Actually Exploreworthy: Invictus

Its been a while since I posted something here. Partly due to RL reasons (good RL reasons!), partly because there haven't been so many interesting sims I have seen lately and none really which was worth to take some photos and blog about them.

Invictus though is different. Unlike most LEA installations it is more than just a plain surface, dotted with some more or less random abstract humanoid sculptures: It is beautiful, dense, gloomy and in its composition and emotional impact simply stunning!

Sure, the visual standard today has become pretty high in SL. Complex, mesh structures with baked textures and material effects are a commonplace, but aesthetically many creators are walking on a well beaten path. This sim though makes things a bit differently; has some edge and a certain vibe... and it did instantly captivate me.

Before I forget: the theme of the installation is a poem Invictus by William Ernest Henley:

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find me, unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.

So yeah, check it out. Its not shit!

Lets Go Psychedelic! II

Its weird, its unsettling, its silly fun - and I couldn't resist to make more! I think the visual impact of Google's "machine-dream-pictures" hits you the hardest on the most common motives. The contrast between normal and - well - not normal makes it simply jump into your face ;-)

While this is a pretty weird effect of the company tinkering with neuronal networks, its of course only a side-product of their AI-research. But it kind of shows you where the direction is going at and how powerful that stuff already is. Just as humans can recognize a few dots and lines organized in a certain way as a "face" (like at the end of the paragraph above), they are teaching their machines to do the same: recognize and interpret patterns.
If nothing else, it tells us at least a bit about how the human mind works. How it recognizes things like faces faces and what exactly happens when this pattern-interpreting runs a bit out of control (like when dreaming or hallucinating).

This time I added also some brief description under the original files. So you get some background information to the photo, but without distracting you from the impression the modified (or "weirdified") picture.

Ok, enough rambling and theorizing lets get you some creeps!

This landscape shot was taken at SL12B. Its actually a 32x32 parcel!

One of the buildings at the Elven Village at Dark Wishes.

A ruin at Dark Wishes.

Prof. Wickentower's clank-workers in his old airship workshop

A - already - pretty crazy art-installation at SL12B.

My Dream Generator, already the name is simply suiting.

The DJ Stage at SL12B

Tessie, the mascot of Tesla Island, home of Unzipped.

No, I was not hunting that dinosaur. Its just sleeping!

New Babbage at sunset.

Professor Wickentower's Transmissions through the Aether - Part 2

After the positive reception of the first post of our new series, I am glad to present you his second transmission today. Enjoy!

The Professor transmitting his transmissions!

Beware, beware,
Be careful where you tread, 
Be careful what you do,
'cause Mumbo-Jumbo 'gonna Hoo-do you.
I heard a Soldier say that once, Soldiers know death is watching and waiting, but they do not fear death, they are just watchful of him. The Soldier was quite right of course. One should be careful where you walk, be careful where you tread. You see there are some places you should not walk, and the less adventurous, or more sensible if you ask me! Will not tread. Be warned, some places, do not like visitors, some places are very old, and sometimes there are very old things which still dwell there. and they do not like you treading in their streets.

In a ancient rotting Seaport, cloaked in mist and shrouded in rumor, it is not just death that watches, things older than death lurk just beyond your lamplight, half seen out of the corner of your eye, only to vanish when you turn to look. A creak on the Hotel stairs, is just an old building settling, isn't it? Because, you know no one is there on the stairs, just beyond the door, which you keep locked because, well...you just do...Or, is it, in the back of your mind, really a barrier? Between you, and the other side of madness?.

The residents, or as one might like to call them 'denizens' watch you, unblinking from half shuttered windows, as you wander along over grown pavements flanked by crumbling houses, once fine and even austere, now draped in ivy, unkempt and unclean.
The shoreline flows into the salt marshes, vast, mist shrouded and empty...But are they empty? Of course they are! That is just mist, and not tendrils from a half formed bulk of some 'thing' which perhaps, is best left alone...

