Second Life ™

It was a small, but enthusiastic crowd that met beside the sandbox for this week’s Wednesday Workshop. Second in a series of workshops conducted by myself (Celestia Cazalet) to introduce SL residents to RL tools that make building easier.

This workshop covered the remarkable 3D program, Sculptypaint, which was created by SL resident, Cel Edman. This program allows you to build a 3D object in RL, then bring it into real life in the form of a sculpted prim.

What is a sculpted prim? Regular “prim” objects can sometimes actually be many prims linked together to create the desired shape for furniture, flowers, sculptures, stairs, you name it. With sculpted prims, the prim takes the shape of a map of sorts that has been created in an outside program and brought in world.

In this workshop, we started off by learning how to make a flower. You can see Knowclue Kidd’s beautiful creation here. Then we experimented with dropping random textures into sculpted prims and finding out what we got

Petlove had this dramatically beautiful prim lurking in a texture file in her inventory.

As always, you can download the powerpoint presentation I used below. It doesn’t tell you everything I said, but you may be able to work your way through the program with it. My goal for these workshops is to encourage everyone to run with it! Try making your own wonderful creations. Experiment with dropping files you already have in your inventory and see what comes of it. The picture below is the result of me dropping the file from one of my slides into a sculpted prim. Have fun with this awesome venue of creativity!

Download the powerpoint here: Sculptypaint Powerpoint.

Join us this Wednesday for the second in a series of workshops on ’Making Your Second Life ™ Easier’ presented by Celestia Cazalet.    In this second workshop, Celestia will introduce you to free programs and websites that can
enhance your Second Life(tm) experience.  This week’s topic:  Sculptypaint. Learn how to build those cool sculpted prims. Come prepared to share your own discoveries, as well.

NOTE:  Please download the program before Wednesday.
Here is the URL: http://www.xs4all.nl/~elout/sculptpaint/

SLT TIME: 5:00 p.m. SLT ( 7 p.m. CDT, 8 p.m. EST)

We’ll meet in the Sandbox.
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Eduisland%20II/44/60/22

Hope to see you there!

The DEN’s motto is “We are our greatest resource!”  So here’s your chance to share your expertise. The DEN in SL Events
Committee is planning our Wednesday Workshop series for the Fall and we would like to offer you the opportunity to present.  If you have an idea and are willing to present please contact Lor Fredriksson in SL.

The DEN LC will support any new presenters.  We help and support you with presentation set up. Presentations can be in voice, can be a discussion, may include slideshows or media.  Presentations can be on RL educational resources, tools, applications or related to SL.

Events presented in SL can be submitted to the DEN as STAR events to keep your STAR status.

Phew, is all I can say!  Why, you ask?  Imagine hosting an Anniversay Gala, imagine redecorating your home, purchasing arcade games for your guests to play (yeah, Cel…I’m gonna beat your high score!), hiring a DJ, stationing a limo outside your home and 40 minutes before the start of your event, but after the paparazzi had arrived, your Department of Public Works decides to close all roads accessing your home.  Yup, that’s what the DEN in SL LC faced at 7:20 p.m. yesterday.  I decided to head in early and this is what I saw on my screen:

image from Flickr - KJarrett

Needless to say Skype was up and running within minutes.   Eventually Beth made it in-world, though was redirected to another island.  The rest of us continued to stare at our screens and the spinning circle indicating that something (though we weren’t sure what) was happening.  Poof!  I’m in….though I ended up in a Hobo railroad encampment — and not fully rezzed at that!

Riptide was able to get in-world shortly after, again landing on another island. And although we offered teleport, Riptide decided he needed to explore his current location a little further as he was surrounded by avatars all facing the same direction and something about ‘Night of the Living Dead’….???? Soon thereafter, it was ‘raining avatars and alts’!

By 8:15 the gala was well underway and by 8:30 most of us were on the top floor dancing to the tunes of Gregster Kidd.

The theme was ‘Dressed to the Nines’ and indeed our guests were. And with the pose balls on the dance floor loaded with ballroom dancing animations the evening was indeed a sight to behold. Skirts were swirling, gentlemen were dipping, and nary a toe was stepped on. Our DJ was absolutely amazing, flawlessly spinning tunes requested by our guests (I can ONLY imagine what his inventory must look like! LOL).
   
Images from Flickr - DiscoveryEducation and kkrossbow

Thanks to all who stopped by to help celebrate the DEN in SL’s 1st anniversary, and if you were unable to join us last night for a night of fun, dancing, and socializing, don’t worry….Halloween is JUST around the corner!  And we know what THAT means at the DEN in SL!!! P.A.R.T.Y.-time!!!

You are officially invited to attend the DEN in SL 1st Anniversary Gala - “Dressed to the Nines”!

This will be a formal affair so start looking for your gowns and tuxes. If you need help just contact one of the DEN LC or DEN guides.  There are many freebie places or splurge and go shopping for some SL couture!  Don’t forget to scroll down this page to the bottom right, Blogroll, click on the link to ‘Fabulously Free in SL’ for ideas to some free clothing & accessories.

