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Rolling Diner Waitress Outfit for Genesis 3 Females: a conversation with Jareth

Rolling Diner Waitress Outfit for Genesis 3 Females: a conversation with Jareth published on No Comments on Rolling Diner Waitress Outfit for Genesis 3 Females: a conversation with Jareth

Jareth: “I neeeeeeed this.”

 

Me: “Why?”

Jareth: “Two words: short skirt.”

Me: “I thought I just got you the shortest skirt on record — that Oculic thing.”

 

Jareth: “You don’t think I could do with just one short skirt, do you?”

Me: “You have more than one. In fact, I’ve lost count of how many pieces of skimpwear I’ve purchased for you. I think skimpy stuff for you forms the largest part of my runtime.”

 

Jareth: “I think you’re right. I also think you should add this to it.”

 

Me: “You have yet to provide justification. Furthermore, may I point out that you already have this Carhop for Genesis Female outfit, which is the same damn thing?”

 

Jareth: “No it ain’t. The Rolling Diner Waitress has a lower neckline and a shorter skirt with more flare. Also the cap has a brim.”

Me: “Hmmm…true.”

 

Jareth: “Plus the new one has a sit morph in the skirt and better posing controls than the earlier one.”

Me: “Well, that would definitely make it easier to use than the Genesis outfit.”

 

Jareth: “Also comes with four textures.”

 

Me: “Okay, okay!”

 

Jareth: “Besides, it’s like $8.52 with your extra 30% off discount.”

 

Me: “Okay! Jeez! I’m getting it!”

 

Jareth: “Thanks! You should get Jennifer something too.”

 

Me: “Good Lord! Like what?”

 

Jareth: “The wood-paneled station wagon is on sale. I think she needs one.”

Me: “Yeah, but I can’t tell if the doors open. If the doors don’t open, I don’t want it.”

Jareth: “Okay, well, I found one with working doors and trunk on Renderosity.”

Me: “No wood paneling, though.”

Jareth: “You could add some.”

Me: “No, I know! I’ll get her a camper.”

Jareth: “She already has the Airstream.”

Me: “This one’s a teardrop.”

Jareth: “Eeeeeeee, so cuuuuuuuuuuuute! Is it gonna be pink?”

Me: “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but Jennifer’s interests lean much more toward the blue and grey side of things than the pink.”

Jareth: “How ’bout periwinkle with magenta trim?”

Me: “Do those even go together?”

Jareth: “They do if you put them together!”

Me: “I’ll consider it.”

“Thank you for not being racist” and the distressing anomaly of decency

“Thank you for not being racist” and the distressing anomaly of decency published on No Comments on “Thank you for not being racist” and the distressing anomaly of decency

Marketing for digital models at Daz, Renderosity, Renderotica, and the ilk trades heavily in stereotypes. For example, there are the stereotypes of empty, objectified, conventional white cis femininity. There’s also the perennial portrayal of WOC as primitive and bestial, as well as the broken English that appears along with ads for Asian characters. And there’s the sexism, racism, ableism, and transphobia built into the programs we use to make our art. In conclusion, it’s pretty racist out there.

That’s why FeralFey’s products attract my attention. This vendor specializes in realistic poses for figures and regularly does packages associated with particular cultures/ethnicities. To see what’s so refreshing and respectful about FeralFey’s stuff, check out their V4 and V5 Voodoo Magic Poses; compare and contrast this package with Capsces Digital Ink’sĀ  Madame Mojo Poses for Monique 6. Both sets are linked to WOC characters, V4 Mama Brijit for the Voodoo Magic, G2F Monique 6 for the Madame Mojo, but they each treat their subjects differently.

  • FeralFey’s promo shots depict a WOC as active, confident, and powerful, while Capsces’ promo shots depict a WOC as dehumanized, lacking in power, and pointlessly sexualized. FeralFey’s product promos have Maman Brijit dancing, invoking, drawing, and tipping her top hat in dramatic, full-body poses reminiscent of dancing. Her intense gaze and the strong angles of her posture demonstrate strength; even in poses named Entranced and Enthralled, her stances remain solid, balanced, and compelling. By contrast, Capsces’ promo shots show Monique pretty much naked, with goofy body paint. The near nudity combines with the character’s arched back and high-heel foot poses to place her in the pinup category. More subtly, Capsces’ decision to roll Monique’s eyes back in her head and open her mouth for many of these poses connotes an altered state of consciousness that may or may not be orgasmic. Plus there’s a snake or two in there for some reason. In other words, with unintentional double entendres like “parent snake[s] to Monique’s hip before applying pose,” Capsces’ promos show the tired old conjunction between a WOC and a transgressive, excessive, bestial sexuality.
  • FeralFey’s product shows the results of accurate research, while Capsces’ does not. FeralFey’s promo text uses the correct vocabulary of Voodoo, and the product even includes accurate veves [diagrams] used to summon various loas [interceding spirits between people and deities]. Meanwhile, Capsces’ product bills itself as “voodoo and witch doctor inspired,” which is code for “based on imaginary stereotypes.”
  • Finally, FeralFey’s promo text describes Voodoo differently than Capsces’. Capsces’ text settles for evocation of a stereotype, with “Monique…cast[ing] some dark mojo,” blah blah blah “voodoo,” blah blah blah “witch doctor inspired,” blah blah blah. Note the equation of Voodoo with “dark mojo,” which most consumers will probably translate as “incomprehensible black magic,” and “witch doctors,” most readily translatable as “evil wizards.” Basically Capsces says that Voodoo = evil magic. By contrast, FeralFey says only that “…the magic of voodoo enthralls the curious and ensnares the imagination.” There’s a distinction made between Voodoo itself and how outsiders perceive it. It might seem like puzzling sorcery to the clueless, but the information in FeralFey’s promo text reveals that Voodoo contains, in part, rituals to call on intercessors and/or deities so that people can gain advice and help. In other words, practitioners of Voodoo do what many other people in many other religions do. In implicit rebuke to Capsces’ exoticizing portrayal, FeralFey’s text insists that Voodoo is a religion like any other. Sure, it’s not perfect; FeralFey does use the adjective “visceral” in the description, which is code for “primitive,” but, overall, FeralFey’s Voodoo Magic Poses demonstrate respect and realism in opposition to Capsces’ stereotyped, demeaning cliches.

 
I was so overjoyed when I noticed the distinction between FeralFey’s stuff and everyone else’s that I sent a thank you note to them, saying much of what I noted above. In a sea of lazy, sloppy, unresearched, and racist characterizations, their [much more] respectful illustrations stand out as an example of what people should be doing. I get so sick of calling out racist bullshit that I’m thrilled to have an opportunity to congratulate someone for respect and inclusivity. I can tell that FeralFey works meticulously on all aspects of their creations, carefully crafting them for realism and respectful portrayal. I wanted to let them know that I recognized and encouraged their efforts. They wrote back and thanked me, which made me happy.

At the same time, I have the same sort of meta-reaction toward FeralFey’s poses as I do toward Dead or Alive’s gender-unmarked love songs or Queen’s respect for women. In all of these cases, the respect and decency of the artists toward their characters is really rather basic. And yet, because we live in a societal cesspit of racism, heteronormativity, and misogyny in which people are denied basic humanity because of their race, sexuality, and/or femininity, a modicum of authorial respect is mind-blowing. I don’t want to be surprised by Dead or Alive’s gender-free love songs. I don’t want to go into raptures over the love and equality in Killer Queen. I don’t want to write a thank you note to a digital artist for treating WOC like people. I want gender neutrality and equality of the sexes and respect between the races to be the standard, not the exception. And yet they aren’t, so my momentary happiness is outweighed by a greater structural disappointment.

Taking the Carrara plunge

Taking the Carrara plunge published on No Comments on Taking the Carrara plunge

Excerpted from an intro post on the Carrara section of the Daz boards:

I’m a longtime Daz Studio user who just took the Carrara plunge last night. PC+ brought 8.5 Pro < $30.00, and the PA sale send-off allowed me to get Maple Meadows and World Gardens Maze very affordably. With all the included content in 8.5, plus its varied capabilities, I figured that was a deal too good to pass up.

I blame Howie Farkes for bringing me to Carrara. :p Maple Meadows, for example, is the only digital set I’ve ever seen that accurately replicates the area where I live [the Champlain Valley of Vermont], with its gentle, rolling, rounded hills. I am also a huge labyrinth [and Labyrinth] fan, so I just had to get World Gardens Maze. I haven’t seen any landscapes like these two matched anywhere else by any other software, so you might ultimately say that it was Maple Meadows that did me in. šŸ˜€

After using Daz Studio for several years, I have great familiarity with it. I basically use it as a way to play with digital dolls that I dress up to my liking, then place in various settings to act out multi-panel sequential stories [oh okay, comics!]. I’d love to use my Daz [and Poser] content in Carrara for the same effects. And here I come to my questions…

I read the Carrara 7 manual [except for the parts about animation, which does not interest me], but note that it does not cover using Gen1 and G2F content in Carrara. Are there tutorials specifically about using these new figures in Carrara? Do duf files even work in Carrara, or would I have to set up my characters from scratch in Carrara? Are there Gen1 and G2F things that DON’T work in Carrara?

I have to say that I’m really excited about using Carrara. After reading the manual, I think that the program seems clear and logical and maybe even intuitive in a way that Daz Studio isn’t. Daz Studio does so much, but its lack of documentation makes getting beyond a beginner level challenging. It also hides things in illogical places. Carrara’s rooms, plus its wizards to help you make terrains, for example, just make the software more approachable. Of course, a manual helps too, even if it is for 7. After reading that thing, I want to run my characters through World Gardens Maze and design some fantastical trees with heart-shaped leaves and do some spline modeling of jewelry and make some snowy terrain and import 3ds files… You get the idea. šŸ˜€

Recent digital acquisitions

Recent digital acquisitions published on No Comments on Recent digital acquisitions

Daz recently had its annual Orgy of Consumption Premier Artists’ Festival, during which new products and related old ones hit the stands with a variety of deep discounts. I got quite a few things that I’ve been desiring, the following of which are my favorites:

  • DG Toon Style Hair Shaders. Combining ease of use with flamboyant color combinations, this product allows me to indulge my love of meretricious hair shades on pretty much any hairstyle in my runtime.
  • Any G3F pose collection by ironman13. I picked up Road Trip, Chat Collection, Steakhouse, Implications, Ornate Bathroom [with poses], On the Rails, and Emotions Running Wild. Though I dislike the feet on tiptoe and the arched back endemic to nearly all G3F poses, this diversity of poses makes translation of images from mind to screen much easier. G3F has way more bones than older Daz figures, so pose conversion utilities only get me part of the way there. I have found it much more expedient to stock up on poses designed for the G3F [or G3M] base.
  • DesignAnvil’s DA Let It Snow Shader. Haven’t used it yet, but it looks like a great way to easily add snow to existing scenes without a lot of tedious retexturing.
  • Oskarsson’s G3F/G3M Autumn Jackets. Finally, some realistic winter clothing for the digital Vermont winters that my people can wear when the Let It Snow shader attacks.
  • Faveral’s Medieval Market. I’m not really interested in the medieval part, so much as I am in the baskets of produce, with which I could conceivably make a convincing produce section, as part of my ongoing quest to replicate a realistic grocery store in digital.
  • Luthbellina’s G3F Broken Doll. A little bit frilly, a little bit silly, a little bit militaristic, and a little bit mecha, this outfit — with bonus robo arm! — is a whole lot of cool.
  • Valea’s Gen1 Pretty Basics Ballerina Flats. Simple, easy, widely applicable.
  • Arki’s G3F/G3M Eagle Guard Armor and G3F Rune Outfit. I normally don’t go for armor, but the Eagle Guard claws and shoulder pads, as well as the Rune cape, made me spring for these. Both sets in combination look like something from the Goblin King’s closet, if he were a little pointier and more vicious. ^_^
  • ImagineX’s Cozy Breakfast Nook. When I first saw this, I immediately knew that, with a different backdrop, this glassed-in booth formed part of Jareth and Jennifer’s pied a terre.
  • Blondie9999’s Gen1 Sports Clogs. I might as well have a pair of the kind I wear as house shoes all the time.
  • Stonemason’s Streets of Old London. In my ongoing quest to approximate downtown Burlington in digital, I have called into service the 19th-century brick buildings in this set, modeled by the master of built environments. Consumption Orgy discounts brought down the price from $42.95 to ~$18.00, making it much more attractive.
  • RawArt’s G3F Silent Sally. Totally tentacular and eeriely faceless, this character is a beautiful exemplar of sculpture, texturing, and poseability. Long segmented things don’t have a great track record of being easy to manipulate digitally, despite the so-called E-Z Pose technology that allows for mass rotation of segments. However, Silent Sally’s tentacular arms are relatively easy to position in realistic ways. I’m currently working on some hierarchical poses for her and her tentacles, and she’s just so much fun to play with!

