Bobbi Fox @BobbiCoulter

For the last 3 weeks, I have dealt with a intermittent issue on my grid that has about driven me nuts. I have tested, and eliminated possibilities …..without luck.

Yesterday two of the largest grid owners in open sim, Lone Wolf from Wolf Territories and Josh Boam from Aviworlds, took time from their busy schedules to help finally fix this issue. In addition , Rafael from Wolf Territories assisted. I cannot say thanks enough!

Although I work with Josh’s hosting business, this involved much more. Josh would not give up and recruited Lone Wolf.

In my opinion, maybe this is what opensim was designed to be: sharing of knowledge and helping each other.

Lone Wolf and Josh did not have to give up their time to help a tiny grid…..but they did!

Maybe we can all learn from these individuals!

Sharing knowledge is Caring



FYI. The default setting of 2 threadsets can cause major headaches depending on your region….it is way too low in some cases. You all probably know that…but I learned.

The early morning sun paints the sky with warm, golden hues as it rises on the horizon. The gentle caress of the wind fills the sail of the boat, propelling it effortlessly over the calm and glistening water. It's a perfect start to the day, with the promise of adventure and tranquility ahead.

As you gaze out over the water, you're treated to a mesmerizing sight. Majestic whales breach the surface, their massive bodies breaking through the shimmering waves, and they emit powerful spouts of water as they exhale. Their playful antics in the water create a sense of wonder and awe, as if they are celebrating the new day's beginning.

Amongst the whales, elegant manta rays gracefully glide through the water, their wings undulating like ethereal dancers. They add a touch of grace and beauty to the scene, as if nature itself is putting on a spectacular show just for you.

It's a moment of pure serenity and connection with the natural world.

friends-grid

...some people call it home!

(Picture with my sister on it because I didn't have anything else at hand...)

Yes, I know it isn't really beach season (unless you're on the Southern hemisphere or in some subtropic or tropic area). But on the other hand, if it's too cold to go to a real beach, there are plenty of virtual beaches where it isn't too cold.

Now, what I'd like to talk with you, the community, about is: What makes a good beach? What does a good beach need in your opinion?

Generally, from my point of view, a beach should be more than just eyecandy on a sim that serves another purpose (freebie shops, event location, welcome landing, whatever). A beach should serve its own purpose, namely the same purpose real-life beaches serve. And that purpose shouldn't only be sex either.

So there are certain things I expect from a beach. Fair warning ahead: I'm biased because I grew up between a whole lot of nice beaches, and I've been to quite a number.


First of all: It should be possible to go into the water. Possible, credibly so and not hazardous. The sand should slope into the water gently so you can actually walk out into the sea (or lake or whatever) just like you usually can in real life. This is such a basic demand that you may wonder why I mention it.

Well, in many cases, this isn't possible at all. Either you have textured ground which drops off steeply from one metre above the water surface to way below. Sand can't do that, and it renders the number one key element of a beach useless.

Or you have a beach made of mesh sections. But these pieces of mesh either only barely lead into the water, or the water-side edge lies on top of the water surface, and all that washes over them are the waves. You can't even walk into ankle-deep water without falling off the edge and seeing the large hollow underneath the mesh beach pieces. I guess this is often a case of a beach built by someone who spends so much time flying above their own sim that they've literally never set a single foot on their own beach.

So, either way, whether or not you build your beach out of mesh: Please let the sea ground slope away from the beach gently.

This, by the way, is also why springboards on beaches are non-sense. Unless you place them on piers where the water is deep enough.


Speaking of swimming: Swim rezzers.

They come either as a single white-and-blue life-saver (where you have to explain how a life-saver floating in the surf stays in place) or as two life-savers on a wooden pole (the more elegant solution). In case you don't know them: What they do when you click on them is rez another life-saver. You sit on it, it disappears, and you assume a swimming position, complete with swimming animations. You can steer yourself while swimming. You can swim like you walk, only that you swim. If you stand back up, the life-saver reappears. If you wait for long enough, it deletes itself. One swim rezzer can rez multiple of these life-savers.

