Looking back... And looking forward.

Its that time again, another World Goth Fair is going on here, with a lot of really awesome things, and some stuff from Atomic Faery, too.  I've been in every World Goth Fair now, and its a very special event for me; it was the first event I was in with Faerycat Designs.  Besides, goth.  And this year I'll be DJing from 8 am until 10 am at the Gothika Mobile Unit, getting my own version of goth on with my usual twists and turns.

But last year was a bad one for me.  I'd switched from Faerycat designs to Atomic Faery last January to go into a partnership with someone very close to me in real life, someone I'd known for over 20 years.  World Goth Fair 2014 was going to be our first one working together, and we were all set up and ready to go when I was awakened the morning of May 15 by a sick cat, to one dead partner.  Luckily, we were set up. 

This year, well, its still bittersweet.  I still love the event, I mean, what's not to love, but its also a marker for something that's sad too.  Today would have been his 46th borthday, and part of this post is about memory, and rebuilding.

I forgot to switch out my wings when I took this picture.  But, for World Goth Fair this year, there are some techno-gear wings, a pair of boots based on some I got last fall [which I am wearing], and a special release for tomorrow, Roses have Thorns necklace [which I'm also wearing].

The rest of what I'm wearing: Slink Physique, Visage, Hands and Feet with a custom skin.  Sidhe ears I made that I need to update for a re-release, hair by Magika [Meadow], NV Fluffy tail, jeans and cropped tee that I made forever ago.

Sim is Fox Meadows and the portion is Tempus Fugit and Atomic Faery.  There are other places in the background.  If folks want to use it to take pictures, feel free to drop by.

A break of sorts

While my store alt[s] get the burden of doing the work as far as uploads and ad pictures, in the end it is still me doing the work.  With Lovecraft's Wake behind me and this round of A Tattered Page about to end, I feel I can take a short break before getting myself into working on gothy things and also getting the store finished [Its built, just need to restock things, including a lot of event items].

A long time ago, I hurt the muscles in my right shoulder in a car wreck.  While most of the time they work just fine, recently I had a flare up.  To say its painful is something of an understatement, so I spend a lot of time with a heating pad and ice packs.  But, I did offer to make something for a friend's RLF team to sell, and I did get it finished.  And sometime soon I'll be making the hud for the normal version [the RLF version is an exclusive].

I suppose I should post this over on the shop blog, but since this is rambling and not a simple announcement, I figured it fit here.

I have a lot of things I want to do.  And not all of it is Atomic Faery sorts of things, or might not be.  Right now I've technically got two shops; Atomic Faery and Facade Noir.  With my shoulder still acting out, I expect more items to come out from the latter.  I also need to get Tempus Fugit open properly.

And I'll be trying to blog a bit more regularly again, as well.

A Faerycat goes to a Wake pt1

Hello everyone.  Another event that I'm blogging for, though since I set up the bloggers for this one, not sure if this counts as a major victory; of course I'd pick myself as a blogger. [Okay, no, not really, but I did want to increase the blogger pool for this event, so here I am].

There are some lovely things, and I plan on featuring more things later, but the event is only going on until the 22nd of this month, and there is Entertainment! planned for this weekend and into the next, so I really wanted to get a post done this week.

Its a wake.  And on sunday, it will be the anniversary of H. P. Lovecraft's deathday.

So, entertainment stuff:
      Saturday, DJs Sred and Khaos will be spinning tunes for folks in the main graveyard
      Sunday, DJs Elwood, Beth and Sirius will be spinning tunes for folks in the main graveyard
      Wednesday, Zoltan Mint will be running an RPG event at a special location.

More info can be found http://lovecraftswakesl.blogspot.com/

Credits
Body: Slink Physique with hands, feet and head.
Skin: Custom
Shape: Custom
Hair: Magika Dreamy
Tail: NV Fluffy

Dress: Facade Noir - Sonia Dress [Lovecraft's Wake]

Graveyard and Tentacle Candle: Howling Asylum [Lovecraft's Wake]
Ground Polyp and Mushrooms: Pixelancer [Lovecraft's Wake]

Come out and join us.

From a Creator's PoV - Feb 18

I didn't have a topic last week, maybe because I was actually sick as a dog.  And had a lot I needed to do for some [wonderful] real world stuff.  But I have a topic for this week that covers how entitlement affects us creators.  I'm sure there are entitled creators too, but this week I'm going to concentrate on the other side, as it affects creators and creating.

