can't step off it, someone else will cop it

Okay, this one promises to be odd. The description:

MILENA DOLL CREATIONS:RLV,Traps, BDSM,OpenCollar,sex,Bukkake,Experience Key,tentacles,Alien,Dungeon,ANIMEH , Cinema,RLV.Nude beach,Dance,Club, ,Gangbang,orgy,Caves,AFK,Greedy,Haunted Mansion,
/* Sky @ 251
0m to 2560m: "[NB] P-Haze 0800"*/ RegionOverride

I'm pretty sure the "ANIMEH" mentioned was meant to be "animesh", and believe me, I'm fairly sure of that, at this point. My system can process animesh here and there, but large stands of it--Hayabusa's forests of animesh trees spring to mind--tank my graphics processing entirely.



This run did not go well, and I'll tell you why. Normally, I port to a new sim, leave the direct port-in spot, and wait. Anywhere from two to five minutes, depending on how much my computer, or the sim, is struggling, I see things rez in fully.

Not here. The reason it looks like I'm taking the shot from the side, kneeling, is because I was fighting my cam controls for every single centimeter I could get it to turn. It took ten minutes to get the cam to turn from facing front, to facing back, behind me, to snap the sign.



I finally managed to get something that was a halfway decent snap, so I left the gazebo to enter the sim proper. And left the gazebo. And left the gazebo. Snapback was intense, then I started freezing in place. It took five minutes of struggle just to get my cam to the far side of the store from the gazebo, which was...maybe...five meters away.

I turned around to get a wide shot, and waited. Two minutes. Five minutes. Ten minutes. At the twenty-minute mark I said the hell with this and snapped the shot you see, full of unrezzed grey walls and shapeless blobs. The big "ANIMESH" sign is very obvious; nothing else can really be made out, beyond "general arch" and "general wall" and suchlike.

There's no haunt here, as far as I can tell, and I'm not going back to verify, so...I'd recommend avoiding the place entirely, but that's just me. The literal ton of animesh on the parcel guarantees that if I do return, I won't be able to move any better than I did today. It's not worth it.

jeepers creepers, shiver me, tingles, what’s a girl to do?

It takes all kinds. Standing in the middle of the last Adult haunt I was at, was an apparent Cistercian nun, full habit, wimple and veil included. I pulled her profile and her entire SL bio consists of two Bible quotes:

Matthew 5:28
But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.

and

Romans 13:13
Let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarreling and jealousy.

Her groups are kind of all over: six hardcore religious groups, most of them having "NO SEX" in their group descriptions, then three very much sex groups, including a "teen" sex ring and Whore Street.

My brain has no place for this.

Pursuant to the Tumblr post, I did go ahead and download my files in a backup .zip. It took eighteen hours to batch up. Eighteen. Hours. And four additional hours to download. It's a stunning eleven gB of data.

So, soon as I figure out how the download format works, and sort through things, I'll be killing my Tumblr account. And then I'll be done with it.

In the meantime...let's discuss TRICK OR [F**KING] TREAT (censorship mine). Uh-huh. Their description states:

Halloween, Haunted house, creeypasta stories, graveyard, great to explore or take fall themed photos. Trick or treat. scary. pumpkin patch , hay, corn maze,

" RegionOverride*/ /*Sky: "[TOR] FOGGY - Silent heck" RegionOverride*/

Riiiight. The creepypasta mention threw me, until I actually got to the sim and realized the soundtrack to this was someone reading creepypasta stories. Okay, that works.

But keep that Windlight setting in mind, because that's important to this. That setting, and insane amounts of lag. Let me explain.



This is the first picture I took. And I took this picture after ten whole minutes of standing in the weeds. That is the best rez, best visibility, I could manage. Take that in.

I crashed twice from the land, let a couple of days pass, and went back today. Where I just sat in front of a harp and then watched Horror Noir on Shudder. At the forty-nine minute point, I crashed again. This haunt is impossible.



I ported to the Delphinus sim, and walked to the corner edge, and tried to cam in and grab the haunt that way. No joy.



I gave up, ported in, then walked back until I was on another section of Mercury, and cammed in. I set the sky to (SS) Atmospheric 00:00cloudy, and I let it sit. I wandered off to get more iced tea. I watched a bit more of Horror Noir. And then, finally, I started taking pictures of the haunt.

I do love this corner set-up. The twig stars and Blair Witch sticks from Death Row Designs, the blanket-draped chair from dust bunny, all of it conspires to create a scene that's both comforting and unnerving.



The large living room, complete with piano, harp, and idly dancing skeleton.



A skeleton climbs the stairs towards empty frames, empty cages, and stillness.



And this is proof that haunts don't have to be vintage to be disturbing. The Cammino e Vivo Capovolto statues, the mysterious Illuminati print from Dahlia, one of NOMAD's still-impressive mannequins...very well done, very evocative of a certain mood, and, under normal circumstances, I would highly recommend going.

