This is Dave the technical director of Forsaken Studios which is the studio I am working as the texture artists on the development of MMORPG game, Embers Of Caerus.
Elizabeth Gallagher Freelance Environment & Game Texture Artist
Wednesday, 22 February 2012
Saturday, 4 February 2012
Decorative Metal Tile Textures By Elizabeth Gallagher - TRU Textures
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| Click to Enlarge. |
The Monochrome collection is split into four sets priced 350 Linden Dollars per set.
The coloured collection has 18 textures and priced 450 Linden Dollars.
You can see them by clicking this SLurl
They will also be available from the Second Life Marketplace.
Monochrome here
Coloured here
For use outside of Second Life, from the TRU Textures website later today.
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| 40 Different Designs. |
Sunday, 29 January 2012
Snoring Dormouse with sound - listen
THE cutest video I have seen in many years....I want one! lol soooo adorable.
Wednesday, 25 January 2012
Seamless Animal Skin Hide Tent & Throw Textures Version II
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| Version Two |
10 seamless cow, buffalo, pony and bear hide skins thrown on top of each other as they would be in the days of Vikings or for RP Gorean locations.
They can be purchased now from within SL by clicking this Slurl
They will also be available from the SL Marketplace.
For use outside of Second Life, you can purchase them under an extended license from the TRU Textures website and contentparadise.com very soon.
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| Click to enlarge |
Friday, 20 January 2012
SOPA PIPA - Stop Online Piracy Act A Rookies Point Of View
It’s big news apparently, but me and news don’t get on.
It took me 8 months to learn that Gordon Brown was the PM (seriously)
I don’t watch the news and I don’t read news related newspapers or websites.
Anyway, I got an email from my other half this morning which took me to the wikipedia site for the Stop Online Piracy Act which can be read here
Even now I haven’t read all of the two websites that I have stumbled upon, so my opinion is less than worthless I guess. But I’m gonna give it anyway. :P
From the bullet points I read, I am behind it.
Of course I am!
I “am” one of those people that make a living in digital goods and I have experienced countless cases of digital piracy, usually born out of total ignorance.
Further more, in my newbie days I have even breached peoples copyright in lets call it “Convenient Ignorance”
By that I mean. I didn’t go out of my way to see if it was OK. I took the view that “Everyone is doing it, it must be OK”
True story:
My very much moralistic and law abiding Father asked if he could make a copy of a DVD drama series I had purchased over Christmas.
I laughed a little and said: “Technically, we would be breaching copyright Dad”
He looked a little taken back and replied “No, because I would only be using it for myself to watch and not charging people to view it”
This is not a rare, incorrect misunderstanding over copyright and neither does it come from an idiot.
My Father is very well read and very much up to date with the news and political topics.
But is does display how Copyright on a massive international and multi cultural level is completely misunderstood.
Furthermore, that huge scale lack of understanding is costing those of us that make it our business to understand, 50, 60, 70% of our potential income as people share digital files like they are sharing a bag of chips.
My main direction of thought was secondlife.com and IMVU.com
We all know places like these are breeding grounds for file sharing and IP theft and the owners generate millions of dollars in "User To User” transactions of digital content so potentially they are both targets for this new law, should it come to fruition.
I would NOT want to be them right now because the damage is done really.
In “their” ignorance, Linden Labs opened the floodgates to people uploading pirate textures and artwork, avatar animations, sounds and goodness knows what else in 2003.
Further more, SLers can also export content out of SL such as textures they did not make.
Why we need a “Save Texture As” option I don’t understand. Why should people be able to export other peoples content out of SL?
Why did Linden Lab think that option was important to offer whilst they continue to ignore the fact that texture and sculpt map artists are loosing sales and money on a massive scale due to the lack of protection Linden Labs offer us.
Unlike prim and mesh made content, texture artists do not get the same level of protection they get.
Our customers (And the people they may share our textures with) can export an artists texture file AND resell it AND share it with great ease.
Hell, there are even “Texture Sharing Groups” the act is so “normal”
All artists can do is throw a User License in with the product and hope some of their customers take the time to read it.
