BBW Shapes and Avatars?

This is true.

I did a TOTAL makeover a few months back. The older me was very slim. A lot of my older attachments no longer fit of course, as well as the couple of prim skirts i did have.

Not to mention much on my wardrobe doesnt look the same on me in my new full figured size.

I find myself getting shorter as time goes on; for some reason I feel vaguely disturbed at the thought of being 6 feet tall; I'm currently 5'9" which is still tall, but as I actually have RL girlfriends who are that tall, I'm okay with it.

I think my biggest shape pet peeve is, and I've said it before, are those women who have chopstick legs and itsy bitsy arms that barely reach their waists. Like a tyrannosaurus rex or something....

Oh, and to the OP; nice idea, go for it!

I have tried a number of different sizes for my shapes and yes most of them look huge when you put an sl skirt on them.. but as I make them mod and copy you can make adjustments and still keep the original in case you make a mistake!

However Too tall seems to be the norm and even my avatar is at least 6" taller than I am in rl.

My av is 6'5" in bare feet according to various height detectors...which we all know underestimate anyway.

It's a cartoon world and, as such, I don't mind her being unrealistically tall, but that's still a bit much. I'm just not motivated enough to do anything about it. *sigh*

Ironically, I'm taller in RL than I am in SL. Interesting experience being slightly smaller for once. Most of the time, though, I still seem to be towering over certain people in SL, though.

If I didn't like the shape I got from the first freebie box, I'd have already made my own shape. Already have my own clothes, eyes, and furniture . . .. shape is the last thing left that I'm vaguely interested in playing with. Not going to mess with my hair created by another; and cannot figure out how to play with skin (though I did create a "sunburned" skin where I apparently had been out in the sun with just my head covered up).

If it's mod, they don't mind. Actually, the reason most hair is mod/copy is so that you can tweak it to fit your head shape and/or av aesthetic better while still retaining a fresh copy in inventory in case of "Oh sh*t! I didn't mean to do THAT!"



Most skin is not modifiable or, if it is, it only allows you to somewhat alter the shade of such things as skin tone, lips, and brows.

Thank-you By "play with" I meant try to make my own version of the item. And the skin I did make is just a transparent outfit that covers everything but my head. I made it red, so it ends up looking like I sunburned myself.

I did adjust my hair, but most times it is to move it from a certain location back to the top of my head I haven't decided yet if I want to buy skin (instead of just using freebies), so I haven't looked into it yet. I didn't know that some were slightly modifiable. I had just assumed that they were not.

Oh no, don't do that.



lol, 'Edit Linked Parts' is my friend...some prim is invariably doing something I don't want it to, particularly around the ears, and I have no qualms about whipping it into shape.



There are some nice freebies out there, but don't let that stop you from trying on demos. I'm hopelessly devoted to Celestial Studios skins and I STILL try on virtually every decent looking skin demo I come across. If nothing else, it can be entertaining to see yourself in a slightly different light.



The Celestial Studios skins are all mildly mod...Charmed has lips and skin tone, Vogue has lips and brows. I know there are other with similar capabilities, but they don't reside in my inventory.

Ack . . I'm not expressing myself correctly - the "Oh no, don't do that. :eek: " let's me know :)

So, I'll try again - by "play with" I mean make my own completely original shape/skin/etc. Like I have created my own completely original clothing/furniture/eyes/etc. :) Not try to recreate someone else's work.

The only problem, at the moment, with my hair is that it keeps stabbing me and going through me . .. . :)

Ok, I'll check out those skins you mentioned :) From another thread I got the name of RAC and gathered a lot of those demos and tried to see if I wanted to buy a skin. I didn't even think to look to see if they were modible or not though.

I understood, I was just teasing.



I don't think the RaC are modifiable. They also have a completely different look from Celestial Studios....RaC are meant to be more photorealistic, whereas CS are hand painted. I don't love photorealistic skins in general, and I have some specific issues with RaC, but it all really boils down to personal taste. So try things on! lol

But, because I'm biased, you can check out some pics of the CS skins here: http://www.starley.com/skins/index.html

Oh, and the new Tete a Pied skins are lovely...I didn't like their previous lines, but I bought several of the new ones.





Someone talk about shapes!

I would definitely be in the market for the stuff that the OP is designing -- BBWs and Big Guys too! Post a link for your shop!

