New stuff at Pygar's Stuff!

Hi there!

Acouple weeks ago, at one of the summer fireworks shows, there was a girl with a Deadwood tag looking for vintage toys for their role-play community. She was not having any success, so I told her I'd start working on some. So, now I've got a papier-mache style doll in my store:

I think she turned out pretty nicely, and in only 7 prims! I used Robin's cuddle script for a hold, included three sizes with dresses in five colors (pink, yellow and blue in that piccie, peach and green are the others).

Now I'm working on cast-iron pull toys and bell toys. I made a good horse figure I can use, and then got distracted LOL!

This carousel horse is also seven prims, but just sits there and looks nice. :-D

Well, that's all the news I have. I'm going to be helping Mari build Inner Child Camp on the virtual Playa for Burn2 for the next couple weeks. Then back to cast-iron toyland!

Enjoy! :-D

Pygar Bu

Party, Sale & Gatcha Festival at The Nest!

Okay, it's not really Livingtree; but I have a store in The Nest, and this week we're doing a special Labor Day/End of Summer/Sim Opening parts and celebration!

The parts kicks off at 4 PM SL time, with a couple of DJs, and lots of other festivities.

The Gatcha festival starts then, too. I made a little white wicker occasional table for it, with a quilted cloth that's finished with lace and satin in the border on top. There's a pile of 3 books on the table shelf, and a flowerpot full of blooms on top of the table. The table, books, and plant are 3 different objects, so you can use them together, or separately.

It comes in 9 varieties, with 9 different quilts, and 9 kinds of flowers.



The flowers are from the Arctic Greenhouse; but all the rest of it is my own original sculpts and textures. There's a lot of detail here. The shadows of the lace are burned into the table top, there's a raised design on the flowerpot, and the books are real books that I actually own.

Here's a closeup of one with White Flag Iris, so you can get a better idea of what a single table looks like.



Just L$65 for a try. Come visit my Gatcha machine at The Nest

Also, as part of the promotion and sale, I have set my picnic table, and all the snack coolers and ground quilts for sale at 50% off the normal price! Yep, half off, but only at my Home & Garden Store at The Nest. They're still full price in my main store, and the Marketplace, because we're trying to encourage people to come see The Nest.

And really, it's well worth seeing! It's right next door to Cheeky Pea (you can see my shop from the Cheeky Pea main store) and most of your favorite furniture, home and garden stores are right there on one of the two sims.

So come by and check it out!

Tuesday Photoshop Tutorial - Brushes 10 - Organizing Brushes!

Another Tuesday, another Photoshop Tutorial!



This time, we finish up the series about brushes in Photoshop CS4 and earlier with a discussion about how to make a brush from a color image, using either a Black & White Adjustment Layer, or Lab color, to get the values you want for your brush.

I'll also show you how to easily copy the settings from one brush preset to another one.

Finally, we'll talk about how to organize your brushes, save them so they show up in the Brushes menu, and save them so they won't; but you can find them easily.

Next time, I'm going to do something else, because I feel like all I've talked about for months and months is brushes! (Mostly because that's all I've talked about for months and months.) I'll get back to them, and do brushes in CS5, later.

If there's anything you're really curious about in Photoshop, let me know!

Mesh Exploration Plant Stand

Mesh came to SL™ last week. For those not familiar with it, that means that, for the first time, we can now upload models that we make in other 3D applications directly to SL, with their UV Maps and everything else intact.

It's a huge change, and like all other changes in SL, it's not without controversy and confusion. To help alleviate some of that, I've made a mesh object for people to experiment with, and 3 videos to help explain how to work with it.

The first one talks about what mesh is, what Prim Equivalency is, what LOD is (and how to adjust the LOD you see using renderVolumeLODfactor,) what UV Maps are, and how to save a texture from SL onto your own hard drive.



The second one explains how to use the UV Map to easily put a texture on the plant stand.



The third one shows how to bring your finished textures back into SL, and put them back on the model.



If you are an SL resident, and you want to try playing with the plant stand yourself, you can get it at the SL Marketplace.

Enjoy!

Robin has a New Store!

This isn't happening at Livingtree; it's happening at a brand new sim called "The Nest" which is attached to the Cheeky Pea sim. But if you are interested in shopping for your Home and Garden, and interested in Robin's Home and Garden store, then you'll want to know this!