The stuff already doing its rounds in SL is so entrenched into the platform and peoples inventories even if they were to identify everything, to literally rip it out of the system would leave millions of honest peoples content not working or half textured and the customers who purchased in good faith pay the price because they won’t get any refund.
Its mind blowing what this may mean to SL and Linden Labs.
On a positive note, I think peoples awareness of IP and Copyright will dramatically increase.
With the very real threat of such acts being treat as a federal crime, people will now go out of their way to learn the facts so they don’t break the law in ignorance.
Of course, the small time opportunists are not under threat here, at least not initially.
It's the torrent websites and those that make a living from file sharing which generates massive traffic which they can then turn into very high advertising fees from other “legit” companies.
It’s a clever if not bloody lazy ass way of making a ton of money because all they provide are the servers and a website:
The traffic is attracted by the Free and 90% illegal software and digital wares that other people upload.
(I am not sure what their incentive is? Feel good factor? Feeling generous with others content? Oh, how kind!)
Then millions of people visit the site to download all the free software and digital content (Along with the crack codes generated by those that upload the pirate content)
The owners then can sell advertising space on their website to other legit websites who will pay big bucks for the kind of traffic a torrent website attracts.
The torrent owners are cashing it in without having to invest time, money or even skill into their business.
They’re what I like to refer to as “bottom feeders” and yes these websites are owned mainly by certain countries which I won’t disclose here for fear of having my house burnt to the ground.
But as I say, Copyright has so many shades of grey, it's massively misunderstood and I would say at least 50% of the “damage” comes from ignorance.
Stop Online Piracy Act
And here is the other side of the coin. Those that are against the act.
SOPA - Why is the world against it?
It took me 8 months to learn that Gordon Brown was the PM (seriously)
I don’t watch the news and I don’t read news related newspapers or websites.
Anyway, I got an email from my other half this morning which took me to the wikipedia site for the Stop Online Piracy Act which can be read here
Even now I haven’t read all of the two websites that I have stumbled upon, so my opinion is less than worthless I guess. But I’m gonna give it anyway. :P
From the bullet points I read, I am behind it.
Of course I am!
I “am” one of those people that make a living in digital goods and I have experienced countless cases of digital piracy, usually born out of total ignorance.
Further more, in my newbie days I have even breached peoples copyright in lets call it “Convenient Ignorance”
By that I mean. I didn’t go out of my way to see if it was OK. I took the view that “Everyone is doing it, it must be OK”
True story:
My very much moralistic and law abiding Father asked if he could make a copy of a DVD drama series I had purchased over Christmas.
I laughed a little and said: “Technically, we would be breaching copyright Dad”
He looked a little taken back and replied “No, because I would only be using it for myself to watch and not charging people to view it”
This is not a rare, incorrect misunderstanding over copyright and neither does it come from an idiot.
My Father is very well read and very much up to date with the news and political topics.
But is does display how Copyright on a massive international and multi cultural level is completely misunderstood.
Furthermore, that huge scale lack of understanding is costing those of us that make it our business to understand, 50, 60, 70% of our potential income as people share digital files like they are sharing a bag of chips.
My main direction of thought was secondlife.com and IMVU.com
We all know places like these are breeding grounds for file sharing and IP theft and the owners generate millions of dollars in "User To User” transactions of digital content so potentially they are both targets for this new law, should it come to fruition.
I would NOT want to be them right now because the damage is done really.
In “their” ignorance, Linden Labs opened the floodgates to people uploading pirate textures and artwork, avatar animations, sounds and goodness knows what else in 2003.
Further more, SLers can also export content out of SL such as textures they did not make.
Why we need a “Save Texture As” option I don’t understand. Why should people be able to export other peoples content out of SL?
Why did Linden Lab think that option was important to offer whilst they continue to ignore the fact that texture and sculpt map artists are loosing sales and money on a massive scale due to the lack of protection Linden Labs offer us.
Unlike prim and mesh made content, texture artists do not get the same level of protection they get.