Why do I deem them important? Because you may want to actually swim. And not stand in the water. Because that's what you do on beaches (in case you don't know because you've never been to one).

Some of you may confuse them with those old-style swim balls. They're basically poseballs for swimming: You sit on them, and you swim back and forth, back and forth, and you can't control where you swim. But seriously, 2011 called, it wants its OpenSim 0.7.3 tech level back. Poseballs may still have their places, but this isn't one anymore.


Now comes something that may not be interesting unless you "play it real" like me: What do you do after you've been in the water? Lay down on a lounger or a towel?

Nope.

When I was a kid, we were taught by the adults to take off our wet swimwear and slip into something dry ASAP. Real life isn't Hollywood where your swim trunks or your swimsuit is dry the instance you come out of the water (or after the next cut). Nope, it's wet and clingy and getting cold, no matter how hot the weather is. So I'd like to have a chance to do that on a virtual beach as well.

Now, either the sim is Adult-rated which usually (but sadly not all of the time) means that nudity is allowed. Or it's Moderate-rated, and nudity is allowed (but sex isn't), whether or not it's mentioned. Or you don't really "play it real" (layer clothes: replace your swimwear directly with something new; mesh: put on your new swimwear, wear two sets clipping through each other for a few seconds, then take off your old swimwear, or replace one full swimwear outfit with another one in one go).

Or you do "play it real", but you can't be naked in public, so you have to hide. The same goes for when you arrive on a beach in street clothes with no swimwear underneath, by the way.

Ideally, the beach provides changing cabins (with scripted doors, not just static decorational dummies!). If not, there should be something that you can go behind to change. This something should be a) placed in such a way and large enough that it's hard to look behind it (camming or intentionally walking in notwithstanding), b) large and opaque enough that it actually covers you up (knee-high shrubbery isn't) and c) arranged in such a way that you can easily walk behind it and back out (a 100-metre-long hedge isn't; a long dune is if it's tall enough because you can walk over it).


As for other things, there should be a difference between "natural" beaches and other beaches.

If a beach is "natural", there shouldn't be any more facilities. Maybe a few beach towels for convenience (and plants to change behind unless you're allowed to be naked), or rezzing should be allowed so that people can place their own towels.

Everything else should be left to beaches which are officially run by someone, but then it should be there. Loungers. Beach showers or even full facilities. Changing cabins if necessary (see above). A bar or two (a halfway credible beach would have more swim rezzers than beach bars, though). Ideally a place to get something to eat. Lifeguard chairs. (The latter three work even better with appropriately-dressed NPCs giving life to them.) Shops and a party area with a dance floor and a permanently installed DJ set don't belong on "natural" beaches either.

On the one hand, a fully stocked beach bar one some remote secluded beach island that doesn't even have a landing pier doesn't make any sense. On the other hand, a beach that's otherwise so fully equipped as though it's right in front of a resort hotel is kind of incomplete if you can't get anything to drink.


A few more things concerning the above: Please, dear beach builders, if you place down furniture such as loungers or towels, sit on them. Can you sit on them properly? If you can't, do away with them because they're just a waste of space and prim capacity. It doesn't matter if you have never sat down on furniture, and you never will. Other people do, believe it or not, they do.

As an extra precaution: If the sim isn't Adult-rated, and the furniture has a menu, look at it. If there's anything sex-related, either replace the furniture with something without sex animations or edit them out.

Also, inflatable, floating items only make sense in pools. If you place a pool floater or a bouncy island in the surf in real life, it will be carried away unless you anchor it very thoroughly. And none of the floating items on the Hypergrid looks like it's anchored at all. So no floaties in the ocean surf.


Last but not least: The "dress code" on the beach (and in the surrounding areas) should be clear, and visitors should be informed about it both in-world and on OSW if the sim is entered there. Textile? Clothing optional? Nude? It's nigh-impossible to safely assume from the rating (or from the culture wherever the builder lives). Adult may mean a full-blown nudist "piggy beach" of which there are dozens just as well as a textile beach on a sim that allows nudity only in one small and well-concealed nook with one piece of sex furniture. And even Moderate may or may not allow for nudity.

