I've been busy :-)

Yes! Another fantastic event by Keira Seerose. This one is all about vintage, check out the Vintage Fair 2011 for more information. I'll be bringing an exclusive shoe design to the event! Don't want to give too much away just yet but heres a little teaser:

Well, mesh is out and a steady flow of exciting products are hitting the grid. Just so you know, I'm working on poly models and will have something to show you in world soon. There are some problems with mesh as I see it (and many others too if you look around the forums):

• Mesh worn items don't conform to the avatar
  
• Mesh items only work in viewer 2 or later based viewer clients
  
• Other stuff which I can't think of right now
  

The first one needs to be addressed moreso for mesh based clothing. I'm not sure people realise the implications of wearing mesh clothing in relation to their avatar shape. People, that's you and me and everyone who has an avatar in Second Life are very attached to them. The shape and look of your avatar is a personal thing. As it stands right now, Mesh clothing will not take into account your avatar dimensions. if you wear that spanky new mesh based top, its going to be shaped the way the designer made it, not by your avatar shape. For shoes and accessories this isn't such a problem, but for anything else, it means some avatars are going to look a little odd :-)

Mesh code has been backported to the 1.23 codebase so we will see it in Phoenix and other such viewers. If you want to check out the pioneering work, have a look at Cool VL Viewer. I recently made the leap to Firestorm from Phoenix and it has taken some getting used to but I think I'm just about happy with it (just).

So, what does mesh mean for HOC? At the moment, nothing :-) I am developing a pair of mesh based thigh boots as I've been dying to make some for years but held back because I didn't like how the knee joint would look. With mesh, i can make them how I originally imagined them to be. Sculpted items are not going away, not until everyone is onboard with mesh enabled clients, however long that takes. I will be doing mesh releases alongside sculpted so everyone will be happy :-) Mesh is in its infancy and will take time to mature to a grid-wide alternative to sculpts. It's gonna be a fun ride :-)

In the mean time, here are some shots of the mesh based thigh boots I'm working on. They'll be out sometime soon :-)

I've been quiet for a little while so I thought it was time to dish some dirt. Firstly, some Maya screen shots of two pairs of shoes coming soon. I've revised my foot sculpt yet again for ultra ultra smoothness and to hide pinching on the toes. The revised shape around the angle means no more straps to hide the pesky joint where avatar meets foot! Click the pics for a closer look.

Well, after a little rest and a break from work here we go with a new pair of shoes. Actually, these are a brand new remake of a classic HOC shoe, the absolutely amazingly popular mens formal dress shoes. The originals are a few years old now and are actually still very popular but I decided it was time to give them a new spit shine for 2011. These new formal shoes are a simple classic design, squared toe with simple lace up fastenings. Only black is included because quite frankly, when it comes to dress shoes, what other color do you need? Answer: None!

It's been a busy few weeks so here are the latest releases in the HOC shop. First of all, those sneakers I mentioned a few weeks ago, all done! The Bolts II sneakers are a follow up to a very popular pair of unisex sneakers and feature a snazzy shell toe and bolt design.

Next we have the Platform Pumps, a pair of heels that kind of happened by accident (they weren't originally going to be platform pumps) but hey, they turned out very nicely indeed!

Loads of color options are included so you can really make them your own.

I have more new shoes coming very soon and everyone can enjoy them as they're unisex! Hooray! Not much to say, but the texturing is coming along splendidly and is worthy of sharing.

For those that are interested in these things, and I know there are some of you out there because I'm the same.. What you're looking at is a Maya screengrab. After baking the base leather texture in my lighting rig scene, I add extra details to the sneaker such as additional shading, stitching, decals and other bits and pieces using Photoshop before calling it a day and uploading to Second Life. There is a lot of back and forth between Maya and Photoshop to ensure the textures are positioned accurately and more importantly, look good. The stitching you see above on the laces section of the sneaker has taken many many hours.

The texturing on these shoes is one of those happy accidents that Bob Ross always mentioned. I tried the embossed effect, liked it, fiddled with it and ran with it :-)

These shoes come with 8 color options and 4 metal color options. I'm really enjoying pushing the sculpts to their limit to maximise the quality. Sure, it takes a bit more work but the difference in finish is very substantial!

I'm quite pleased with these, hope you will be too!