your heart is now washed up in bleach

I should also say, before I get to more eye pics, that I've been taking all of these standing in De Baza's "Chandra" gothic chapel. It's got a neat adjustable rezzer, and rezzed out, it's only twenty-three prims. You can get it as part of the Eclectic Desires Halloween hunt, mentioned below. (And you can get the eyes at Rue's main store in Netherfield.

(from the Avatars album, the WEG group gift for October)

Also, I changed into World's End Garden's monthly group gift, "La Nuit Du Chasseur". Join the group and it's yours.

More eyes!

(from the Avatars album; Rue's Cassiopeia eyes from the Feral set)

"Brass" starts off the Feral set of eyes, and it really is reminiscent of a good brass tone.

(from the Avatars album; Rue's Cassiopeia eyes from the Feral set)

And "Firefly" is very reminiscent of firefly lights in a drifting summer night, warm and sparkling.

(from the Avatars album; Rue's Cassiopeia eyes from the Feral set)

The "Gold" is closer to a burnished brass than a true bright gold, but it does convey a rich, sumptuous, luxe tone, so "Gold" works.

(from the Avatars album; Rue's Cassiopeia eyes from the Feral set)

"Halo", as a tone, has more to do with early Christian iconography (when all the saints bore their own halos as a distinctive sign), than the various FPS games of the same name. No objections here; it's a better source for a glimmering metallic shade.

(from the Avatars album; Rue's Cassiopeia eyes from the Feral set)

This is "Saffron", which is again, a rich buttery shade, and yes, it does put me in mind of saffron rice.

(from the Avatars album; Rue's Cassiopeia eyes from the Feral set)

And we tie up the Feral set with "Sunshine", a bright, happy, summery shade. I have a few skins that would work well with these, I think...

More to come, when I sort out the hash I made of the next set, because I think the pics uploaded out of order.

(And again, the horns in this series [that you, well, haven't seen in the last two entries] are also from Rue, part of the Eclectic Desires L$10 skull hunt and maze. The hair for this shoot is from Ploom and it's called "Harlowe" [I'm wearing it in Poppy, but it's from 2010, so no idea if it's still around]. The skin's still from MoMo [also may not be available], and the forehead jewels are from the Arachnos skin set at Fallen Gods [it comes with spider back-arms and the Arachnos skin as well; it's for the next day or so only on the Lucky Fortune machine].)

torn and repaired, just to endure it all again

The Evil Dead reboot now has a trailer. And from the looks of it, it promises to be a gorefest, start to finish. I don't know how I feel about that, honestly, because while I (and most fans) loved the original for the concepts it introduced, most of us ended up actually enjoying the second and third chapters more, in the end. And part of the why behind that was the element of tongue-in-cheek the writers, producers, and actors brought to them.

This one doesn't seem to have a sense of humor to speak of.

While we're talking seasonal selections, though, here's the Joker in pumpkin form, a pumpkin beast, how to make fanged pumpkins, and how to make candy corn on the cob. Projects for next year! You can start early!

Now back to the eyes (which you can get at Rue's main store in Netherfield.

(from the Avatars album; Rue's "Cassiopeia" eyes, the Earthen set)

We start with the eyes in "Ale", which remind me strongly of chocolate stout (which, by the way, makes a mean chocolate cake).

(from the Avatars album; Rue's "Cassiopeia" eyes, the Earthen set)

These are the eyes in "Bronze", a shifting, rust-toned melange of orange pulp, melted gold, pumpkin, aged whisky and orange juice. Lovely shade.

(from the Avatars album; Rue's "Cassiopeia" eyes, the Earthen set)

These ones, Miss Ruina named "Chocolate", and I didn't get it at first. They're closer to cognac than chocolate, but then I started thinking of things like the S'mores Martini or the Mystic Chocolate mixed drink, and I get it now.

(from the Avatars album; Rue's "Cassiopeia" eyes, the Earthen set)

This is "Creature", and I'm strongly put in mind of an autumn night on the moors, with drifting mist and strange moonlight reflections from trees. Burning coals, drifting shadows and tobacco-soaked leaves.

(from the Avatars album; Rue's "Cassiopeia" eyes, the Earthen set)

"Gunmetal", on the other hand, has enough color and tone to it to be more reminiscent of gaslights than guns. Either way, it's a mysterious, evocative color.

From Avatars

Which brings us down to the last in the Earthen set, "Smog"--which is more closely reminiscent of universal star gases than actual industrial pollutants. I think this one and "Ale" are my favorites from this set.

