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There are no zoning regulations. LL is leaving this up to the residents to establish and maintain guidelines if that is their desire.

Not that anybody give a damn about my opinion, but hey, you'll get it anyway!

There's a few dimensions to this. The first is the simple "OMFG Lindens competing with land barons!@#". On the other hand, First Land is the same thing in that regard; it comes from the basic promise of being able to freely create things in SL; that 512 first land plot is the local "40 acres and a mule".

Then you have the free house prefab. Free house prefabs are nothing new; I was in one of Jai Nomad's houses in my first few weeks on the grid. These are nice prefabs, pre-laid out by Linden Labs.

Then you have the "oh yawn another boring suburban tract" factor. There, all I can say is... tough. The fantastic isn't fantastic without the mundane to use as a yardstick. A lifelike replica of reality is, in many ways, tougher to do than a construct entirely from the imagination. This gets the prospective basic account an initial grasp of SL without sending them straight into the deep waters of the surreal. (and... as ably pointed out... most people never DO go for the surreal. Even the people who like living in spaceships or something out of Myst are overwhelmingly grounded in the basic Earth-like aspects of the grid. There's an up, there's a down, there's a ground, there's the sun. Those of us who want to live with purple ground or the inside of a torus or on the Astral Plane are uncommon.)

So, in conclusion, it's First Land, with a house, initially zoned (but not permanently zoned like Boardman, apparently?). Betcha half of 'em bugger off to rent a larger plot on a private island or buy land elsewhere as soon as they can.

12? Can I get a location on that home? Looks more like 21...

It is almost surely 23.

"High-Quality Entrance"

hosted by snapzilla

"High-Quality Textures"

Hosted by Snapzilla



fyi, this description of the competition rules is completely wrong. link


agreed. the fact that these houses can be replaced means that the levittown sprawl aesthetic will more than likely completely disappear. eventually players will buy out their neighbours and build larger houses. the easements around the back of the houses will limit the usual encroachment and the current temporary houses provide an example of how to space out houses and be a good neighbour.

perhaps i was too hasty in my judgement. by rebuilding a bland and uninspiring moment in north american town planning, LL simultaneously provided a template for good neighbourly conduct and ample motivation for residents to rebuild their house.

for a location, follow the snapzilla link under the image for the one i photographed. it's a privately owned example.

here's a link i found to sl boutique that had actually alerted me of its existence. bear in mind, i don't even know the guy. i'm not advertising for him. i'm just very impressed with how good he made 12 prims look!

http://www.slboutique.com/index.php?&p=buy&itemid=21512

Jetpacks, Planes, Fast Cars, Rockets, Motorcycles, Hoverbikes, Giant Robots, Assault Bots, Skateboards, ATVs, and 4-Wheelers...

Seriously, where's my Minivan?!?!

* sings* another pleasant valley Sundaaaay. Here in Status symbol land. Rows of houses that are all the same....( Monkee's song Pleasant Valley Sunday)

Yes, Jauani, that entrance isn't terrific from that angle, I admit. I was having to conserve every prim. The first roof I had for the entrance, my husband aptly pointed out, if it were irl, it technically would act like a bathtub, and actually COLLECT water, rather than repelling it! haha What you see is what I ended up with, with very little time to spare.

As for "high-quality textures":

The combinations of textures used on that house isn't the combination of my originals. That was not my roof texture, and it wasn't my foundation texture. I wouldn't have chosen those color combos, and if I had chosen that foundation texture, I would not have put it on with the bricks going the wrong way.

The window textures - if you want to dis that, you will have to dis the texture place where I bought those wonderful 1-prim windows textures from. I believe it was Textures Unlimited, but her name escapes me right now.

I don't have photoshop and can't make my own textures. But I enjoy using the textures others have made, especially these with the built-on shutters, in terms of saving prims.

That link doesn't go to the rules. If I have the rules "completely wrong," I will be surprised, as I printed them out and virtually memorized them while I was making my build for the contest.

I will go in the game, set up this house myself, and then post the picture of it here, as your photos don't exactly do it any service.

coco

P.S. OK, yes - looked at that link again, and saw the post saying the original was always preferable.

Many apologies. I apparently immediately discounted the idea of using one I had already made, because that wasn't what they really wanted, and that's how I had it in mind it had to be exclusive. I know for the first promotion competition, there was no such emphasis on it being a build not previously sold.

