Okay, this is really, really… weird.

I was in a class at Caledon Oxbridge and realized that it was a little more basic than I needed (though it was about making them, it was actually about finding and wearing clothes and attachments). So on a whim, I whipped out my iPhone and tried to log in my alt to see what would happen (yes, I know it’s possible to log in with multiple computers and laptops, but this… this is an iPhone, people).

And… succeeded. But in a truly odd way.

From Northwest Indian Images

He’s a wizened little boy in need of a shave and a haircut. 2 bits? Heh. There I am, standing behind my “child.” And if you really know me, you know how intensely creepy I find this idea.

I have no idea why he’s half-size, except that it may be because he’s logged in via the iPhone app (Touch Life). As he’s got an animation overrider loaded, he changes stands, and can move after a fashion, although I ended up teleporting to his location. Turns out I’d logged Dhughan out at the Caledon Oxbridge sandbox, and currently the viewer is set to log him in from at his last location, so there you are. Or there I are, and me too.

Good thing I don’t care about people knowing my “real” identity, along with both of my Second Life personae, or I wouldn’t be able to quickly share the bloggy goodness via Picasa’s “upload” feature.

And oh drat, Vista and Picasa Web Albums have conspired again to put the image on a new album page. That’s another reason I’ll be making a big change to this blog soon. Although it’s very convenient to use Picasa sometimes, because it can upload an image to a web album, it has its own ideas about naming folders, nesting folders within folders, and creating new web album pages based on the folder name unless carefully watched.

So: although I didn’t create anything new tonight, I did decide to get a domain name for the new venture, and I found some wonderful public domain images and inspiration today. Big plans afoot, though not anything as big as Natalia’s new sim for the store she’s rebuilding. This blog will soon be re-directed to the new domain, which will be a WordPress blog (yay! Categories! Widgets! CSS Drop shadows (don’t ask)!

I have so many ideas, but still learning how to make stuff, texture stuff, build stuff, and sculpt stuff. I end up talking to myself while trying to figure it out, kind of like talking to Dhughan here, except not as intellectually stimulating.

As in:

WTF?? GIMP whoooooooooooo? Sculptypaint whaaaaaaaaaaaa? WTF WTF… oh! ok.

Yeah, there’s been some swearing and banging and Googling and frankly wasting a lot of time reading posts on Second Life-type forums while looking for tutorials and how-to guides (and also getting a feel for the rough and tumble in the discussion boards, not to mention figuring out who not to piss off if possible).

However, I’ve actually succeeded in getting acceptable results for a “marketing” type image to use on XStreetSL (which the cool kids all hate now, of course, but it’s a place to start).

I still have to figure out some kind of “getting things done” workflow to help me stay on task with SL as far as getting an idea out of my head and on to the screen without losing interest halfway through and starting some other half-baked idea. So far I don’t get much done on weeknights other than chat with friends and attend classes; but I can’t always count on having uninterrupted time on weekends AND I tend to make new n00b friends easily that I meet in class, which also leads to more chatting and less creating.

Dhughan is going to have to be less of a social butterfly, that’s for sure.

My plan is for Dhughan to be self-supporting, and he’s made something saleable at least. It needs to be packaged for XStreetSL, too.

Maybe he’ll be able to get more done tomorrow… or else I’ll have another one of our little chats.