Frenzoo. Games with Style.

Frenzoo at SLCC 2009!

Last week, Frenzoo was a part of the 3^rd annual Second Life Community Convention in San Francisco, California. The SLCC is the largest virtual world convention combing art, business, education and non-profit industries to share ideas and learn about new technologies. It was a great opportunity to meet people from different gaming platforms and was interesting to learn about many different activities within the metaverse.

During the convention I held mini demos and received great feedback from the con-goers! Many were surprised to see a browser based creating tool for the first time. They were excited about the ability to edit and create your avatar items in real time and to do all of this without downloading a heavy application! Others found it really easy to use for a person unfamiliar with creating in 3D. In addition to the browser based create tool, they loved the idea that Frenzoo supports Second Life creators promoting and importing their products and individual designs.

When I wasn’t partaking in demonstrations, I had the chance to attend a workshop held by Second Life fashion designer MadamG Zagato about transforming your avatar fashion into real life clothing. Turns out making your own clothes takes more time and work than virtual ones…hmm, I think I’ll stick to shopping for avatar fashion for the time being. Another panel I attended called History & Future of SL Fashion was held by Avenue Magazine. I learned about the past and future of the Second Life fashion industry. 

Other panel speakers I met during the convention include Dr. Yesha Sivan a professor from Shenkar College of Engineering and Design, speaking on the Business panels, Paisley Beebe producer of the SL talk show Fabulous Fashion TV and Catherine Linden of Linden Labs.

 

Avatar: Welcome to the Dark Side of 3D

So we had an interesting debate in the Frenzoo office last week, about the introduction of fantasy / scifi skin colors to our 3D Avatar Community...

This request had originally come from members who wanted more darker skin tones, but our artist karlt, a fan of anime and sci fi culture had mocked up several other different colors including electric blue, apple green, midnight black...

But there were concerns...

On one hand, there was the opinion about wanting to keep the site more realistic and fashion & style oriented.  The way that argument was that: introducing lots of "weird" colors would change the site's feeling and be unappealing to those who like to dress up with beautiful realistic fashion and cosmetics.

Well then on the other hand, we had already started up the marketplace via our Pro program and it would only be a matter of time before we support avatar body and skin imports, so if we didn't add these colors, someone else would, and still those fantasy styles would appear and potentially "put off" others.

The counter argument was that fantasy colors would be more difficult to find in the marketplace compared to directly in the skin adjustment interface, and putting it there would set the wrong impression..

Well after a bit of back and forward, at the end of the day we just thought... "it looks so cool" and if we feel that way, then others probably do as well. So it made sense to release them and give our community the choice to love or hate them.

And the reaction? Great! There are now many of our ztylists who are very happy with the new skin colors and creative possibilities.  And surprisingly very little negative reactions.  I think we all learned a nice little lesson from this: when in doubt, go for more creative freedom - let people make of it what they will.

One of my personal favorite looks from the skin colors is the super dark other-worldly looks that have been popping up... here are some of the highlights from our members: NAME, Kay V and Glittergirl:

 

I wonder what will come next...

Begging for Gold Coins!

I'm always running out of Gold Coins on Frenzoo...

Yes, somehow even as an admin I always somehow seem to spend too much in our 3D avatar shop and end up back at zero again.

Whether it be reckless purchases of virtual motorcycles or mobile phones or just designer threads...

Well the good news is that now all you generous people can now donate me Gold Coins via the shiny new "Send Gold Coins" feature.  I'm excited!

Other awesome things we have updated today:

- Tons more skin colors including Fantasy styles, think Mystique or Shrek...

- Find a ztylist search

- Contest pics in your profile

- Take off worn items in the shop

- New emoticons

I'm excited!!

Check out all the good stuff here

Glittergirl and her evil twin win big!

Our joint avatar art contest up on virtual world portal koinup, has come to a successful conclusion after over 50 entries and no-doubt countless hours of shopping and photoshopping (:

The winner?