The Nest is a home and garden shopping paradise, with all your favorite Home and Garden stores. (Places like the Loft, LISP Bazaar, Theosophy, Clutter, Mud Honey, Thistle Homes, north west, Second Spaces, and many, many more.)

The sim is beautiful, with a main street, some cottages, and a farm and "shacktown" on the wrong side of the rails. I wasn't early enough to get a store on the main street, but I did manage to get one of the shacks! So Robin's Home and Garden Store is right there on the same sim as the Big Names!



I'm very excited about this, and am already starting to get more home and garden stuff done. You can see the "Rail Quilt" I did just for this shop in the picture. (The shack really needed something to brighten it up!)

So come on down to Robin's Home and Garden at the Nest and take a look at my new digs!

New Coolers!

Labor Day is almost upon us; time for cookouts, tail gate parties, outdoor concerts, and one last picnic on the beach!

Take along all the snacks and drinks you want, for just 2 prims, with my brand new Large Snack Cooler!



It's packed 14 different snacks, and 21 beverages, in 5 categories (Healthy Snacks, Sweet Snacks, Soda Pop, Juice, and Milk.)

Just touch the cooler to get a menu that lets you choose the category, and then click the button for the category you want to get a random snack from that group! So you can see if you really do get the peanut butter and jelly sammich, or if you're given a raw carrot instead.

You get unlimited servings, so if you don't like sugar cookies, you can feed it to the ducks, and try again for the choklit cupcake!

There are no alcoholic drinks, so it's safe for families with kids and teenagers.

When you're tired of standing around eating muffins, you can have a seat right on the cooler! Just right click and Sit Here to sit on top of it. Then touch the handle to choose from 9 different seat poses; 3 on the cooler, 3 sitting on the ground, and 3 lying down.

All the poses are adjustable, and the cooler will remember the adjustments for people who sit there frequently.

The cooler, and most of the food, are original sculpts and textures; and there's one pose specifically for watching fireworks or clouds that's also original. Available in 5 colors, that match the colors for the Water Coolers.

Transfer Only, L$300. Available now at the Home and Garden Store on Livingtree at Robin's new Home and Garden store at the Nest and on the Marketplace.

Photoshop Tutorial on YouTube

It's occurred to me that some of the people who join Livingtree Island do so because of the tutorial materials there, and that those people might be interested in tutorials I have on YouTube as well!

So, for those of you who are, I posted a new one today, about Making and Saving Brushes in Photoshop. It's actually a continuation of a series I've been doing. (The rest are on my channel.)



We start with a short discussion about setting up the workspace to make a new brush, and capturing a brush tip shape. Then we'll explore how to save your new brush as both a Brush Preset and a Tool Preset. Finally, we look at the differences between the two types of preset, and talk about how to choose which one to use.

Next week, we'll finish up this series with a lesson about organizing your growing brush collection, and how (and where) to save Brush Sets.

Until then, I hope you enjoy this tutorial!

Small People Farm Playset now available!

Hi there!

I made another addition to the Small People line of playsets: a farm! It's got a buncha low-prim and high-detail sculpted pieces, all copy/modify, so you can have a farm toy however big you have room for!

All of the animals are clickable for sound and chat too. Many of the noises are from Lorin Tone's vast library of audible fun, but the kitty meows just like my RL kitty. :-D

Have fun playing!

Pygar Bu

Wicker Furniture

It's summer! Time for outdoor living. To make your outdoors as elegant and comfortable as indoors, I have a new Wicker Patio Set.



It's available in either white wicker with rose cushions and pillows, and a Rose Garden teapot, (shown above), or in espresso dark brown wicker, with green cushions and pillows with a leaf motif, and a Green Willow teapot (shown below.)



Either way, you get two chairs with multiple seats in the cushions and arms (so each chair seats 2 people, and it doesn't matter if one has a tail or long, trailing wings.)

You also get an interactive teapot that gives unlimited cups of tea and plates of petit fours. If the owner (or anyone in the owner's group) touches the handle, the teapot will start to steam gently. Touch it again, and the steam vanishes.

