Tag: Exploring Second Life 2021

It’s been two years since I first visited Jilin Estates, the Full region design by Jin Zhu (KidDreamz) and his SL partner, Li Zhu (JamaicasianBaby). It was a visit I can still recall and enjoyed at the time, so when Jin extended a personal invitation to drop into the latest iteration of Jilin – DYNASTY at Peony – Jilin Estates – ahead of the official opening, I was delighted to accept.

For those who remember the 2019 Jilin build, this latest iteration – which opened its doors to public access on at midnight SLT of the 21st / 22nd August, 2021 – is very different in presentation, but still retains the same Far East themes throughout, and more than maintains Jilin Estate’s to present an engaging design. With this new setting, the rural focus of 2019 is completely absent, replaced by a setting suggestive of a city borough or precinct, the shining towers an gleaming apartment blocks of the more affluent parts of the city forming the surrounding horizon / backdrop.

The focal point for the build is the tall, modern headquarters for Dynasty, Jin’s brand of oriental furnishings together with décor items and avatar accessories. North and south, this is bracketed by two squares, one of which forms the landing point for the region, the other the home of what might have been an old Shinto temple, now protected by a huge Tori gate even as more recent buildings attempt to hem it in on three sides.

Roads completely surround the Dynasty building, separating it and the square that is home to the landing point from what is clearly a much older neighbourhood, one perhaps looking down upon figuratively as well as literally by the distant shining towns of the city’s heart, that mixes utilitarian concrete blocks of buildings old than the glamming skyscrapers but more youthful than the wooden places of business and homes with which they mix. Besides the main square of roads around the landing point, this a neighbourhood rich with side street and alleyways and smaller squares (some one always obvious) that mark it as a veritable melting pot of ideas and opportunities for photographs.

It is also a place dominated by advertising, suggesting a society in which consumerism is the main deity. Along the side streets and alleys, neon signs hang much as up might expect them, but along the broader streets, the advertising is almost overpowering: great screens give life to adverts for faster, sleek cars, military careers, shows, and more. Not even the tall fingers of what have might once been the towers guarding former city gates have been spared, their faces covered in smooth cement on which still and animated advertising hoards have been hung, the spread of the city having long ago rendered the need for protective walls moot, their presence washed away in the drive to develop and grow, the towers left behind given a new lease of life.

Nor does the advertising end with hoardings, boards and signs: drones periodically swoop along the main roads, “pushing” holograms before them, deftly avoiding the traffic lights that also hover aloft, periodically directing traffic that many or many not require the surface roads and local expressway. These drones, together with a Deckard-style decommissioned Spinner parked alongside the landing point, suggest this is a place sitting in our not-too-distant future, a future that is refreshingly less dystopian in presentation than can be the case within SL.

The advertising perhaps initially suggests Japan as being the home to this city scene, but exploration around the landing point is likely to lean opinions more toward China. Places like the Yu Hua and Tai Fung Lau restaurants help with this push, as does the presence of  Fu dogs ornamentation around some of the building, lending them a degree of Feng Shui  protection as Chinese lanterns hang from rafters ore are strung along or across alleyways. But the truth is, this is a blending of oriental themes to which a soupçon of western elements have been added to provide a perfectly balanced mix of ideas that is both rich without in any way unpalatable.

And for those who might feel intimidated by all the advertising, a trip down one of the side streets / alleys might offer comfort thanks to the words DON’T PANIC! appearing above the roof of one building in large, friendly letters. One of these signs actually overlooks a small Cybermart – but whether the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation has a stall there or not is open to debate (see, two Hitch-Hikers Guide references for the price of one!).

But the advertising is not the only thing to be found here – there is a wealth of attention to detail to be found through the build, from the appearance of several of shiro0822’s delightful Maru Kado cats (including a couple serving behind the counters of the Izakaya food bar!), through the detailing in the various restaurants to the placement of little market stalls, vehicles and other elements that bring the setting to life as a place, and all of which await the patient explorer.

As well as being offering for exploratory and photographic delight (if you join the region’s group for L$250, you can also have rezzing rights for props – just please make sure you clean up behind yourself!), the region retains opportunities for rentals; Jin informed me there are apartments available, and that commercial opportunities are available, be these “regular” stores or pop-up opportunities. Those interested in either should contact the Jilin Estate management team for details.

