I Catch up with Simone

My first reaction when I rezzed at Simones was to LOL, why? Well you walk into a huge notice which not everyone saw the funny side of, but the reason behind it is understandable too :-

Simone Stern: I had to do something... people were driving me nuts over not knowing how to use the vendors.
(Lesson to be learned - read the notices and learn how to use a vendor LOL)

Simone was wearing one of the special outfits she devised for Halloween and it looked fantastic on her.

As I looked around I noticed the huge changes to the store since my last visit, "You have remodelled the store?" I asked Simone

"Partially, it's still underway. I'm going to have to put up a second sim, the formals need their own home I am afraid". She replied "Still quite a bit to finish before the remodel is through however."

Simone wasn't sure on a finish date but reassured me 'the grand opening for the new store will be announced, and we'll make sure there's a big fat THANK YOU sale as well... might even combine that with my third SL reziversary :D'

There are 200 new items in the new 'fall line' so far, with redesigning the store plus the new lines I am amazed yet again at how many hours Simone finds and yet she still finds time to help others with the Virtual Angels a group dedicated to helping others.

I asked her about it: Simone Stern: "it's a charity originally started to benefit one SL resident, but as we came to realize there was a much greater need, it has expanded. We have applied for official status so that's pending."
Below you can see some of the designs for Halloween the 'hexed' sexy witch range are irresistible there are other outfits ranged around the store like the 'Doctor'

"Most interesting thing is to watch the gender bias in place... people see the scrubs, the lab coat, and think 'Nurse". So, it's named 'DOCTOR" for that reason."

There is also a morticia style gown, its worth taking your time and looking around.

I had also heard that Simones was featured in the recent CSI machinima and asked her how that came about;

Simone Stern: "I work for the company who did the project the machinima department selected my store to shoot in for convenience's sake, for many reasons. Easy to get the owner to help, easy to make changes to the build and displays if necessary, easy to get the land owner to close the island, etc. That little bit of machinima you saw was months in the making."

All through the changes and total upheaval the one thing I was most impressed with was Simone's willingness to help anyone that asked, all through our conversation people were asking questions or looking for something in particular, all went away happy with what they found.

Good luck Simone - can't wait to see the finished store.

Dana XxX

SL's first award for new designers of men's clothes

Press Release from Second Guy Clothiers
October 30, 2007
Contact LB Fellini or Balthazar Balhaus

SL's first award for new designers of men's clothes.

Today Second Guy Clothiers announces the Ballini Award, which will recognize new designers of quality men's clothes.
Four Awards will be given in the areas of Business, Casual, Athletic, and Rebel Cool.
The winner in each category will receive a cash award of L$10,000, a 1/4 page ad on Men's Second Style magazine with a value of $3000 and one month of free retail space at Second Guy Clothiers including promotion.

Judging will be done by a distinguished panel in the world of men's fashion: Ryan Darragh of Men's Second Style, Shai Delacroix of Casa del Shai, Swaffette Firefly of SF Design, Jesseaitui Petion of Aitui, and Ben Vanguard of SLMen.com.
"Second Guy was founded on the principle of quality clothing for men and we are excited to help bring the best new talent in that area to public attention," said, Balthazar Balhaus of the Ballini Suite.

Submissions are due by Friday November 16. "We encourage everyone who has recently started to design in the area of men's clothes to entertheir best work for consideration.
We are casting a broad net and wish the best of luck to SL's next star designers." said LB Fellini of the Ballini Suite.

Winners will be announced at a party at Second Guy on Saturday December 8 and in Men's Second Style.

Rules for Submission
Eligibility: Less than one year in Second Life. Less than three months selling clothing for either sex. No stand-alone main store.
A designer may enter and win in more than one category.