I don't usually support mesh bodies that have got nothing to do with Ruth2 or Roth2. But I've come across an improvement trick for Athena 6 with BoM that nobody seems to know.

The major problem is that the skin on Athena 6's limbs may look weird under certain viewer settings, much like a lighting bug. Some skin areas look brighter or darker than they should.

A minor problem is that alpha masks don't work on Athena 6 although they technically should with BoM.

The reason is because Athena 6 has a chaotic hodge-podge of alpha settings all over it. Parts are set to alpha masking, more parts are set to alpha blending (it's them which may look weird to you or to others), most have alpha off (this is why alpha masks don't work on Athena 6 out of the box).

The solution:

Step 1: Edit your Athena 6 body. All of it, not just any piece. Select it in your inventory while wearing it.

Step 2: Go to the Texture tab.

Step 3: Set the alpha mode to alpha masking.

Now the different shades of skin colour are gone, but your hands and feet may turn partially white. Don't panic, this is supposed to happen and will be fixed in the next steps.

Step 4: Set the mask cutoff to 128. If it is already 128, set it to 127 and back to 128.

The white should disappear, and your body should look normal again. Or better than what you saw previously.

Step 5: Take the body off and put it back on to save the new settings.

Also, you can now wear alpha masks like you can on the system body which might save you from the hassles that come with the alpha cuts on the HUD, and which you can save with outfits. The only limitation is that the alpha masks still don't work on fingernails and toenails.

Should alpha masks stop wearing, just edit the body and set the mask cutoff to 127 and back to 128.

The same method should work on Adonis 4 if you want to use alpha masks with BoM.

Oh, and before anyone tries this on Ruth2 v4 or Roth2 v2: You don't have to, at least not with the "BoM" bodies and Ruth2 v4 "Business". They've got alpha mode controls on the HUD. The "0.8.2.1" versions, on the other hand, are de-scripted and have no HUD, so they require this trick, too, if alpha masks don't work.

ANNOUNCEMENT - ANKÜNDIGUNG


[GERMAN VERSION]


Liebe Freunde and Starkies,

was wir heute ankündigen werden, fällt uns nicht leicht. Niki und ich, Mathilda, haben beschlossen, den Betrieb von Stark Islands nach dem 30. Juni 2021 einzustellen.
Wir haben uns viele Gedanken darüber gemacht, unter welchen Voraussetzungen wir Stark hätten weiterlaufen lassen könnten. Aber letztendlich hätte es zu viele Änderungen geben müssen und Stark wäre nicht mehr das gleiche gewesen. Außerdem haben wir uns außerhalb von OpenSim eine neue Aufgabe gestellt. Einerseits bedauern wir, Stark zu schließen, nach all der harten Arbeit, die wir in dieses Paradies investiert haben. Aber wir sind auch sehr stolz darauf, dass wir es bis nach ganz weit oben auf der Liste der beliebtesten Regionen von OSW geschafft zu haben. Das wäre ohne euch, unsere wunderbare Gemeinschaft, nicht möglich gewesen.
Deshalb möchten Niki und ich uns an dieser Stelle bedanken. Danke an alle Starkies für eure Unterstützung und Treue. Danke an unsere DJ’s! Jeder einzelne von Euch hat mit seinen mittlerweile legendären Sets zum Erfolg von Stark beigetragen. Danke an das Zeta Worlds Team, ohne dessen Unterstützung der stabile Betrieb einer solch leistungshungrigen Region wie Stark nicht möglich gewesen wäre. Danke auch an alle Besucher, die jederzeit herzlich willkommen waren und viele nette Kommentare und Likes hinterlassen haben. Wir wünschen euch allen von ganzem Herzen alles, alles Gute!
Für OpenSim wünsche ich mir, dass die Leute, die Grids, viel stärker zusammenarbeiten und nicht gegeneinander. Ihr seid ein Grid! Das Hypergrid! Nur gemeinsam hat OpenSim eine Chance.
Wir werden euch im Auge behalten und vielleicht, irgendwann, sehen wir uns wieder.