In terms of viewing the city, I will say it is pretty heavily loaded with textures, and these can take a while of render, particularly if you have Shadows enabled in the viewer. As such, it might be easier to toggle these off except with taking photos. Given the lighting employed through out, I would recommend you keep Advanced Lighting Model (ALM) active, or you enable it on arrival (Preferences → Graphics → check Advanced Lighting Model). And while the setting works under a range of EEP settings (I used my own for several of the images here purely for illustrative purposes), do make sure you enable Use Shared Environment (World menu) to see the region as Jin and Li intend it to be seen. Finally, do make sure you have local sounds enabled – it’s worth it to hear the supplied sound scape, which is perhaps not quite what you might expect in places (the robot commentary in particular!), but it again adds a further layer to DYNASTY at Peony.

Another engaging and photogenic design by Jin and Li, well worth the time to visit and appreciate – any maybe pick up some household / personal bits from Jin’s store!

SLurl Details

• DYNASTY at Peony – Jilin Estates )Peony, rated Moderate)

This is going to be a shorter than usual travelogue piece – which might be a blessing, given the way I can ramble on 🙂 – but I’m caught between several personal projects at the moment, which are limiting my time a little. However, Shawn Shakespeare pointed me towards half-region design  called Kailani, designed by Peter (Peterkes Beaton) with assistance from Sakira Mirabella.

Kaïlanï, a place between heaven and the ocean! A place created to hang with friends by friends, come and enjoy the chill mood at the beach or other photogenic spots.

Wander around at the plaza or play a little game just enjoy your stay…

– The About Land description for Kailani

Recently opened (August 7th), this is a setting of two distinct halves that blend together as a whole, making for an easy-to-tour location that is – as the About Land description notes – nicely photogenic.

The landing point sits within the walled yard of what looks like it might be a gallery space in the future. It sits tucked into the south-east corner of the region – Kailani has an east-west orientation – forming part of the small split-level town the form one of the two major areas of the setting.

The lower aspect of this town forms a waterfront area, complete with a small beach and wharves for fishing boats. Above it, reached by steps, is a square piazza and a cobbled street that sits between two paved sidewalks shaded by palm trees and the broad umbrella of a monkeypod tree. Brightly coloured houses line one side of the street, pointing the way to the Kailani café sitting in the little piazza, while a number of static NPCs add a sense of life to the setting.

West and north, separated from the rest of the region by a curtail wall of high cliffs and from the little town by a narrow channel of water, is a broad beach that arcs around a tropical forest that holds its own little secrets awaiting discovery.

This beach itself is home to the Hermit bar, while there are numerous places to sit both on the sand on on the water. At the western end of the beach, a boardwalk passes over the shallows to a circular sand bank where further places to sit and / or escape can be found. A second board walk skirts a small set of falls at the forest’s eastern end to reach a little set of facades nestled beneath the cliffs almost is if they are a little holiday home for visitors.

To reach the second board walk explorers must make their way through the forest to where wooden steps descend down to it. The route will carry visitors past the locations event space (and claim a group gift if so minded), and find a further place to sit and relax beyond it that offers a nice little view back towards the town.

There’s more to be found here (will you find the little cavern, for example?) as the setting sits beneath a setting Sun that casts long shadows photographers may enjoy playing with. However, other then repeating the fact Kailani offers multiple opportunities for photography and kicking-back (trying alternate EEP settings is recommended), I’ll leave things at that and suggest you hop along to witness things for yourself.

Thanks again to Shawn for passing along the LM!

SLurl Details

• Kailani (Destiny Isle, rated Adult)

I finally made time to drop into Endless: Permafrost, the latest design by Sombre Nyx that occupies her Full region in Second Life – my thanks to all who have been poking me to go over the course of the last week or so.

Sombre has a talent for capturing the essence of physical world environments from fenlands to the rugged beauty of Scottish / northern hemisphere islands and more. I’ve followed her work since she opened the first iteration of Endless – La Camargue – in 2019, and have always enjoyed the sense of place she incorporates within her designs – and Endless: Permafrost is no exception to this.