(And again, the horns in this series [that you, well, haven't seen in the last two entries] are also from Rue, part of the Eclectic Desires L$10 skull hunt and maze. The hair for this shoot is from Discord Designs [fairly sure it's no longer available, and fairly sure I'm going to find different hair for the next eye run], the skin is from MoMo [also may not be available], the lip tattoos are from Pin Me Down [acquired during World Goth Month], and the forehead jewels are from the Arachnos skin set at Fallen Gods [it comes with spider back-arms and the Arachnos skin as well; it's for the next day or so only on the Lucky Fortune machine].)

so torn and frayed, my times, lives, faces

All the pink shades were part of the "Bloom" set; we're now taking on the "Cupcake" set, and here's where you go to get 'em.

(from the Avatars album; Rue's Cassiopeia eyes, from the Cupcake set)

We're moving now up the spectrum, from reds and pinks to pinkish-orange tones. This is "Bleeding Heart", a tarnished pink-red with coppery highlights.

(from the Avatars album; Rue's Cassiopeia eyes, from the Cupcake set)

This is "Bubblegum", which is pretty much exactly the shade of grapefruit juice, a strong, clear iced orange-pink.

(from the Avatars album; Rue's Cassiopeia eyes, from the Cupcake set)

The above shows the "Peach" eyes, and again, Peach reminds me of the exact tone of peach-flavored Jell-O before it sets up.

(from the Avatars album; Rue's Cassiopeia eyes, from the Cupcake set)

And these are the "Renaissance" eyes, with a beautiful melded shimmer of yellow, green, peach, chartreuse and orange.

(from the Avatars album; Rue's Cassiopeia eyes, from the Cupcake set)

These are the "Rose" eyes. I'm intrigued that of all the different hues of rose petals, she chose what seems to be the "Pink Promise" tea rose. Tea roses are known for exquisite scents, as well as more gentle gradations of color for the most part.

(from the Avatars album; Rue's Cassiopeia eyes, from the Cupcake set)

Finally, the "Salmon" shade reminds me of the bright orangey-pink tone of salmon ceviche.

More to come!

(And again, the horns in this series are also from Rue, part of the Eclectic Desires L$10 skull hunt and maze. The hair for this shoot is from Discord Designs [fairly sure it's no longer available], the skin is from MoMo [also may not be available], the lip tattoos are from Pin Me Down [acquired during World Goth Month], and the forehead jewels are from the Arachnos skin set at Fallen Gods [it comes with spider back-arms and the Arachnos skin as well; it's for the next day or so only on the Lucky Fortune machine].)

and this may be the last time I'll ever see a blood sunrise

So, Rue news today.

(from the Avatars album; Rue's "Cassiopeia" eyes and "Shaman" Hallows-striped horns)

Remember way back when I mentioned I had an all-eye entry in the works? October pretty much pinned me to the ground early, and it's only slightly let up, so I'm putting these out when I can, and that will likely eat the first week of November as well. Alas.

(from the Avatars album; Rue's "Cassiopeia" eyes, from the Bloom set)

These are the eyes in "Cerise", which--or so Wikipedia tells me--generally indicates an uncooked, pulped cherry-tone: basically, a very vibrant, slightly blued pinkish-red. In these eyes, with the triple pupil, they seem to just radiate the color.

(from the Avatars album; Rue's "Cassiopeia" eyes, from the Bloom set)

These are the eyes in Fuchsia, a similar but slightly varied red-pink (more red than pink).

(from the Avatars album; Rue's "Cassiopeia" eyes, from the Bloom set)

Next up, the eyes in Grape, a good, sturdy purplish for all purplish occasions, or a really strong-tannin merlot, depending on your reference set.

(from the Avatars album; Rue's "Cassiopeia" eyes, from the Bloom set)

This is Nebula, and I really, really like the shifting mix of shades. This isn't the best picture, but when these are actually worn, there's at least three solid pink tones that weave around the triple pupil.

(from the Avatars album; Rue's "Cassiopeia" eyes, from the Bloom set)

The "Temptation" eyes are another great shade, with tones of red, pink, orange and yellow surrounding a golden-green triad pupil.

(from the Avatars album; Rue's "Cassiopeia" eyes, from the Bloom set)

And finally, the last in the Bloom set, "Wine", which comes across as an iced burgundy, with lots of magenta and rosepetal tones.

More coming!