In diesem Sinne, lebt wohl!
Niki & Mathilda Stark

The Art Factory is about art and artists. At The Art Factory, we display art; we appreciate art; we learn about art; and, we promote art. We have over a dozen galleries dedicated to in-world artists, where they show their innovative creations. As such, we are beginning a feature called Meet the Artist.

This week we want to introduce to you, the very talented Nice Minik.

Ms. Minik, can you tell us a bit about yourself and your art?
My interest for VL-Photography started back in InworldZ with some photos of dancing Avis.
In 2017 the "Nice Minik" on OSG was created to try out "hypergriding" and to build a photo-studio with backdrops and "flat" lighting for Avi photo sessions.A visit of Ellen and Ernest in my first little gallery changed my virtual life.
Since that day I explored the photo-features of Firestrom and tried a lot of light-effects to make my inworld-photos more interesting. It comes in handy to be a prim builder (for certain backgrounds) and I also learned to create poses in the meantime.

And what are you doing artistically now?
Nowadays I can display model-sessions and themed series at "the Art Factory". And I was able to create some issues of the Stark Magazine.

So, what's the motivation behind your work?
Some of my work just tries to show beauty. Some may be a bit provocative. But I always try to find the mood, lighting and angle to take photos, that "tell a story". And sometimes I can even achieve that goal.
One thing stayed consistently through my development as an inworld-photographer: what you see is what I saw. That means, that I never do after-works on my photos.

What do you enjoy most about creating art in virtual worlds?
Besides that, I very much like to show virtual life in a way, that makes viewers enjoy what I enjoyed or maybe get an impulse to think about certain aspects.

Thank you for the interview, Ms. Minik!

Please stop by The Art Factory Reloaded and check out Nice Minik's art! It won't disappoint!

The current issue of Stark Magazine is another wonderful piece of work by our talented photographer Nice Minik. Strong photos in black and white are based on the theme of the cinema genre "Film Noir".

Pick up your copy of this ornate edition directly from the Stark landing point, or take the entire vendors with you.

The first time ever in open sim, a magazine dedicated to Hentai in all its glory. This magazine will have you all racing to the store to get many copies. Hehehehehehehe!
It is rude and it is fun so please dont take offence. It is A rated but not malicious or ill meaning.

You can get old or new style vendors containing the whole range of Stark! magazines from the welcome area at Stark Islands.

Enjoy!!!!!!!!!!

The new Stark! magazine is out now!

Nice Minik from Stark Islands ZetaWorlds did another great edition as photographer with the beautiful Vanessa Mondar, her model and muse.

You can get your copy of the magazine and vendors at the Stark landing point.

Profession: Dj Perfomer since 2008.
Donations: https://www.paypal.me/YaKaClub

- Every Thursday@Stark Island-01pm.03pm (Germany) - Opensim
With my Beautifull Host Lady Bobbi ♥

Limousine: hg.zetaworlds.com:80:Stark

OUT NOW! The new Stark! magazine with the famous Nice Minik as photographer and model! I can promise, you'll see new sides of OSGrid's most popular photographer. Definately worth a closer look!

Get your copy of the magazine and vendors at the Stark landing point.

This is the repost of the Stark! magazine with the submissive Mina Sato and the famous Ernest Moncrieff, well knows as singer and curator of The Art Factory (OSGrid), with a kids-friendly-cover. ;-)

Get your copy of the magazine and vendors from the Stark landing point.

We are proud to present you the new Stark! magazine with the famous Nice Minik as photographer and the stunning model Bobbi Coulter. This issue is definately worth coming by at Stark to grab your copy.

You can get your copy of the magazine and vendors at the Stark landing point as usual.

Comment to the review of MarkZyn at Stark:
Beeing unfriendly to our visitors is not the nature of either me or Niki. You can ask whoever you want, so I guess you never got in contact with us. Child avatars aren't allowed at Stark, but we can't be there the whole time to see who is on. So if you have a problem with something or someone it would be nice if you would have get in contact with me BEFORE you write such an unfair and defamatory review. But I guess that was all you wanted. Your account is brand new and empty, seems to be created just for that reason.