There will be a DJ, dancing, games with prizes of course, places for informal quiet chats and of lots of surprises!!

DATE:  August 20, 2008

TIME: 5 p.m. SLT ( 7 p.m. CDT 8 p.m. EST)

The last two Wednesday Workshops at the DEN in SL are what the DEN is all about, networking and sharing! We are our best resource!!

On August 6th about 20 avatars gathered in the DEN in SL garden and shared various technology resources, tools and best practices that were learned this summer at NECC, Discovery Institutes, state and school professional development workshops, reading blogs, twitter and plurk. There were lots of ideas shared for using DE streaming for collaboration and creativity using some of these Web 2.0 tools. Ideas on using wikis, nings and blogs, ustream and mogulus for collaboration were shared. Tools such as Animoto, Voicethread, Blabberize, Voki, Kerpoof, and Tux Paint for creativity were shared. Please add a comment to share something you learned this summer.

Tonight, up in the DEN Tower, Faythe Fouroux ( aka Melanie Ruiz), one of our DEN STARS and DEN in SL guides,  presented Newbie 102, Avatar Makeovers. She shared many suggestions for how to create a new look for your avatar, including lots of landmarks for free and inexpensive places to shop. At the end many teleported to go find their formal wear for next week’s Gala. Check out our google group for a notecard with landmarks and a copy of the Newbie 102 ppt, so you too can be “dressed to the nines” at the DEN in SL Anniversary Gala on August 20th.

OMG!  Halfway through August already!!!  WHERE has this summer gone?  And will I make it through the rest of my ‘SL Summer To Do’ list before I go back to school?  For some of you, this Wednesday’s workshop will enable you to check off another SL task.  For those of you who are somewhat familiar with SL, but wanted to take your avatar to the next level have we got a Wednesday Workshop for you!  Newbie 102 - Avatar Makeover with Faythe Fouroux (now here’s someone that I would LOVE to have as my personal shopper!).  Here’s a sampling of what Faythe will be covering: Mastered walking?  Doing alright with flying?  Know what TPs and LMs are?  Then you are ready for an Avatar Makeover!  Lose that newbie look and personalize your avatar to fit who you are.  Join Faythe as she explains how you can make over your avatar!  And just in time for our Gala next week!

SLT TIME: 5:00 p.m. SLT ( 7 p.m. CDT, 8 p.m. EST)

NOTE:  We will meet in the Tower room up the elevator or use this landmark to take you directly to the workshop.

O.K.  So maybe not quite for president, but I did catch your attention didn’t I?  The DEN in SL blog is in competition to be the featured blog for the month of September at ISTE’s Blogger’s Hut.  You’ve got the month of August to get over there and vote (you may only vote once….although I guess if you have an alt they could vote as well! LOL).  Below is the information found on the notecard in the Blogger’s Hut:

The slurl is http://slurl.com/secondlife/ISTE%20Island/18/130/23/

And Scott Merrick’s blog is http://scottsecondlife.blogspot.com/

“Click a blog’s voting bar to vote for the upcoming month’s featured blog. The winning blog will appear in the RSS feed here at the Blogger’s Hut for the entire month. When you visit the hut you can check out the nominated blogs in a browser window whilst you enjoy a chat with your friends here in Second Life! Check ‘em out (copy this text, paste it into chat, and view your history–the links will be live!) and vote (click your chosen blog’s voting bar) : You might just find a new blog you need to add to your own RSS feed aggregator! I use Netvibes but Google Reader is also wonderful–and there are others!

For a video tutorial on this voting thingy, visit http://sleducation.ning.com/video/video/show?id=1537868%3AVideo%3A1506, or just click on your media player and have a seat to watch right here. Make sure your video is enabled in your preferences!

This month we’re voting on:

“Rambling Reflections”  — Lynne Crowe
http://lynnetai.edublogs.org/

“DEN in SL” — collaborative
http://blog.discoveryeducation.com/secondlife/

“Muve Forward”–Topher Zwiers
http://muveforward.blogspot.com/

and
“Phasing Grace”–Grace McDunnough
http://phasinggrace.blogspot.com/ ”

Hope to see you in two days at ‘Conferences Unplugged’ - a sharing out by DEN members of things they learned at various conferences over the summer.  Think of it as your own ‘It’s a Wrap’ session.  So come prepared to share a thing (or two,
or ten) with the rest of the group.

TIME:  5:00 p.m.. SLT ( 7 p.m. CDT, 8 p.m. EST)

The competition was tough, some of the questions were very difficult, but fun was had by all. Lots of lindens were given away for correct answers about sharks.  Vita was the big winner answering some scientific questions as well as ones about sharks in movies and television shows.  It was a great end to Shark Week at the DEN in SL.

Next up - Join us this Wednesday:

August 6, 2008

‘Conference Unplugged’ - a sharing out by DEN members of things they learned at various conferences over the summer.  Think of it as your own ‘It’s a Wrap’ session.  So come prepared to share a thing (or two, or ten) with the rest of the group.

TIME:  5:00 p.m.. SLT ( 7 p.m. CDT, 8 p.m. EST)