Process to enter:
Send a folder with one set of clothes for each category you are entering to LB Fellini.
All clothing MUST be full permission so that it can be distributed to the judges.
Clothing will be relabeled as "no transfer" before it is sent to the judges. Do NOT submit your clothes directly to the judges or contact them for information. All folders MUST be labeled with the category you are entering followed by your name. Do not submit more than one outfit per category. Do not give your folder submission a clever name. If you do not receive a confirmation from LB Fellini after 24 hours, resend your submission. All submissions are due to LB Fellini by midnight PST Friday November 16. We reserve the right to consider your work in a different category than you have submitted it.
Category Definitions: Business traditional business wear as well as formal attire. Casual includes jeans, pants, shirts jackets, swimwearand underwear. Athletic includes clothing designed for any and all sports. Rebel Cool is a loosely designed category for alternative clothing including club wear and extreme urban fashion.

Finalist phase:
If you are chosen as a finalist in one or more categories, you will be asked to provide a full wardrobe for judging on Saturday November 24. Clothing will be judged on style, construction and originality. Winners will be invited to attend the party on December 8, but attendance is not required to win.

You Can't Keep A Good Mystic Down!

AS WORD SPREAD that Mystic Academy had been wiped from the face of Second Life, members and supporters tp'd in, shocked and disbelieving that their beloved Academy had truly gone.

As they gathered, like refugees, on the grass, questions bombarded Academy owner/director, Dragon Shichiroji about the how, what, where, why of the disaster.

Sagely, he pronounced there was no point in getting all agitated about what HAD happened, the focus would be on what WILL happen ... the rebuilding of the academy ... the disaster was an opportunity for a fresh start.

Eyewitness to the dramatic "meltdown", Wisdom & Enlightenment Centre co-owner Zaak Miles said, "It was the strangest thing. I'd just arrived and they were doing a rebuild after Mystic had disappeared for the first time, when all of a sudden the ground started to drop down about 600 metres. It looked like the ground was melting, and it was covered with all these funny-looking flowers!"

"The ground rose up and down about three times. It was the most amazing thing to see!" "I've never seen a meltdown like that in Second Life."

As supporters excitedly talked about what they wanted to see in the 'new' academy - a temple structure, an internal garden, more discussion rooms, a bigger entrance etc - some of the academy's 40 staff, started replacing what had been lost.

Somehow, 'design' didn't seem to be as important as the continuance of the classes and discussion groups that people flock to the academy for.

Slowly, the familiar purple couches appeared out of someone's inventory, then a fire, and then the ever-handy events calender, now a table and chairs, and over there, someone else provided a tree.

Despite there being no building, the 'Academy' began to rise again in the form of the people who make it such a special place. With around 1,200 members that's a lot of spiritual willpower!

Jane Atkey could be seen in the distance, on a stonehenge type of structure, practising her tai chi; and in the moonlight, a Buddha glowed in the dark.

Elborath Gelfand reflected on a library and a club to gig in; StarRose Merlin found her fire; Saphira Masala requested that the 'new' Academy have, "The openness and spontaneity of Rydal(its previous location), with the excellence of the present structure."

And Aurora II Oceanlane cracked up some of the group by declaring, "And I want a pony!"

"The credo of the academy is 'One Light, Many Paths'," explained Dragon, "and we exist to explore the mystical dimensions of the human spirit."

The Academy has meditation, yoga, philosophical discussions, enneagrams, astrology etc ... learning in many forms.

"But we're not just all about tree-hugging," Dragon added, "we know how to party all night too!"

Mystic Academy lives on again in an empty field, because it is nourished by the hearts, minds and souls of the people who go there.

If you want to check out their progress, just go to the Mystic Academy site.

Calla celebrates its 1 year anniversay

Calla started in a skybox with a handful of designs and has now grown into one of the best know hair stylists in SL.
Tigerlily Koi and Haedon Quine deserve the acclaim they now enjoy - hard work and perfectionism combined with great marketing and customer care have made the name Calla stand out in the name of fashion.