But unless you have a higher-end computer, lag will eat you alive, and that may be the scariest thing of all.

do as you will but don't you lie

This happened on the 27th, but I already had entries lined up for the following days, so. Got this out of the blue while trying to find a hair that matched the current retro look:

[11:09] JotaVico: heyyy
[11:10] Emilly Orr: Hello?

OF NOTE: Jota is not anonymized. Not because I don't think he's being a jerk for IMing me out of the blue, but because he apparently is looking for photographic clients.

[11:12] JotaVico: How are you? Are you interested in photos? I'm looking for new clients. I can show you my flickr with realistic photos? Can i show you my prices?

This is the other reason he's not anonymized, because he did send me the link, and I looked it over. He does fairly good work, if you like duck lips on people. Though I fully realize that may not be his fault, and more the fault of the pouty-runway-model look that's taken over all genders on SL for mesh heads.

[11:12] Emilly Orr: You're...kidding, right?
[11:12] Emilly Orr: How did you get my name?

This seemed to stump him, so at 11:20 am, I tried again.

[11:20] Emilly Orr: Okay, if that's too difficult for you, then sure, show me your prices.
[11:22] Emilly Orr ponders the lack of response and peruses your profile.
[11:22] Emilly Orr: You know, for a photographer, having only one pic on the profile is kind of sketchy. No FL pic at all? No info? No picks?
11:23] JotaVico: My photos are in my flickr.
[11:23] Emilly Orr: I asked about your prices.

Wow, way to miss the question entirely.

[11:24] Emilly Orr: And yes, I know that, I saw them. I mean on your profile. You know, the thing that comes up when you hit "Profile" in SL?

So he sent me the notecard of his prices. It's L$3850 for a single person, portrait, and from his Flicker it seems to be shoulders and up, or occasionally neck and up, only. For couple/two people (I guess he means friends) portraits, it's nearly double that, at L$6550. Everything seems to be on the same nondescript black background, no outdoor shots, no non-studio work at all. If this is standard for photographers in SL now, it's news to me.

[11:24] Emilly Orr: Not interested, and it's spelled "available", but thank you. I'll pass it on.

And that seemed to be that. I did mean it when I said it to him, I am passing the information on. And yes, the line below the prices on the notecard he sent read "I'm avaiable now for take the pic?". Riiiight.

I'll leave room for not being an English speaker natively, but still. Way to come off like a jerk and a boring person. Barely anything on his profile, misspelled words, and IMing me out of the blue. (He never answered that first question, by the way--how he ran across my name. Still don't know. Which is also irksome.)

In less snarky news, someone sent me a pastebin link for lower-poly stores. I have no idea who wrote this list, but I'm also passing it on for what value it may be.

This is a list of shops with efficient poly counts and texture usage, good UV maps, and everything they create is modify. These people understand and respect the platform they are creating for. Content from each shop is thoroughly checked using a viewer with enhanced inspect abilities before being added to the list.

If you know of a shop that should be on this list, please contact me. Shops that make it common practice to make their content no modify will not be considered. This is mainly because the average consumer cannot check UVs and textures for themselves, but also because this special snowflake mentality is genuinely harmful to Second Life.

This makes me think it might be a NiranV project about avatar/landscaping optimization, first mentioned on New World Notes. I thought I remembered the original post being somewhere on their blog, but damned if I can find it. I'll ask friends and see if they still remember where it is.

Last update: May 23rd, 2019.

---------------------------------------------------
Top tier. Items from these shops are made to a modern visual standard while staying well optimized. If you are ever wondering what acceptable triangle and VRAM numbers are, look at similar items from these shops to know what to aim for:
---------------------------------------------------

DECO (GutterBlood Spoonhammer)

The only DECO store I found was [DECO], owned by Max Butoh, and it doesn't seem to have an in-world store. The only thing mentioned on Spoonhammer's profile, store-wise, was BLUD Official, which again, has a group, but no apparently in-world store. Neither seem to have a Marketplace presence, either, so...good luck finding them.

Half-Deer (Halogen Magic)
+ILO+ (ZoZo Raven)
G Field (Cerberus Noel)
The Black Forest (Arduenn Schwartzman)

The only thing listed for Arduenn is Warbug, so if the Black Forest is part of that, great. Otherwise I can't find it.

Realist Tek (Jay Taggart)
Birds-E-Mart (Raven Seraph)
JOMO (Xiaoduo Abbot)
Organica (Aki Shichiroji)

My only problem with Ms. Shichiroji's lovely work is that most of her trees have the same shape. I want more out of a tree than curved Japanese maple with varying leaves. That, and I do wish she'd bring back her skins and update them to mesh. That being said, she really does amazing plants, trees and landscaping details.

Schadenfreude (Allegory Malaprop)

This is another case. I love Ms. Malaprop's work, I always will. I wish more of it would be converted to mesh.

---------------------------------------------------
Decent tier. Items from these creators are usable as-is, but are lacking in areas that would make them perfectly efficient, such as wasteful UV maps, or some textures too high resolution (but still better than nearly everyone else).
---------------------------------------------------

NOMAD (Piraiyah Novikov)
Barnesworth Anubis (Barnesworth Anubis)
UTILIZATOR (Utilizator Mode)
fk0724 (fk0724 Resident)

The only thing that shows up under this name is Anhelo? So not sure if that's the same business or not.