P.S. I'm certain that house most certainly CAN be 12 prims! He makes the textures himself, and you can make a wall with the window already textured in it! So it's not even two prims, just one, for the whole wall, window, and shutters, and that is probably the case here.

However, I don't believe it contains more than one living area, or conforms to 14 x 14. I'm sure if he had turned his hand to meeting those requirements, though, he could have done something equally wonderful.

coco

Not entirely sure what your problem is here.

The best design, in the opinion of the judges, won.

You don't like it, fine, attack the judges, not the winner.

I think its quite cute actually... and it's certainly a lot more attractive than some of the monstrosities and griefer builds that pass for 'builds' I've come across around SL.

I'll have to come and look at your property some time, since you obviously have such great building skills.

Perhaps you should try entering the next competition and see if you can do any better.

Lewis

Ok, I went into the game and put out my house on my shop lot (having to remove a lot of things to do it), and took a picture of it. The attached picture is Mood Indigo, the house as I turned it in. I made it rather generic on purpose, knowing it had to appeal to a number of people.

And on this matter of textures, I'm not a texture maker. I don't claim to be a texture maker. I don't have Photo Shop Pro, or any of those programs.

I consider house making to be a different activity from texture making. There are some people who make textures as well as houses, and use their textures in their houses, and that's great, but I don't consider texture making to be a requirement for building houses that people buy and enjoy living in. I tend to purchase textures, instead. I think that is legitimate, and didn't consider this to be a texture-making contest, but rather a 512-house making contest.

And Jauani, what do you make? I'd love to have a go at criticizing it.

coco

Additional views. There is a bedroom, also, but I forgot to take a picture of it. It's the same width as the bathroom. I've also included another view of that roof portion, from the unfortunate angle. You'll note that roof isn't nearly so problematic, for any practical purposes, when textured properly.

By the way, I could have added another prim under that roof part, and you would have seen NO problem, even standing under it and stretching your neck, but I was conserving prims, and didn't want to waste one on something mostly unnoticable.

I considered getting a lot into a very small, prescribed space to be the major challenge, and I think I got a lot into it, as did the others whose houses were chosen.

coco

Or...

cocoa, first of all i don't "diss" your work. you do what you can do. my criticism was directed towards LL for promoting mediocrity. your work was more than worthy for a 20$ prize. you have turned my comments around to make them about you.

when you put your work out in the public domain you have to be prepared for criticism. you can not expect to present your self as a serious content provider of high quality work and expect everyone to pat you on the back. it will be inspected, measured, compared, and discussed. once it is out there, it no longer belongs to you.


when you make a build you can't deflect the blame on to others. you are presenting us with your high quality build. you chose this texture. if you lack the skills or means to make good texture, you can find someone who can provide them for you.

anyway, if you don't want any criticism, don't draw attention to your work

yay, urban sprawl!

It'll be like living my REAL life, in second life! HUZZAH!

I'm sure after Cocoa's buddy's treatment of the SL-famous, and her vehement defence of such treatment, she couldn't possibly have any problem with the critique of one who had deliberately put themselves on display to the public.

She's not that much of a hypocrite. No one could be. Really.

Clearly I need to do more work to my tower...

i make cynical and silly forum posts. fire away!

I keep thinking of the suburbia depicted in Edward Scissorhands. The oddball Johnny Depp characters thrown in to offset the oddball houses.... oh god.

In my defense, I had only been in SL for less than a month when I made my submission.

I have since found numerous things I would change. In fact, in the off chance that any of the new Premium account holders that got one of my houses is actually reading this, IM me and I will gladly make those changes and give you a copy. Please note this is only for those who already have one of my houses, though I would consider selling them for a reasonable price in the off chance that anyone else actually wants one of their own. The fifties style thing isn't my thing, but I just wanted to take on the challenge and see if I could do it as I felt the criteria were pretty tough and I like challenges.

Haha very cool The spacing though...The houses seem so close you could probably pick up normal chatting from next door. Kinda like that in RL but mainly you have to "shout" to get the other neighbors attention. Probably same goes for sounds.

Oh Snap!

Yup guess I could just go buy some cottages with full mods and skip the process altogether. Textures are very difficult in SL due to scale, repeats and some very difficult alphas. I am very suprized to hear you buy the textures. Where from? Maybe I too can save myself a few weeks and in some cases a few months worth of work.

Mar