'Over this past year Calla has grown larger than we ever imagined. Way larger than we imagined. It's all thanks to you! So, we'd like to kick off the weekend with a 50% off sale.
Sale items will be marked with a bright red 50% off sign so it's easy to see which styles are on sale.
We will also be releasing *10 new styles* this weekend! (We're hording them right now, and we feel really bad about it... so, we can't wait to get them out.)
We have also had many designers and friends who have offered up some very generous gifts for you.
I honestly cannot believe the awesome things they have made and given to us for all of you. We've got gifts from Nicky Ree, Alaska Metropolitan of Opium, Shai Delacroix of Casa Del Shai, Pushbutton Skolnick of Pushbutton Industries, Marleen Vaughan of Marlys, Truth Hawks of Truth, Rebel Hope, Haver Cole & Aemilia Case of Lemon, Colleen Desmoulins of The Loft 3, Eolande Elvehjem of Accessories by Eolande, Soda Domela of Bubblefish, and more! These gifts will *only* be available this weekend, so be sure and drop by to pick yours up.
There is also a special Limited Edition of Bramble with a Calla baseball cap available in all 175 colors for $L 50.'

source http://callatropia.com/blog/


I just heard the sale will be extended to Tuesday so if you didn't get over there yet, don't panic
just click here to go :- http://slurl.com/secondlife/Callatropia/125/193/23/
Don't forget to join the group and become a 'Callatropian' too for all the updates and new release news.

Dana XxX

New in SL: automatic group invite

What would make an experienced scripter jealous? Yes, a script made by someone else that hasn't been made before. And even worse: a script that was deemed impossible !!


And now the day has come. Aiming at big stores, organizations and/or groups, Scripts 'r Us, run by Wietse and Gwendolyn Cassini have done it. Drop the script in a prim, click it and you will get an instant group invitation. It almost sounds too good to be true. No more IM'ing someone and waiting for that person to come online and for him/her having to manually type your name and invite you. No more opening the Search panel, typing the group name, going through a list, having to find it and then join it.

This script is now available, but at a cost. Not only will it set you back L$5000, you do have to have a computer online, 24 hours/7 days. Or whenever you want the script to work. And on this computer you also need to have Windows XP with service pack 2 and .NET technology (which you have when you regularly update). And you do need an extra second life account (an 'alt').

I cannot and will not reveal how it works exactly, but I can say that it works with a separate program outside Second Life, linking to the LSL script that you use in second life.

The price is high, because it is a unique script. It hasn't been seen before, it is truly unprecedented. And, as the scripter has told me, it has cost some considerable time to make it. So unless you're rich, the people likely to buy this script are those who own popular shops, or have any other popular groups (like the SL Newspaper). Think about the sheer number of IM's the people from stores like Xcite! get every day, having to attend to every single one of them by hand. It could be over now, with this new gadget.


The SL Newspaper has had the opportunity to test it for about a month now, and it works great. The signs can be found in our headquarters as well as some of the other outlets/bars/fanshops/offices we have. The program only goes offline when SL goes offline, and on rolling restarts.

If you don't believe me, or if you just want to test it for yourself, please visit the SL Newspaper headquarters or Scripts 'R Us (AKA Cassini Creations). Because this script has to be manually set to some specific info (like the alt name and role that you want the new member to be in), it is not a boxed thing that you can buy. If you are interested, you can contact Wietse Cassini directly (by IM) and he will prepare it and walk you through it. Setting it up should take no longer than 20 minutes, or a bit more if you are completely inexperienced with windows and scripts.


Scripts 'r Us also sell other common scripts with all permissions, but these are all low-cost. By shaking up the scripting world of Second Life with this new tool that was unavailable before, this might be the big breakthrough for Scripts 'r Us. By the way, they are linked to Cassini Creations, a women's clothing shop who also sells scripted silks (with striptease option including sound and custom animation). Check it out at Scripts 'r Us and Cassini Creations.

A revolution in silk........

