Turquoise

Turquoise Bracelet

Turquiose Belt

Jade Bracelet

Written 21 August, 2007

Turquoise

I know ninety percent of avatars decide they’re going into the clothing or jewelry design business, but ta-da! Cheyenne has made jewelry.

I’ve always loved heavy silver-and-turquoise jewelry. Never had any, but always liked it and thought it would go well with my olive skin tone.

Cheyenne has olive skin!

I’ve kept an eye open for nice turquoise jewelry, and even recently actively searched for it, but I found little—and what I did find was low-res scans of real turquoise jewelry pasted onto a flat prim. Not satisfactory.

So, a week or so ago I set myself down and made this bracelet.

For the bands, I used a silver texture from Textures Unlimited.

For the stone, I used a texture I created myself.

Well, sort of.

I searched the internet for images of turquoise, and, when I found one, downloaded it. Then I cropped out as big a piece as possible using Photoshop Elements (haven’t mastered cropping in The GIMP yet [and yes, I know, I promised you Film at eleven, and I delivered, didn't I?]).

Then I imported the image into a neat little texture program I bought (more Film at eleven!), made it seamless, saved it, and imported it into Second Life.

I pasted it onto the stone prim I’d created, made it a bit shiny, and suddenly I had a beautiful turquoise-and-silver bracelet.

It took a while to get the sizing of the bands just right; I did that before attaching the stone. I sized them by attaching them to the right forearm of my avatar and manipulating them until they fit the wrist without being either too loose or disappearing into the flesh. Then I put the bands on the ground and attached the stones.

The last step was manipulating the fit again.

When the right bracelet was finished, I duplicated it and fit it to my left forearm.

Then I made bracelets with three stones, much prettier. Then I made a belt with five conchs. Then a belt with 14 conchs.

My first go at the belts used a single band, but at the ever-so-stylish Sweetie’s suggestion, I gave them the same double bands I used in the bracelets. And they rocked.

I’ve done jade versions of the bracelets and belts, and will be experimenting with gold and bronze metal for the bands.

And I’m working on a necklace and earrings.

I quickly realized that a necklace chain requires several prims; otherwise, it won’t hang right, regardless of the shape of the primitive you use (well, a single sculpty would work). I found a blog that showed the three prims required to make a necklace chain, but it didn’t mention the size or rotation—so I went to New Citizens Plaza and picked up a box of free jewelry and pulled out a necklace which I’ll use as a template.

Because the sort of turquoise jewelry I like is big, I was able to work within the .01 meter minimum size limit of Second Life prims. But I’m sure I’ll need to torture prims to make the necklace chain and earrings.

I’m a little worried about that, actually. Alberto Gonzales sent me a memo stating it was perfectly okay to torture prims, and told me George W. would back him up on that. But Gonzales is now in disgrace (rumor is he’s hiding in SL, having taken the name of Imsonotadiva Bartlett), so I’m not so sure about the ethics of prim torture. Are they sentient, do you think? Think about it. After all, prims can talk to you if you put a script in them. If they can talk, do they have a soul? Do you there’s a Prim heaven where all the deleted primitives go? Or is there just a secret Linden prim graveyard with tombstones inscribed with the UUIDs of dead prims and a flock of newbie campers making 1L for wailing at the gravesites?

And what about the outlawed and confiscated huge prims—are they locked away at some Machiavellian Guantanamo-Style Linden secret prison? Do you suppose?

And what if they manage to break out and combine with the corkscrew-twisted prims and make a primrevolution. They we'll all be in trouble. They will birth mutated hyperprim children with sculpted genes which will take over the grid and subject of the avatars to slavery. And yes, yes, I know the Goreans will like that, but the rest of us won't be happy standing in a field having to be flexi plants for the primastocracy.

I went so far as to buy a set of tiny cattle prods and thumbscrews on SL Exchange. So far I’ve not used them because I’ve been scared their use would violate the Terms of Service—but damn it all, style is as important as prim rights! Even if the little buggers do have souls! One night, when no one’s around, I’m going to—

You don’t want to know the rest.