Bishoujo style Jareth?

Bishoujo style Jareth? published on No Comments on Bishoujo style Jareth?

Last night I sprang for the long-limbed, big-eyed Star 2 for G3F by LadyLittleFox, Cake One, and Traveler. All the renders on the Daz boards made her look irresistibly adorable, especially when blended with other G3F characters. I wanted to see how my digital people would look if Starified. Continue reading Bishoujo style Jareth?

So…devos…have you actually ever encountered an amputee?

So…devos…have you actually ever encountered an amputee? published on No Comments on So…devos…have you actually ever encountered an amputee?

Just like any other group of fetishists that doesn’t desire who or whatever they lust after so much as what connotations they afford to their fetish, so devos seem not to actually be interested in amputees themselves. Nah, instead, the devos seem to prefer a sexualized combination of immobility, helplessness, passivity, diminution, and humiliation with which they associate people with amputated body parts.

And yet — surprise surprise! — amputees are not essentially immobile, helpless, passive, diminished, and/or humiliated! They’re [gasp!] fellow human beings, with a wide variety of various temperaments, traits, skills, abilities, and inabilities, just like everyone else in the species. I have a special loathing for devos because their fetish so blatantly illustrates the objectification and dehumanization that many disabled people struggle with every damn day.

 

On a tangentially related subject, I remain highly disappointed that I haven’t figured out a good way to render amputees in digital, especially Fay. She has a BTK amputation of her left leg, and there are no realistic socket prostheses anywhere on the market. I’ve resorted to hiding her left leg from the knee down and parenting a lower leg from my vast collection of robots to her left thigh. This is inaccurate all the way, as well as limiting to the type of clothing I can make her wear, as I don’t want to show the unrealistic join between end of [hollow] leg mesh and beginning of metal prosthesis. I could also do with some sort of attachments that would realistically turn plug the [hollow] open ends of figure mesh to create convincing stumps, but I haven’t seen any of those either. Thhpfft.

OMG it’s the Tentacular Spectacular!

OMG it’s the Tentacular Spectacular! published on No Comments on OMG it’s the Tentacular Spectacular!

I’ve had a penchant for digital fair/carnival/midway stuff ever since my first multipart digital photostory occurred at one. I thought up a really cool ride, the Tentacular Spectacular, but didn’t show it in that series, as I didn’t have a model.

Well, I just found one: Simon 3D’s Otis Carnival Fun Octopus Ride! So cool! Too bad the digital me would digitally puke after digitally riding one. I can’t stand anything more exciting than a merry-go-round or a Ferris wheel these days.

Digital stuff I collect:

 

  • Fair/Carnival/Midway
  • Realistic cemetery stuff
  • Therianthropes
  • Clowns
  • Robots/Clockwork
  • Dolls
  • Dead people
  • Books, bookshelves, libraries
  • Realistic contemporary cars
  • Corsets, collars, gags
  • Hilarious skimpwear

Mr. Beep, the adorable and pointlessly gendered toon car model

Mr. Beep, the adorable and pointlessly gendered toon car model published on No Comments on Mr. Beep, the adorable and pointlessly gendered toon car model

I’m currently on a digital toon kick, and I discovered this exceptionally cute toony classic car, Mr. Beep, for free over on TurboSquid. Created by squir, this is an unrigged model, but it’s so adorable that I have spent several hours this weekend breaking it up into separate morphable doors, trunk, and bumper, making more expressive eyes and movable geoshell pupils for it, and rearranging the material zones for more customization. Here are some of its new faces below. It’s so cute that I want to develop some digital photostories specifically featuring it… šŸ˜€Continue reading Mr. Beep, the adorable and pointlessly gendered toon car model

The one thing I miss about my previous base model

The one thing I miss about my previous base model published on No Comments on The one thing I miss about my previous base model

I’ve upgraded my most-used digital characters from the Genesis 2 Female base model to the Genesis 3 Female base model. The G3F model benefits from a vast array of facial “bones” that make subtle nuances of facial asymmetry and expressions easily achievable. This is mostly awesome!

I can make the model have all sorts of expressions, but I just can’t make it smile convincingly. The top lip doesn’t roll up and thin easily, and the corners of the mouth don’t become as deep and as pointy as they need to.

 

On the other hand, the Genesis 2 Female has expressions based on hand-crafted morphs. Some of my favorites include the correct nuances of lip flexion in smiles, creating results on G2F that G3F can’t come close to.

 

Here’s an example:

 

Continue reading The one thing I miss about my previous base model

Thoughts about various iterations of the Girl

Thoughts about various iterations of the Girl published on No Comments on Thoughts about various iterations of the Girl

The Girl, one of Daz’ iconic figures [and, in more recent versions, figure morphs], began life as a toon created by Kim Goossens. Daz or its predecessor Zygote acquired the figure and all rights to it, I guess. From then on, the Girl joined Victoria, Michael, and a small elite of characters that appear in [almost] every generation of figures that Daz puts out.

 

The Girl has four iterations so far. The first was as a standalone figure by Kim Goossens, a contemporary of Victoria 3. The second was a character morph of Victoria 4, called Girl 4. The Girl skipped the next generation of Daz figures, Genesis 1. However, Girl 6 showed up as a morph of Genesis 2 Female. Most recently, Girl 7 appeared as a character for Genesis 3 Female. I put them in a lineup below to compare and contrast.

 

Continue reading Thoughts about various iterations of the Girl

Facial hair!!!!!

Facial hair!!!!! published on No Comments on Facial hair!!!!!

I figured out how to get facial hair [both transfers from G3F and also from previous figure generations] onto G3F so that it follows expressions! Woo hoo!

I’m also happy because this evening I just sprang for AprilYSH’s Leandros Hair and Beard for G3M. I got it because it beautifully represents the messy ponytail that I see so many people use whenever they don’t want to put much effort into styling their hair — just pull it back and don’t worry about the flyaways. The inclusion of a beard, up to AprilYSH’s usual spectacular standards of modeling, was just a nice bonus.

Now that I’m playing with it, though, I really like the beard. It’s a decent closely clipped style, very realistic, and the alternative trans maps for full hair growth and sparser hair growth are pretty convincing. Once I made a little morph to keep the mustache hairs from shoving themselves up Jareth’s nose, everything worked well.

Continue reading Facial hair!!!!!

Therianthrope with talons

Therianthrope with talons published on No Comments on Therianthrope with talons

I love Mankahoo’s original digital figure Bod. With her wide-set eyes, pronounced brow ridge, and talons instead of feet, she looks like an avian therianthrope. She’s the sort of character for which AprilYSH’s V4 Yolande Hair or V4 FeatherHawk would be perfect! I also feel like she needs a feathered texture…and some clothes, of course!

Things I am going to model whenever I get around to learning

Things I am going to model whenever I get around to learning published on No Comments on Things I am going to model whenever I get around to learning

Digitally speaking, of course. Continue reading Things I am going to model whenever I get around to learning

Digital robo-dolls and stuff

Digital robo-dolls and stuff published on No Comments on Digital robo-dolls and stuff

Samildanach’s clown robot dolls Black & White are on clearance at Rendo. Time to get ’em!

 

Also at Rendo, Edart3D’s Pin-up Gynoid Phase 1 implies the future existence of later phases, so I’m keeping an eye on this vendor. As a bonus, this person also does accurate [from what I can tell] renders of outmoded technology in a way that I haven’t seen anyone else do.

 

Speaking of clearance and also of gynoids, Traveler’s Technophilia Retro Gynoids are in the RDNA discount bin.

And, in recent purchases, I acquired Mannequin for G3F last night. Much to my delight, the geografted head follows head morphs and expressions somewhat, allowing for rough likenesses. Woo hoo!

I also made some sorely needed disturbing overlays for the blank head. Below is one of them. Continue reading Digital robo-dolls and stuff

“Does it make a realistic digital human model look like an inanimate humanoid object? I’ll take it!”

“Does it make a realistic digital human model look like an inanimate humanoid object? I’ll take it!” published on No Comments on “Does it make a realistic digital human model look like an inanimate humanoid object? I’ll take it!”

Today’s digital models of people — I’m thinking primarily of Daz Studio 3D’s Genesis 3 Female and Male — are designed for maximum realism, mimic human anatomy, flexibility, skin translucency, muscle flexion, facial expressiveness, fat distribution, etc., as much as current computing technology allows. While I benefit from all the advanced features of such models, I spend much of my time dehumanizing them and objectifying them as dolls, puppets, mannequins, robots, cyborgs, statues, and inanimate humanoid objects.

I don’t feel like I collect actual dolls, preferring instead to refer to them as small populations. But I definitely collect digital dolls, to the extent that I have a whole category in my database of digital content devoted to them [and a separate one for robots]. Thus I am happy to see Mannequin for G3F released at Daz today. I’m especially interested in the geografted stylized head [effaced face :p ], but it would be infinitely cooler as geografted patches to seal up the eyes and mouth of any model, rather than a whole new head to be swapped out. But I can work with it — I wonder if I can make the geografted head a conforming figure for G2F? Anyway, I think the Mannequin needs some sinister textures…

 

Have you ever seen something so beautiful you want to weep?

Have you ever seen something so beautiful you want to weep? published on No Comments on Have you ever seen something so beautiful you want to weep?

I have, and it’s this model by 3D-GHDesign, Fara Hair, an exuberant fountain of dreadlocks for G2F. It’s very hard to set aside the distracting bullshit exoticism of the promo pictures [because of course a WOC needs an outfit adorned with leopard print and claw accessories :p ], which makes me want to weep out of frustration, but I am also very impressed by the sheer loft achieved by these amazing digital dreads. The inclusion of a head wrap, usable by itself, improves Fara a thousandfold. I feel a sudden urge to remove the hair model from the stinky promo pictures and use it on some digital people who could demonstrate its awesomeness without resorting to stereotypes.