There are two cups, and two sets of spoons and napkins on the table. The cups have a group touch that will fill them with the tea of your choice. The napkins have one that lets you change the embroidery.

(The tea things are all original sculpts from my popular tea sets.)

The teapot, cup and saucers, and napkins and spoons are all separate items, so you can control your prims by Taking them into Inventory, or leaving them out. The baked on shadows in the embroidered cutwork doily change via a menu so you have the right ones for what you choose to have on the table.

The table itself is an original sculpt that gives you tons of detail in only 3 prims. Like the chairs, its shadow prim is a separate piece, so you can choose to have it, or not.

On the bottom shelf of the table is a book of Fairy Tales. Touch the book to get an original sculpted book that attaches to your left hand. It doesn't have an animation in it, because it's meant to read while using the "reading" animation in the chair. But it does have an original retelling of "Beauty and the Beast" by Robin Wood.

All together, a lot of grace and beauty for only 34 prims! No Mod/No Copy/ Transfer only. L$650. On sale now on the SL Marketplace or at the overflow for the Home and Garden Show on Livingtree. If you want to see the Espresso in world, I have a set out at the Pergola on Livingtree. Come take a look!

It's June! Time for Flip Flops!

And Robin has made a bunch of beautiful new ones, using brand new, all original sculpts.



The sole has been remade so it has no pinch points. This means that it looks perfect from any angle, and that the texture isn't distorted, and doesn't "shatter" anywhere.

The strap has been remade so that it's exactly like the straps on cheap flip flops in Real Life. The sides curve around under the foot, and all three places where it attaches to the sole end in "buttons" that show on the bottom.

Shadows have been baked on, so they will always look great.

And best of all, they are only 2 prims, so you can leave them lying around as decorations! (And wear them too; they're copyable!)

There are two kinds; the Basic flip flops, like the Plain ones shown above, are designed for tinting. The only colors used are black and white, so the colors you make them are pure and clean, and as bright as you like! Since the "buttons" really are part of the strap, when you tint the straps the buttons turn that color too. They will always look authentic on the bottom of the sandal.

All the flip flops are copy/mod, you can tint them to your heart's desire, or add decorations (as long as you have copy/mod perms on the prims you want to add,) make the straps partially transparent, resize them, and keep all the variations. You can make a whole wardrobe of different colored flip flops to match all your summer outfits.

They come in six different designs (so far!) including plain, white polka dots on black, checkerboard, horizontal stripes, a fun footprint design and a graphic of the Vitruvian Man that stretches across both flip flops.



The second type, shown above, already have colorful designs on them. Robin is really enjoying making these, and has six done and lots more planned. So far, you can have Water's Edge (shown above,) Pride (vertical rainbow stripes), Fiesta (festive, multicolored horizontal stripes), Denim Swirls (soft blue grunge, with a delicate white pattern of swirls and flowers that cover both flip flops, with a butterfly on the right one,) Chocolate Labels (antique chocolate labels,) and Picnic (a red and white checked picnic tablecloth pattern.)



They all come in adult sizes, good for men and women with realistically sized feet, and in kid sizes ready for size 0 feet. (The kid size Basic Footprints are shown above.) There are no scripts, but they are very easy to resize. Also included is a base shoe (although you probably won't need it; they work fine on bare feet) and instructions for tinting, resizing, etc. (although you probably don't need those, either.)

L$65, 2 prims, copy/mod; on sale now at Kick the Can and the AV Store and also from the Marketplace.

Come and take a look!

Small People Growing Bigger!

Hi there! Just wanted to give an update on the new line of toys I've got... :-)

There are now four Small People playsets out, and I am working on the next four. \o/

Each playset is modify/copy (any textures are copy/transfer so you can use them with the dolls and stuff) and has a notecard explaining how to put everything together so you can get to playing with it! They are also very low prim - make a whole village of these guys. :-D

So far there are two types of houses - a conventional one and a treehouse, an art studio with a buncha original drawings and paintings by me (go ahead and add your own!!) and a remote-controlled school bus. I had a lot of fun play-testing the bus. :-)

In the works are a farm, castle, boat, airplane and the Blinging Disco! Gotta have a dance club, this is Second Life!

Stop by and take a look -

Pygar Bu

Robin is in the Shoe Fair!

