Warning, topless shots below the fold.
Let’s talk boobs. I see a lot of female avatars getting it sooo wrong in SL. In RL, we don’t have to worry, we have built-in shapes and physics, and our cleavage is controlled by the clothes we wear, not a texture, so we don’t usually have to think about it (with the exception of picking out that awesome pushup bra for a hot date lol)
In SL, none of this works automatically without some input from us. We have shapes, physics layers, and skin options to worry about.
A decent quality skin is one of the things you should definitely splash out some money for. You can get a reasonable skin for a couple hundred Linden Dollars, but a good one will probably set you back over L$800. Believe me, it’s worth the time and money to find one that you like, as, along with your eyes, it’s the one thing you’ll wear all the time.
When it comes to selecting a skin, pick one with multiple cleavage options. You want at least small for when you’re bare breasted, medium for when you’re wearing a bra or a bikini top, and “lots” for corsets and some formal gowns. There’s nothing funnier than seeing an otherwise naked girl wearing a skin with lots of cleavage. I keep having to ask myself “did she stick them together with superglue, or what?” lol
Do NOT look like this, there’s someone on that beach (like me) quietly laughing at you!
Much more natural looking 🙂
With Lara by Maitreya, there’s a great option in the HUD to store skins in save slots under the “Skins & Options” tab. My skin (Adore Peach by Lumae) has four cleavage options, and all of those are stored in the HUD in Firestorm’s “Favorite Wearables” for easy switching without having to dig through my inventory.
Now, you all know we need support, and when that support is taken away, things tend to sag, much as we wish they didn’t 🙂 Before fitmesh clothing, we had standard sizes, and to fit them, many of us saved off a modified shape along with the clothes, and the most modified sliders, at least for me, were breast size and gravity.
Using the same principle, you should have at least a few variations on your base shape for the bare/bra/corset thing with various levels of gravity applied.
And also, when that support is taken away, things tend to jiggle. This is where physics comes in. Physics is a system layer that you wear. Not only can it control breast physics, but also stomach and butt as well. Basically, the settings tell the viewer how much things should jiggle and which way they should jiggle when you move.
Again, you want at least the three options for bare/bra/corset, with plenty of bounce with little damping for bare breasted, and basically no bounce and high damping for corsets.
You can buy physics packages on the marketplace, but they’re pretty easy to set up yourself. There’s a page on the Firestorm website with instructions on creating physics layers, so I won’t repeat all the “how-to” here, you can hop over there and read it if you need help. The Firestorm team also have a free physics collection available on the marketplace which is a great starting point to experiment with all this.
I strongly believe it’s worth the time to set up your avatar so it looks as natural as possible.