The setting offers a take on the sub-arctic permafrost that stretches beneath 65% of the Russian landmass and under nearly a quarter of the northern hemisphere. It is a layer of soil up to several hundred metres deep that has been frozen for two or more years (most of it having been in a frozen state for hundreds of thousands of years). Only now it is changing – and it is this change that Endless: Permafrost uses as its focus.

In short, the permafrost is thawing as a result of global warming, and it is doing so at an increasing rate year-on-year – on average, temperatures with arctic and sub-arctic areas of the world are warming two to three times faster than the rest of the planet. This is both revealing a new landscape within the permafrost regions, and having serious implications for the planet as a whole.

By coincidence, I’ve recently been reading about the effects of permafrost thawing in the Chersky region in the far north-eastern tip of Russia. Around two decades ago, the main town in the region was referenced in western media as being “buried under ice and snow for eight months of the year” with temperatures averaging around -6ºC. Today, the periods of snow-bound isolation are less long-lasting and  the average winter temperature sits at -3ºC. Current estimates suggest that in the course of the next two decades this average will rise to around 0ºC – all of which is a stunning change in climate.

As a result, the once-solid permafrost around Chersky has been degrading: the few roads within the region that were once passable (in summer at least) by any type of vehicle are now the preserve of 4×4 drive vehicles, the thaw having caused the ground under them to collapse, breaking their surfaces. Similarly, buildings have been exposed to subsidence and severe structural damage and / or collapse – and not just houses and other structures that may not have deeply solid foundations.

Chersky was once home to the largest building in north-east Asia, a water treatment plant that had been built upon steel piles driven into the permafrost, held in place by the frozen soil. But with the thaw had come a melting of the ice and softening of the ground, opening sinkholes and craters that robbed the piles of support, causing them to sag and / or fall over, bringing down parts of the building such that it looks to have been struck by a massive earthquake.

I’ve no idea if Sombre has in any way used Chersky and its surroundings as a basis for her Permafrost design, but I was drawn to thinking about it, because Sombre’s landscape bring elements of it to mind. For example, close the the landing point is the Arimat-Lubyn Research Station. Leaving aside the slightly Russian sounding name, its presence brought to mind the climate and permafrost research facilities also located in Chersky – facilities noted for being among the first to raise concerns over permafrost thaw back in the 1990s.

Sombre’s research station sits at the western end of the setting’s upland are. This curves around the southern extent of the region, centring on high peak tall enough to rise above the tree line, its upper reaches bare of vegetation but still the home of paths that climb to its summit, where one the region’s sitting spots can be found.

To the north of these hills, the region offers a lowland setting reflective of more of the changes being wrought in northern latitudes by the thawing permafrost: the grass is potted by flooded sinkholes, while the broken remains of buildings and structures brought low by ground-level subsidence as the ice has melted. It’s an enticing setting, made all the more rich and photogenic by the presence of a sound scape and suitable wildlife – foxes, reindeer, geese, rock ptarmigan, all are awaiting discovery – while there are numerous sit-points for those who wish to make use of them.

Those who check the landing point should spot the information giver. This provides a note card with Sombre’s comments on the permafrost and the risks involved in its thaw. In them she comments on the fact that the permafrost is perhaps the largest carbon sink on the planet – an estimated 1,400 gigatonnes of carbon is believed to be locked in the frozen soil. This is a worry because as the soil thaws, so organic processes within it resume. These consume the carbon and produce the greenhouse gases of carbon dioxide and methane. and the consumption of the carbon alone could produce 1.5 times more carbon dioxide than is currently present in the atmosphere.

Also to be found within the information note card are a pair of additional LMs that give access to other locations in the region: the Light House and the Endless: Islands. The first of these is a gentle, dream-like setting created by Sombre, offering a long boardwalk over water, places to sit scattered along it, the surrounding waters home to ice floes and a lone green island. The second is another fantastical setting of from the imagination of Jackson Cruyff: series of floating islands visitors can lose themselves within, and populated with their own delights.

Beautifully conceived and executed, Endless: Permafrost is once again an engaged visit.

SLurl Details

• Endless: Permafrost (Heraiki Bat, rated Adult)

Back in May 2020, Num Bing-Howlett (Num Bing) and her partner Clifton Howlett) invited me to visit The Empire of Dreaming Books, an environment to honour the Zamonia series of books by German comic creator and author, Walter Moers (see: An empire of books in Second Life). The setting quickly – and rightly – became very popular among Second Life travellers, who now once again have the opportunity to travel to Zamonia, as Num and Clifton present The Path to Buchhaim.