But -I'm- special! or how to ruin the day of a creator over a couple of dollars.

This has never personally happened to me, but I can imagine how crushing it would be for me if it did, and also I do see what my fellow creatives say when it happens to them.  I touched on this a little on my last two blog posts for this series, in the whole Gacha culture, and in the weird disconnect there is with real world equivalencies to the linden$.  But it can get pretty harried for us when people get upset over being told 'no'.

Okay, let me step into the shoes of someone who really wants X.  Let's define X as a pair of totally cool boots.  I -really- want these boots, they have daggers on them, and people who know me know I adore sharp, pointy things [I have a lipstick dagger somewhere in a box].  I need these boots.

And hey, I have a blog, let's apply to be a blogger for the store, then I don't need to pay a couple bucks for the most awesome boots ever.  So, I send in a query for being an official blogger so I can get the boots, and get told no.  Maybe I was told no because they aren't looking for bloggers, or maybe its because I'm not really the best fashion blogger.  But I was told no.

Now, there are two ways to deal with being told no.  You can take it like an adult, or you can act like a petulant child and throw a tantrum.  Now, honestly, I don't think an SL tantrum is the same as one a 3 year old would throw, but they strike me as being just as immature.

So, let's say I decide to throw a tantrum.  First, I get all my friends to start pestering the creator of those boots, and trying to convince them that I'm special, that my blog is the most wonderful blog ever.  Or I get the boots anyway, from MP, and decide to leave a horrific review.  Real mature, right?

Let's go to something I -do- know, bad marketplace reviews.  I've gotten two of those, I know how bad they make you feel.  Some of them are just imformation, like 'I never got the item' and while the 1 star sucks, anyone reading that who knows about MP, knows that sometimes things don't get sent, you contact the merchant, they fix, no big deal.

But sometimes, the reviews are just hurtful; like when you used yourself as a model and people say it looks hideous.  And sometimes, the reviews don't even make sense, either the review itself is positive with a low rating, or a high rating with a negative review.  But the thing is, using reviews to basically throw a tantrum is just low.

So, back to those boots.  If I get told 'I'm sorry but your just not what we want in a blogger', or 'I'm sorry, but we're not taking any bloggers', then to get mad and petulant about it is just plain silly.  I'm sorry, but no isn't usually anything personal.

Or here's another one, and I guess that this one does cover creators with entitlement issues; I've applied to events, I think by now most creators with shops have.  Four different events have told me no.  In one case its because [I'm still working on this] I didn't have enough merchandise in my shop for one of the criteria [I thought I did, but I think skins with the same base count as recolours].  At least one time was because my main theme for the store didn't fit the event genre [I applied because I wanted to branch out a bit], and a third I think because I don't currently have stuff of the rating that the event covers [again, that is changing].  Not sure on the fourth, all I can figure is my application was over the limits for the event, so they had run out of room.

I -could- have gotten all petulant and pouty, but why?  Especially now I'm on the other side of the event thing.  You only have so much room, even if the event covers 12 sims or is a hunt.  You can't always say yes to everyone.  There are plenty of reasons not to accept every request.

Anyway, for those who get told no - think about why, take it in stride, and deal.  And for those who have to tell someone no?  Just remember the reason why you said no, and try not to let any tantrums ruin your day.

Lions and Tigers and.... plush Cthulus? oh my.

A picture post!  I know I promised a picture post, and since next week I'll be out of town and unable to take as nice of an image, it has to be this week.

A few weeks ago, our landlord for the club [Tempus Fugit] and the store [Atomic Faery] said he was moving to estate instead of mainland and asked us to come with.  Since he's an awesome landlord, we said yes! and for the last week or so, I've been in the process of a complete rebuild/redesign of the whole mess.

I'd asked for some constructive criticism from some of my friends, and I got it, and hopefully this is a more cohesive look.  Also, in the redesign, the club got pared down from two buildings and a stone circle to one building that's designed to be a cozy-ish hangout.  The standing stones will come back, and the garden, but that's something I can do as the mood strikes.






See, I've got other things to do as well, important things.  Somehow I found myself running an event with some other awesome folks.  I really want to talk about this, and encourage folks to apply.  It is a Lovecraft Event, and we do want themed items, however, I really am afraid most folks automatically think 'Cthulu' and don't go any further.  Although this little guy sitting on the dock of the bay [lake] looks positively cuddly, doesn't he?

