Lara X and Mytra

“If you’re an owner of the Maitreya Lara body, and you’ve been reading the news, what Maitreya are calling the “next generation” of the Lara body is now available: Lara X.

You can use the redelivery button in your Lara 5.3 HUD to have the body delivered to you for free.  If you own the Petite add-on, you will have to get a redelivery by visiting Maitreya’s main store, also for free.

I’m not going to detail all the changes, you can read them on the Maitreya website if you’re interested.

My initial impression when I first tried on the body was that unless I do extensive shape editing, I won’t be rushing to incorporate it in an outfit soon.

Don’t get me wrong, Lara X has some really nice features, like vastly improved shoulder joints (at the expense of dropping my shoulders by at least 3cm in the name of a “smoother” look).  And due to the wrists being slimmed (actually, the entire arm is slimmed), and the ankles also being slimmed (but my thighs and hips got way bigger?!), my SLink hands and feet no longer fit.”

I wrote the above at the end of November, just after Lara X came out, but I didn’t post it.  I was having trouble finding the time to do the comparison photos I wanted to post with the comment.  And Lara X being just slightly different in height offset from Lara made it difficult enough to get good photos without a lot of fiddling that it made me think it wasn’t worth it.

Since then, I’ve edited a modified shape for Lara X, mostly in an attempt to deal with the above mentioned “way bigger” observation.  Looking through the freebies today, I saw the first outfit that made me want to run and make an outfit for the new body.

This dress is Mytra by Madame Noir, a FREE group gift for members, and the group is also FREE to join.  There are sizes for Lara X, Legacy, and Reborn.  The dress also comes with a three color HUD that also allows you to switch materials on or off.

  • Dress: Mytra by Madame Noir
  • Body, hands, feet: Lara X by Maitreya
  • Face: Jennifer by GA.EG
  • Hair: Run the World by Exile
  • Shoes: Nako Heels by Breathe (marketplace link, item unavailable)
  • Jewelry: pieces from The Promised Morrow Set by Chop Zuey
  • Makeup: Joss 09 by Zibska

 


Día de los Muertos

SL days being one behind me, today is the 2nd of November, generally the second day of the Mexican Day of the Dead celebrations.  So today, we had a party in Eden with this as the theme.  Researching this the other day, I came across an article that called El Catrina “the original dead sexy” which completely cracked me up.  So of course I had to do that for the party!  This was my outfit.

I’ve shown you this dress before and you can find details about it here.  I really want to highlight the face makeup though – it’s fantastic.  For L$5, you get this design in not one, but six color palettes!  And this is not the only design the creator does, they have a number of them for both female and male avis.  The makeup is only on system tattoo layers, so you’ll need a BoM capable head.  Highly recommended!

  • Makeup: La Dia de Los Muertos – 03 by Delizio (marketplace link)
  • Face: Jennifer by GA.EG
  • Body and feet: Lara by Maitreya
  • Hands: Slink
  • Hair: Ruda2 by Monso
  • Shoes: SL14B Heels by Thalia Heckroth
  • Jewelry: Pearl Necklace with Bow by TLC (store appears to no longer exist)
  • Hat: Vintage Hat – Black by Kenvie (store appears to no longer exist)
  • Flowers: Flower Crown by Exile

What lies beyond the dark?

Hallowe’en is a Big Thing™ in Second Life.  Creators go nuts with outfits and usually this time of the year, you can’t find a single freebie that’s not Hallowe’en related.  So, I’ve spent my time on building a spooky setting for Eden‘s big party this year.

That’s what’s behind the dark entrance way here!

Save the date: Saturday 28th October at 2pm SLT!


Quincy

This dress is a FREE group gift from WellMade.  Their group is FREE to join, so rush over and pick up yours today!

The dress is sized to fit Lara, Lara Petite, Legacy, Legacy Perky, Kupra, and Reborn.  It comes with a twenty two color HUD that lets you color the dress and ropes separately.


Marnie

Here’s a FREE group gift top from Spotlight, whose group is FREE to join.