Water flows into half covered sewer grates, twisting out across the port town like veins under a corrupt skin.
And here, you really should not wander, and if you do, when the lamp light flickers and the shadows dance, and the half hidden openings in the walls, yawn wide into the proverbial blackness, you really must be careful where you tread, be careful what you do, because something more foreboding than Mumbo-Jumbo is going to do much worse, than Hoo-do you!..
But...
Those places are far away, far from the nice normal safe streets of your home town, and one would never ever think of visiting them, but ...Would one?

Exert From
 'My further travels across the 35th Dimension and other places'
Prof.Z.Wickentower.

[here the writer tips his hat to the Innsmouth Sim and it's creators]

An Undead... Sim?

Shoregate, today afternoon: still kinda there.

It seems not only the zombies of New Shoregate, but the whole sim itself has become undead! Exactly one week after the last payment happened the place is still intact! Well – mostly.

I don't expect this state to last for much longer though. I guess the rental company just wants to show what beautiful landscaping and builds are possible on a homestead sim. There is at least a clear sign that the land managers did indeed visit and like the place. They put up their land sale booth right in front of the tower, instead of clearing up the sim and rezzing it then.

This is quite ironic, but shows how much the place was and still is appreciated and loved. That's at least how I interpret it ;-)

So if you want to pay the Sim that was New Shoregate a last visit – better hurry. It is still here. But who knows for how long.

This way, please.


P.S.
Due to changing the land-group by the rental company zombies, kraken or the plane rezzer don't work anymore. but the tram is still there! 

Byebye for Now, Dear New Shoregate

Actually I wanted to surprise you with great news about New Shoregate moving to a shared full sim (which would mean more prims, more traffic, more Avatars allowed at the same time) but as things sometimes go in SL, this seems rather unlikely now, due to reasons beyond my control.
I also have to announce that we are forced to close the Sim down today - hopefully just temporarily.

Land pricing in SL is just ridiculous for what you get and one of the reasons it never reached the mainstream, if you ask me. Sims come and go, often before their could reach their full potential due to too high rent costs - like New Shoregate and its predecessor.

This is pretty saddening, taking into account how much time and passion my friends Cyhtleen, the Prof and I put into the Sim to make it the beautiful place it was.

I hope this isn't the last thing you will hear about New Shoregate. I'd be certainly more than happy to recreate it in the (hopefully near) future. Actually Emma and I were busy to make a backup of the buildings I made for the Sim with the Scene-Rezzer-System she did develope. (Interesting fact: The bridges, houses and roads I made were less than 800 prims in total - now is that efficient or not?^^)

So New Shoregate isn't lost. Its essential parts are sleeping in my inventory, ready for their return. And when it comes back it will be better than ever before!


Lets celebrate New Shoregate's glory with this little gallery - I hope you enjoy it!

P.S.
Apart from these rather unpleasant news, things are going great for me. Especially in RL. I was pretty busy in the recent weeks and didn't had much time to be active in SL or write in the Drow Diary. But it's the good busy!

Name The Street!

As you might have noticed, New Shoregate has quite everything a decent, zombie-infested steampunk city needs: zombies, a tram, airships, stores, a workshop... you get the idea.

But what New Shoregate is still missing is: Street names! This has to change, don't you think?

For this reason, we are asking YOU to send us your ideas how to name the streets - and you can win cool prizes!

Every idea, which makes it into a official name, will be rewarded with a gift! Either from Drow Science or Prof. Wickentower's Airship Workshop - yay! As rule of thumb: the more important the place, the bigger the prize!

How does it work? Very simple: The map below features numbers from 1 to 9. The first seven are streets which want to be named, number 8 and 9 are the cemetery, respectively the swamp with the sunken fair grounds.

All you have to do is send a notecard with your name and your ideas to Somehow Peccable before March 12. The filename should be something like this:

((Insert your name here)) New Shoregate Name Contest

With its content in this way:

1. Somehowroad
2. Somehowstreet
3. Somehowalley
4 ...

The winners will be announced soon after March 12.
You don't have a name for all numbers? No problem - the list doesn't has to be complete, you can win regardless how many name proposals you send.

We are looking forward your ideas!


New Shoregate City Council

P.S. The street signs are donated by the lovely Misty Payne from the sim Tempelhof. Definitely a place  worth to explore (hint, hint!)