Having fun with Ayana Doll

Having fun with Ayana Doll published on No Comments on Having fun with Ayana Doll

I discovered a new free standalone Poser figure recently, Ayana Doll, by Glidman. I think she’s very cute, despite her alarmingly bazooka-like default breasts, so I’ve been making some freebie stuff for her.

 

The vast array of breast morphs, tongue morphs, and extremely skimpy outfits provided with Ayana Doll clearly demonstrate that she is intended for stereotypical sexy pinup shit. In response to the presumed innocent and yet flirtatious personality implied by all the pinup accoutrements, I have deliberately made my Ayana Doll stand around coolly, making unimpressed sneers. She looks better that way.

 

Continue reading Having fun with Ayana Doll

Final digital David Bowie

Final digital David Bowie published on No Comments on Final digital David Bowie

Finished up the morph and packaged it today. It’s not a perfect likeness, but it’s eminently recognizable, which is what I was going for. Shown below on Genesis base figure with Basic Male Head at 0.3 and Emaciated [from Genesis Evolution Body Morphs] at 0.5. Texture is Victoria 5 Elite texture Valerie modified by me to look like Ziggy Stardust’s makeup. Hair is from MEC4D’s 80s Gym Suit for G2F with custom texture, tinting, and trans map by me. Shaders on lips and forehead circle are from GeorgeHaze’s Metals. Backdrop by me.

 

Continue reading Final digital David Bowie

Girls just wanna have fun!

Girls just wanna have fun! published on No Comments on Girls just wanna have fun!

In honor of her 45th birthday, a digital vendor, MEC4D, has been releasing limited freebie clothing + hair sets with 1980s style. Here’s Michaela in the latest, Girls Just Wanna Have Fun for Genesis 2 Female.

 

Continue reading Girls just wanna have fun!

Fine! I’ll make my own David Bowie!

Fine! I’ll make my own David Bowie! published on No Comments on Fine! I’ll make my own David Bowie!

There’s no really good David Bowie morph out there for us digital art amateurs. Sure, there’s a free Jareth preset available for Michael 4 using Morphs++, but it kinda looks like Rod Stewart. So I decided to make my own [David Bowie, not Rod Stewart]. I went for a likeness from the Ziggy Stardust era, and, after a few hours with some free, redistributable morphs by Die Trying, as well as strategic use of D-Forms in Daz Studio, I achieved maybe an 80% likeness using the Genesis figure.

 

Continue reading Fine! I’ll make my own David Bowie!

Time for some Jazzercize [TM]!

Time for some Jazzercize [TM]! published on No Comments on Time for some Jazzercize [TM]!

Med4D offered a time-limited freebie, 80s Gym Set for G2F, including the clothing and hair you see below. It’s a beautifully modeled set with lots of material zones, and the hair especially makes me very happy. Jareth too, as you can tell by the renders below.Continue reading Time for some Jazzercize [TM]!

Introducing the Samil Bots!

Introducing the Samil Bots! published on No Comments on Introducing the Samil Bots!

As I have repeatedly stated, I love the work of Renderosity vendor Samildanach, but I have long lamented the unavailability of some of her coolest characters. Much to my joy, though, Renderosity has been bringing back expired products on deep discount, and Samildanach offered a selection of her old stuff for this sale. I picked up the greatly coveted No!, Android Blues 2 NatƩ, and Rusty Dreams Delicious Delirium. Then all my Samildanach characters got together for my idea of pin-up shots. Who knew they were all such hams?

Continue reading Introducing the Samil Bots!

Lack of practical digital shoes

Lack of practical digital shoes published on No Comments on Lack of practical digital shoes

Oh for fuck’s sake, people! Just because I have one person who likes to wear exaggeratedly high heels, that doesn’t mean that nearly every single pair should be some sort of skyscraper and/or platform and/or pointy and/or stiletto thingy!

Also, I violently detest open-toe or peep-toe shoes with an unreasoning antipathy. They look silly and unfinished, like the cobbler forgot to add a toe cap. Also I keep worrying that the people who wear them will have no protection when they stub their toes.

Rusty kinky dolls

Rusty kinky dolls published on No Comments on Rusty kinky dolls

Back when I was first getting into digital, I really enjoyed the creepy, mannequin-like, and mechanical character textures created by artist Samildanach over on Renderosity. Sadly, most of the characters that captured my imagination have been retired, as they were for 3rd generation Daz figures [V3 and M3], but the link shows that a few of her products remain.

Anyway, all of the above provides backstory for my link to this picture by Odilicious on DeviantArt. The render uses one of Samildanach’s unavailable characters, No, that I am kicking myself for not purchasing back when it was on sale. This particular concept has been bugging me so much that I’m trying to figure out how to recreate it for G2F.

Clearly it’s a set of non-conforming props, most of which can be easily constructed from cylinder, torus, and sphere primitives. The mouthpiece challenges me, though, because it’s obviously shaped, but not conforming. But maybe it should be conforming to fit on a variety of characters. I’m baffled, though, by how to keep that smooth curve on the mesh as it conforms to morphed figures. It would be easier to make it a non-conforming prop based on the default figure, but then it would be of little use to me because none of my characters are default G2F. Pffffft!

Petipet’s inspirations

Petipet’s inspirations published on No Comments on Petipet’s inspirations

This entry is probably relevant to exactly zero people who read this thing, but I’m keeping it for my own reference, as the thread on the Daz boards accumulating this information seems to have been eaten.

One of my favorite digital content makers, petipet, produces a vast array of fanciful land, sea, air, and space vehicles, along with a few structures, available at the Daz site. I have been collecting them [starting with Resort Lagoon last year] because of their low price [I got most as Platinum Club freebies], their meticulous sculpture, and their sense of humor. This person also clearly takes inspiration from recent and classic vehicles in movies and history, so identifying sources of inspiration is fun.

In no particular order, here are the influences I have discovered:

List will be updated as warranted.

EDIT: Oooh, I found a thread on the Daz boards identifying a few more inspirations!

March Madness digital spoils

March Madness digital spoils published on No Comments on March Madness digital spoils

As I mentioned, Daz had its annual March Madness sale from the last weekend in February to the first in April. Very excited about the following things I have acquired:

  • Marshian’s Kaleidoscope is a set of reflective props and render settings that let users multiply scene objects. I have only used it so far to create an infinite castle hallway, but I’d like to tinker with it some more to create endless, dreamlike architecture as shown in the promos.
  • ForbiddenWhispers and Sabby’s FWSA Keshi is just beautiful, especially when I crank her face morph up to about 1.25, thus rendering her features stronger and more distinctive.
  • I was not in the market for a hot dog cart, but, when I saw Hole’s, I had to get it. The modeling is accurate, detailed and gorgeous. Plus I couldn’t resist Pavlov’s Dogs!
  • I got the Girl 6 Pro Bundle for free as a promo, mostly because I wanted the latest Girl. Everything else beyond that was just icing on the cake. I particularly dig SWAM’s Loyce Hair and Neftis’ Lady Florence Hair, as I’ve seen hairstyles of this type a lot in real life.
  • Nikisatez and DarkStarBurning’s Urban Metro Outfit for G2M jumped right into my cart because of the puffy down vest, a fixture on Vermonters in mud season!
  • SickleYield’s Big Beautiful Genesis 2 Females fulfills pretty much all my desires for a variety of realistically fat women.
  • Aeon Soul’s Fantasy Ornaments for Genesis 2 Females are impractical and silly…and therefore awesome, especially at 50% off!
  • While known more for her hair models than her character morphs, AprilYSH also does nifty characters like Milen M6 Promo Guy. He is the sole reason I got Michael 6, the morph of Genesis 2 Male upon which this guy is based. I like the morph, mostly for the smirk, but, as a bonus, I discovered recently that the very pale texture works great for Jareth when he’s in his “regular dude” drag.

Poses I use all the time

Poses I use all the time published on No Comments on Poses I use all the time

There are some digital pose collections that I regularly use in making my scenes. In no particular order, they are as follows:

  • Body Talk for Genesis: Arms and Body Talk Genesis: Hand to Mouth. Both of these freebie pose sets, while not based on my preferred model [G2F], nevertheless appear in pretty much everything I do, either because I’m using the poses by themselves or using poses I have made based on these.
  • While we’re talkin’ arms, FeralFey’s Hand Details for Genesis 2 Females is a great balance of value, volume and quantity. Again, they appear everywhere.
  • Khory’s Easy Going Poses for Michael 5 contain some of the most realistic neutral/casual walking and sitting postures I’ve seen.
  • I almost always default to one of Sedor’s BWC Runway Poses when someone needs to walk or stand around with hand[s] on hips, which my characters do a lot. They’re a bit exaggerated, as runway struts and stands are, but I like their asymmetry, which I think gives them a lot of character and realism.
  • Here’s an oldie, but a goodie: Xpression for Victoria 3 by Schlabber and Cascarda. These partial and full poses translate remarkably well to G2, and there are a few highly specialized ones — mostly variations of “Tah dah, look at me!” — that I refer to often.

I’m pretty well stocked with standing, lying, kneeling, walking and running poses, but I recently discovered a sore deficit of sitting poses — more specifically, the type of loungey sitting that people do in upholstered chairs. I’ve got plenty of stool poses and desk/table poses, but not really hanging out poses. My people do a lot of hanging out — dammit!

Fortunately, this weekend culminated Daz’ annual March Madness — a.k.a. “ridiculously deep discount” — sales with almost everything in the store 50% off, so I got Tako Yakida and Wee Dangerous John’s ARTYficial Furniture and Poses and blondie9999’s Sitting Pretty for Gia. The former contains modern upholstered furniture and poses developed specifically for the pieces, so I sure hope it works out. The latter has poses demonstrated with a dining room chair, but a little over half can easily be transferred to upholstered furniture. I hope that they work well, without too much fiddling, for my characters.

Yesterday’s purchases also included HilligerMedia’s Fool Around Poses because, when my people aren’t standing around talking, lying around talking, or sitting around talking, they’re hanging around making faces at each other.

 

I now have all the Girls.

I now have all the Girls. published on 1 Comment on I now have all the Girls.

As I’ve mentioned periodically throughout my life in digital art, I really like the digital model known as The Girl. She first began like as an original creation by Kim Goossens. After issuing her once as a standalone figure, Daz rolled her into their base female model and, in her next iteration, made her a morph of Victoria 4. This iteration, the Girl 4, changed shape from the original, but retained the original’s signature proportions and style.

There was no Girl released as a morph of Daz’ next base model, Genesis 1, also known as generation 5, so there was never a Girl 5. With the release of the “generation 6” Genesis 2 Female base, the Girl reappeared, after skipping a generation, as Girl 6.

Of all the characters Daz regularly releases, I prefer the Girl most of all. Sure, I can morph G2F into pretty much any humanoid shape I want, but, when focusing on default appearance, I will choose the Girl any day. Since Victoria 4, Daz’ basic female models have had increasingly generic shapes that are supposed to conform to the modern U.S. bourgeois societal ideal of slender, curvy, gravity-defying, neotenic and cute feminine attractiveness. Borrrring. Though the Girl has changed over her iterations, she started off as Kim Goossens’ particular artistic version, and she has maintained much of that engaging aesthetic. She has a specific personality from the get-go, which makes working with her more fun.

