Post-Hair Fair developments...

I say post, but its still going on... If you've not been yet then be sure to do so!

OK... advertising = off

I only managed to get three styles out for HF, because I was out of world for a few weeks - but while I was away my brain was ticking over and I wondered about the possibilities of pushing my boundaries.

Basically, if you flip back through this blog you'll soon discover that its all about hair... building it - rather than texturing it. Basically, I've been more or less convinced for years that I cannot so much as draw a straight line in Photoshop - primarily because I'm unfamiliar and uncomfortable with it; and my usual routine in that circumstance is to back away and not touch.

Anyway... I've been thinking about updating the braids for a while. I've bitten the bullet and have looked at the possibility of working with the new tattoo layers in 2.x and compatible viewers. For one it'll reduce the primcounts by 40 or so because there wouldn't be a need for a prim hairbase. Either way - here's a pic of an early prototype. See what you think...



Feel free to abuse the comments options below... ;)

Until next time,

Kalli

New textures - new braids - new releases...

Well, I've made good on my word... After a small amount of blood, plenty of sweat and even a few tears, I've been able to fling together some new braids and successfully texture them to match the current dDx color palette... and seeing as the creation techniques for these were significantly different to the other textures that have gone before, that was no mean feat!

In addition, I've thrown out a full 'regular colors' version of the dreads in the Crazy Arse Hair Hunt for those who like the style, but don't find the snakeskin texture to be a good match to the rest of the wardrobe.

So without further ado - once again, here's Astrid - the Bavarian buns, Aeshna - the layered dreaded do; and Trine, the experimental thick cornrows... which, incidentally is supplied with and without the pulled hair between the braids, for those of you wishing to wear a hairbase underneath.




All now live instore. Come in and give them a try

Until Next time,

Kalli

Rolling out Rowan...

Earlier this week I finally got my act together and launched an extended range of colors for the dDx hairstyles... starting initially by retinting Ursula into the new 36-color range, and I also finally made a new men's whole-head style called Rowan:


Definitely a new direction for me... I've not made a slightly longer men's do before and it came together remarkably quickly... so no bad thing. However, with any long men's do, it works equally well as a short women's do. While Lewis Luminos was the first to blog it... yes he beat me by three days, but, dear reader, I've been having issues logging into Blogger... Karla Scorbal posted it in her blog on a girl less than 24 hours later. Furthermore, Faery Sola has assured me that it works wonders of fey types, and has offered me the 25 prims required to throw up the vendor in her store - Studio Sidhe. As such, I went back and reworked the vendor front for the new location, to better fit in with the client base.... ;)


I always knew this one would be a Unisex do... hence the gender non-specific style name... but let's be honest, since Marshall twelve months ago... there's been a dearth of short, straight men's hair from me...

Either way... equal ops hair for the win... now available in 36 new and improved colors. I love them and am currently wearing Auburn, Chestnut, and even Berry... as well as the light and Platinum blondes, Celtic Agouti... Natural White... dot dot dot...

OK... shutting up. If you want to see how they wear, just pick up a demo box of Rowan or Ursula... each has the full gamut in there!

Until next time,

Kalli

Born to be wild... and the beginnings of a new product line

Felicitations on this fine antemeridian of a Friday...

I'm going to come clean and let slip some details of the new development I've been so cagey about now that the time has come for me to start publicising.

Back in January, my good friend, and sometimes accomplice Faery Sola approached me with an intriguing offer - a stamp rally, involving a number of stores that do a really nice collection of out of the ordinary clothes, gowns, accessories, poses, skins and all the rest of the sort of thing to need to function in-world as an avatar who doesn't sit in the middle of the road. Anyway. As it happened this coincided with a long thought out plan I had (initially thought of it in October 2009) to give the brand a boot and hopefully draw in new people. How? Basically I look at my textures and realise they were OK in 2007/2008, but things have moved on drastically.

Why has it taken me five months? Well... I tell people this repeatedly, but they simply don't believe me... When it comes to 2D digital artwork, I suck. What I know about Photoshop is writable with a wedge-tipped sharpie on the back of a postage stamp; so there's been a bit of a learning curve at my end... including a month set aside to create JUST THE ALPHA MASKS...as I had to do it by hand... well.

