Over at Hamlet’s blog he wrote about a website that offered face morphing/transformations. As you can see in the pic you can choose, age, race, sex and even artistic styles. The race and sex transforms turned out pretty nice. The age ones were sort of creepy and the artistic renderings were OK.
Hamlet’s post: http://nwn.blogs.com/nwn/2013/03/cool-web-app-converts-faces-to-art.html
I’m waiting, but you never appear, originally uploaded by ** GoSpeed Racer **.
Ever feel like this sometimes? Waiting on others can be a trying experience. How long do you wait? Are they worth the wait? When do you stop waiting and give up?
Sometimes it’s more sensible to walk away for a while. If it’s worth having it will arrive.
While you’re waiting dig up some dirt on someone’s medical background 
Just don’t tell Santa though!
This past weekend marked the passing of 6 years in SL. What a long strange trip it has been.
Hey, even Linden Lab gave me a rez day cake! It was a nice gesture 
. I doubt many people noticed as I haven’t spent much time in SL the past 6 months or so. I’ve been going through many changes in my real life and those matters occupy more and more of my time. Sometimes they slow down and I can pop back in world for a short time.
Time enough to pose for a picture with Tessa:
Or just for myself:
I notice that the PC client for Blue Mars is still working. There are still 36 “cities” up and running there with hardly anyone using them. Here’s a crazy idea. Linden Lab could buy all or part of Blue Mars and open it up to Premium users. There is a steadily growing base of creators in SL who work with mesh and many of their products could either be ported or recreated for Blue Mars. These cities have been up and running 24/7 the past few years so they can’t cost very much to maintain. One of SL’s weakest points is its horrible physics engine and its grid system. Vehicle enthusiasts would certainly enjoy no sim crossings and maps up to 8000 meters per side.
Speaking of wide open spaces I am still cruising deep space with Space Engine. It’s still a few years away from having a game framework tacked on to it but in the meantime the exploration is still fun.
In my recent wanderings around the web I stumbled across a space simulator that renders stunningly beautiful vistas and detailed star systems. In the past I’ve loved space simulators like Celestia and I’m wowed by the level of detail with Outerra. If you were to combine the two you come up with a program like Space Engine. Like Celestia it can render planets, stars, galaxies, moons, and a whole range of space objects. Like Outerra it can render planet surfaces and atmospheres, but not quite to the fine scale as Outerra.
The program uses a procedural method to generate solar systems to include the number of stars ( most solar systems have more than one star!), the type of stars, planets and their orbits, and asteroids.
The majority of stars in the galaxy are red dwarfs and their planets tend to cluster close to the star. This causes the planets to become tidally locked so that one face always faces the star. This is similar to our moon which has the same face pointing towards earth.
Some worlds are blazing hot on one side and freezing cold on the backside. Perhaps in the twilight areas life is possible?
Large, subsolar hurricanes could form,
In multi star systems each star could hve its own collection of planets.
Dual waterworlds.
An eclipse.
Gas giant moons could have an atmosphere and possibly harbor life.
Planets and alien skies can be beautiful.
The day is over, time to relax on a warm blanket.
Ami : Go, I think Mrs Grouch is watching us.
GoSpeed: Let her watch, She has no power over me at all.
Ami: Really?
GoSpeed: Yup, if someone is going to hold a grudge for years, not say a word about it for years, and then throw it in your face without explaining why? You then come to the realization they really don’t mean much in the grand scheme of things.
Ami: I would pity them.
GoSpeed: Why bother, it’s a waste of time and feelings. I’d rather feel good about someone than hate them or pity them. If they want to clear the air fine, otherwise I can do as I please.
Ami: Nods…. So what did you do today?
GoSpeed: I visited a nice large estate with plenty of open water and committed acts of mass genocide.
Ami: What?
GoSpeed: I went fishing in my German trawler. I netted whole schools of fish and other sea life (including baby seals), asphyxiated them in the dry air and then placed them in crates full of ice.
Ani: Go, you’re nuts.
GoSpeed: Yes I am!
One week later…….
I’ve been banned! Who knew fishing was illegal there! No note cards or signs? It’s a trap!
In the past two months my interest in Second Life has picked up with the advent of my rediscovering of sailing and flying. Flying is a bit trickier than sailing as the average speed is much higher. This higher velocity makes sim crossings more hazardous and exposes you to more ban lines and full parcels. Typically in the past sailboats were the ship to use. Powered boats were frowned upon as crass and too easy to use. That’s all changed now and powered vessels are common place on the grid’s waterways. Me being different prefers the bigger, less common ships. Ships like oil tankers, aircraft carriers and destroyers:
See you on the high seas!