I suppose I should define this enjoyable personality, huh? I think it’s mostly defined by expressiveness. She’s a toon character, so her large head, exaggerated eyes and big mouth highlight her facial expressions. Same with her large hands. The exaggerated shape of her body shows twists, turns and shifts of weight more obviously than a realistically shaped figure. She fits in well with my overall aesthetic of beauty as an exaggerated, stylized, flamboyant gender presentation.

I should put all three Girls in the same render and evaluate the figure’s changes over time. That would be cool.

Two Satyresses: one default, one tall and fat, both really cute!

Two Satyresses: one default, one tall and fat, both really cute! published on No Comments on Two Satyresses: one default, one tall and fat, both really cute!

Below is a quick render of Pinin’s default Satyress on left and one on the right with some of my custom body morphs and scaling. [Pay no attention to her unrealistic lack of body hair.] Much to my surprise, arm poses for Genesis [Body Talk Arms by katfeete in this case] work pretty well on her. I see that I need to make some more face morphs, especially to change the distinctive angular shape of the default’s head.

Holy crap, she’s adorable. [She’s also naked, in case you’re sensitive about that sort of thing.]
Continue reading Two Satyresses: one default, one tall and fat, both really cute!

Monster Mash update: now featuring Pinin’s Satyress!

Monster Mash update: now featuring Pinin’s Satyress! published on No Comments on Monster Mash update: now featuring Pinin’s Satyress!

While conceptualizing my Monster Mash picture, I struggled with the problem of how to render satyrs using a G2F base and freebies. I found bat wings, horns and a devil tail without difficulty, but the hooved legs — and their particular digitigrade shape — stymied me. Some free hooves for plantigrade human figures exist, but they tend not to create a true digitigrade shape by elongating the feet. But I want anatomically convincing satyrs!

Well, it turns out that Pinin over on Poser Outer Zone offers a Satyress figure for free. She is more cartoony than super realistic [bulky shoulders, four-fingered hands, alarmingly round and symmetrical breasts, thighs out of a James Bond novel, long legs], but she has plausibly shaped digitigrade legs with hooves. Come to think of it, she reminds me of Kim Goossen’s toony Girl, one of my favorite digital models. I decided that the adorable Satyress should be my base for all my Monster Mash satyrs.

I immediately confronted two problems: 1) no morphs and 2) no clothes. Ā Since I’m an advanced beginner at D-Forms, problem 1 proved no match for a half-day’s work, during which I cranked out a variety of partial head and body morphs. I lavished the most energy on bulking the figure up, not with muscle, but with fat, especially since the central figure, the dancer, is a fat woman. I never expected that a mesh originally sculpted to be wiry and muscular would deform so well into pear-shaped fatness, but it did. Pictures later…

Satyress’ empty wardrobe required some more labor. I started off by, first off, converting Satyress from a Poser native [.cr2] figure to a Daz-compatible figure with Daz’ proprietary Triax weight mapping so that Daz tools would work on her. I then began loading up freebie clothes and scaling, translating and D-Forming them until they fit her in zero position, exporting the items as OBJs, then reimporting and using Transfer Utility, with her as the source, to rerig them. Since I was resculpting the clothing meshes pretty crudely, the modified items didn’t fit well.

I then got the genius idea of using the Autofit function and G2F to do most of the sculpting for me. I overlaid Satyress and G2F, making G2F partly transparent. I then translated, scaled and morphed G2F so that her core [torso, arms, hips, upper legs] shape matched Satyress’. Then, when I Autofit clothes to G2F, they ended up resculpting to fit Satyress’ shape with 95% accuracy. After minor tweaks of the clothing wtih D-Forms, I exported the OBJs, reimported and used Transfer Utility to rerig.

Voila! Satyress gained instant access to closets’ worth of clothing. In fact, with the help of Autofit, she could now wear V4, M4 or K4 clothes [Autofit to Genesis, then Autofit a second time to G2F], as well as Genesis clothing, G2F clothing and/or G2M clothing. I have hand-converted some V3 and M3 items for her — short-sleeved V3 dresses seem to reconfigure particularly well, probably because V3’s shape, like Satyress’, features blocky shoulders and hips — but mostly just breezed through a bunch of V4, Genesis and G2F stuff. I don’t bother with pants because I don’t want to deal with Satyress’ hooves, but short-sleeved shirts, long-sleeved shirts, above-the-knee shorts, above-the-knee skirts and above-the-knee dresses convert with [relative] ease. At this rate, I will have outfits for all five of my satyrs, each with unique pieces.

This entry was originally posted at http://modernwizard.dreamwidth.org/1688023.html. You can comment here, but I’d prefer it if you’d comment on my DW using OpenID.

Hilarious cat-headed owl model

Hilarious cat-headed owl model published on No Comments on Hilarious cat-headed owl model

This Meowl figure by Sixus1 cracks me up. Like ryverthorn’s Snuffles, this is a fantasy creature that I have no use or plans for, but which will probably make my way into my runtime because it’s so damn cute.

This entry was originally posted at http://modernwizard.dreamwidth.org/1686214.html. You can comment here, but I’d prefer it if you’d comment on my DW using OpenID.

On a long, dramatic gowns kick…

On a long, dramatic gowns kick… published on No Comments on On a long, dramatic gowns kick…

It started with Chris Cox’ freebie Rococo Gown for V4, but really kicked into high gear when I got Neftis’ Lady de Lioncourt Dress for G2F, which is Rococo + Goth. I spent the first few months of my possession admiring the detailed mesh and classy textures, but also pissing and moaning that the dress did not sit well — i.e., it contained no morphs or other provisions for seated postures and the ways in which they deform and re-drape cloth.

I could not resist two more relatively new releases, despite their collective inability to sit realistically: MEC4D’s Queen of Hearts for G2F and Penny Dreadfull for G2F by MartinJFrost. Even if my characters could only stand around in Queen of Hearts, the elaborate hairstyle could be used with other clothing. And heck — even though the creator of Penny Dreadfull himself said that he had tried all sorts of ways to make the dress sit, but had been unsuccessful, it was one of the most realistic bustle dresses I’d ever seen. I tried to resist it, but I could not.

Eventually my annoyance hit a breaking point. What was the use of all these nifty outfits if I couldn’t pose them in positions that my characters use at least a third of the time? My exasperation thus motivated me to force the gowns to sit myself. Using D-Formers in Daz, I made a morph first for Lady de Lioncourt that tucked it up around the figure’s ass and calves, as it would if being sat on. I achieved something passable and cheered myself on.

Since then, I have been unstoppable!! I made sit morphs for the Rococo Gown, Queen of Hearts and Lady de Lioncourt [try #2, using what I had learned from previous attempts]. My proficiency with D-Formers increased dramatically to the point where I created and released an entire package of morphs for Penny Dreadfull, including morphs to make it sit, to compress parts of the skirt and even to lengthen the whole skirt with a minimum of texture distortion. I’m now packaging up another set of helper morphs for Ravenhair’s Priestess for Genesis because someone liked the work I did on other dresses and requested that I do something similar on a Genesis outfit. I’m also converting the Rococo Gown to Genesis for her.

The compliments and request from a fellow user really make me feel like a digital artist. I’m glad that someone appreciates my work and that I can help others achieve their artistic ends. I’m also glad that I’ve found areas of specialty — such as shaders and sit morphs — at which I can demonstrate rapid improvement and that other people like too. I’ve spent so long feeling socially and artistically lonely that public approbation means a lot to me and my confidence.

 

This entry was originally posted at http://modernwizard.dreamwidth.org/1686003.html. You can comment here, but I’d prefer it if you’d comment on my DW using OpenID.

I don’t care if you’re not much for Jennifer Garner, Tom Cruise or Miley Cyrus…

I don’t care if you’re not much for Jennifer Garner, Tom Cruise or Miley Cyrus… published on No Comments on I don’t care if you’re not much for Jennifer Garner, Tom Cruise or Miley Cyrus…

…Just go check out Studio Art Vartanian’s amazing morphs and textures! She specializes in various celebrities, with spot-on likenesses, realistic skins full of depth and matching hairstyles with realistic textures and movement morphs.

Incidentally, I cannot take Tom Cruise seriously in anything. His mere presence ruins everything, from Legend forward. Too bad, as some of the movies he shows up in are interesting.

This entry was originally posted at http://modernwizard.dreamwidth.org/1679214.html. You can comment here, but I’d prefer it if you’d comment on my DW using OpenID.

A digital model I would really like…

A digital model I would really like… published on No Comments on A digital model I would really like…

A dress with ridiculously huge leg-o’-mutton sleeves like Sarah’s in Labyrinth. And I don’t mean standard leg-o’-mutton sleeves — I mean sleeves that equal a panniered skirt in width and make it impossible to go through doors head on.

Jareth: "Why don’t you put some sitting morphs in the Lady de Lioncourt Dress, the Skirt, the Marie Louise 18th Century Gown and that Extravaganza thing? I mean — what’s the use of ridiculously voluminous dresses if you can’t sit in ’em?"

Me: "A) I don’t have the 18th Century Gown anymore; I thought it overlapped too much with Lady de Lioncourt. B) The Skirt already has sit morphs. C) Shush. I’ll get to Lady de Lioncourt and Extravaganza when I have the time."

Jareth: *adds the Victorian Gown for G2F, Penny Dreadfull for G2F and the Marie Louise to my Daz wishlist* "Did you notice that Penny Dreadfull is 50% off?"

Me: "The creator explicitly told me he couldn’t make it sit. The bustle gets in the way."

Jareth: "So take the bustle off."

Me: "I’m going back to work."

Jareth: "Hey!" 

This entry was originally posted at http://modernwizard.dreamwidth.org/1677136.html. You can comment here, but I’d prefer it if you’d comment on my DW using OpenID.

What would a creepy doll be afraid of?

What would a creepy doll be afraid of? published on No Comments on What would a creepy doll be afraid of?

I was playing around this morning with some recent digital acquisitions and came up with this picture. Caption: "I’m pretty sure I made a wrong turn somewhere because this definitely does not look like a shopping district where I can acquire some less skimpy pants."
Continue reading What would a creepy doll be afraid of?

New Orleans-like cemetery for $10.40!!!

New Orleans-like cemetery for $10.40!!! published on No Comments on New Orleans-like cemetery for $10.40!!!

As all two of my regular readers know, I really like cemeteries, but have trouble finding realistic representations thereof among digital models. Over at the Daz store, for example, Spooky PlotsĀ by LaurieS and Lisa’s Botanicals looks more like a digital rendering of Halloween decorations than an actual graveyard, as does Pretty3D’s Lost Cemetery.Ā Sure, you can find some nice individual tombs, but most digital cemetery sets seem to have been created by people who have never even seen a tombstone in their lives.

Imagine, then, my ecstasy when Danie and Marforno’sĀ Tranquility Lane appeared on sale at Renderosity for 60% off! Danie and Marforno specialize in timeworn, vaguely fantastical sets in which one can dramatically pose one’s scantily clad female models. Let’s call them the masters of the Gothic lite pinup.

Occasionally, though, Danie and marforno deviate from Ye Olde Phantaisie Weirdnesse [seriously — why does Cult Diaries have tusks everywhere?] and do something more realistic and evocative. Enter Tranquility Lane, a cemetery set obviously modeled after those in New Orleans — hell, there’s even French on the crypts and signs. Of course, I have no personal experience with crypts clustered as tightly as urban apartment buildings — we don’t stack dead people up here in New England; instead we tend to spread them out. However, even though Tranquility Lane does not reflect my personal schema of a cemetery, I can repurpose elements of the set, such as the monoliths, fences and certain mausoleums, in my ongoing quest to represent digitally the type of graveyard with which I am familiar.