As an ex-dancer when I heard about these silks I pricked up my ears, of course I have seen and heard of scripted clothes that the wearer can remove - strip, piece by piece, so what is different about these? I asked the creator Sneakina Piek -

Sneakina Piek 'You simply click on each piece of silk to wear.....rez the tip jar in world......set the tip jar to the amount you want to allow others to remove each item for and you are ready for fun and profit'

Sneakina Piek 'The silks and tip jar work together'

Dana: How did you come up with the idea?

Sneakina Piek: I think the patrons would like to have that control, to remove the clothes for you

You: So whoever is tipping chooses which silks come off?

Sneakina Piek: Yes, after the tip.....click on on a piece .....to remove it from the dancer, each silk I have made so far comes with 4 pieces - but couples can have fun as well.....playing tip the dancer......just set the jar to $1

Sneakina has 8 styles available at the moment and as you can see from the images above they not only work they are beautiful in themselves.

I asked an old friend to try them out, just to see how they worked in a club situation, Penelope Lorenz had this to say about them:

"Well the outfit is great...beautiful...and the strip worked!!! yes... fast enough...really good, you need to put the jar on floor so you need to be allowed to do this... but the item is good"

Sneakina had helped with the scripting from Lois Laughton, 'she taught me so much about scripting'

This Tip To Strip idea has a lot of appeal especially I think in the club market - no more messing about with rules for when the dancers remove an item, beautiful flowing flexi silk most dancers would be proud to wear! A revolution in the silks market - and maybe a little fun for the couple at home :)

Try them out yourself they can be bought from Sneakina's stall

SLurl: http://slurl.com/secondlife/Baileya/90/67/22

or of course send her an IM in world. I don't think you will regret it Penny is loving them!

Dana

Avenue Inc opens in heaven

This place has been designed with great care, the atmosphere being the most important factor

apart from the runway itself of course.

With 83 people present it was a wonder the models could even walk but they did a great job showing their skill and professionalism during the entire show.

The opening fashion show featured Apple May Designs, Ravenwear, Indyra Originals and Szentasha Fashions in a spectacular setting which showed the designs to their best advantage.

After the show we were encouraged to join in the party and dance away with DJ Marko Beery or take a look in the mall to buy some of the outfits we had seen so well displayed.

AVENUE MODELS is a subsidiary of AVENUE Inc, founded by Rusch Raymaker, that specialises in customised fashion shows at Heaven's AVENUE or gracing their shows at clubs and venues and are also available for print, promotional and commercial assignments.
Click here to read what this great company has to offer.

Congratulations on an impressive launch you all did a fantastic job, I hope to be attending many more shows with you.

Dana XXX

Digital Knight Scripted Art Studio is Now Open

October 1, 2007 from 5 to 8 p.m. SLT was the fantastic opening of Digital Knight Scripted Art Studio. The evening was a success and the competition to identify the name of the "Tall Ship" was in fun.

We had fantastic guesses of French tall ships such as: Dora, Le Napoleon, the Royal Louis, and Cutter Sark to name a few. Some not so serious guesses of Unroyal Louis and H.M.S. Fig Newton were a few of my favorites.

The guessing was intense as was the Googling for the answer. Yours, truly, was the first to identify it, but since the Museum was the Exclusive Sponsors of the event, was not qualified to win the Tall Ship.

Drathon Montague, Scripted Artiste, threw out helpful hints such as: It's flying a French flag, Napoleonic War, and it's a special ship as I had to find a picture of it to make it into "Tall Ship".

Spanish ships Nina, Pinta, and Santa Maria made an appearance in the guessing line up as did the HMS Victory and Surprise.

The win went to Tressie Jetaime with: "Acheron". HMS Surprise was the British ship that was commissioned to arrest the Acheron. The picture of this fabulous tall ship can be found in the movie, Master and Commander.

Congrats to Ms. Jetaime on winning the contest and thanks to all who participated in the event.

Article by: Atlantis Jewell

Curator of Elven Enchantment Museum and Art Gallery

Exclusive Sponsor of Digital Knight Scripted Art Studio

Under Attack !!