(The horns in this series are also from Rue, there's more information on them here; the short version is that you can get a metric ton of unusual hair, Hallow-striped horns, and several "Halloween"-style eyes for the low, low price of thirty Lindens. How? Well, those are the three skulls Miss Ruina set out for Eclectic Desires' Halloween Maze hunt. The hair for this shoot is from Discord Designs [fairly sure it's no longer available], the skin is from MoMo [also may not be available], the lip tattoos are from Pin Me Down [acquired during World Goth Month], and the forehead jewels are from the Arachnos skin set at Fallen Gods [it comes with spider back-arms and the Arachnos skin as well; it's for the next day or so only on the Lucky Fortune machine].)

the thought of you is still haunting me

In wandering through the Destinations page, looking for untapped haunts, I came across mention of an "Adult-rated" haunt called Hell House. It sits on Bad Romance, one of the Adult-rated sims in the Solace Beach chain of sims. I couldn't imagine what an "Adult" rating would deal with, so off we went.

(from the haunts album; the shifting woman in Hell House)

The first thing I noticed was the overuse of alpha textures. Now, there are a lot of different ways to make persistent haunts--prims, sculpts, and yes, flat textures. Most of these either changed when we got close, or just faded in and out. In any other setting, this wouldn't be a problem, but in this place, there was far too much scripted to react to collisions--from doors that would open when I walked near them, to effects that would only occur when I was close enough. With that many scripts listening constantly and registering collisions...well, let's just say lag was the least of our worries.

(from the haunts album; the shifting woman in Hell House)

Which is not to say lag wasn't high--it was, but the biggest problem was things rezzing in at all. Or effects going off, but only after we'd left the room. Or effects going off, and then never stopping, whether we left the room or not.

(from the haunts album; oh look, a Wiki page)

The stranger problem I ran into was, after a room full of massive effects and collision scripting, seeing Wikipedia pages textured on objects, like this absinthe bottle.

(from the haunts album; another Wiki page)

It happened in more than one place and on more than one floor. The strangest thing about this, though: I didn't have a Wiki page open. So what was it pulling from?

(from the haunts album; a tortured victim in the wine cellar)

Granted, due to the Adult nature of this haunt, there weren't a lot of pictures suitable to display on the blog. That doesn't mean they were necessarily that outstanding, though--there seemed to be a lot of textures imported of Poser-posed CGI elves with demons bent on rape, and of standard (modern) porn actresses scattered on virtually every surface. This didn't lend the air of "dark eroticism" they said they were looking for on the notecard, but...clutter. Much of it tawdry, tacky clutter.

(from the haunts album; bad alpha edges on the second floor)

In fact, that was one of my larger complaints, actually--the white edging on easily 60% of all textures used in this haunt. I got so tired of the halo effect after a while.

(from the haunts album; the rising body on the bed)

This was one of the effects that worked, and worked really well--a simple satin counterpane on a simple bed, that featured a body rising and disappearing again under the quilt.

(from the haunts album; another little note in Hell House)

There were lots of little details mentioned in the notecard, that we were told would add to the backstory of the mansion. While they did offer information, most felt out of step with the rest of the house--like wandering into a genteel club for tea and biscuits that happened to feature stripper poles next to a peep show. They just didn't fit with everything else.

(from the haunts album; more clutter in Hell House)

I admire what they were trying to go for--that air of the Hellfire club mixed with the ornate, over-embellished Victorian manor house, tainted by debauchery and evil. And there are good moments in this one (though they're few and far between), but what kept striking me, over and over, is how busy everything felt. Very nearly a frenetic level of haunting, and a positively cluttered mish-mash of porn stars, Victorian furnishings, bondage pics, and shots from horror films inserted seemingly at random.

It is a five-level haunt, and if you really feel compelled to wander, it's not a complete waste of time. At least, if you have nothing better to do. But I wouldn't count it as one of these year's successes.

I climbed down to watch the tide

(from the haunts album; pLAST's tiny Halloween ghost avatar, currently one Linden on the Marketplace)

I wish I could remember how I found this; I know something tipped me to it, I just can't remember exactly who or what it was. What I do know is this entire thing (with two variations, an opaque and a translucent, which looks AWESOME) is only a Linden on the Marketplace, or you can go to pLAST's store in Bonaire and pick it up for free. And it's a good idea to do that, because it comes with a moddable UV texture to make your own alterations.

(I've been on-again, off-again haunting La Frayeur in the meantime, so if you want to know where the Lucky Tombs I'm on are at, that's where. Currently it goes like this: a floating mesh 'sheet ghost' avatar is cycling through letters and numbers once per minute; various bits and pieces of a Hallows feast are cycling through letters and numbers every two minutes; and on the other side, not shown, the tomb is cycling through letters and numbers every five minutes for either the complete haunted dining room set, or the complete haunted living room set.)

(Oh, and it doesn't come with the wings. Those were from Seven's Selections.)