Oh yeah — and I got this for $10.40, 60% off its usual $26.00 price! Whoo hoo!

This entry was originally posted at http://modernwizard.dreamwidth.org/1672947.html. You can comment here, but I’d prefer it if you’d comment on my DW using OpenID.

Scorpion therianthrope problems

Scorpion therianthrope problems published on No Comments on Scorpion therianthrope problems

I never gave a detailed description of Hattie, the scorpion therianthrope who attended the mini universe’s Xmas party last year. I’m not sure if she’s mostly human, but with a scorpion tail, like Soom Vesuvia, or if she’s half-human, half-scorpion, like Impldoll Colin. If they’re like Impldoll Colin, do they have claws and pincers?

EDIT: Okay, I just checked. Apparently the scorpion therianthropes are more along the lines of Impldoll Colin, although I didn’t specify whether they had pincers and/or claws. If I want to make a digital version of Hattie [which I do], I’ll have to purchase a scorpion and modify it to be a lower body for a therianthrope.

As an aside, I notice that Impldoll’s sculpting has become more refined over the years, but I think their sculptors still struggle to find a signature style. The sculpts and concepts, especially of the Star and Idol lines, smack strongly of Iplehouse to me.

This entry was originally posted at http://modernwizard.dreamwidth.org/1670934.html. You can comment here, but I’d prefer it if you’d comment on my DW using OpenID.

Possibilities of skyboxes

Possibilities of skyboxes published on No Comments on Possibilities of skyboxes

Flipmode just came out with a nifty digital product, Easy Environments: Autumn. It contains a road, bordered by a stone wall, a fence and some turning deciduous trees, surrounded by a 360-degree skybox that makes the set “[gleam] and [gloom] / ‘Neath billowing skies that scatter and amass.” [Thank you, Dante Rossetti, for Silent Noon, which contains the best description ever of such dramatic clouds.] Quick-rendering light sets were also included, promising to duplicate the type of light pictured in the skybox.

When I saw this set, I felt an involuntary pang, as the dappling of shadows across the landscape epitomized for me the melancholy of fall. I bought the set for the lovely panorama, but then couldn’t get over the fact that the mountains contain no trees whatsoever. There should be some fall colors on the distant hills too, right?

I tried to rectify the barrenness of the background with the help of a Wikimedia Commons panoramic photo from the top of Mount Mansfield. I spent hours dividing up the panorama into four pieces [one for each side of the sky box] and blending it with Flipmode’s sky. I even made a texture for the bottom of the skybox, which originally showed more parched, treeless ground. After all that, the result looked like a bad overlay, despite all my hard work. I thus concluded that I could not get a forested skybox out of Easy Environments: Autumn, so I returned it.

Not all is lost, however. I still have the Mount Mansfield overlay panels. I have another idea. I got a great discount on Dreamland Models’ Movie Sets: 81 Blocks last night. Regularly $24.95, it was down to $7.48, so I picked it up. It’s marketed as a huge city environment, but I snagged it because it contains a skydome, low-res forest props and low-res deciduous tree props with several materials. I’m thinking of rendering some panoramic shots in this set and making my own forested skybox.

This entry was originally posted at http://modernwizard.dreamwidth.org/1670550.html. You can comment here, but I’d prefer it if you’d comment on my DW using OpenID.

Stuff I ordered from the Daz store, but then forgot about, but which I’d like to use.

Stuff I ordered from the Daz store, but then forgot about, but which I’d like to use. published on No Comments on Stuff I ordered from the Daz store, but then forgot about, but which I’d like to use.
  • 3 Piece Suit for D3. Part of my ongoing quest to find a decent suit for everyone…
  • Air Bike. Probably illegal, but prevalent, in Intellectum.
  • Alien Plants. Big plans for these never materialized…
  • Basic Hair. A short, clean style, more attractive than it looks on the product page.
  • Bus Maxis and Bus Pegasus. I’m beginning to think that everyone in Intellectum gets around on petipet machines.
  • BWC Runway. Jareth wants to have a fashion show.
  • Classic Deco. I’ve used the chairs, but that’s it.
  • Daz Squirrel. Will eat any French fries my runtime has to offer.
  • Daz Water Pump and Grain Silo. Plop a stove-in barn next to the silo, and it’ll look just like Vermont! …Anyone know where I can get a collapsing barn?
  • Disconsolation. A waterfront set that demands atmospheric fog and low lighting.
  • DM Time Shadows. Ye Olde Genericke Machines by Danie and Marforno, who do great moody environments. Good background for the Wrathful Scientists, now that I think of it.
  • Epic Wings. Amazingly enough, almost properly scaled for actual use by human beings.
  • Fly Girl. Another thing for which I had big plans that never materialized.
  • Generic Sci Fi Corridor. Another possible location for the Wrathful Scientists.
  • Hilly Surround. Showed up in my renders of Intellectum’s Fink, but dropped back into obscurity.
  • Home One Bathroom. Whoops, I forgot I had that…and I explicitly bought it to easily add a fully stocked w.c. to my runtime.
  • If You Build It Picket Fence. In case I need to render a representation of the American Dream Lie.
  • Newport Outfit. How did I forget that I bought a modern, realistic, pretty generic outfit? Ah I see…I got it as a bundle and only paid attention to certain items in the bundle.
  • Interiors The Model Agency. Purchased as an inexpensive, fully stocked office interior and then…summarily forgotten.
  • Lune Portail. This could work as a cemetery gate.
  • Maple Tree Pack 1. Big plans for these were only half executed.
  • Mediterranean Patio. For al fresco dining. I have a lot of these Nouschka Design sets that I got as freebies the first time I was in Platinum Club; they don’t get out much.
  • Neo Stop. A regular fixture in Intellectum.
  • Noggin’s Duck Mallard. Purchased when I wanted to reproduce in 3D the Make Way for Ducklings sculpture in Boston Public Garden. The duckling poses are hilarious.
  • Ranaki. Now that I’ve finally figured out how to convert those frog legs to G2F, I can redo Grenk.
  • Regenerator. I bet the Wrathful Scientists have one of these in their shack lab.
  • Sculptural Genesis Ultra Fun Kit. Time to put lampshades on people’s heads!
  • Shackled! The more I stare at this set, the more I realize that I would only use pieces as background props in a stereotypical medieval dungeon. I could never put people in chains; it reminds me too much of the Middle Passage.
  • Shelter. Wait a minute — this comes with snow? How did I miss that?
  • Space Base. You know, just in case anyone needs to go to the moon.
  • Skulduggery. Really cool bodysuit and makeup effects!
  • Technopolis. A whole neighborhood of Intellectum! Swanky, new, rich…
  • The Conservatory. I dunno — looks like a greenhouse to me…
  • Time Traveler. Exposed wires — coooooool.
  • Tubo Hotel. Probably not a hotel, but a makeshift community near Intellectum’s dump, constructed with abandoned sewer construction materials.
  • Versailles Tail. The less gravity-defying cousin of the pompadour.
  • Unicycle Bob. What the hell is this? Who knows? But it’s by petipet, which means that it probably belongs in Intellectum.
  • Waste Container. Probably a part of the Intellectan shanty town next to the dump.
  • Wynter Hair. That built-in headgear probably picks up radio signals or something.

This entry was originally posted at http://modernwizard.dreamwidth.org/1669853.html. You can comment here, but I’d prefer it if you’d comment on my DW using OpenID.

Even more of my favorite digital content creators

Even more of my favorite digital content creators published on No Comments on Even more of my favorite digital content creators

Again, in no particular order.

  • maclean. In a commercial field dominated by skimpy clothing and pseudomedieval architecture, maclean concentrates on utilitarian basics. His Home One series of models, for example, contains an apartment interior, a house interior and various rooms. I recently purchased the Home One Bathroom and Home One Kitchen. They both reflect the bourgeois residential interiors that I regularly encounter and feature everything from the basic fixtures and appliances to the little details such as silverware and toothpaste. All that for $12.95 a set! How can you go wrong?
  • petipet. I first encountered his creations in the form of Resort Lagoon, a houseboat/raft offered as a Platinum Club freebie sometime in March. I found it so unusual, opulent and entertaining that I wrote an entire mini universe story around it [which my computer then ate grrrrrrr!]. I then discovered his sleek neo-retro vehicles like Bus Maxis and Bus Totally Not Postwar Greyhound Pegasus, and I was hooked.

This entry was originally posted at http://modernwizard.dreamwidth.org/1655235.html. You can comment here, but I’d prefer it if you’d comment on my DW using OpenID.

More of my favorite digital content creators

More of my favorite digital content creators published on No Comments on More of my favorite digital content creators

 In no particular order.

  • Grey Cloud Design. She specializes in meticulously sculpted interiors with fabulously done drapery and luscious textures. The Montespan Interior Scene got me hooked on her stuff, and I look forward to getting the Montespan Bedroom and the Classic Curtains Set 1.
  • Richabri. He makes a variety of everyday sets — laundromat, parking lot, shooting range, hot tub, photo studio —  both detailed and affordable. I especially dig the Roadside Diner. He also specializes in kinky stuff — again, simple, well-made and affordable.
  • Alfaseed. Known in the past as Awful Soul or Aery Soul, these vendors do fantasy skimpwear par excellence. All of their pieces feature sculpted wrinkles, drapery and other details that give them a dynamic feel, as do the fantastical movement morphs included in most flowy pieces. Furthermore, most Alfaseed pieces play well with pieces from other Alfaseed sets. I don’t have any Alfaseed clothes [yet — waiting for Arkham Angel to go on sale, hah hah hah], but I use a very early release of theirs, New Age Room, a lot as a simple and elegant set.
  • AprilYSH. The hair goddess! Arguably the best and most talented creator of Daz/Poser hair, she provides highly detailed and asymmetrically sculpted meshes with easily customizable textures. Many of her models include a hair model and some accessory, like Calais Hair and Ruff 2, which contains a hair model, a ruff, a custom character morph and a custom character texture. Another favorite, Deeta Hair 2, comes with a hair model, a veil and a fascinator.
  • Adzan. Creator of densely sculpted, well-textured clothes for Hiro 3 and David 3, loaded with movement and style morphs to add realism. All the meshes convert superbly for use on other figures, even G2F [my latest base model]. Pretty much everyone in my runtime has worn the jeans and sneakers from Small Sins at one time or another.
  • PhilC. Known primarily for his ancillary utllities such as Wardrobe Wizard, which I have found indispensable for converting clothes so that I can dress who I want in what I want. 
  • Capsces Digital Ink. The goddess of morphing! Though she defaults to a toony style, the detailed head and body morphs that she creates for many Daz humanoid figures greatly enhance their customizability.

Maybe more later…

This entry was originally posted at http://modernwizard.dreamwidth.org/1651318.html. You can comment here, but I’d prefer it if you’d comment on my DW using OpenID.

This is SO COOL.

This is SO COOL. published on No Comments on This is SO COOL.

Vanishing Point recently released a standalone therianthropic figure, SquidMan, clearly influenced by Davy Jones from Priates of the Caribbean 5000. I just love it when people take standard ideas and head them off into little-used aesthetic regions.

This entry was originally posted at http://modernwizard.dreamwidth.org/1651025.html. You can comment here, but I’d prefer it if you’d comment on my DW using OpenID.

