Guitars ...

In doing research for the recently mentioned super-secret project that's coming up in a scant few weeks, Eschatos journeyed over to the new Gibson Guitars sim (LINK), which is very well done. They have a lot of activities there to keep you amused, including a very cool hang glider (great job of coding on that!), a train, lots of movies, and this "rope climbing" thing up a giant Gibson mandolin ...



Up top there's an "observation deck" with a viewer thing, which Eschatos is checking out in this picture! What's very cool about their grand opening is that there are free guitars ... Eschatos got about twenty ranging from an insane cut-out "Flying V" to an Angus Young (of AC/DC) model Gibson SG, plus guitar bags, t-shirts, etc. They even have guitar-body shaped tables if you want to start up (or re-equip) a club. One caveat, however: the guitars are small for the "average avatar" and the attached animation is sort of lame, so actually playing them looks pretty goofy.



Their main island seems pretty much complete at this point, but they are developing connected sims, one "French Quarter" themed, one "bayou" themed, and one that seems to be some affiliated media group. You really should check out the top of the mountain on that island as they have this totally freaky "time tunnel" thing in which Eschatos is sitting above. There is probably some HUD which goes along with that, as it had some info hovering inside, but Eschatos just wandered in and took a seat on the rough-rezzed cube that was floating in the middle of it ... it may be still "under construction", but it's way trippy!

More later ...

The Theatre!

Yesterday, Eschatos got snagged by his Second Life friend Gwenette Writer to teleport off to a floating theater for a performance art piece called "THE RING" by some associates of hers. Despite Eschatos missing a bunch of it due to crashing and having to log back in, what he saw was quite impressive. The group doing this was CARP - Cybernetic Art Research Project (LINK), which has previously produced a recurring "cyber version" of Pink Floyd's "The Wall", which I understand plays every weekend in-world. They also have an on-line magazine, the latest edition of which can be found HERE.



Eschatos was very happy to be immersed in "cyber psychedelica" as he's working on a VERY EXCITING (and, as always) super secret project that has an aspect of that. We're planning on doing a big intro for this at the Virtual Worlds Conference in six weeks in Los Angeles, as well as piggy-backing on Avatrait's exhibition at the Festival della Creatività this fall in Florence ... but if you're good (and he gets permission) you may see some teasers leaked here!

More later ...

Life's a beach ...

Eschatos was sure that his readers were just burning to find out more info on the new Avatrait Island ... only, there's not much to really report as yet. As always, when transferring islands around between people and groups, there have been some snags (the first Avatrait Board members who showed up at the island couldn't "terraform", for instance), but we should have that taken care of today.



Eschatos, however, couldn't resist having 65,536 square meters of sand to play with, so he set up a beach chair and some decor right in the middle of the island, so it didn't look so desolate. Then, using his rudimentary SL building skills, he put together a big honking sign and smacked that right there as well, so when the Avatrait Board do start showing up, they'll know they're in the right place!

Yeah, it's not a big update ... but that's what he's got at this point!

More later ...

Yeah, it doesn't look like much now ...

Don't you just love "big secret projects"? Eschatos can't get enough of 'em (which is why you keep hearing hints of upcoming stuff in here), and now he's getting to "pull the tarp off" of another one!

Ta-daaaaa ...



Huh? You're not impressed? Just a brown parallelogram floating on a dusky sea? Oh, you of little vision ... THAT is the brand new Avatrait Island in Second Life!

As those who were paying attention (and the might yet be a quiz) will no doubt recall, our Avatrait division is growing remarkably, and our current (very popular) Avatrait Gallery (LINK) was just starting to feel a little cramped. So, we decided "why not do a whole island for Avatrait?".

Not only will Avatrait have its own island, but the celebrated Avatrait Artists will have pretty much free reign for designing it! There will be a big new gallery, a "classroom" building for the Art seminars, an office for the gallery managers and advisory board, a theater for outdoor events, an Avatrait store, and lots, lots more.

We don't know yet what the Artists will come up with, but we're sure it will be very exciting ... no doubt Eschatos will take you all on a number of tours as the work progresses ... which will certainly be more interesting that the view of the current sand patch he's hovering over!

Anyway, more later ...

Two weeks!

Every day Eschatos thinks about his blog readers ... well, the days when he gets a chance to, that is ... some days his typist doesn't even get into S.L., so he isn't rezzed, and well, what do unrezzed avatars dream of? I'm sure the unrezzed Eschatos is dreaming of coming up with exciting things to write about, though!

Things have been alternately frantic and insane (well, with interludes of being both frantic and insane) around the office, and taking the time for Eschatos to even go do something interesting has been hard to come by. But Eschatos was mortified to realize that his last entry here was two weeks ago ... quelle horreur!

Since it would be simply too stressful to relate the actual blow-by-blow of the past half month, Eschatos decided that he was going to come up with a cover story ... and he's sticking to it! If anybody asks, the reason he hasn't posted anything to his blog here is that he had to have his virtual gall bladder out over at Cisco's Palomar West Hospital in Second Life (LINK)...



Poor Eschatos! There he is being medevac'ed to the hospital, in his room chatting with the doctor via video phone, being scanned, then being operated on (through his suit no less), while remote teams looked on, and, finally recuperating post-surgery. The hospital was so thoughtful, allowing him to keep his steaming hot mug of coffee with him, even during the operation!

You see, it wasn't sloth or lack of a deep, abiding, concern for his readers ... it was a medical emergency which caused this two-week silence! In the words of the petite flower, Judy Tenuta: "Hey, it could happen!"

Anyway, Eschatos is feeling chastened by this whole experience and says he will try way harder to make your visits to his blog far more frequently rewarded with new stuff, and the stuff that you'll be being rewarded with being all sorts of cool and fun and newsworthy and all of that.

Or, as most of the other posts end ... more later!