The 2011 Second Life® Shoe Fair opens today (May 14) at noon Pacific time, and runs through May 27th. It's one of the Big Events in SL™, with 4 sims full of stores (over 60 shoe designers.)

And I'm one of them!

The build this year is minimalist; with a clean, white, low-lag mall which really makes it easy to get to all the booths.



I set my booth up with some stunning photos taken by my friend Marianne McCann, some shoe stands, and a sort of path running down the middle...



One of the requirements of the Fair is that you make a new shoe, and that it be exclusive to the fair for the duration. That was a bit of a challenge for me, since I only found out that I was (probably) going to be in the fair on May 2! (I was confirmed some days later.) Mari and several other young friends had been begging for saddle shoes, so that's what I decided to make.

Eight days of intensive work later, I achieved saddle shoes!



While the fair lasts you can buy them there, and only there, in nine different color combinations, for L$150 a pair. (Or get the FatPack, for L$1000 during the show only. The price of the FatPack will go up after the show.)



Since I had so little time to get it all together, I haven't made boxes to put the saddle shoes in yet. I'll be doing that in the next couple of weeks, so they'll be in boxes when they get into the stores.

Instead, I just took photos of them, and put the photos on a prim. But, since I'm me, I also took a photo of the back of the shoes, and put that on the back of the prim! So when you go, be sure to cam around and look at them from the back. :D

The other requirement is that all vendors at the Fair donate some portion of the proceeds of sales to Soles 4 Souls, a charity that sends shoes (new and used) to people in need around the globe. I've chosen to donate 75% of the sales of the black and white saddle shoes, and 10% of the sales of the Fat Pack, to the charity.

So come on down! See (and try on) the new saddle shoes, and give to a worthy cause! See you at the Kick the Can booth at the 2011 Shoe Fair!

(For more info about the fair, including a list of the vendors, check out the Official Shoe Fair Blog.)

Spring Gatcha Festival!

Marianne and Robin are both in the Spring Gatcha Festival in Albero!

Robin has two machines up, filled with socks in bright spring colors.

One has four colors of argyle socks, and some rare tie-dye socks.



The second has four pairs of socks in different spring color gradients, and some rare polka-dot socks.



Each color is in the machine as tights, over-the-knee socks, and knee socks. That's 15 different packs in each machine. Each pack has its pair as both regular socks (or socks and underpants for the tights) and a Tattoo layer for people using V2 compatible browsers.

They are all mod/transfer, in keeping with the nature of Gatcha machines. So you can trade them with your friends if you got the one they were dying for, or vice versa.

All this for just L$25 a try! You can find them in the Event Area in Hyssop.

After the Festival is over, the price will revert to L$150 for a pack with all the lengths, and copy/mod permissions. So if you want to see how gorgeous and seamless these socks are, this is your chance to get a pair for less!

Hope to see you at the festival!

Easter Baskets!

Robin has Easter Baskets!



These beautiful baskets are only 12 prims, so you can put them out to decorate your home. Or you can hold them in your right hand (there are two carry poses built in; toggle the basket to toggle between them.)

Inside the basted are 4 dyed eggs, a foil egg, a chocolate egg, and a chocolate bunny, all lovingly nestled into a soft bed of Eastro-Turf.

Touch them for treats and surprises! (Hint, one of the eggs plays a music box version of Little Bunny Foo Foo, and the treats range from cup cakes and muffins to chocolate and a hard boiled egg!)

If you're not familiar with the story of Little Bunny Foo Foo, it's in there, on a notecard. Find out what happens when you insist on scooping up the field mice!

Available in six color combinations; with violet, pink, or blue binding and handles, and with green or matching Eastro-Turf.

All this spring goodness and interactivity for only L$150! No mod, no copy, but they are transferrable, and make perfect gifts!

Come see the basket now at Kick the Can or at The Home & Garden Store. Also available for sale from The Marketplace.

Special for March 6!

Robin just finished a beautifully detailed wooden shelf, with curved brackets and a stunning backboard that boasts 2 pegs and a heart shaped cut out between them. It also has baked on shadows that are continued on the accurate shadow prim. All this, in only 3 prims! (One for the shelf, one for the pegs, and one for the shadow.)