Favorite digital content creators

Favorite digital content creators published on No Comments on Favorite digital content creators

In no particular order.

  • SickleYield and Fuseling. I dig her their collaborative products [Burlap Dolly and Ball Joint Doll for G2F], as well as SY’s always well-sculpted everyday essentials. Heck, she’s the only person who offers Six Sickle Sandals 2, which includes close-toed webbing sandals of the type I regularly wear. I also like SY’s sense of humor; she has a freebie outfit for G1 called Impractical Rogue, for example, providing equal skimpwear time for the dudes as well as the gals. And there will always be a special place in my heart runtime for FSL’s Latex and Rubber shaders.
  • Traveler. A true Renaissance man over at Runtime DNA, Traveler does bugs and plants with equal finesse. He also has a fetishy Technophilia series, for all your robotic, cyborg and gasmask-related needs. The Breathless package, which allows one to build one’s own gasmask — ventilators and goggles and helmets and tubes and valves, oh my! — is a useful and easy-to-use set offering hours of recombinatorial fun. No links because RDNA is temporarily offline. šŸ™
  • WillDupree and MAB. These two team up on a variety of therianthropes. I started off with Catgirl for V4/A4 just because it was on deep discount several years ago, and most recently got Popobawa for G1 for the bat wings!
  • Stonemason. A specialist in urban and sci-fi environments, Stonemason makes urban decay look beautiful. I only have some of his cheapest items, such as The Tomb and Fairy Tale Collection Tower Interior, but I lust after Abandoned Interiors Warehouse, for example.

More later.

This entry was originally posted at http://modernwizard.dreamwidth.org/1650783.html. You can comment here, but I’d prefer it if you’d comment on my DW using OpenID.

Stuff I use all the freakin’ time in Daz

Stuff I use all the freakin’ time in Daz published on No Comments on Stuff I use all the freakin’ time in Daz

Just for entertainment, here’s a list of some of the digital models and resources that I regularly rely on in my art:

Tune in later when I start figuring out the fun stuff, like what clothes I use most often.

This entry was originally posted at http://modernwizard.dreamwidth.org/1650457.html. You can comment here, but I’d prefer it if you’d comment on my DW using OpenID.

Jareth the goof, or, Sometimes the best things in life are free!

Jareth the goof, or, Sometimes the best things in life are free! published on No Comments on Jareth the goof, or, Sometimes the best things in life are free!

I’ve finally approximated something close to Jareth’s usual expression, which is about one-third playful, one-third fabulous and one-third off-the-wall. Hey, I even threw some lights in there! You don’t know how much of an accomplishment it is to finally have him able to stick out his tongue.
Continue reading Jareth the goof, or, Sometimes the best things in life are free!

Now I want hamburgers.

Now I want hamburgers. published on No Comments on Now I want hamburgers.

Exnem over at Renderosity makes the most realistic and versatile digital food I’ve seen. Witness the Amazing Super Burger Pack, which, with a 55% off [!] sale + my Render Rewards, set me back a whopping  $3.53. Cleverly done and beautifully sculpted and textured, this is a wonderful product. And now I want a burger.

This entry was originally posted at http://modernwizard.dreamwidth.org/1648992.html. You can comment here, but I’d prefer it if you’d comment on my DW using OpenID.

The perfect silly cyborg set for Dawn!

The perfect silly cyborg set for Dawn! published on No Comments on The perfect silly cyborg set for Dawn!

I downloaded Hivewire3D’s Dawn because she was free and I wanted her odd bouffant/ponytail hair. I didn’t play much with the figure and quickly left her for G1 and eventually G2F, now my preferred base. For BlackRain and SixthSense’s new RuntimeDNA release, B.L.U. XR-512, however, I would either reinstall Dawn or just invest in EvilInnocence’s CrossDresser to convert it to V4 and then autofit to G2F. I think I should just spring for CrossDresser — free base program, $9.97 license to convert from any supported figure to V4 — because it might crunch some clothes better than Wardrobe Wizard.

I probably need a tag for "robots" at this point…

This entry was originally posted at http://modernwizard.dreamwidth.org/1647129.html. You can comment here, but I’d prefer it if you’d comment on my DW using OpenID.

Leg-o’-mutton sleeves! Feathered cape! Dramatic swoopy skirts!

Leg-o’-mutton sleeves! Feathered cape! Dramatic swoopy skirts! published on No Comments on Leg-o’-mutton sleeves! Feathered cape! Dramatic swoopy skirts!

 The new Dragon Keeper for V4 outfit hits all my aesthetic buttons. Well, except for pinkness and sparklitude, but I can add those. The feathered cape looks like the larger sibling of AprilYSH’s Calais Ruff, seen below looking fabulous on my standard model:
Continue reading Leg-o’-mutton sleeves! Feathered cape! Dramatic swoopy skirts!

Smashing!: Jareth’s latest outfit

Smashing!: Jareth’s latest outfit published on No Comments on Smashing!: Jareth’s latest outfit

Earlier today I mentioned Jareth in the same entry as various theatrically costumed rock stars from the mid-1970s. I think David Bowie, Freddie Mercury and probably Adam Ant [though not from the 1970s] would approve of the get-up below.
Continue reading Smashing!: Jareth’s latest outfit

Atomic Age lingerie!

Atomic Age lingerie! published on No Comments on Atomic Age lingerie!

Do you know how hard it is to find a digital version of one of those pointy bras from the middle of the last century? I thought I wouldn’t have any trouble, as this style appears popular with people who do "pinup," "vintage" or "retro" renders. Using these terms, along with "bra" and "lingerie," brought me nothing but a lot of girdles and garter belts. Hooray for girdles and garter belts [great band name!], but they’re not what I was looking for.

Further poking around ["1940s lingerie Daz Studio," "1950s lingerie Daz Studio"] revealed that the magical search term was "bullet bra." Using the magic phrase, I came up with outoftouch’s X14 Revenge for V4, which will do nicely for my purposes.

I have to wonder about the term "bullet bra," though. Is that really what people called it back then? I mean, I always thought they looked more like rocket cones. Either way, I find it fascinating how the aerodynamic, long and curvy look gained popularity not only in vehicular style, architecture and furniture, but also in clothing. Perhaps World War II and the ensuing arms race gave people weapons on the brain, affecting their sense of style so that, slowly and subtly, everything started to look like bullets, bombs, missiles, rockets and satellites. From today’s perspective, we think look up the aesthetic as a set of cool design elements, but it arguably represents a generation’s deep-seated and thoroughly legitimate fear that they were going to do themselves in with their own technology.

This entry was originally posted at http://modernwizard.dreamwidth.org/1643171.html. You can comment here, but I’d prefer it if you’d comment on my DW using OpenID.

Everyone’s getting older and/or fatter! ^_^

Everyone’s getting older and/or fatter! ^_^ published on No Comments on Everyone’s getting older and/or fatter! ^_^

I just scored Zev0’s Aging Morphs 2 for G2F on 60% off sale, which allows me to realize a long-held dream: old and/or fat digital people! Some of the morphs provide effects of aging, while others change the distribution of weight on the face. I’m gonna make everyone fat and wrinkly now!

..Well, except for Jareth. He’s not fat [not in his usual form anyway]. Aging, yes. Fat, no. But digital me and Jennifer and Allyson and and Felicia and Fay and Win, plus any other mini universe denizens I develop, plus all characters for Intellectum, are gaining fats and signs of aging. Now my digital populations can start to look like my doll populations!

This is gonna be so much fun!

This entry was originally posted at http://modernwizard.dreamwidth.org/1642862.html. You can comment here, but I’d prefer it if you’d comment on my DW using OpenID.

Baroque architecture, BDSM lust novels and very expensive puns: starring Jareth and Jennifer

Baroque architecture, BDSM lust novels and very expensive puns: starring Jareth and Jennifer published on No Comments on Baroque architecture, BDSM lust novels and very expensive puns: starring Jareth and Jennifer

I made this mini universe story this weekend just so I could have a chance to make this pun. Well, I also did want to use my new Montespan Interior Scene and Jareth’s fabulous Baroque outfit. Anyway, enjoy.

Note: Jareth is reading the third in the 50 Shades Trilogy. All the faces he makes come directly from my own reactions, although, in my case, there was a lot more yelling at the book. :p
Continue reading Baroque architecture, BDSM lust novels and very expensive puns: starring Jareth and Jennifer

Statues, dolls, robots, therianthropes and other humanoids

Statues, dolls, robots, therianthropes and other humanoids published on No Comments on Statues, dolls, robots, therianthropes and other humanoids

I got my first chance of trying to make a humanoid digital model into statuary when I make my digital replica of Story’s Angel of Grief. This was before I discovered the utility of shaders, so I created a seamless marble texture tile and laborious applied it to the angel’s body, hair, wings and dress, as well as her plinth.

Then Muusa The Myth, a character package and set for V4 by Forbidden Whispers, FWDesign and Daz, appeared on deep discount. It contains a fully human texture, a full stone texture and various textures to represent the character in the process of enstonement. The set, of course, contains a platform to stick her on after transforming her. I used the stone texture and my go-to texture for digital people, RBSD Merchant Base by rebelmommy and shellyw, to create a more stepwise progression on enstonement, thanks to the help of my limited Photoshop Elements skills. I really enjoyed myself, and I’m now trying to apply these skills to another set of stepwise transformation textures — this time, a tree. What type of tree depends on what type of tree I can find locally to scan bark and leaves from.

Anyway, back to statues. Now I have my own Ingenious Rock Shaders by JGreenlees/Daz, so I can make statues of people [and gravestones] without manual application of my own texture tiles. Whoo hoo!

I also just found this hilarious product in the Daz store: Canary3D’s Sculptural Genesis Ultra Fun Kit. It’s a kit of Daz shaders, full-body poses, hand poses, objects to hold and objects to stand on — all to aid in the creation of humanoid statues based on Genesis figures. The great number of material shaders alone make this worth the price, even if I weren’t going to use it for statues. The wonderful details — like the conforming fig leaf to stick in the statue’s crotch and the shades so that one can make figures into lamps — move the package from merely cool to must-have.

Yeah…like I need more humanoids in my runtime…

This entry was originally posted at http://modernwizard.dreamwidth.org/1642003.html. You can comment here, but I’d prefer it if you’d comment on my DW using OpenID.

New digital stuff I can’t wait to use

New digital stuff I can’t wait to use published on No Comments on New digital stuff I can’t wait to use

…But have to wait to use anyway, as my compooper is off in the shop, having its screen replaced.

  • Montespan Interior Scene by GreyCloudPublishing. Jareth’s fainting couch!
  • Flying Cadet Lola Pepper by Val3DArt. Besides dolls and robots, I apparently also have a weakness for gloriously impractical jetpack gear, of which this set is not my first. My favorite details here include the helmet with wings and ear trumpet, the uselessly cog-decorated vambraces and especially the hotpants with dynamite belt [a truly inspired touch!]. The helmet, vambraces and leggings go to robots, the top and dynamite shorts to — who else? — Jareth.
  • L’Arahna for V4 by Val3DArt. No human/spider hybrid dolls allowed in the house? No problem! I’ll acquire digital ones instead. Though I strongly object to the fact that the arachnid portion has eyes and fangs right below where the human portion meets it, I can deal with it. I’m thinking that I’ll use the arachnid portion as a robotic mobility aid for a character with a disability anyway, so maybe the eyes can be headlights or buttons or something. ["Wait — let me just hit the LEG RETRACT button…"] As a bonus, the package includes a heavily laced underbust corset and matching bracers.
  • Mildred Busybody by Tempesta3D and lunchlady. I don’t buy lots of characters, i.e., morph and texture packages, as I prefer to digitally sculpt my characters on my own using various morphs and then use one of my all-purpose textures on them. But sometimes it’s love at first sight, and I absolutely have to acquire someone. Mildred Busybody, with her caricatured features full of personality and her realistically aged texture, caught my eye in this way. This is exactly my sort of aesthetic, and it’s fabulous!
  • FWRD Aikaterine by FWDesign and renapd. I love this character’s face, especially the chin and the nose, plus the way they work together with the lips. As soon as I saw her, I said to myself, "Wow, she needs to gain about 200 pounds, and then she’d look awesome!" She would also look very cool in combination with Mildred Busybody.