I like camo, and this top comes with twelve different color schemes via the included HUD.

There are sizes to fit Lara, Lara Petite, Reborn, Kupra, Kupra Kups, GenX, GenX Curvy, Freya, Legacy, and Legacy Perky.  There is some minor clipping around the bottom hem in extreme poses, but there’s an alpha included if you’re using BoM.  Also, as the sleeves are so long, you’ll want to use your body’s hands and not SLinks like I’m using here, or you’ll certainly see clipping.


Jyn

This dress is a group gift from Salt & Pepper.  It’s a little too reminiscent of the “camisk” style dress for my taste, but I can’t help showing it to you because of the fantastic texturing job.

There are fits for Lara, Lara Petite, Reborn, Reborn Juicy, Reborn Waifu, Gen X Classic, Classic Squishy, Dainty, and Dainty Squishy.

The HUD lets you chose from one of twelve colors, but where it gets exciting is the material picks, where you can chose from no shine, normal, or holo.  The holo “shine” texture (the specular texture, to be technical), I’m guessing is the same texture as the pattern I’m wearing in the photos.  As you move, various color reflections are highlighted, giving the dress a wonderful look.

Salt and Pepper is quite expensive to join at L$300, but they occasionally have free join weekends (which is how you’re truly got into the group) so it’s worth keeping an eye open.  The store carries past group gifts, so if you do get into the group, this will be waiting for you!


Soko

I haven’t posted for a while, a lot of the free content I’m seeing recently I’m going “blah” at.  But!  This outfit deserves a post, can you guess what caught my eye?

The sandals of course, with their quirky heels and high laceups!  I’m generally a fan of flat soles, I mean, walking in platforms is a pain, but at least in SL we don’t have to worry about losing our balance.

The sandals come with fits for Maitreya, Physique, and Hourglass and have an eleven color HUD that matches the dress colors.

The dress also fits Lara, Physique, and Hourglass.  The colors are muted rather than bold, which gives me a chance to wear red.

The outfit is a group gift for members of the Paparazzi group, which is FREE to join.


Save the Sea

This dress is a L$3 hunt prize on the Save the Sea Hunt 4.  The hunt runs until the end of the month, so you have plenty of time!

The dress is sized to fit Lara, Lara Petite, Legacy, Freya, Altamura, Hourglass, and Erika.  It comes with a ten texture HUD, with of course some sea themed patterns, a few florals, and a plain red.

  • Dress: Veronica by Telsiope’s Coture
  • Body: Lara and Lara Petite add-on by Maitreya
  • Face: Jennifer by GA.EG
  • Hands: Slink
  • Hair: Ruda2 by Monso

Second Life is not for everyone

Do I want to post this?  I sort of can’t resist because sometimes people make you laugh, and not because they’re funny.

Generally at night my time, when I’m getting dinner and relaxing before bed, I’ll log in to SL.  Most of my SL friends are scattered all around the world and it’s unusual for me to find someone I know online at night, so I’ll run to a social place and plonk on a sit and hope for some casual conversation with someone interesting.  But this is SL, and there are some really strange people…

Tonight, a girl IM’d me and complemented me on my looks, and as she was looking fine too, I returned the complement and made a casual joke about tattoo removal being easy in SL.  To each their own however, if you love your tattoos, knock yourself out.

It turns out that this girl had some serious issues, as she’s apparently Maori (although her avi was as white as mine) and took offense when I mentioned her tatts.  Apparently, she dislikes the English (to put it mildly), with one of her picks literally saying “f*ck off back to England”.

The funniest thing was she’d apparently looked in my picks too, and noticed Eden, and ended the conversation by calling it “the most cliquey girls club in SL” before bailing out of the region.  Trying to hand her an apostrophe, I discovered she’d blocked me, with a vulgarly worded block message.  Perhaps she should have read my pick about being the tech girl for Eden… as I log every visitor, and she’d never even been to the club.

As each of her picks ended with “SL = Shit Life”, I wonder what she gets out of Second Life at all…