The couple were kind enough to extend a personal invitation for me to visit this latest installation of their vision of Moer’s mystical land over the weekend, which I was delighted to accept – although offering a write-up has taken a while for me to get to. 

With Empire of Dreaming Books, Num and Clifton set a scene fairly focused on the city of Buchhaim, with its myriad bookshops, printers, and publishers. Now, in The Path to Buchhaim, the focus switches the focus a little away from the city to expand on the landscape of the Dull Plateau that was to be found in part the previous design, and which here offers some of the many trails that cross the plateau to converge of Buchhaim whilst also offer some of the steppe-like feel of the Dull landscape (a name that while taken from the Zamonia books, is a contradiction in terms here, given the richness to be found as one wanders the undulating landscape, whether keeping to the trails or walking through the long grass and seas of flowers).

A portion of the city is still to be found tucked into a corner of the region. It offers what appears to the end-knot of the winding alley of Schwarzmanngaße, and shop number 333, the home of Phistomefel Smeik and his bookimistic laboratory. Here – should you decide to accept it – an Experience awaits with the opportunity to be teleported to three further destinations.

I had hoped one of these destinations might be the the catacombs, as presented in the previous Zamonia build. However, two of the listed options will carry visitors to Hidden Bottle, another region design by Num and Clifton, and which I wrote about in May 2021, while the third goes to The Digital Apperture, a skybound gallery Clifton and Num present. At the time of my visit, the latter featured an  exhibition by the couple entitled A Day at Elvion (a destination also on my list for a return visit, as I understand it has expanded to  Full region).  

Whilst not a part of the theme of The Path to Buchhaim, both of these destinations are very much worth dropping into, with Hidden Bottle offering a further bewitching visit for those who have not previously seen it, with the portals there obviously offering a gateway to reach this setting, those coming through them – and returning from the gallery – being delivered to the cobbles in front of the good professor’s shop. 

Of course, I may have missed an entrance to the catacombs if they are still present – in which case, silly me – but even without them, this is still a setting where the central character is that of the book. Across the region books offer places to sit or stand as walls or stepping stones or rise rise in piles – they even form a kind of landslide as they fall away down a slope and into the waters of the island’s coast. 

Also to be found throughout the setting are numerous places to sit, both for individuals and for couples or groups of friends. Most of these are outdoors, although a couple of the bookshops in the little corner of Buchhaim offer quiet retreats as well. And needless to say, the entire setting is beautifully photogenic, the region’s environment settings making for an ideal backdrop for images.

All of which makes for a richly engaging visit, and rather than prattle on here, I’m going to urge those of you who have not done so already, to jump across an immerse yourself in this introduction to Zamonia and explore the Paths to Buchhaim.

SLurl Details

• The Path to Buchhaim (Zamonia, rated Adult)

– with apologies to the estate of Samuel Taylor Coleridge!

Hera (Zee9) is a region creator whose imagination is in many ways unparalleled in Second Life; over the years she has consistently produced immersive environments built around themes that have richly and deservedly captured the hearts and minds of all who have visited them.

Perhaps best known for her ever-evolving Drune builds, many of which I’ve covered in these pages, she had also been the creator of places such as the medieval-like Golgothica and the captivating Venesha. Now, after what she describes as a “hectic and unpleasant four months”, she has opened another build for people to enjoy – and it is another marvel.

Shangri-La, modelled in part on an earlier Drune Raider design, was originally going to be a private place Hera could retreat to and spend time; however, she has generously opted to open it to the public as a place to be enjoyed and explored.

I actually first got to hear about it as she and I shared a brief conversation – as we have on occasion recently, the result of bumping into one another a couple of times quite by chance – just ahead of the weekend, and she kindly offered to provide me with a tour. Sadly, circumstances dictated that I was unable to take the offer then, so Hera dropped the LM to me, and as soon as my schedule allowed, I jumped over to pay a visit.