This entry was originally posted at http://modernwizard.dreamwidth.org/1640869.html. You can comment here, but I’d prefer it if you’d comment on my DW using OpenID.

Digital pigs: free to a good home

Digital pigs: free to a good home published on No Comments on Digital pigs: free to a good home

Oh my God, these freebie Poser figures of pigs by Lyne are adorable. Look at the one rolling on its back! I need some free pigs stat! I notice that this person also has bunches of other free animals, always good to know.

This entry was originally posted at http://modernwizard.dreamwidth.org/1640186.html. You can comment here, but I’d prefer it if you’d comment on my DW using OpenID.

All G2F, all the time!

All G2F, all the time! published on No Comments on All G2F, all the time!

I moved all my main Daz dolls [me, Jareth and Jennifer] from the Genesis base to the Genesis 2 Female base. I have loads of gen 4 [Victoria 4] content that, for some reason, skips a generation [i.e., Genesis 1] and autofits on G2F much better than on G1. I assume this is because the lack of breasts on G1 messes up the V4 > G1 refit, while the presence of breasts on both V4 and G2F makes conversions much less painful.

Anyway, despite the presence of breasts on the default G2F shape, I can turn the figure into Jareth, who does not have breasts, without a problem. I assume the process will work for any minor characters — for example, Win and Frederick Ā — that I decide to port over from G1.

I’ve finally attained my long-awaited goal of 3-D digital people: a single base mesh that can encompass a vast diversity of body shapes AND fit pretty much anything on the market while doing so. Daz’ autofit feature allows the G2s [G2F and Genesis 2 Male {G2M}] to stretch the mesh of any outfit designed for them so that it will fit pretty much any combination of shaping morphs. Autofit also lets G2F wear G2M’s clothes and vice versa without expensive conversion processes. YAY EVERYONE CAN SHARE CLOTHES!

…In practice, of course, this means, “YAY I CAN ACCURATELY RENDER JARETH’S WARDROBE!” :p Just like the BJD version of him, the digital version of him demands vast and expensive quantities of clothing. Everyone else hangs around in jeans and T-shirts, which I think would cause Jareth Toxic Shock Syndrome if he put them on, and he wants masquerade-worthy get-ups. I’m certainly not complaining, though, because clearly I like playing dress-up.

Tangentially on the topic of masquerades, I just picked up GreyCloudDesign’s Montespan Interior Scene, mostly ’cause of the exquisite fainting couch. Makes me want to do some scene involving this set, the Totally And Completely Unrelated to Interview With a Vampire — Hah Hah Who Are You Kidding?!!! There’s No Copyright Infringement Here! Lestat de Lioncourt Suit for G2M and Chris Cox’ freebie Rococo gear [dress, textures and appropriately decorated wig] for V3/V4. Come to think of it, the two outfits complement each other well. I just need an excuse to get me into the first and Jareth into the second, as there’s no way I’m wearing something I can’t sit down in.

This entry was originally posted at http://modernwizard.dreamwidth.org/1639903.html. You can comment here, but I’d prefer it if you’d comment on my DW using OpenID.

Apparently I am stocking up for some Labyrinthian renders.

Apparently I am stocking up for some Labyrinthian renders. published on No Comments on Apparently I am stocking up for some Labyrinthian renders.

I took advantage of some discount coupons at Renderosity yesterday to purchase the following items, all of which make me think of my favorite movie.

First there was Beautiful Darkness, a V4 eye makeup resource by PureEnergy and hotlilme74, because Jareth’s eyeliner may be thick, yes, but it doesn’t make the sharply demarcated swoopy shapes that he prefers. Labyrinthian because the Goblin King has eyeliner as seen in this kit.

Next I started poking around in the "Fairy: Props/Scenes/Architecture" subsection of the marketplace, where I discovered that content creators have a puzzling obsession with making mushroom houses for sprite-like characters. While ignoring the plethora of fungus-based residences, I happened across ironman13 and EmmaAndJordi’s Enchanted Bubble, which I quickly snapped up. I can think of all sorts of fun things to do with this: blow soap bubbles, trap people inside it [okay, not so fun], scry with it, repurpose as crystal balls… Labyrinthian because magical balls [hah hah hah] feature prominently in the movie.

Then I clicked on yet another fairy ring set and discovered an adorable figure atop one of the mushrooms. A little research informed me that she was Anceata, one of a pair of figures by my latest favorite figure creator Nursoda. Of course I had to check Anceata and Semil out, and they promptly hopped into my cart. I tried to convince them that they were unwanted, as I already had a scrawny figure with a big bobble head, pointy ears and oversize hands [Telka, also by Nursoda]. However, Anceata pointed out her devastating cuteness, especially with her round and pointy little chin, wide mouth and glasses, so I allowed them to stay. Labyrinthian because Nursoda explicitly cites Brian Froud, designer of many Labyrinth puppets, as an inspiration for his work.

Links to other suggested products on Anceata and Semil’s page directed me to Poisen’s Eyeball Garden 2 Posable. I’ve always found the eyeball lichen one of the most memorable and inventive elements of Labyrinthian scenery, but also one of the most revolting. Since I’ve been kitting out my runtime with fantasy elements, I decided to toss the eyeball plants in there. I have successfully reduced my revulsion by telling myself that these are not actually plants with vertebrate eyes, but instead plants whose flowers mimic said eyes for unknown reasons. I’ll bet you money that the slightly sadistic alchemist responsible for other Experiments is behind the eye plants too.

By this time in my order, I was only cents away from $40.00, which would make me eligible for a 20% discount. I wondered if there was anything I could that would put me above that threshold. I went with Schurby’s Landscaping Hedges, mostly because, in a Labyrinthian mood, I was thinking of hedge mazes. They’ll also be nice for putting in front of digital houses, though.

Speaking of digital houses, I got another item recently that reminds me of Labyrinth: the Ant Farm’s NeverHome. This neighborhood of narrow, peaked houses resembles the ramshackle structures of the Goblin City in their brownness and pointiness. I like how they look realistic enough to be interpreted as standard residential buildings, but stylized enough to be slightly uncanny.

This entry was originally posted at http://modernwizard.dreamwidth.org/1638657.html. You can comment here, but I’d prefer it if you’d comment on my DW using OpenID.

The Experiments: Ramona, Linnea and Beep

The Experiments: Ramona, Linnea and Beep published on No Comments on The Experiments: Ramona, Linnea and Beep

Besides clothes for a very happy Jareth, I have also acquired some standalone digital figures or character morph packages mostly because I thought they were cool. I think of them as the Experiments, as the only reason I justify their inclusion in my runtime is that I imagine them to be the results of some slightly sadistic alchemist’s magic hybridization attempts.

Experiment One: Ramona.

Continue reading The Experiments: Ramona, Linnea and Beep

Digital disco fever

Digital disco fever published on No Comments on Digital disco fever

I have been wanting Stayin’ Alive for Hiro 3 for about six years, which is forever in digital time, but could not justify its $22.50 price. Well, it went down to $5.63 last month, so I tergiversated for a while, then decided that I still really did want it. Purchased! Still have to download the free complementary disco ball and dance floor… Gotta find an excuse for the denizens of the mini universe to throw a shindig…

This entry was originally posted at http://modernwizard.dreamwidth.org/1636526.html. You can comment here, but I’d prefer it if you’d comment on my DW using OpenID.

She looks like a fat Pippi!

She looks like a fat Pippi! published on No Comments on She looks like a fat Pippi!

I just bought Nursoda’s original Poser figure Vila this morning. Designed to be a small winged fairy, she comes with textures, hair, dress, wings, facial expressions and poses. I wasn’t in the market for her, but I picked her up because of her adorably stylized features, her lovingly sculpted fats and her similarity to Pippi Longstocking.

Upon getting Vila, I scaled her up, reduced the size of her head and gave her a full outfit, naming her Penni. Cuteness ensued. ^_^
Continue reading She looks like a fat Pippi!

Tiny toy toon train model

Tiny toy toon train model published on No Comments on Tiny toy toon train model

Look at this wonderful toony toy train setup for Poser/Daz. The whole thing is a freebie by mrsparky. Adorable! 

This entry was originally posted at http://modernwizard.dreamwidth.org/1630317.html. You can comment here, but I’d prefer it if you’d comment on my DW using OpenID.

Jennifer showing off the best $6.06 I’ve ever spent

Jennifer showing off the best $6.06 I’ve ever spent published on No Comments on Jennifer showing off the best $6.06 I’ve ever spent

Here’s Jennifer in progress. She’s supposed to look similar to me, but younger, rounder and blunter in the features. I took the digital me that I had made, fattened and rounded the face, plumped up the lips, widened the mouth, enlarged and rounded out the eyes and snubbed up the nose.
Continue reading Jennifer showing off the best $6.06 I’ve ever spent

I would actually wear [most of] this.

I would actually wear [most of] this. published on No Comments on I would actually wear [most of] this.

Digital me returns, now upgraded to a Genesis base.

Head is from is Daz3D’s Victoria 4.2 base, with V4 Morphs ++. Head morphs are from V4 Morphs ++ and Capsces’ Morphia. Skin texture is rebelmommy and shellyw’s RBSD V4 MerchantBase. Hair is freebie Boy Hair for V4 by 3Dream. 

Body is Daz’ freebie Genesis base figure, shaped with basic included morphs, as well as Jabba’s freebie Pinup Girl and freebie Junk in the Trunk, some of DieTrying’s 182 freebie morphs ported from V4, a few of RAMWolff’s copious freebie Genesis morph package, all topped off with some manual scaling of body parts by me. Skin texture is rebelmommy and shellyw’s RBSD V4 MerchantBase. 

From top to bottom, the outfit consists of Eden Evergreen’s freebie Tie-on Fantasy Sleeves for Genesis, Richabri’s freebie V4 Corset [the red bodice], the corset from SickleYield’s freebie Impractical Rogue [the black cincher], the short shorts from Daz’ Magus and dx30’s Thick Sole Boots 3. Background by propschick. Pose from Schlabber and cascarda’s eXpression for V3.

I would wear this all [and fuckin’ ROCK it! :p], except for the shoes, in which I would turn my ankles and fall over. High heels and I have never gotten along, which is why they go on digital me and not actual me.
Continue reading I would actually wear [most of] this.