Yep id be interested too, i tried fiddling with the shape sliders but they dont look that good when i do it, more like an ogre than someone big and buxom. It would be good to see some well made different shapes and maybe some more 'aged' looks too. Though I enjoyed being 25 i also enjoyed 35 too

I would love to see skins for faces that look over 30. Maybe some for 40 year olds, 50, 60, even 70? Why not? Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations and all that.

Somebody is going to have to start making Apple Mummy sculpties...

With pretty much anything, niche markets are the way to go. I love strolling around through shape shops, but I really dislike how almost all of the shapes are almost identical: unrealistic shapes that even make Barbie shake her head. Chest at 100, hips at 10 but derierre at 80. I have literally no prim shoes that I can wear since I have size 20 feet (very small), while virtually all women's shoes are for size 0 feet (which look like tiny skis lol).

I was considering cloths as well, since I make some for myself anyway, but that is a really good point. Make clothes that go with skins that go with shapes. Skin makers Tete a Pied did something similar earlier this year by pairing limited edition skins with matching outfits. Definitely a great idea!

I've had a shop before, and made a little bit. I'm not a paying member anymore, so it's mostly me trying to cover the costs of the uploads with maybe some spending money on top. I'm helped by the fact that I got a great deal on mall space and the mall gets about 30'000 traffic. I'm not that good with prim skirting (in terms of making it), but I tend to look pretty good in them, even though I have a fairly large booty.

The shop is located at: Kittyland 5 (152, 181, 32)
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Kittyland%205/152/181/32

But there's not really anything there for the next couple of days. Thanks for the help everyone! Lots of good points on all sides

Shapes are by many, largely overlooked, underrated and even ignored. Judging from a lot of the comments here I think many agree.
When I started, I delighted in the pasttime of changing shape. Whilst Bilbo very rapidly established himself as I think a pretty realistic proportion of the real me, my female alt took a succesion of heights, builds, colourings.
She eventually boiled down to three main shapes, a tall, slim brunette, a medium height and buxom and bootied redhead and a short, very cuddly blonde. Being careful to keep proportions right with each guise involved the careful adjustment of many sliders, readjusting, looking and adjusting again.
And even then, one evening I got the camera in a particular angle and spotted that my blonde standing in bare feet had stretched legs so had to shorten her further - there is so much more difference between a tall and short avi than just height and leg length!
Mod shapes are vital. I wholeheartedly agree we need more 'older' skins but to the OP I'd say go for it! Many people staunchly try to immitate their true shapes ... and truly believable shapes need more publicity!!

Fascinating........

When I was messing around with shapes, I tried making some heavy people. I was kind of disappointed. Women get stuck being sort of apple shaped, fat thighs or arms just doesn't seem possible. Trying to make a heavy man that didn't look like a bunch of legos was really hard - keep away from the stomach slider. There's pics of both on here. The most realistic looking heavy people on SL I've seen were shaped with prims, which makes clothing a problem.

http://avatartoolbox.googlepages.com/Avatar_Shapes.html

*Raises eyebrow*

*sneezes*

*naps*

Illogical, Captain.

I started a shape shop a couple months ago......for me it was more about the faces. I kept seeing the same 'look' every where I went and I really wanted to capture facial structures in a variety of AV's. I am thin IRL...not much T&A and I made my own AV as close to 'me' as possible....the face being the most challenging and most rewarding part. I have a lot of fun with and I don't care how much I sell....it's just something to DO with all the shapes I make. lol I do custom now as well and I absolutely love the challenge of transforming a photo into an AV. We are limited with what we can do in edit.....but there's still quite a bit we CAN do. I agree doing full figures is not going to produce the realism that thinner figures have. But then again.....SL caters to the fantasy.... people like to be beautiful in SL .....Remember this is a world we create....so it stands to reason if we're gonna build Utopia...we're all gonna look like Venus & Adonis. (ugh...that reminds me..I need to get working on male shapes...the lack of variety there is unacceptable! lol)

Other than alternative shapes, what I can't understand is the lack of Black/Dark skin in SL, I'm assuming that as with most graphical interpretation of Black skin, you have to be a very good artist to make it look correct, am I right?

Yup. I personally use a Nomine skin myself. The darkest one she has availible for men. She also has some nice dark shades for females as well.

And I too once thought about getting into the shape business, with my first shape actually being that of a BBW. I'm another one of those people that try to make my avatar as close to the real me as possible, and while I know I've cheated a bit and slimmed down his tummy, he's not overly tall nor does he have massively wide shoulders and roid rage muscles. I think it makes me stand out a bit more not to be another huge, lumbering guy running around looking like I want to challenge someone for the Mr Olympia title.