Quite how you might describe Shangri-La is a matter of personal choice. There is a marvellous fusion of Asian elements that reaches from India through to Thailand, Cambodia and Malaysia. At the same time, the very name of the setting – Shangri-La offers echoes of Shangdu, Kublai Khan’s “upper capital”, as well as echoing Hilton’s mystical place within the Kunlun Mountains, whilst climbing the steps and walking around the temple-like structures in places brings with it a faint sense of Mayan history out of South America.

It was the Shangri-La / Shangdu “connection” that brought to my mind Coleridge’s Kubla Khan – hence the opening lines to this piece, based as they are on his work – a poem about a fantastical palace, formed within the imagination; a place of dance, music, pleasure. But where Coleridge’s palace was the product of an opium-addled mind, Hera’s the result of her richness of creativity and imagination – although like Coleridge’s poem, there is a hidden edge to the setting, but where he writes of demon lovers and cries for war, the “shadow” here is much more classical, folding a touch of Grecian mythology into the build, as hinted at in my re-working of the poem’s lines.

From the moment of arrival, it is clear this is place welcoming to those wishing to escape: blankets and cushions are spread cardinal-like around the landing point, with more to be found on the various terraces, along with curtain-draped pergolas, whilst the tree tops and the surrounding beach offer yet more places to sit and relax.

For the explorers, there are halls large and small awaiting discovery – including the lower cavern / hall and its waiting statue, whilst the upper reaches of the main structure bring forth thoughts of  Angkor Wat, thanks to the great carved faces mounted on the stone walls. These also highlight another unique aspect of Hera’s region builds: rather than relying purely on commercial kits and building obtain through the Marketplace or in-world, Hera is truly the architect of her settings, designing and creating many of the meshes she uses.

To the south, the temple stretches out over the sea to grasp a rocky outcrop. The back of this stone arm sits a simply gorgeous bar, its roof open to the sky, its narrow length split into three cosy areas whilst a canopied balcony at its far end offers a further retreat.

Whilst in places completely modern in design (the bar and the central lighting), it nevertheless sits perfectly within the “ancient” walls, a place crying out to become a gathering point for like minds and imaginations, masterfully completed by the Vallejo-like paintings Hera has created for the walls, paintings that for me again added a twist of South America to the setting, given their apparent inspiration.

A ship – one of Lia Woodget’s marvellous Blackpsot builds – anchored off the northern coast adds a different sense of era to the setting, its presence suggesting the island has just been the subject of discovery by 18th century explorers from the west. Thus, between bar and ship, Shangri-La encompasses  a sense of existing outside the normal passage of time, much like its namesake.

When visiting, I do strongly recommend using the shared EEP settings for the region (admittedly, I’ve post-processed the images here to give a slightly different look to the setting, as I wanted to offer a sense of age to them that might be in keeping with that of the region, and without falling back on purely monochrome / sepia finishes).

Also, do make sure to have Advanced Lighting Model (Preferences Graphics make sure the ALM setting is enabled) as well as local sounds enabled. And as a final side notes, please be aware that while the building set upon its own in the south-west corner of the region might appear to a continuance of the main structures, it is actually a private residence and not part of the public spaces.

Captivating, photogenic and laden with tales awaiting telling, Shangri-La is exactly what its name and About Land description state: a tropical paradise and retreat.

SLurl Details

• Shangri-La. Tropical Paradis Island (Island of Jahesa, rated Adult)

I received a special invitation from Nessa Nova and Natalie Starlight to pay a visit to the latest iterations of their Lost Unicorn estate, which officially open at 12:00 noon SLT on Saturday, August 7th. As a long-term admirer of their work, which I’ve blogged about numerous times in these pages, it was an invitation I was only too happy to accept.

As this is a preview piece, this article is going to be a little different to my usual travelogues, as rather than offer something of a walk through of the settings, I want to talk about the atmosphere that Ness and Natalie create within their region designs, and why I find their work so attractive and memorable. I’ll also note that that while both regions offer dedicated EEP settings, the images you see here have been taken with one of my personal EEP Fixed Sky settings, as I wanted to offer more of a personal take on the regions and their mysticism – so please make sure you have your viewer set to Use Shared Environment (World → Environment) when you visit.

The Lost Unicorn estate has long been the home of the Lost Unicorn Gallery. Traditionally housed within a great castle watched over by the gigantic form of a dragon and seated upon its own island, the gallery has been home to some of the finest fantasy art, both mixed media and produced from images captured entirely in-world, that Second Life has to offer by some of the platform’s greatest talents.