Merry-go-round mecha mannequin

Merry-go-round mecha mannequin published on No Comments on Merry-go-round mecha mannequin

This digital dress and prop combo for V4, Amusement, just gave me the best idea for a doll. I would love to make a 1:6 scale ‘bash of a mannequin with a merry-go-round for her skirt. I could use a Harumika mannequin head [or any head really, spray painted white] and a Spin Master Liv Doll mannequin for the body. She could have Harlequin make-up and a tail coat and top hat like a ringmaster, with a huge balloon skirt in alternating panels of, say, red and gold to connote a circus. The only challenge is to find a miniature merry-go-round Ā that actually goes ’round. Bonus if it plays music…

Maybe Isabel needs a merry-go-round mecha mannequin in her house?

EDIT: Well, apparently, merry-go-round music box ornaments are a thing…and they’re the perfect size!

 

This entry was originally posted at http://modernwizard.dreamwidth.org/1616137.html. You can comment here, but I’d prefer it if you’d comment on my DW using OpenID.

Latest Daz dinking around: the CynBot

Latest Daz dinking around: the CynBot published on No Comments on Latest Daz dinking around: the CynBot

As I previously mentioned, I have put Daz and various stuff back on my computer for the purpose of goofing off. No therianthropes have been generated, but I have been making some fetish pin-ups. Today’s silly effort is the CynBot.

Cynthia 1.2 base, ASP bracers, Sisters of War gas mask and Bootylicious boots by bvh3d.com. V-BORG042V-1 and -2 by Reika-Kano. Background by propschick. Minor adjustment morphs to Cynthia and V-BORG parts by me.

This picture started with the Bootylicious boots, which are pretty much the Platonic Form of fetish footwear, as far as I’m concerned. They did not fit my go-to model, Daz Victoria 4, so I had to download the Cynthia 1.2 base just to have someone to put the shoes on. Fortunately, bvh3d also provides several extravagantly silly sets of fetish armor/underwear for Cynthia, pieces of which I used to make my bot.

The core of this picture depends, of course, on the lovely robo-parts made by Reika-Kano. These are not figures, meaning that they lack articulation. They are simple props that can be parented to the chest [the top part] and the hips [the bottom part] so that they will follow the poses that the body is put into [within reason]. For simple props, these parts feature stupendously detailed sculpting and many different material areas, meaning that the color, texture, reflectivity and opacity of pretty much every part can be adjusted. You don’t have to be a technosexual or an agalmatophile to appreciate the love and care that went into the development of these models.

Oh yeah, and the aforesaid robo-parts, as well as a bunch of other related stuff by Reika-Kano, can be downloaded for free from sharecg.com. Not only has this person put immense amounts of time and skill into creating these models, but they have done so for free! In fact, I constituted this render entirely from free items, from Daz Studio itself to all the elements of the picture.

Hilarious cyborg with silly gas mask and meretricious boots ahoy!

Continue reading Latest Daz dinking around: the CynBot

Oh God, it’s so beautiful!

Oh God, it’s so beautiful! published on No Comments on Oh God, it’s so beautiful!

Stayin’ Alive for H3 is a beautiful digital outfit. I try not to buy clothes for my digital people any more, but I think I’m going to cave because this is EXACTLY Will’s style. There are also disco ball and disco floor props. Whhhaaaa hooooo!

Black characters in LHF are now happy!

Black characters in LHF are now happy! published on 1 Comment on Black characters in LHF are now happy!

I found them some hair that doesn’t look like it’s been run through an ironing machine. [I think Materyllis might straighten her hair, but not Velvette, who has cumulus clouds of hair, and Janet, who has a fuzz cut.] Hey, Velvette and Janet and Susie and Materyllis! Realistic hair awaits….

The oldest vampire in Massachusetts

The oldest vampire in Massachusetts published on 4 Comments on The oldest vampire in Massachusetts

Ethan Stuart, leader of the Colos of Salem, is the LHF universe’s oldest vampire. He was in his 80s when he was vamped at the end of the 17th century, so there wasn’t much youth to preserve in the first place. He’s also wasting away, which explains his deliciously zombie-like condition [courtesy of the Mr. Happy package mentioned earlier]. Of course he looks exhausted and melancholy.

I have a crush on a walking corpse.

I have a crush on a walking corpse. published on No Comments on I have a crush on a walking corpse.

Mr. Happy, as sold at Renderosity, is a modification of an adult male digital model from robust and bland-looking to zombie-riffic. Morphs [sculpting mods] are included to make the model look that scrawny, as well as textures [skin] to make him appear rotten. Highly detailed and obviosuly crafted with love and a sense of humor, this package is an exquisite work of art…and this accolade is coming from someone who usually thinks that zombies are dull and uninteresting.

I keep making versions of Ethan Stuart, LHF’s oldest vampire [at almost 400 years], with versions of the zombie morphs supplied with V4 Creature Creator, but I don’t like the prospect of a V4-based vampire as much as I like the prospect of an M3-based, Mr. Happy vampire.

I just realized…

I just realized… published on No Comments on I just realized…

…I finally have enough skills to realize a project that has been bugging me for years: my music video to I Go Wild. Of course, it would be like a movie slide show because I refuse to animate it [it would take years], but I could do it nonetheless!! It’s a great excuse to get a straitjacket and some fiendish devices. [It’s a toss-up between MADLAB-4 and the Re-education thingy.] Alas, alas, no one would ever see it unless they personally came over to my home computer and looked at it because there is no way that I would put anything so explicit up on the Web.

I’m really looking forward to illustrating…

You left me; I’m braindead
I’m feelin’ nothing, strapped to my bed
On life support, tubes in my nose
Tubes in my arms, shot full of holes

In other, not really related news, Sadotronic would be a great name for a band, preferably a Norwegian death metal one that thinks it’s really edgy and blasphemous.

Seriously in love with “The Girl”

Seriously in love with “The Girl” published on No Comments on Seriously in love with “The Girl”

I wonder what the LHF characters would look like with toony heads all based on “The Girl” and more realistic bodies? Maybe they would achieve that doll-like look that I’m going for. Do you think they’d look like BeGoth characters? Here’s one who reminds me very much of Will.

I have a crush on “The Girl.”

I have a crush on “The Girl.” published on No Comments on I have a crush on “The Girl.”

I figured out why I like “The Girl” so much…She looks like a My Scene Barbie doll, and I love the stylized features of this line. Here’s some background on “The Girl,” including an interview with the creator, concept designs and a gallery.

I’m currently making a custom goblin morph for “The Girl,” no commercial morph packs required. The custom morph involves a primitive form of 3-D modeling with Daz’ version of magnets called D-Forms. It’s horribly fiddly and time-consuming, but a lot of fun to put my own impressions on an existing character. Right now she has big pointy ears, a little pointy jutting chin, a pointy little beaky nose, high cheekbones, slightly sunken cheeks and a high, sloping forehead. I want to sink her temples and add a mohawk of spikes on her head. šŸ˜€

Medusa de la Mer, or, Distracted musings of a therianthropophile

Medusa de la Mer, or, Distracted musings of a therianthropophile published on 1 Comment on Medusa de la Mer, or, Distracted musings of a therianthropophile

I just discovered that I have a free octopus model and a free mertail model. I should make a merperson with tentacular [yes, that’s the adjectival form of “tentacle” — I made it up] hair. Hmmm, now I’m thinking of that picture I did, combining a person and all the non-human animals I could think of. It was like a woman with horns and wings and claws on her hands, a centaur front half and some sort of fish tail. Oh yeah…and feline eyes. It was quite silly. However, I’m sure that somewhere someone has created a detailed world and culture for such beings.

This is the most beautiful 3-D modeling product I have ever seen.

This is the most beautiful 3-D modeling product I have ever seen. published on No Comments on This is the most beautiful 3-D modeling product I have ever seen.

It is a texture set and series of morphs for Victoria 3 called “Mary Ann.” The advertising text says she’s perfect for a “mom, a young grandma or even a witch.” However, I think she’s perfectly lovely for anyone over the age of 25. I especially like the light flush over her face, the hollows under her eyes and the brackets around her mouth. Where so many character sets look flat, flawless and stupid, with most of their variety appearing in the palette used, this character has obvious depth and personality.

Sexy but obviously stylized stuff: http://www.renderosity.com/mod/bcs/index.php?ViewProduct=51887&Start=91&TopID=11219.44031.44033. Lillith…lots of dribbly eye makeup…has second skins, but…sigh…

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/bcs/index.php?ViewProduct=50621&Start=121&TopID=11219.44031.44033. Diwania…eye makeup is too heavy…

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/bcs/index.php?ViewProduct=44503&Start=331&TopID=11219.44031.44033. Marilyn…lots of eyeshadow…

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/bcs/index.php?ViewProduct=44420&Start=331&TopID=11219.44031.44033. Rachel…a little less eyeliner…but definitely a frickin’ lot!

 

Plus de shit

Plus de shit published on 1 Comment on Plus de shit

 Goth Poser stuff from Renderosity.

Dark Moods [reflective] V4 http://www.renderosity.com/mod/bcs/index.php?ViewProduct=58167&Start=31&SearchTerm=vampire

Alexandra base http://www.renderosity.com/mod/bcs/index.php?ViewProduct=59479

Mark and Maximilan base http://www.renderosity.com/mod/bcs/index.php?ViewProduct=37061

Hair porn

Hair porn published on 3 Comments on Hair porn

Please check out this picture of Paradise Hair. It’s a hairstyle for the Daz 3D Victoria 4.1 female model. The Paradise Hair model consists of one ponytail on either side of the head with loose strands on the forehead and around the ears. Length of the ponytails can be varied. 

This particular hair model immediately inspired lust in me because it’s a realistic render of Anneka’s wild, full, gravity-defying ponytails. Streams of hair! Oceans of hair! Buckets of hair! I love the watery profusion of it all, as well as the shimmering highlights and the illusion of the strands being fine and possibly charged a bit by static. I love the way that it seems to be the work of an artist who starts drawing quick strokes for the ponytails and gets so into the groove of making those satisfying swooping motions that he or she just goes berserk with them. The result looks realistic, but it is not achievable in this particular universe. It’s a fantastical style done with not just great technical skill, but also great exuberance and relish, and for that I really esteem it.

Hair and clothes

Hair and clothes published on 1 Comment on Hair and clothes

Found more dresses for guys on the Daz 3D Web site in its official store…they were all hiding in the fantasy/sci fi category because no guy would ever want to wear a dress in real life. The stupid gender binaries of these rendering programs astonish me. On the plus side of things, I found Will’s sperm-crunchingly tight pants and fishnet shirt! More links.

Free shit on Renderosity!

Free shit on Renderosity! published on No Comments on Free shit on Renderosity!

Renderosity amasses many free things for Poser. I found several kitchens [Alexandra and Maximilian’s backdrop], a bar [the NIghtcrawler], a living room [Anneka and/or Will?], multiple bedrooms [Anneka and Will], a cellar [Janet and Velvette, a kid’s room [Geordie], kitchen cabinets [Alexandra and Maximilian], a toilet, a sink, a bathtub, beds with curtains, a folding screen [Chow and Baozha], a taser [Janet], a syringe [Janet], Pocky [Baozha], barrels of toxic waste [Janet], an egg chair [Will!!], a corner sofa, a wheeled table, all sorts of bookcases [Anneka, Will and Mark], office desks [Anneka, Will, Mark, Janet], candlesticks with unlit candles [Will], a fucking Gothic tomb with removable grave [Will], a “Dystopia Console” [Janet], hats, watches, BDSM equipment [Anneka and Will], a 5-ring earpiece [Baozha], open and closed books [Anneka, Will and Mark], wheelchairs [Maximilian] and lots more….

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