbibing wine might be best avoided!

Making Memories, June 2022

Between and around the house and barn is much more to be appreciated, enjoyed and photographed: animals in the meadows, seating around a fountain, a romantic wishing well, tea for two next to an old ruin or a family meal out in the garden of the farmhouse, walks out over the waters of the coast or around the local pond – and that’s just for starters.

To the north of the island, sitting on a low shoulder of the western hills, is another house. Occupying its own grounds, it lies at the end of the main track and rises as a red-roofed curiosity. Unfurnished and a little rough around the edges, it is again more for backdrop than internal exploration, and it fulfils this role with ease, the wild garden before it again offering the opportunities for photography.

Making Memories, June 2022

Those who fancy a little activity can find it by grabbing duckie bumper boats from the rezzer and paddle around the water to the north, east and west side of the region. Those who prefer something a little quieter, there are at least a couple of hideaway hammock either hidden among the trees or out on a little island.

All told, a pleasing, easy-on-the-eye setting with plenty of photo opportunities. Those in need of props can join the local group for rezzing rights (L$49 joining fee) – but please remember to pick up your items when done!

Making Memories, June 2022

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Space Sunday: saving MAVEN, Tiangong readying to expand

Posted on by Inara Pey
An artist’s impression of MAVEN as it looks down on Mars’ Vallis Marineris. The NASA mission, which arrived in orbit in September 2014, is studying the Martian atmosphere

NASA’s MAVEN Mars orbiter has been in orbit around the planet since September 2014. For the majority of that time, and following science commissioning (Sept-November 2014), the spacecraft has been studying the Martian atmosphere, yielding valuable science. Except for the past three months, that is.

On February 22nd, 2022 – ironically the day Shannon Curry, appointed to take over the role of MAVEN’s Principal Investigator in August 2021, was making a three-hour presentation on the vehicle’s science findings at the conclusion of its latest 6-month mission extension – when Things Went Wrong.

We finally finished the presentation, I turn my ‘phone back on, and our project manager calls me immediately. I’m thinking, he’s calling me to be like, ‘Congratulations, you did it, you’re doing great!’ And he was, ‘Shannon, we’re in safe mode.’

– Shannon Curry

Shannon Curry was appointed to the role of Principal Investigator for NASA’s MAVEN mission in August 2021, and steered the project through its most serious issue between February and June 2022. Credit; via Wikipedia

Regulars to Space Sunday will know that “safe mode” is when a spacecraft has encountered a condition that exceeds its programmed parameters / expectations, causing it to shut down most of its non-essential systems and services and ‘phone home with a call of “I’m in a spot of trouble, folks!”

Safe modes are rarely easy to diagnose and resolve remotely, with MAVEN (Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN mission), the issue would prove to be almost catastrophic.

In order to both study Mars and communicate with Earth, MAVEN must periodically re-orient itself. Up until 2017, it did so by using one of two Inertial Measurement Units (IMUs) to calculate its position, attitude and rotation. However, from 2017 through until the end of 2021, MAVEN has been reliant on just one unit – IMU-2 – after IMU-1 experienced data issues.

By the start of 2022, IMU-2 was starting to show issues of its own, so a project was started to write new software to enable MAVEN to orient itself using the stars in what the mission team called “stellar mode”, a project that would take until late 2022 to complete. In the meantime, the vehicle was instructed to switch back to using IMU-1, with the power to the unit being periodically recycled to help with keeping it operating smoothly.

However, on February 22nd, 2022, with MAVEN oriented to communicate with Earth, a power recycle was started and IMU-1 crashed, and when IMU-2 automatically started, it had absolutely no idea of where it was, and MAVEN went into a loop of trying to restart IMU-1 after shutting down all science operations.

When it was clear IMU-2 was “lost”, and IMU-1 was not going to recover, risking MAVEN drifting out of communications alignment, the mission team took a desperate step: heartbeat termination.

That term is not just for dramatic effect: basically, it’s like ripping the cord out of the wall. We ordered the vehicle to shutdown and reboot its primary computer without switching to the back-up. When that failed, we had no choice but to then swap to the back-up and we’ve never been on that before.

– Shannon Curry.

Whilst the switch to the never-used back-up computer was a risk, it nevertheless allowed position data to be given to  IMU-2 to ensure communications could be maintained with Earth. This allowed the mission team to accelerate the work on developing the “stellar mode” software.

On April 19th, the first version of the software was uplinked to MAVEN five months ahead of its due date. However, it could only be tested by shutting-down IMU-2. If the software failed, there was no guarantee either IMU would reboot, leaving MAVEN to drift out of its communications orientation within hours. Fortunately, the software demonstrated it could keep the vehicle correctly oriented, and the mission team were able to continue to refine the software and add the tasks required for MAVEN to use stellar mode for both communications and science operations.

In May, work had reached a point where the science instruments could each be brought out of safe mode and tested to ensure they had suffered no long-term damage. Then on May 28th, the order was given for MAVEN to fully transition all operations to use the stellar mode for navigation / orientation, allowing science operations to resume.