(from the haunts album; carted through Barkerville)

[00:11] Hay Ride whispers:
[00:11] Hay Ride whispers:

The Hay Ride had a few...bugs.

(from the haunts album; carted through Barkerville)

Tonight, I investigated Barkerville, which is only slightly confusing, but it's worth a meandering trip through in spite of the occasional confusing bits.

(from the haunts album; meeting up with the Headless Horseman)

There is a constant moving fog bank, gripping sounds (including haunted mansion doors that creak in the most unnerving way), and great, great decorations.

(from the haunts album; it's a fog machine!)

Basically, we came into Barkerville, and there was a sign saying "Haunted Hay Ride". We thought that would be a good, basic start to things, but oddly, it dropped us off at the top of the hill, next to the creepy old mansion.

For added fun, the creepy old mansion had an actual fog machine behind one of the dying shrubs by the stairs up. That was a gorgeous little detail.

(from the haunts album; the bloody mannequin)

Most of the pictures I have, in fact, are from inside the mansion. But don't let that stop you from going; there's more to the sim than just a haunted house. (Though it's a pretty good haunted house.)

(from the haunts album; the animated Jack-o-Lantern)

This was another creepy touch: we kept finding these long shadows down the walls that were roughly human-shaped...or at least Shape-shaped. This particular one had a moving pumpkin for a head. It followed our movements around the room as if it was actually watching us.

(from the haunts album; reading the cards)

And they have a working Tarot card table upstairs!

(from the haunts album; reading the cards)

There's at least one place where I fell through the floor. There's really no way to tell whether it was just my weird avatar trick of falling through builds manifesting again, or if there were actually weak points in the structure. Whatever happened, I found myself down in the basement, which seems half-dungeon cells, half strange medical experimentation.

There's the bones of a haunted ship, a cemetary, a small haunted western town, and the main mansion to go through. It's definitely worth your time to go.

until there's nothing left of what was my former self

This next one's...odd.

(from the haunts album; the Haunted Holiday Area at yet another almost-DisneySLand)

As you may have gathered from the last couple of entries, there's a lot of Haunted Mansion references on the grid this year. The next one is no different: Bracket's Magicland Park, and the "Haunted Holiday Area", which was...a little weird for me.

(from the haunts album; more of the Haunted Holiday Area)

First, it's not a ride, it's more of a casual stroll (which, in one section, you can turn into an ice-skating opportunity). Second, it's all...wintry, and 'holiday' holiday. Like...Yule holiday. Bwuh?

(from the haunts album; more of the Haunted Holiday Area)

I won't lie, some of the decorations were charming (personally, I'd kill for bat wrapping paper in December), and the size of the area made it feel very cozy and familiar. But...it's not a haunt.

(from the haunts album; more of the Haunted Holiday Area)

Apparently--at least, since the arrival of Nightmare Before Christmas--this is something Disneyland just does in October, and have done so for several years now. I wouldn't know; most of my Disneyland experience is prior to the millenium shift. According to one who's spent more time than might be legal obsessing on all things Disney, this one's fairly close to the way the original looks, so I get why they wanted to...deck their halls, so to speak.

(from the haunts album; more of the Haunted Holiday Area)

I don't know, though; I guess I'm the wrong target audience for this. Or maybe it's just too early for jingle bats.

(from the haunts album; the Haunted Railcar..."Attraction"?)

Rixendale's Haunted Ride Railcar was next. Ugh.

(from the haunts album; the Haunted Railcar..."Attraction"?)

I did snap a few pics, the best two of which I've included here, but seriously, unless you really enjoy head-splitting volume levels and far too much bass distort on your vocals, don't even bother.

It's overly busy, it's not well built, the concept is disjointed, the ride--when it dumps you off into one of the ride areas at the end--sends you down very nearly beneath the floor of the room you land in...pair that with the fuzzy vocals, the distortion, the screaming, and poorly timed special effects, and really, it's a dead loss. Don't go.

(from the haunts album; the cemetary at Le Dome)

I'd like to end on a high note, so let me bring up Le Dome's little haunt. All it is really, is a small parcel cemetary, but trust me, it's far from a waste of time. Whomever's behind this really knew what they wanted to build, and it's both quaint and charming.

(from the haunts album; the cemetary at Le Dome)

Plus, pumpkin mask! No, I'm serious, before you go in, there's a box where you can get one of six pumpkin "masks" that cover your head entirely. And they're free! That alone is worth the trip.

There is a slight zombie infestation going on, but they're relatively easy to damage, and (generally speaking) won't damage you. It's still fun, though.

With or without a pumpkin head.