Some people just know how to design their sculpties !! On my travels through the wonderful world of SL, I suddenly found myself in a situation of peril. 3 giant ants seemed to be surrounding me !!


Of course these ants were just standing there, frozen in time. But still wonderfully crafted by someone called Ron Hubbard, and 74 prims each.



Location: Watchman region

YSL in Secondlife !

Yves Saint Laurent in secondlife ! ( http://slurl.com/secondlife/YSL/127/11/21/ )

Media On A Parcel / Prim

This project comprises tasks related to supporting various different types of media in Second Life. Currently we support a single quicktime compliant URL per parcel, which is associated with a texture ID and thus displayed on any prim using that texture. We would like to expand this to include multiple URLs per parcel, and abstract the underlying media layer to allow for the easy addition of new media support. Eventually we will also support a single URL per material component, and thereby allow users to display media on any face of a prim.

In the end this might also allow users to project html on a prim which will make virtual media displays so endless divers. - Source text and images : Secondlife WiKi.

★ AVENUE MODELS ★

30 September 2007
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contacts: Rusch Raymaker, CEO of AVENUE Inc Annette Wilder, PR Manager of AVENUE Inc
Re: AVENUE MODELS Opening Launch and Fashion Show --------------------------------------------------------------
Come October 6, Saturday at 11am, AVENUE Inc will be launching with a Fashion Show Extravaganza and party headlining their modelling agency, AVENUE MODELS. AVENUE MODELS is set to be the premier modelling agency boasting the finest female models in SL. The opening fashion show will feature some of the most talented and established fashion brands namely Apple May Designs, Ravenwear, Indyra Originals and Szentasha Fashions. Straight off after the party, guests can groove along with london-based DJ Marko Beery (aka The Suit) of Dogglounge Radio with a slick serving up funky soulful house beats.
Set in Heaven's AVENUE, a sky runway concept created by Rusch Raymaker in collaboration with model and builder Kim Dench, will be the uber venue for fashion shows and events that will leave its audiences spellbound and talking about it the days after. Come and rock this town with us with the slickest fashion runway show and party with the hottest models that you will ever meet in SL. Its only just beginning...expect the unexpected and only the best!
Date : 6 October 2007, SaturdayTime : 11amVenue : Heaven's Avenue (Maria Christine 160, 63, 199)
Guests coming for the show are invited to preview the models portfolios in the Gallery (Maria Christine 154,44,22) at the agency.
AVENUE MODELS is a subsidiary of AVENUE Inc, founded by Rusch Raymaker, that specialises in customised fashion shows at Heaven's AVENUE or gracing their shows at clubs and venues and are also available for print, promotional and commercial assignments.
AVENUE Inc is an all-female run talent management agency specialising in fashion, photography and events. Its other subsidiaries include :
> AVENUE Studio , backed by a team of professional female photographers, is an original studio concept that has one of the most sophisticated customisable holo deck system with the capacity to shoot portraits, fashion, groups and even transport vehicles such as cars or planes. Studio portfolio works can be found in Avenue Models Gallery.
> Heaven's AVENUE, sky runway for AVENUE MODELS monthly fashion shows and designer partners
> AVENUE, a mall that features designs and works of Avenue Models as well a the best that SL fashion has to offer. Fashionista and model must-haves under one roof. Tenant openings are still available. (Opening end October 2007)
> AVENUE Sky Deck, a chillout bar in modern luxe for all fashionistas
> AVENUE Coast, chillzone by a beachside pool
Landmarks:-
AVENUE Inc (Maria Christine 178, 40, 22)
AVENUE MODELS (Maria Christine 154,44,22)
AVENUE STUDIO (Maria Christine 144, 48, 302)
Heaven's AVENUE (Maria Christine 160, 61, 199)
AVENUE Sky Deck, (Maria Christine 155, 47, 321)
AVENUE Coast (Maria Christine 175, 21, 21)
For more information, please contact Rusch Raymaker (CEO) or Annette Wilder (PR Manager) of Avenue Inc.