Lassitude and Ennui (Jackal Ennui)
HPMD (Sasaya Kayo)
ColdLogic (ColdLogic Resident)

Again, the only thing I could find was neve, but it does say it's a brand made by coldLogic? So maybe that's it?

Violent Seduction (Iki Akiri)
Chin Rey Houses (ChinRey Resident)
OPQ Builders' Supplies (StormKB Resident)

Okay, this one's weird, because it seems to be the same place as Chin Rey Houses? I don't understand, but OPQ is also listed on Chin Rey's profile, so the confusion continues.

OPQ Gardens and Landscaping (TessJL Resident)

This is listed as belonging to yet a third person, but it's also listed on Chin Rey's profile, and all three of these businesses operate out of Coniston sim, so...baffled, here.

Dysfunctionality (Kalia Firelyte)

And that's the list. All of these (presuming I tracked down the right places, and I tried to do my best) offer either very low-poly mesh items, or reasonably low-poly mesh items, so they will rez in faster and more effectively. Helping, therefore, with the overall lag on SL, and our computers, in general.

and you should realize you are beloved

Welcome to VISIONAIRE Institute's current crop of graduates, with a showing of what they considered was their best work. I am going to link you to the main entry point for the exhibit, which is a charming little country garden, but, because I didn't see much of anything photo-like here, and the gate to the exhibits was closed, I thought it was part of the back wall and left. Thankfully, one of the graduates caught that, and showed me where the real exhibits are.



You want to walk through the gate to find the exhibits. And believe me, if you value digital art in the slightest, you will want to go and peruse.



The bulk of the showing is in a rectangular, slightly overgrown space, with open demi-pavilions made from pale wood ringing the rectangular patch of grasses and rocks.



Don't forget to go back behind the chain-link fence, there's a few more showings there. And keep in mind, these exhibits will be up until Aprille, so there is time, but don't miss it!

The theme for this final showing was "Magic", and I completely get some of the exhibits. Other exhibits, while good, look more like the current round of SL fashion photographers--good, artistic, but...hardly magical. Still, everything is worth seeing, I believe, because whether we like the work or not, each booth shows that person's understanding of the concept. Some of them hit it dead-on. Some of them creep up on it sidewise. Some of them are enthralling, some delighting, at least one disturbing. But it all reflects how they processed that theme.

There are two booths that are empty, which is somewhat sad, and I'm hoping their exhibits were just delayed and they'll be filled in later. Either way, do go look. It is worth the time.

(Also, since today was the graduation, earlier at eight AM, the sim is lagging quite badly. Keep that in mind, though that may ease in a week or so.)

if you could see us, then you'd listen

At the staging area for Vilmer House, there were instructions for how to set up their desired effects. Apparently, their main desired effect is embracing fuschia as a lifestyle.


The next panel told me to turn on Shadows. I've never used shadows before. And suddenly, everything is monochrome.


But I hate mouselook!


So this is the Vilmer House orphanage. Doesn't look...that terrifying...

[20:27] The Vilmer House II: A long time ago, the Vilmer House Orphanage was a very popular orphanage. Children from all over the area were brought to the orphanage because there were always rooms available.

That's not the best sign in an orphanage, actually. That does imply a lot of space, but if the house isn't that spacious, then...there's an overly high rate of turnover, illness, or...death.

[20:28] The Vilmer House III: Miss Agatha, the elderly lady who ran the Vilmer House, was never married. The people who lived around the area never knew Miss Agatha for anything else than the woman at the Vilmer House.

That happens with gentlefolk who keep to themselves, though.


Is that...surely that's just carpet folds...right?


Is that...That's just a dust cover over a coat-rack, of course.

[20:41] The Vilmer House IV: The children were not allowed in the kitchen at the Vilmer House. Miss Agatha didn't want the children to grow fat, so she kept them always a tad hungry.

That's not good.

[20:37] The Vilmer House VII: It became the local kid's right of passage to break in to the Vilmer House and take one of Miss Agatha's beloved Porcelain Dolls. It's said that only a few kids have accomplished this and have a Miss Agatha Doll to show for it.

I hear a child sobbing. "Hello? Is anyone there?"

[20:36] The Vilmer House VIII: The breaking and entering of the Vilmer House ceased when a group of kids was rumored to enter the house for a seance and were never seen again.

This room is...so very, very dark, save for flashes of lightning. Even the flashlight does not seem to work.


Creepy dolls...


II? What does II mean?

So what happened next? I don't know--running with that many extra features enabled killed me almost as fast as Slaughter House Manor. If your computer is very powerful, and has an excess of memory, you may just skate through these two with no effort. I, sadly, could not, which is sad for me, because the storyline was intriguing, the effects were subtle and wonderful, and I most definitely wanted to see more!

Giving this one four out of five skulls, with the skull deduction only because I could not make it to the upper stories of the house!