See, HP was a writer, and while his stuff about scary things that lurk beyond the ken of mortal men is the best known, he did do other stuff.  My partner even found out he'd done a romantic comedy story yesterday, while doing more research.  And...  you can do stuff inspired by his life (August 20, 1890 – March 15, 1937), too.

Anyway, this is my update, as it were.  You can find out more information about the event over at 
http://lovecraftswakesl.blogspot.com/ and we do still have spaces open.

And hopefully the club and store will be reopened soon.
  Until next time...


-------------------
Cthulu is the AB Cthulu - Curdled Steampunk

From a Creator's PoV - Feb 4

There will be a blog post with pictures this week, I promise!

Last week I mentioned that I'd had this awesome idea for a blog post that I wanted to share, but then I'd forgotten it; until near the end of the one I did do.  So, this week, the topic is just how much are you paying for items in Second Life, and is that really a fair price for the hard work of creators.

First off, yes, I know that things in Second Life are ephemeral, not as much as food maybe, but we also do not need to eat in SL, either.  And SL might be less durable than WoW, but I'm sure people who bought extra costume packs in City of can tell you that even that can be an illusion.  So, yes, its 'not' real, like a chair in Real Life, but its still something that exists, like an MP3, which is a virtual thing as well.

So, how much is a linden dollar actually worth?  It varies, based on market fluctuations, but one l$ is worth [are you ready for it?] .4 cents.  That's all.  So that roughly, 1000 linden dollars is $4 USD.  Or, to put it in terms of an outfit, you can get a decent wardrobe of stuff from top notch creators for about $10 USD or less.  And you can effectively get plastic surgery [mesh body parts] for less than $15 dollars.

So, why do so many people complain about how much they spend in SL, then start rattling off these high linden dollar amounts?  Is it because 20,000 lindens sounds like a huge sum?  Well, okay, it might start going into large sum numbers, since it would be roughly $80 USD, but let's look at the creator's side of the equation before we start griping, shall we?

What goes into an item for SL

Okay, time for a breakdown on how creative work works [well, really any work - minimum wage in the US is somewhere around 10 an hour, unless you wait tables [that's still 2 something an hour + tips, last I heard].  Okay, so, on to the discussion at hand.  Let's say I'm making some jewelry.  I've made a fair bit of jewelry, even if its not all made it in world, so it might take me an hour or so to come up with my design, then another few hours to model, UV unwrap, texture, and make some lower definition meshes to cut down on the LI costs in SL.  So, we're looking at about four or five hours of work so far.  At minimum wage this would come to about 60 dollars, or 15000 l$ worth of work.

Then, of course, you need to upload your piece into Second Life, along with the textures.  Let's say I'm going to offer four different metal textures and nine different gem textures.  Okay, if I combined the entire mesh onto one texture, I can get the four metals onto the same textures as the gems, so nine textures and the mesh.  This is roughly another 100 l$ in upload costs.  Another hour or so in assembling either a hud, or the individual pieces in all combinations.  Then packaging and taking images for the ads, which need to be uploaded as well, so if you -aren't- using a hud, that is another 360 l$ in upload fees for those, and another few hours in taking all those images.

We're up to nine or ten manhours of work for one necklace, and an additional potential of almost 500 l$ in additional costs.  This means that one necklace costs roughly 25,500 l$ or over $100 USD to make.  Some folks might work faster or slower, I figure I'm on the average side of work flow, especially on the assembling and image taking side of things.

Okay, I -know- that we can now sell as many copies of this necklace as people want to buy.  Surely we'll make up that cost quickly, right?  Well, in theory, yes.  But let's say you are in a niche market.  There are only so many goths, for example, or roleplayers, or faery types.  Let's say I opted to do everything as a hud - that probably cuts out a good two hours of work, since I already have the basic hud setup done, and I'll only need to take a few pictures of the product to make my ads.

But there is only so much I can charge for my piece before people won't buy it, and I'm really niche, so that already cuts into how many folks will buy my stuff.  So, I'm maybe charging 300 l$ for a piece that is effectively an uber fat pack.  To make back the money spent making the item, I need to make sixty-nine sales.  That's to break even.

That's break even assuming our time is worth the same as someone working at a fast food restaurant, though.  Really, artists are skilled labour, we ought to be making twice that an hour.  So, that means really we need to make one hundred and thirty seven sales to make what our time is conceivably worth.