There will still be periods in MAVEN’s operations when it will have to rely on an IMU, but for now the mission team has brought the mission back from the brink of disaster, and are now focusing on ways in which the craft can better deal with possible data hiccups from the IMU systems.

Starship + Crew Dragon Update

Starship

The FAA report on the SpaceX starship facilities at Boca Chica, Texas, will now not be published until June 13th. In the meantime, it has been confirmed that the first orbital launch attempt will be undertaken by Ship 24 and Booster 7.

At the time of my last Starship update, Booster 7 had suffered a failure with a downcomer pipe, resulting in the booster being returned to the production facilities for examination, together with speculation that Booster 8 might replace it for the orbital launch attempt. However, repairs were made to Booster 7, enabling its return to the launch area.

Starship 24 undergoing liquid nitrogen cryogenic tests. A similar test at the end of May 2022 resulted in a header tank feed pipe failing, ejecting heat shield tiles from the underside of the vehicle. Credit: NASASpaceflight.com

At the end of Mays, Ship 24 was been rolled out to the test stands where cryogenic tests using liquid nitrogen commenced – only for a feed pipe connected to its LOX header tank to fail, throwing heat shield tiles off of the vehicle as the hull flexed. As a result, the pipe in question went through a rapid pipe redesign whilst on the test stand, with additional expansion joints being fitted to prevent any over-pressurisation.

With engines now being fitted to both ship and booster, and deliveries of liquid oxygen, liquid methane and liquid nitrogen being made to the tank farm, SpaceX appear confident the FAA report will give the green light for the orbital launch test – a test that will include a test deployment of Starlink satellites through the small payload slot.

This view exemplifies one of the issues SpaceX may still have with the Boca Chica launch facility. The orbital launch tower can be seen centre top; to the bottom left and in close proximity to the launch facilities, is the propellant and consumables tank farm, well within the blast radius should a starship / super heavy combination to explode at launch, the earth berm between tanks and launch stand notwithstanding. The horizontal tanks to the right of the upright tanks were installed after-the-fact in part to pre-empt concerns from the FAA on this matter. Credit: RGV Aerial photography

Even if this first flight test is a success (which is unlikely), it is perhaps important to note it is not a prototype test flight per se, but is rather an initial proof of concept. This is because the starship vehicle is far from its final configuration (Musk has announced first possible changes to the design). Nor is Ship 24 reflective of an “operational” starship: it has no means to carry the volume of payload promised (100-150 tonnes), the mechanism(s) required to support such a mass during launch, or the means to deploy it payload bay doors and their mechanisms. As such, there is a long way to go before starship reaches an actual prototype flight, with a lot more to prove. Even then, the realities of its promise are still highly questionable – something I hope to be looking at in a future Space Sunday.

Continue reading “Space Sunday: saving MAVEN, Tiangong readying to expand” →

An Inner Bloom of art in Second Life

Posted on by Inara Pey

Art Korner: Ms Sqeeeze – Inner Bloom
Update, June 27th, 2022: Art Korner has Closed.

Say it with flowers is a banner line perhaps most recognisable from adverts for Interflora, the global flower delivery service. It is said to be a slogan crafted by ad man Patrick O’Keefe in 1917 on behalf of the Society of American Florists. It was a recognition of the fact that floriography – the  means of cryptological communication through the use or arrangement of flowers that has been a common practice across many cultures in Asia, Africa and Europe – had soared to new heights of popularity throughout Victorian Britain and the United States.

Most usually we associate the use of flowers as a means of shared communication of feelings. We give flowers as an expression of love / desire or as a means of communicating shared sympathy / commiseration / commemoration, or of a united joy / shared happiness, and so on.

However, such is the versatility of flowers that they can be used as a means of personal expression and narrative – and this is beautifully demonstrated in Inner Bloom, a remarkable exhibition of photography by Ms. Squeeeze (Squeeeze), which opened at Frank Atisso’s Art Korner on May 27th, 2022.

Art Korner: Ms Sqeeeze – Inner Bloom

Comprising 17 images spread through a single exhibition hall carefully crafted into three individual areas, Inner Bloom uses flowers to communicate moods, stories and feelings that may be highly individual to the artist, but are richly recognisable to the observer.

Separated by phantom translucent walls, the three spaces making up the exhibition are marvellously graduated in their presentation, the first section offering pieces largely slanted toward monochrome with just soft hints of colour, progressing to images where the colour is more prominent, to those with a depth of colour that contrasts strongly with those in the first section.

At the same time, the style of the images grades through the three sections, from a heavy, but controlled use of shadow and silhouette through to backdrops that provide clarity of image and lighting that more readily reveals expressions, whilst shadow and tone are used to draw specific attention and focus.

Art Korner: Ms Sqeeeze – Inner Bloom

By presenting the images in this manner, together with the changing colours of the flowers that form the “carpets” of the display areas, we are imbued with a sense of shifting moods and thoughts, and our imaginations are drawn to different narrative themes in progressing through the exhibition.

Evocative, rich in interpretation and artistic expression, Inner Bloom should be viewed using the supplied environment setting (World → Environment → Use Shared Environment), and with Advanced Lighting Model enabled.

SLurl Details