Two Heads are better than one - Pandora reporting

I never thought that I would find my original Pandora especially not in Mesh and now that there were two of me I knew I would be in for a lot of work. Neither avatar wore the same outfit or hair as I wanted them both to have their own look and style.
Pandora’s Poppy really nailed it. She had the cute sexy thing going for her and it suited her perfectly. The new Pandora, which I simply referred to as V1, took on a more sexy,classy approach. Considering that was how she looked in her classic days it seemed like the obvious way to go.
Something was missing with V1 as much as she looked like the old Pandora I couldn’t work out what the issue was. Then I realised she needed a different head because the Poppy one wasn’t  exactly right for her.
I went to LAQ to get more demos. The story of my life these days or should I say my Second Life. I teleported back home to check out all of the demos. Finally I settled on the Neve head luckily this one didn’t need any further tweaking. I went to LAQ again to buy the head and then home to complete my project.

V1 had now become Pandora’s Neve. It’s as though I have this alt stuck in my inventory that I bring to life every now and then. Alts may have different personalities depending on their creators but two versions of an avatar? That is a whole new situation and one that I hadn’t encountered before let alone thought of. I have two alts already so having a different version of me can get complicated at times.
Pandora’s Poppy earned the nickname of V2 just to make it easier even though she was the first Mesh avatar that I created. V1 had been there since the days of classic avatars and I still have one saved version of her tucked away.

I am enjoying my SL this time around however a word of advice to the newbies out there. Don’t go making half a dozen alts or several versions of yourself just because it seemed like a good idea at the time. Trust me you’ll go crazy … I have and there’s no going back.

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What Makes Bento Mesh Heads Different? – Camury Reporting...

As a result of Second Life viewers being updated for Bento, it seems that the Second Life community is in a tail spin over Bento mesh heads.

For those who still do not know about it, Bento is the newest and greatest improvement from Linden Lab for Second Life.  It allows more realism for avatars by adding ‘bones’ and attachment points to the avatar skeleton.

As the Bento Project makes changes to the Second Life avatar skeleton, avatars (specifically those who use the new joints, bones and animations allowed by the Bento Project) have the opportunity to have a much wider range of avatar body types, facial expressions and animations. New mesh avatars and mesh attachments make full benefit of new joints and attachment points.

A summary of the new bones and attachment points:

·         New limb bones: for extra wings, arms, or legs.

·         Tail bones: Include your tail in the avatar animations.

·         New hand bones: for finer control over hand animations.

·         New facial bones: for complex facial expressions, ears and animated antennas.

·         New attachment points - Associated with the new bones.

Bento does not affect any content in Second Life. What has changed, for the average user, is that older graphics cards and controllers may be finding it hard to process the increase in the number of joins. This has forced Second Life users to upgrade their operating systems or drivers to the latest version to be able to get on board with the Bento era. And now, after a long wait, we are starting to see a variety of avatars with additional Bento options.

The curiosity for Bento has been increasing exponentially.  What people want to know is what the main advantages of the additional options are.

Let’s compare the standard mesh head versus the Bento head. Basically, the advantage of the Bento head is the uncountable customization options for which it allows and the facial expressions tend to be much more realistic. This means that Bento heads allow adjustments and modifications to suit our characteristics. We can make use of the facial sliders to create our own face shapes.

Here are some Bento Mesh head options available inworld:

CREATOR	HEAD	PRICE
Absolut Creation	Male Female	850L 825L
Altamura	Female	3.499L
Catwa	Male Female	5.000L 5.000L
Genesis Lab	Female	4.000L
Lelutka	Female	5.000L
Niramyth	Male	2.766L

Although the delightful additional options of Bento heads are appealing, the cost is somewhat restrictive.  But don’t worry, you can keep the mesh head you are currently using, if you use one that is, for some time to come. Mesh bodies won’t be changing for the foreseeable future.  Although Bento hands and feet are now being released to add to the already complicated mix.

The "classic" avatar of Second Life will continue to function as planned and will not have to be updated. You do not have to change anything if you do not want to.

The adoption of the Bento head as de rigueur will initially be slow.   In my opinion many people will keep the mesh heads that they are currently wearing and will keep their mesh bodies as they are for now as well.  Obviously there are always those are early adopters who will want to use the characteristics of the Bento head, wings ears and tails, to make Second Life more realistic that it already is.

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