I'm not putting this out there to discourage creators.  Second Life is, among other things, a wonderful sandbox environment.  It is a good place to learn how to model and work with others, and could lead to skills that are worth real money.  If you enjoy it, then keep with it!

But before you complain next time about how much something costs, or how much you spend, think of how much it actually was, how much the creator is probably actually making, and then if you still think its too much, then complain away.  But I somehow think most of you won't complain after all.

Because 5000 l$ really isn't much for cosmetic surgery after all.

From a Creator's PoV - Jan 29

Before we start on this week's topic, I wanted to clarify some thoughts on last week's topic, specifically Mod perms.  There are certainly some very good exceptions, usually involving scripting that could very easily get broken unintentionally if the item is modded.  I still think that allowing someone who is good at modding to receive a moddable version is a good thing, but then I've only made one vehicle in all my time in SL [that being where I heard the most exceptions to the modding bit], so its quite likely it just leads to too many headaches.  So, consider this an addendum to last week.  Some things need to remain no mod for sanity reasons.

Onward to this week's topic.  I originally had this absolutely brilliant idea, but I forgot it, perhaps do to a kerfluffle on an a third party SL [and other things] forum about Gacha machines.  So, since I'm thinking about them anyway, I figured I'd talk about how I feel about them as a creator and as a consumer.

First of all, the whole discussion that brought about this topic for this week is; Are Gacha machines gambling.  Apparently, at least some people think it is, but...  its not, unless buying a pack of CCG cards is gambling, or baseball cards, or using a gumball machine is gambling.  Since, the last time I looked those were legal in states with gambling laws [outside of lotteries, gambling was illegal], I don't see how a similar mechanic that deals in pennies of Real World money would become gambling.

Now, you can have buying addictions; I've known people who had to buy just one more pack of Magic the Gathering cards, because the rare they wanted was in that next one.  And there are folks who will put in thousands of lindens trying to get that rare from the gacha machines in world, too.  But it doesn't make it gambling.  Not gambling in the legal sense.  You always get a prize unless something has gone wrong.  Just like you make a 'gamble' that when you put your quarter into the machine to get a red gumball, you will get a gumball, it just might not be the colour you want.

So, random chance doesn't mean gambling, it means you have a chance of getting the specific thing you want, but you will always get a thing.  Besides, as someone who's favorite colour is blue, I rarely want the rares anyway.  I want a common, and I'm fine not getting the rare.  Of course, you know, then we come to -set- gachas.

Set Gachas are probably a very profitable way to go.  You put money in trying to get the whole set and of course, because of how the RNG works, you end up with 20 or so of one thing, because you don't just get what you haven't gotten before.  I'd never do these myself, because I like to keep things as simple as possible, and this isn't my personal cup of tea.  Still, if each item will work on its own?  Its still ethical, and if there were some pieces I'd be happy with, I'd consider playing them, I just wouldn't be inclined to set up my own machines like this.

Now, my biggest problems with gachas personally is rezzables.  I've gotten some freaking adorable items from gachas, early on; piggies in tea cups, lamps.  But I won't rez them because SL eats things.  So they sit in my inventory.  I myself have always offered to trade out trans items for copy ones, once trading was done.  I -know- that other creators do this too, which is a great thing to offer.  After all, who wants to saddle someone with 20 black and white top hats that they could copy.  Not good business practice, in my opinion anyway.  But you know, they could trade those, then whoever ended up with them would have that option; trade it in for a copy version.

Something folks need to understand though.  Some people might sell their gacha items individually [or in a collector's box], or give you one if they see you've spent a good $10 in real money on the machine and are inclined, HOWEVER, some gacha events have rules/agreements in place where you as a creator can't do that.  And that's fine, there is a culture around those events to allow for a healthy resale market of these things.  Its sort of like breedables, without the constant expense of food.

As a creator, the reason I do not mess with gachas much any more, its a rampaging pain in the arse.  It really is.  I'd say there is about twice as much work into setting up for a gacha, and that's with a supplied machine from the event.  That's not including if you need to make some for yourself.
I won't go much beyond this, this week, since it starts going into a different topic.

And now, as I finish this, I remember my topic idea from the beginning of the week, and it will be something we do next week.  But just a reminder to those who think spending 2k lindens on a gacha machine as being a scam?  That is a whopping $8USD.