To celebrate the shelf, the coming of spring, and the successful renovation of her new store, Robin in Bay City, she has paired the shelf with a ceramic pitcher with a lovely blue-speckled glaze that's filled with a bouquet of seven bright spring tulips, and is selling the group for L$120 for Sunday, March 6, only!

Or you can purchase the shelf for L$75, and the pitcher full of tulips for L$100, if you only want one of them. :D

Come and see, at The Home & Garden Store or Robin in Bay City. Or just come and see the new store!

Afterword; the special is long over now, of course, but the shelf is still available!

New Gingham Chucks

Spring is just around the corner! Get ready with a delightful new pair of gingham chucks from Robin!



These beautifully made chucks come in 7 fresh colors, and are perfect for those bright spring days. They all have tiny hearts on both the laces and the lining, and the bumper stripes match the gingham to give your feet a beautifully coordinated look. Notice that the fabric doesn't "pinch" anywhere, and the stitching is perfect! These are shoes that you'll be proud to wear.

Transfer only, so they are perfect for gift giving.

Touch them to activate the low-lag resize script, so you can easily get a perfect fit. (There's only a single script in each shoe, 2 scripts total, and you can remove them after you have used them, if you want to, and reduce your script load even farther!)

Included with the shoes are base shoes, so they'll fit your feet more easily, and a V2 Compatible Alpha Layer (courtesy of Marianne McCann) so that there's no chance of "peak through."

Just L$150 per pair. Available in black, blue, green, yellow, red, pink and purple.

Come try on a demo at Kick the Can Kid's store or at Robin (Sojourner) Wood's AV Store. You can buy them at either one, or get several of the colors on the Marketplace.

See you there!

New Worktable from Robin!

Tired of a drab, dull, boring workroom? Spruce it up with a new worktable from Robin, for only 2 prims!



It's a shabby chic table, in the Arts and Crafts style. The bottom part is a single sculpty prim, with four sturdy legs and a shelf that's perfect for storing the things you need to keep rezzed in world. The top work surface is a normal prim, so it never looks like a sphere, never vanishes as part of the rezzing process, and has no bounding box issues at all.

Touch it, and the top changes from chipped paint to a handy builder's grid for working on. Touch it again, and it reverts to the chipped paint for off hours (or to use as a display in your store!)

At its default size it's 2.5m x 5m, which makes a nice, generous working surface for small to medium sized objects.

But if that's not the size you like, you can change it, since the table is copy/mod. You can also change the rest, of course, and keep a copy for backup.

Available in Blue (shown,) Cream, or Green. $L150, Copy/Mod/NO Transfer.

On sale now at the SL Marketplace at Robin's Store in Bay City and at the Home and Garden Store in Livingtree. Come take a look!

Robin's Making Furniture!

Robin Sojourner has started to make furniture, and her first set is available now!



It's an Art Deco conversation/reading corner, with two chairs, an occasional table with a vase of plumeria, a fashion magazine, and a pulp murder mystery, and an oval rug.

The chairs have been totally remapped, so that the stunning vintage Art Deco fabric isn't distorted anywhere. There are two comfortable pillows, one with a plain yellow case, and one in green damask that echos the pattern on the chairs. Each has seven poses for adults, and 10 for kids and smaller avatars, in the chair cushions. These range from poses for conversations, to reading, to meditation. (Kids get more because of the relatively larger chair size compared to their bodies.) In addition there are four poses in the arms, for perching. Because there are poses in both cushion and arm, 2 avatars can use the chair at the same time! Each chair has six prims total, including the shadow prims below them.

The table is an original sculpt, based on a gorgeous asymmetrical Art Deco table found in RL. It has maple curves that repeat the curves in the chair upholstery, balanced with chrome pillars and a black glass top. It was all made in modo, and shadows, highlights, and reflections have been baked in for an amazingly realistic feel. All of it comes to only 5 prims, including the shadow.

On the table is an original stepped and twisted vase, once again modeled from a RL Art Deco vase, with a lovely sunset glaze. It's filled with Arctic Greenhouse plumeria in soft shades of yellow. The vase with flowers adds up to 12 prims.

Also on the table is a copy of Vague magazine (because you need humor) and a pulp mystery titled Murder in Bay City. Touch the book, and you'll get a readable copy that is an original sculpt as well. You can even read the open pages, if you can figure out where to look for them! (The resolution doesn't allow you to read them from the book, but they are ... somewhere.) Each book is a single prim.