If you look at the pic that follows, you'll see something rather unusual for SL (hey... this is me... what do you expect?) Rather than go for the conventional "dodge shine" in horizontal stripes across the base prims, I've decided to pick out the highlights in the hair to give some depth and variety... basically it shines verticaly rather that horizontally (and on a more technical note, my alphas are at the top of the textures rather than the bottoms... ;) Its been a ride, but they're working for me... even if it took nearly a month, over 200 uploads and a lot of swearing, crying and teethgnashing just to get a workable alpha(!)

The new textures themselves are only, for now, available in limited colors - 8 in fact; but of the shades I sell instore, there's no denying they're the eight most popular so I hope not to disappoint too many of you.

So... what are we looking at? For Faery's event, I'm unleashing Katherine as a prize... score enough stamps and you can claim all eight colors for free.


When the event kicks off on the 20th, there'll be two more new styles under the new dDx banner to choose from... a messy low slung bun, tentatively called Heather, and a simple ponytail which has yet to name itself. In short, look out for some new stuff next weekend!

Until next time,

Kalli

The big Hair Fair reveal - Part 4 of 4

OK... it's technically tomorrow, and I have a busy day in RL... so without further ado... the last in my installments of new stuff for Hair Fair and instore.

Ladies and Gentlemen... the forerunners of braids 2.0

Yes; I've had this in the back of my mind for over six months now; and yes, I could have got to it sooner (in fact I first broke out the sculptor to make a start in December...) but things got in the way... blah blah blah... and to be honest, I re-evaluated how to make the braids from the ground up.

Ok... I'm waffling... Pics...





Now, you can all thank Alice Hoyer for looking at the first attempts at these and making the very valid point that they needed their own designated textures... three banks, or 219 images in total... but you have to concede, it's worth it... She is, as I call her, and evil genius; which is of course meant as a compliment! ;)

Yolanda is the Hair Fair one... and the ONLY female hair I'm presenting this year... while Ryu and DeShaun go into the store.

Furthermore, Faery Sola at Studio Sidhe as done a set of beads to fit Yolanda due for release as soon as Hair Fair opens! Thanks!

So that's it for Hair Fair... All we need to do now is finish loading them all and get the booth set up...

Until next time,

Kalli

Stage two...

It's taken three weeks, cost over 4000L in uploads, and two and a half hours to populate the new tables... but the hair textures for the new tints are in-world and set to go.

Thanks be to Iskar, the tinters have been played with to the extent I can now do blocks of hairs together, which should make things easier... much easier...

Shinobu will hit the tinters in an experimental capacity later today or early tomorrow. Fingers crossed guys and gals...

Until next time,

Kalli

60 down... how many to go?

Designing new textures for hair this week, rather than making new styles... that's a given, but as it stands I've made over 300 textures, including a full gamut (5 textures - 3 alpha, 2 non-) for 60 colors. on top of that I've made another 7 half-way and figured out the most effective way to make tips...

we could be looking at as many as 72 before I run out of steam... BEFORE adding tips into the equation.

we're through the looking glass, people...

Until next time,

Kalli

Ok... I think I got it...

A start has been made on recreating the new textures in every conceivable color and shade; and things are off to a rather rocking start.

Currently I have just three textures for each shade that I use, but having picked through my list of wants and needs, it looks that for the new series of textures, I'll be doubling that as a bare minimum... so 48 colors times six textures... you can see where this is going... but to make matters worse, I'm not just looking at the original shades; oh no... but debating whether to replace or extend the range to phase out those that don't go down so well... either way, I'm looing at comeing up with some colors and textures that will be certainly worth the wait. Here for your delectation, is a sample using the new textures. You'll see I've stuck prtty faithfully to the original palettebut have toned down the AAAAGH shiny qualities that the previous textures had to make something a little different.

Also shown in the mix are two experimental colors, Malice and Amethyst darker red and purple respectively.



As you can see they're holding together rather well... or coming together; whichever.

on a further note, It's been decided to gut the shop and find a more effecive way of creating vendors and filling space... if nothing more than to do something about the heavy primcounts currently tied up in the architecture. Alice is in the process of working on some proto vendors for me... and this is how far she's got...



Vertical... colored 3d objects (rather than the little clicky things)... and rather funky with the cutouts and shiny metal struts... looks good, don't you think?

Anyway... until next time,

Kalli