Reel Expression

Dig it kats and kittens: a new service. Starting this week, I’m taking requests to turn any modeling pose into an AO. How it used to work is that someone would suggest it and I’d maybe eventually get around to it.

Here’s how it will work now:
- Send me or Sara Primrose a notecard with the pose name(s) you want converted. Or you can use our emails found in the contact page.
- I will convert and release them every monday that I have requests in the order the notecards are recieved. If I get too many requests, it may take a while to get yours in but I will.
- I will post here with the names of the modeling poses and what the new AO pose is called and give it it’s own catagory of pose -> ao.
- I may or may not send a list out to those that requested poses. I’m going to try but I’ll have to see how it goes.

I’ve had many people ask why I don’t release “AO ready modeling poses,” but there is no simple answer to that. Personally I see the poses as something other than a natural way to stand which is what an AO should be. Most of my current AOs are converted poses because I don’t like making AOs (or using them) and because they have been requested. However, I do have a couple of AO sets that are being worked on slowly, but I want to give the chance for people to choose. Chances are if there is a pose you want as an AO, others will too.

The differences between a modeling pose and an AO pose are rather minor but important:
- Priority. Animations are uploaded with a set priority to decide which will override. I set my modeling poses as the highest priority so nothing will mess up your shot. However, AOs will be uploaded with a lower priority so gestures and the typing animation will show through.

- Head and Neck:
If you don’t animate the head and neck, your head will turn with the direction of the camera. Most people like this for AOs, but it doesnt work well for modeling poses. Plus with my poses I like to have specific head movements that will not work for an AO.

12 new poses out perfect for the runway and photo modeling. From here on out every pose set will have an ease in and out that will make going into the pose natural, making them perfect for runway work and modeling huddles! All the old sets will be reuploaded for the new store opening hopefully June 15th?

Currently only at my main store and available as a set (800L) and individually (100L each).

The short story:
I’m closing my store for a few hours today to reprice everything as a test for the next month. Think of this as more like a sale which is only at my main store and I will reevaluate again when the new store opens, which is looking like June 15th. I don’t want to call it a sale because the prices may stay that way and I like being honest. More detailed info:

1. Newest poses: 100L, Midrange: 75L, Older: 25L.
2. Packs of 12 poses for 800L - which means 4 poses free.
3. Couples poses: 150L
4. AOs: 100L

The same high quality you’ve always trusted, at a better value than ever.

What I need is your feedback. Buy stuff! Send me IMs, notecards, reply with comments, or send email to luth[at]reelgeek[dot]co[dot]uk.

*UPDATE* Sim is now reopened and prices have been changed to the above.

The longer version:
SL is an ever changing world and a business can really suffer if you don’t pay enough attention. I’m not one to be on the forefront of anything and I can definatly tell you animators don’t really hang out or even talk. Maybe they do but I’m just not included :P Who knows really. But all those months of being too tired to do anything at all and yet still couldn’t sleep a lot of stuff happened in the modeling pose world and SL in general.

First of all, I hear that prices across the grid has dropped for good or bad. Especially on skins. Add that to the influx of pose makers who have varring degrees of quality but mostly rather low prices. Now, that has happened constantly for the past 4 years and will continue. Some keep going and some don’t. However, I’ve been noticing more and more that people are using bad quality poses for their ads while trolling the forums and the fashion feed. It’s looks like a downward spiral heading to 2 years ago when the majority of ads used broken poses. By bad quality I’m not saying “not mine,” but ones with broken bones - especially the arms and shoulders -, broken skin meshes and torso twisting. I am planning a post with picture examples comming soon.

It’s not like I’m taking too much of a hit sales wise, at least since I started making more stuff. But I am curious what the reasons are for this grid wide change. Is it a moving on to something new? Is it supporting mates? Is it that I’ve fallen off the grid? Or is it that the price drop for everything else made my mine just too high? Or is it something else entirely? There isn’t much I can do about most of those, except for keep making new stuff, tell you guys about it and trying a price reduction. It’s not like I’m going to start cold IMing designers and try to be mates, that’s just not my style.

The last time I did a reprice I asked a lot of different types of content creator mates what their amount of working time on average and what the price was. This is because when I went to the 150L range, few animators seemed to spend a great deal of time to make sure bits weren’t broken. See, the software that we use (poser, qanimator, ect) doesn’t have limits of rotating joints where it doesn’t break the skin, joint, or bone in world. So it’s a constant struggle to find those limits and then ways around them to get the look that you want. Time + quality should = a higher price right?

However with the recent purchase of a 2nd flat screen monitor, tweaking poses is much easier and quicker.

Over the past few weeks I’ve been traveling around the grid in search of ranges of quality and price. I wrote out a table that I’ll never share because it might just seem too mean. There are some that are over priced based on their quality against others and a few that are under priced. This entire thing would have been a lot easier had it been a little more clear cut.

The range actually is 10L - 100L, with me still the only one I could find at 150L. Ok, I agree that is too much of a price difference with the raise of quality of some animators. The only reservation I have right now is that some priced at 100L with more breaks and tears then what I was doing 3 years ago with a laptop. I’m not saying I’m the best stylistically or in innovation. I sure can tell you that I have no idea what people want and just make what I feel like doing. But I think we can agree that mine are up there in terms of naturalisim and works well with the skin and clothes mesh.

I’m going to watch this month very closely, hopefully get some feedback and make a permanant decision later.

Cheers!
Luth

We did the interview on Sat while I was mildly hungover, tired and slightly on the side of nervous. So if you want to hear me talk about being drunk, monkey poo, Philip smoking too much pot, and a bit about animations….

www.daphneandtamara.com