Yeah, still suspended from G+ . It sucks watching all my SL friends use the service while I am in a penalty box. I’ve been reviewed after 2 weeks and apparently it is my name that is causing the hang up. I will try to keep the GoSpeed name if I can. If that’s still a no go then why bother? In the meantime enjoy some meme pictures I’ve created with GIMP:
Spock is not impressed with Blue Mars!
As mentioned in a previous post CCP launched the latest expansion for EVE Online, Incarna. Derided by some of the hardcore pod pilots and praised as an evolution by others Incarna rolled out on 21 June. Aside from the compatibility issues the new expansion presented to players with older computers, there were several issues and a pair of leaked staff emails set New Eden afire with anger, resentment and a profound sense of betrayal.
One of the main issues dealt with the price of vanity items in the new marketplace for avatar customization. The avatars for EVE are actually quite well done and textured. They are in my opinion some of the best in the MMORPG realm.
A nice avatar needs nice clothes and accessories too! Here in lies a big problem. In the marketplace the choices are rather limited and very expensive. Typical outfit costs $17.50 USD. Yes, you read right. A monthly subscription to EVE costs $14.95 a month. That of course is outrageous! In SL I’d typically buy outfits for $300-$900L which is less than $4 USD. Probably the worst example is the infamous monocle:
Would you believe it sells for $70 USD? No way Jose! This of course didn’t fly with the users. Getting people used to avatars was going to be a tough sell in the first place. For the amount of money they wanted to charge it makes more sense to collect Barbie dolls as they retain their value and over time gain value as collectors items.
Probably the most damaging event was the leaking of two CCP internal emails. You can read more about those emails here Khalia Nestune’s EVE blog. Apart from the percieved arrogance in and greed expressed in the CCP staff emails was the implied threat to enable a “Pay to Win” scheme to manifest itself in the marketplace. What is Pay to Win? It’s the ability to pay real money to buy materials that give you the advantage. In the EVE universe virtually everything is created by other players. Refined Ore, weapons, ships, ammunition, ship modules, etc.. on and on. Prices and availability are subject to market variables. The proposed “gold” items would have been created out of thin air and sold directly from CCP, bypassing the other users. CCP would pocket it without expending any effort or time. Easy Money. This would seriously screw up the economy and make it easy for players with deep pockets to make easy gains without doing the work everyone else has.
CCP then went on to make a few other mistakes. They ignored the protests for several days. One staffer who did mention it responded angrily. As a result several prominent players either withdrew or outright quit from EVE. Things were looking pretty bleak as New Eden began to falter and slow down. But, something positive has happened…..
CCP is rather unique in the game world in that they do actually listen closely to their customers. In EVE there is the Council of Stellar Management (CSM). They are composed of active players who are elected to represent their fellow players/customers. In an emergency session CCP actually flew several of the members to their headquarters in Reykjavik, Iceland for a summit. You can read the results here: EVE Insider Blog
In a nutshell it boiled down to a series of miscommunications. The emails were not official policy, the silence was a bad move by CCP and they acknowledged the prices in the NEX were out of hand. Now keep in mind how Linden Labs has treated the customers of Second Life. Yes, pretty damn shabbily. Some of the changes in SL were necessary but they failed to communicate how that was so. They also introduced changes that were downright stupid and poorly thought out. Had LL bothered to communicate with the user base so much heartache could have been averted over the years.
P.S. Yes, I’ll return to EVE one day soon. When there is more to the avatar environment then just the Captain Quarters I’ll be sure to log back in.
One of the neat things about being on Plurk is seeing all the new memes roll through and sometimes partaking in them. This week’s meme is a website called Pummelvision. Pummelvision takes your Flickr feed and makes a movie out of it. Here’s my effort where I took the last 2,000 pictures which stretches nearly a year back in time.
You’ll notice it posts everything that’s public to include shots of my garden, SL, Blue Mars, BSG Online and EVE Online.
Go
Hey! Look out Eddie Valiant, there’s a new toon on the block and she’ll put Jessica Rabbit to shame!
A few weeks ago my friend Shockwave Plasma got her cartoon portrait done by an artist over at DevianArt and she posted it to her Plurk timeline. Take a peek at Operative274‘s page there to check out her picture and many others he’s done.
Over the years I’ve been Simpsoned:
Manga’ed:
Clay’ed:
Made a Comic Book Hero:
and Mad Men’ed:
It’s interesting to see your avatar rendered in 2 dimensions, with other materials and styles.
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