Our customers (And the people they may share our textures with) can export an artists texture file AND resell it AND share it with great ease.
Hell, there are even “Texture Sharing Groups” the act is so “normal”
All artists can do is throw a User License in with the product and hope some of their customers take the time to read it.
The stuff already doing its rounds in SL is so entrenched into the platform and peoples inventories even if they were to identify everything, to literally rip it out of the system would leave millions of honest peoples content not working or half textured and the customers who purchased in good faith pay the price because they won’t get any refund.
Its mind blowing what this may mean to SL and Linden Labs.
On a positive note, I think peoples awareness of IP and Copyright will dramatically increase.
With the very real threat of such acts being treat as a federal crime, people will now go out of their way to learn the facts so they don’t break the law in ignorance.
Of course, the small time opportunists are not under threat here, at least not initially.
It's the torrent websites and those that make a living from file sharing which generates massive traffic which they can then turn into very high advertising fees from other “legit” companies.
It’s a clever if not bloody lazy ass way of making a ton of money because all they provide are the servers and a website:
The traffic is attracted by the Free and 90% illegal software and digital wares that other people upload.
(I am not sure what their incentive is? Feel good factor? Feeling generous with others content? Oh, how kind!)
Then millions of people visit the site to download all the free software and digital content (Along with the crack codes generated by those that upload the pirate content)
The owners then can sell advertising space on their website to other legit websites who will pay big bucks for the kind of traffic a torrent website attracts.
The torrent owners are cashing it in without having to invest time, money or even skill into their business.
They’re what I like to refer to as “bottom feeders” and yes these websites are owned mainly by certain countries which I won’t disclose here for fear of having my house burnt to the ground.
But as I say, Copyright has so many shades of grey, it's massively misunderstood and I would say at least 50% of the “damage” comes from ignorance.
Stop Online Piracy Act
And here is the other side of the coin. Those that are against the act.
SOPA - Why is the world against it?
Tuesday, 17 January 2012
Frippery - Whimsical Jewelry for Imaginative Minds
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| Click to enlarge |
More recently she has been the Coordinator for the FFC Fantasy Faire for the last two years.
(Relay For Life Cancer Fund Raising) Which this year runs from April 21st through to April 29th.
But what I am blogging about today is something Elizabeth doesn’t mention much less boast about and that is her creative skill for making incredibly delicate and beautiful custom jewellery which she offers under her brand name “Frippery”
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| Click to enlarge. |
Instead, the quaint cottage appears to be more of a prop scene for taking pictures as I did today when I visited.
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| Click to enlarge. |
I suspect that’s because she creates jewellery as more of a personal passion than a commercial venture but based on my years in Second Life, it is these very types of creators that make the most desirable content.
Not being driven by financial return tends to free up the mind for creativity in its purest form.
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| Click to enlarge |
Nature inspired for sure but even at a glance from a novice like myself, you can see the hours of love and passion which has been poured into each and every piece Elizabeth makes.
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| Click to enlarge. |
As I was there today, there were many people coming and going, mostly couples who took advantage of the sim’s beauty as they posed and took photos.
But I ask that you stop at the cottage and look at Elizabeths work because as they say: “The sweetest things come in the smallest packages”
Sunday, 15 January 2012
Seamless Animal Hide Tent Textures
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| Seamless Layered Animal Hide Tent Textures |
Recently, I literally HAD to get my head around it for a non SL related project and so with my new found technique I decided it would be a popular commercial texture collection to create.
There are 11 textures in total and all are unique (Not the same hides but recoloured) created from various animal skins ranging from pony to reindeer and Buffalo.
The effect is a dozen animal skins thrown on top of each other for the creation of tents and places of shelter.
Popular for Gorean locations in Second Life either as tents or as throws for the floor and seating.
They are all seamless on both axis and come sized at 1024 x 1024 Pixels.
They are available from the SL Marketplace here
And from the TRU Textures in world store by clicking this SLurl
Of course, they will also be available for use outside of the Second Life environment by purchasing them under the “Any World” license from the TRU Textures Website
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| Sample 1 |
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