None other than the fabulous GlitterGirl who now gets lifetime VIP on Frenzoo!  She entered with a painting of her avatar painting her evil twin.  A very creative entry, wouldn't you say?

 

There were a bunch of other entries, from the sexy...

...to the interpretive...

 

...to the glamorous...

...to the showy...

 

...to the funny:

 

Well done Glittergirl and everyone, this was a great avatar competition!!

Avatar art hits the real world

It's not everyday we hear about virtual avatars leaping into the real world... 

  

When we heard about the project of Vera, a member of our Frenzoo 3D avatar community, we knew we had to share it with everyone.

After creating on the site for some time, Vera, an artist in real life, has gone ahead to create a series of paintings for exhibition in Netherlands...we interviewed Vera about this exciting project.

Please introduce and share a little about yourself?
 
Hi, i am Vera, at least on frenzoo i am ;)

I choose this nickname becouse my first dog was named Vera and i still think it is a beautiful name. My real name is Marleen and in real-life i am a painter and i studied artschool from 2003 till 2007 in the Netherlands, mostly i paint big paintings,the bigger the better! But i also love to draw, make collages and use photography. My inspiration comes from all the things i see around me, like the colours, shapes, people, animals, the city and nature.

The artist that i really like are Picasso, Alexander Calder, Lucien Freud, Matisse, Laura Owens, o and ofcourse my favorite: the musician Beck :D

From age 6 i learned to make clothing from my mother, and i make most of my own trousers and shirts, i am not good at jackets and dresses at all haha. So one day i will go follow a course to get better skills and i am still dreaming of making my own collection of fashion in the future. Yes big dreams i know
 
Tell us about the project, what is it?
 
 At this moment i am drawing an frenzoo-inspired art project, i don't have a good name for it yet but the work is going to be a series of avatars, inspired on my avatar Vera and some of the things i designed here on frenzoo.

The best way to explain i guess is: avatar selfportraits. The technique i use is acrylic paint and black crayon on paper with bright colors and dark lines. 

What was your inspiration for the project?
 
The idea for this project came in my head because i find it so strange that you can identify yourself with just a doll on the internet that isn't real and the fact that you can make friends with people you will never get to know in real life. And it fascinates me to see how people dare to be themselves on the internet, because in real-life that is not accepted a lot of the time.

Or in my case, in real-life i don't have the skills to make the clothing i like or have the money to buy them, so i cant wear what i would really like too.

The strange thing is most people see an internet avatar as a fake-you, but most of the people in reallife are not really themselves either, because of lots of things that just wont be accepted by our society.

Why do you use Frenzoo?

Well i started on frenzoo because i was really bored, i had to rest a lot after having had surgery in January and i couldn't really paint or anything at that time, so i really liked being able to be creative through the createtool on frenzoo and i got totally addicted . 

Then in February i could draw again an i made a new collage for an exhibition. In march i had to have a second surgery and had a lot of time again to be on frenzoo. Now i am recovered and i have to combine frenzoo with my real-life again and i cant be online very often anymore, but whenever i have a couple of hours i try to create a few new items for the shop :D

Any suggestions or advice for any other artists or designers out there?

Be creative and don't be afraid to fail because you will learn the most from your mistakes!

Thanks Vera, and we can't wait to see the final exhibition art!

We're joining the Second Life community event!

The amazing Starfire from our Community team will be representing Frenzoo at the annual Second Life Community Convention, held next week in San Francisco.

We'll have a small booth and will be giving demos of our new 3D avatar and creation system, including importing from 3D Max, Maya, Blender, Sketchup as well as new Second Life conversion templates which have just gone live.

Why, you ask?  Well the Second Life community are an incredibly creative and interesting crowd, which we think are complimentary to Frenzoo, even though we're very different products offering different things.

If you're attending the event, do drop in and say hi!