With this iteration, the gallery retains its castle setting, but with a new building design that conjoins the main region thanks to a narrow stone causeway. The off-region surround that cups the the main Lost Unicorn region and which blends with it to the west and north, also extends south and west, giving the impression that the gallery and castle sit along the sweeping curve of a distant land’s mountainous stretch of coast.

The castle is a stunning structure, one of the most unique in terms of the blending of styles that I’ve seen in-world. Great elven arches combine with burnished minarets as water tumbles from high platforms to form curtains along straight and curved walls of stone within which galleried halls rise one another the other, and doorways unexpectedly open onto open-roofed courtyards and gardens or rooms where skylights allow sunlight to wash walls and floors.

Crowned by a building that combines the looks of a medieval cathedral with a distinctly elven tone as it sits on a saddle of rock, the entire gallery structure is  utterly enchanting for its sheer beauty, the art it contains, and the unexpected little spaces that await discovery – such as the jazz venue and the Storybook Nook.

The Jazz venue is something I didn’t expect to come across. Presided over by Ol’ Blue Eyes himself, it is not a place one might readily associate with a fantasy realm – and yet it works, presents another unique tale to the gallery’s ever-growing story. Soimilarly, the Storybook Nook presents a cascade of memories for those who visited Nessa and Natalie’s former region of Storybook Forest.

Down the steps from the landing point, the causeway to the main region – now called Finian’s Foraois (Celtic for “forest”) – adds a touch of Tolkien to the mix, guarded as it is by the Argonath,  the great carven statues of  Isildur and Anárion. Here, rather than guard the passage of the Great River Anduin as it flows into Gondor, they bracket the entrance to the forest.

Passing through the arch – and crossing into the estate’s Full region – was for me akin to stepping into Middle Earth. Not just because of the presence of the Argonath, but because the forest beyond the rocky veil that sits between the two regions brought to mind thought so Greenwood the Great before darkness fell across it, and a time when the paths beneath its great canopy echoed to to happy laughter of Sindarin elves and men and dwarves could find safe passage through the wood. A time long before it became the brooding shadow known as Mirkwood – although look closely in places, an you will see possible portents of the darkness to come, as baleful eyes here and there appear from within the foliage, glare for a moment and then fade away.

Here, under the shade of the giant trees, paths meander and streams bubble. Deer and rabbit, otter and bear are to be found roaming, and the very air seems heady and light as mist curls and sunlight filters across paths or fills glades with light.

But it is not only a sense of Second Age Middle Earth to be found here, and many influences await those who wander.

There is the little market on the hilltop for example – might it be found in Middle Earth or Middle England at the time of the Knights of the Round Table or of Robin Hood? And then there is the brooding bulk of the second castle, cold stone and heavy walls a world away from those of the gallery castle, and within it more touches of Arthurian legend and the romanticism brought forth by the likes of Thomas Mallory and his Le Morte d’Arthur.

Then there are the garden spots and glades with their own settings. places watched by unicorns and set of afternoon tea. But who are to be the guests? Inhabitants of Lewis Carroll’s world, perhaps, so some others?

This is the magic of Lost Unicorn, a magic that filters through each and every design Natalie and Nessa present. It encourages the imagination to soar unfettered, nudged by all that we see, large and small – as with the eyes noted above. Within it, those who have visited past designs will find threads of their presence – from story books to Celtic tales and medieval myths, all of which cast the mind by to lost Unicorns of the past. At the same time, the settings offer something entirely new place with stories as yet unwritten, where the echoes of elves and knights comfortably rub shoulders with the spirit of the Great American Songbook whilst looking into the eyes of Marilyn Monroe without any hint of jarring juxtaposition or misplaced design.

Thus, the Lost Unicorn estate remains, as always, a place to be savoured as much as explored – and needless to say, rich with opportunities for photography as well as for creating stories abound throughout. Yes, there is a lot for the viewer to handle if you run with shadows enabled, but the effort is more than worthwhile, as you will be rewarded by an immersive trip into a realm of fantasy and legend that is genuinely unique.

SLurl Details

• Lost Unicorn Gallery main landing point (rated: Moderate)
• Finian’s Foraois (Lost Unicorn, rated Moderate)