Finally, it's all pulled together and complemented with an oval rug, also a single original sculpt with no alpha, that reprises the design in the green pillows, bordered with the sunset colors from the vase.

Total prim count for the whole set, including the wearable book, comes to just 33. Transfer only.

You can see the set, and buy individual pieces, at Robin's store in world or buy it from the Second Life Marketplace. The whole set is L$550 for a limited time. Prices on individual pieces vary, and range from L$200 for a chair to L$50 for the rug. Come take a look! You'll be glad you did.

Bow Top Mary Janes!

Out now at Kick the Can, Mary Jane shoes with classic grosgrain ribbon bows on the toe top!



These are Robin's original sculpt; it's been copied, but never equaled. (And no one has even tried to copy the sumptuous polished leather texture.) Now it comes with a gorgeous bow, also an original sculpt, to make it even dressier.

Touch the knot on the bow to get a series of menus that let you choose from among 25 colors for the bow, and either silver tone or brass for the buckle.

Touch anywhere else on the shoe to get a very low-lag resize script that lets you easily get a perfect fit.

The shoe also comes with a Base shoe, so that your foot will look great in it, and an Alpha Layer (V2 compatible client needed) that will hide any part of your foot not covered by the shoe. No more poke outs!

There are eight colors of shoe; Black Licorice, Chocolate (rich brown), Chocolate Cherry (oxblood), Red Licorice, Navy, Forest Green, Cotton Candy (pink), and White Sugar. The bow colors range from soft to bright, dark to light, and include a range of warm and cool colors, as well as white, gray, and black.

Come try on a demo at Kick the Can (upstairs, right in front of the railing for now) or see them on the SL Marketplace (link goes to the Black Licorice.)

Valentine's Day Chucks!

Robin just released five new pairs of Chucks shoes, specially designed for Valentine's Day (although you can wear them any time, of course!)



They all have pink hearts on the laces, and they come in Candy Hearts (shown), Gingham Pink, Hearts & Roses, Simple Hearts, and Vintage Rose designs.

As always, they've been made so that the fabric isn't distorted on the uppers, for a beautiful shoe!

There's an alpha layer (courtesy of Marianne McCann) for V2 compatible browsers, so you don't have to worry about your feet peeking through the shoe, and a very low lag resize script in one prim from each shoe, so you can easily get a perfect fit. L$150, Transfer only. (They make great gifts!)

Come take a look and try the free demos now at Kick the Can Kid's Store and at The Robin Wood AV Store on Livingtree.

You can also get them at the Second Life Marketplace. (Link is to the Candy Hearts pair, but you'll be able to find the rest once you're there.)

Argyle Socks!

Add some pizzaz to your wardrobe, and razzle-dazzle 'em with these stunning argyle socks!



Made with remapped UVs, which were then burned onto the SL UVs, so there are no seams! No seams on the sides, no seams on the foot, no seams around the ankle (although it is a bit rough, because of the way the Avatar is made, this isn't noticable from normal viewing distances.)

There are a dozen different color packs, with 5 sock lengths in each pack. So you can choose to wear short socks, knee socks, over knee, thigh high, or tights! Each one also comes on both the Tattoo layer (for people using V2 compatible viewers) and the sock layer, for maximum layering versatility.

You can buy one pack (that's five pair, remember) for $L125, or you can get the fat pack with all 12 pair for $1250. That's 12 pair for the price of 10! Come and see them at the Robin Wood AV Store on Livingtree, at Kick the Can kid's store (on the second floor, near the shoes) or get the Fat Pack from the Marketplace. You'll love them!

Small People, Big ideas!

Happy New Year!

I have a new thing in my store: Small People.

These lil guys are copy/mod, so you can put the accessories I made for em on their heads, or make your own stuff to add, or whatever you like! They are made to be played with in playsets, dollhouses or just on their own, and they are two prims each (without the one-prim hats or hairs I made). So you can have a bunch out all over. :-D

I'll be making some playsets just for these guys too. Lessee, they'll need a house, a boat, a plane, maybe a car garage.....hmmm :-)

Pygar Bu