A message to all Burning Life builders

Seeing the debate about AnneDroid's reviews of the BL builds made me want to post something. I love Burning Life. It was the reason I signed up, and I would have gladly paid the $10 JUST to see it. They weren't all perfect. Some of them were kind of boring, or badly made, or artistically empty. But I appreciate all the time and effort that went into all of them.

The one floating islands build with all the waterfalls? Apparently the waterfalls flowed down at 90 degree angles. Well I actually never noticed that at all, because it was freakin' beautiful! If I wanted incredibly realistic graphics I'd just play Half-Life 2. Here I want to see something funny, cool, fun, interesting, gorgeous, touching, creative....

I loved that most of the time the person who created the build was standing right next to it, and I could talk to them. Sometimes if I couldn't find the person, I IMed them just to tell them how much I loved it. This stuff isn't art that's shipped to a museum, it's stuff that's been built right there, by another person(s), for us.

I loved jumping in the "bouncy castle." I loved playing Bling-Man. I loved all the weird contraptions that flung my avatar into various places or things. Were those art? Not really. But I had tons of mindless fun playing on them, and they made BL a blast. The interactivity of some of these made them that much more special, something I wouldn't have gotten anywhere else.

My sister was at the real Burning Man this year, and I almost went. I can honestly say [I think] I had a better experience here than I ever would have there.

I'm not going to argue about whether we should be grading the builds. I just wanted to say that I love them all for being there. So, thank you to all the builders/scripters/texturers/SLers who contributed in some way!

I guess the way we experience Burning Life is very personal and unique to the observer. Nobody's impressions or reactions are more "correct" than anybody elses. That said, I think *MY* experience of BL matches TommyGun's. For me it wasn't so much about technical accuracy, building/texturing skills, or creating the most profound statement. I enjoyed BL because each plot was a chance to get into worlds of the creator and I was grateful for the invitation. All in all I found the whole experience to be a blast.

Thank you TommyGun for your post ! Made me smile!
This is beautiful .....

Second Life rocks as an arts and crafts exhibition.

Glad to have ya here with us, TommyGun.

I liked going to Burning Life and bouncing from one creation to the next, like some mad kama sutra version of pinball, got twisted in more positions than cosmic pretzels. o.O

Extremely well said, Tommy. I too made effort to IM builder that wow'ed me for one reason or another.

Here are somethings which I found way cool:

1. the geodesic symphony - kinetic, interactive, musical and darn pretty
   
2. the big cube of colored spinning spheres - definitely don't judge this book by its cover, it was only on my second pass that I noticed there was an entrance.
   
3. the oil drum cannon ball instrument - okay, I like music and kinesis
   
4. the triangular tinkly wind chime - better still be the wind, fly through it
   
5. the chained mini-pods - fly inside the big spheres, zowie!
   

I'm leaving out many due to my poor memory not because of lack of merit.

I have to give special note to a symbolic piece that represents one soldier's feelings about war. It starts with a "field marker" for a fallen soldier which bleeds into a field where the blood waters germinating peace. I don't care what war it refers to or what politics you hold. To me, it was a stunningly touching portrayal of the gravity and hopes surrounding any war at any time and a stark reminder that soldiers don't choose their battles, or even particularly like fighting. If part of art's role is to cause one to contemplate the structure of the world and our place in it, then I think this piece ranks as high art and I have no qualms comparing it to Picasso's "Guernica".

I agree with you except this..

Goes a bit too far for me.

I did not actively dislike the piece, but it the original reveiwer (anne?) was right to refer to it as a bit cliched in it's presentation. No offense to the maker, and I am sure lots of folks enjoyed it etc., but comparing this to Picasso's Guernica is like comparing a t-shirt with a smilie on it to the Mona Lisa.

Well I'm the creator and am not offended as such. I wasn't even offended by AnneDroid's "review". I will express to you though what I did to her. Have you viewed my piece in person? Did you read the two notecards in the Arlington Cross monument ? I am the soldier Introvert speaks of. I appreciate his comments while humbled with his comparison, would probably not go that far either, but thank you anyway Introvert. What is this cliche ? I know AnneDroid referred to a TIME magazine cover of vietnam era. While I was born in that era I assure you I haven't ever seen this and the build you witness in BL came out of my mind.

Ah.

Well apologies again, and you are right in assuming that I havent seen it up close. I did not spend as much time at Burning Life as I wanted and kind of "walked by" a lot of them, looking left and right.

I really did not mean to offend, I meant that technically it is cliched in the sense of an over (or much used) image. The "field marker" has been used a lot and has become a sort of cutural cliche based mostly on that time cover that was mentioned.

I certainly would not put your build in the category of some of the other builds (that sucked) It seemed to be well constructed and had a point etc., whereas other folks did not seem to even try.

Perhaps if the show was juried and there were not such a large number of bad and incomplete builds this year, the whole discussion about what is good and what is not would not have happened?

Well thank you for your post. I must clarify I wasn't offended just wanted to allow you the opportunity to absorb the full intent of my build. Thank you again.

I absolutely loved the geodesic symphony too! That's something you'd never get at Burning Man!

The spinning spheres, I think you're talking about the giant colored "gumballs" as I call them, hehe. I flew past that one many times before I noticed you could go in it, too! Then after I went through part of it I didn't realize there was a teleport to the next section until I went through it again!

That was one of the ones where I IMed the builder because I couldn't find him. I thought that piece was so cool and interesting, how each sphere was a different location--especially the submarine, train, airplane insides. He TPed me to his location, where he was working on an underwater house! Then we surfaced and he showed me some of his other stuff. A very cool experience, which says a lot about this community and how open and nice many residents are.