Jazzed Up in Opensim

Poppy Fields and Forest Azure organizing a Jazz and Blues Weekend and it's coming up on September 9 and 10. It's sponsored by Masala Estates, (thank you Unadecal!) and will be held on a dedicated sim, HG Jazz & Bluesfestival. It will cover both Euro and US-friendly hours, 11am - 3pm on saturday, 11am - 5pm on Sunday, for your listening pleasure.  

The full lineup of performers is: Rez Rezzal, Icky and Sum, Charice Singer, Acidicloop, Ruud vandeSande, Clan's Band, and Poppy and Forest themselves.

September is still a month away, but preparations are already well in hand, with this stage, built by Poppy Fields, featuring a great dome in dark blue, filled with stars and

Tropicana fun!

Mike Townsend has been in opensim since way back when. If you're an oldbie, you may remember his UKTurk grid, with its freebies - such a precious resource at a time when finding content was a painful business on the HG. These days, you'll find him in his OSGrid estate, Tropicana. Hot or what. So, what's the story?

 Mike Townsend:  I have never really left OSgrid, just dabbled in other grids and moved around a bit. I guess for me the appeal of it is the building and creation of environment. And of course the friends that we meet in our travels. I don't miss having a grid of my own. Not at all. Most grids, as they get larger, become cumbersome and problematic. Tropicana was not here a couple of years ago, it is really the result of the pandemic. It was built very quickly and homes and lands were added as an afterthought, and it just grew and grew from 9 SL sized regions to around the 600 that it is today. 

Makes sense, after all OSGrid is known as the crossroads of Opensim. You can check out the

To the Manor Born

The best building is like the best writing - the rule 'write what you know' becomes 'build what you know'. That of course doesn't mean that people have to go to Jupiter before they can write a sci fi novel or make a Jovian EEP.  'Knowing' can be a flexible factor. Some people do lots of research, some look within themselves to find that magical harmony of design. Look at the builds on Outworldz, like Virunga, and their Alexandria build, blogged about here.  Or how about Tosha Tyran's Taj Mahal or Angkor Wat, or Dalaran, by Wendie Blackthorn over on Kinky Haven - thoroughly researched and thought through. The same goes for Nyx Breen and his Jazzland builds. Another great example is Star Ravenhurst's Land of Xzar - based on her own novel. You can think of a dozen more, no doubt. Add them in the comments section, if you'd like.

This is Serenity Manor on Serenity Grid, by Erwan Elan. If the grid name is familiar you may remember it from a post about a year ago about the Monet House. This region doesn't have the same aim at realistic precision as Monet's place, with its phenomenal attention to factual detail,  but it is a masterclass in authenticity of genre, instinctively right in tone and proportions. 

OSFest 2023

 Over the years, the idea of a general festival for all opensim has led to many entertaining events, and this year another is planned. The organizers this year are more or less the same team from last year, with Shelenn Ayres taking the lead, Banker Ibor organizing the volunteers, and Rosa Alexeev coordinating the musicians, along with many more helpers, as you can imagine.  

The festival combines space for the commercial creators in opensim to exhibit their wares, as well as many displays and installations by the Free community. People are being encouraged to organize tours and demonstrations on their builds during the festival, and they plan to have musical guests performing over a total of 60 hours during the festival's 2 week run, from September 15 to 30. 

Last year, the overall theme for OSFest was medieval/fantasy, and this year the theme for exhibitors is Jazz in all its many forms - from the Art deco period, the Roaring 20s, right up to the psychedelic 70s and beyond, and includes all kinds of cultural offshoots, from New Orleans, to South America, so there's no end of choices for how to style your build.

How can I participate? 

Missing the Sky

 Are you the kind of person who can't wait for the next update in the Firestorm viewer, and eagerly test its many windows and menus? Or do you wait until you think it's been tweaked into reliable behavior - maybe even wait till you absolutely are obliged to update?  As grateful as we all should be by the people who do the testing and reporting of problems, it's probably fair to say that the majority of us just want the thing to work, and are not entertained by bug hunting. 

Firestorm 6.6.8 (68380) was released this January. When I finally bit the bullet and changed over to it,  it seemed a pretty painless transition. 

With one exception - all the Windlight settings were gone. Urk. 

For a few weeks I just let it slide, but eventually I had enough time to check around to see what was up with that and found this thread on the SL community page. The new way - well, not all that new, but never mind about  that - to make skies is called EEP (meaning Environment Enhancement Project) and you may have seen some stunning EEPs around opensim like this beauty...

Dew Drop Islands, by Azi Az and Danger Lytton

and this one:

Scripted Artwork

 If you've been around Opensim for a while, you'll recognize this familiar face: Wordfromthe Wise. Yes, back in the days of Metropolis you may have experienced his fireworks region, or perhaps you remember dropping in on his Cornflakes Tribute sim during Cornflakes Week.

Word and Cornflakes were good friends, which is why  he has still owns that treasure-trove of early opensim original content.

But there's more to Word than this.

He and his scriptilliscious colleague Sixtus have a small grid where you can find some delightful creations. Called scripted artwork, it's exactly that. Everything in movement, interactive, moving, flashing and generally immersive.

Planet A with Tina Bey

 Tina Bey is one of those outstanding artists who make opensim a joy.

In OSGrid since 2010, Tina's an enthusiastic supporter if opensimulator's Test grid, and this year once again she is contributing to the  Auction event at the end of September (here's a blog post about the auction).

Tina's sometimes perceived as being a little shy, not the loudest voice in the room for sure, but she has always impressed with her willingness to explore opensim, encourage others, learn what is going on out there on the HG, and make stunning original creations. If you're a safari oldbie you may remember our visits to Arcauana back in 2016, and Waterworld in 2015. Tina's from Argentina, so her first language is Spanish, but of course, the language of her art transcends all that.

Tina's art is deeply rooted in real world cultures and issues

Auction objects are sold for real money and won't be free to copy - but that's a huge exception from Tina's usual practice.

Tina Bey: Usually my sculptures are completely free, since the spirit of opensim has been free since its beginnings. That is why I benefited from working here and moving from Second Life to work better and more freely in all aspects, including economics. This "Antarctica" region generously lends me Mazzo Ganitano, a Spanish gentleman I don't even know personally but who gives many of us the possibility of having a region free of charge. I am very grateful for so many people who have given me their regions since I started, and that is why I generally put my created objects free, like in different shopping centers, among others LANI Mall. free copy.