As regular readers of Rez will know, I am mostly found wandering the Second Life network as a 'normal' human avatar however I do also have a penchant for different avatar shapes notably Loco Pocos and Tinies. It was with this knowledge that fellow Rez writer Voodoo Buwan approached me with his latest discovery, namely the BUBU.

The brainchild of Logan Skytowner and Edge Axel the BUBU avatar is larger than a standard tiny avatar and generally with less of the 'aww' factor mixed in. These are highly customisable avatars which come complete (for the modest fee of 250$L) with all the templates and textures for creating your own skin as well as the exceptionally effective (and cool) spraycan for changing skins. The skins and accessories on the market are all very reasonably priced and offer avatars a different style of appearance.

Armed with my BUBU avatar I headed in the direction of the newly created main store for BUBU where I caught up with Logan Skytowner and Edge Axel, in possibly the most fun interview I've ever done for Rez Magazine, and asked them about the BUBU including the future and possibilities you could experience with one.

Trinity Dechou: Firstly, please explain what a BUBU is and how it came into creation in SL.
Logan Skytower: Well, the BUBU is an avatar, made specifically to create your own distinct, stylized look. It came into creation because I love all those little Vinyl DYI toys, but couldn't get any good ones around where I live, in real life. So I decided to sculpt my own and that's sorta where Edge came in and told me I should make it an avatar.
Edge Axel: Yeah. I was like "LOGAN, DO IT! DO IT, DO IT!" And he's like "Omg, okay! :D"
Logan Skytower: That's basically what it came down to :)

Trinity Dechou: How long has the BUBU been available to buy in SL?
Edge Axel: Seventy-four years!
Logan Skytower: Hahahaha, nice, Edge, nice. It's been available for round about 7 months now.
Edge Axel: Wow - It's sure felt like seventy-four years..
Logan Skytower: Absolutely. It has made me an old, old man.

Trinity Dechou: Had you had any content creation experience in SL before you started to make these avatars?
Logan Skytower: Yeah, loads, actually. Quite early on in SL I started hanging out with Aemilia Case of Philotic Energy and Fusemelon fame and she got me into learning sculpts and making clothing. For about 8 months I had a little clothing store called Felid Disrupt, which basically taught me how to do textures, sculpts, and all those things and that's sorta how I figured out how to make the BUBU. The only thing totally new to me was animation. And scripting, so for that last part I hired a scripter, who is now my steady scripter and also consistently for hire, Lillium Elcar.
Edge Axel: I help to script when I can. I'm not as great as Lillium, though - she's fantastic!
Logan Skytower: I have Edge for my crazy fun scripting, like jumping cars and whatnot, and Lillium for my serious scripting, like how to make an encrypted channel to send the textures over when the spraycan paints the avatar.

Trinity Dechou: So there are also accessories which go along with the BUBU, can you explain a little about what those are.
Logan Skytower: Most accessories so far have been made by Edge Industries, owned by Edge here, like the rideable animals and the BUBU car. I pretty much had nothing to do with that, except help testing them and watching them be built. My own big accessories are only just starting to come out, like the army set. And essentially, it's attachments to help personalize your BUBU. Or vehicles to share the BUBU fun with your friends.
Edge Axel: Yeah - as Logan said; I've got the two rideable animals, the horse and the turtle - those were just experiments I guess. They weren't built to go on sale, but I guess I changed my mind. Oh! And the car. There'll be more stuff, better stuff - I'm still learning. :D

Trinity Dechou: Yeah sure, it's all a learning curve of new experiences with a new product, have you each learned any new skills because of the BUBU and if so what?
Edge Axel: Oh, definitely - I've picked up some sculpting skills and texturing skills - and with scripting, I guess that's a given since everytime you script you're going to pick up something new - more often than not, anyway.
Logan Skytower: That absolutely goes for me, yeah. My sculpting and texturing has had to improve so much during the whole process, to create the things that I had in my head. For instance, looking at the Tier 1 skins, as I call them, the ones you see in the vendors , are now, in my opinion quite bad, especially compared to my new work. And sculpt wise, I've just learned so much, just learning how to do oblong sculpts, to keep prim count down and keep the BUBU lowlag. And of course, animations, like I said before, were completely new territory.
Edge Axel: Oh! Yeah, I'm learning about animating, too! :D

Trinity Dechou: Yeah, talking of the skins, you actively encourage people to make their own skins for the BUBU, can you explain a little about the process behind making skins and why you encourage people to make their own?
Logan Skytower: Ah, well, that was fairly easy for me. I set out to make a DIY toy, turned it into the avatar and through the whole process I just kept in mind that I wanted to keep the idea of it being a DIY avatar.
Edge Axel: I like the fact that people can take a product and then work to make it their own kind of thing, having them add their own style to it. It's nice. :D
Logan Skytower: So, encouraging people to make their own skins comes first and foremost, more than what I make with the BUBU. Granted, I have the advantage of knowing how their made and as such how to take the customization to it's full advantage so, as such, I've made a video of the process of how I go about making a skin and made that into a giant tutorial, which can be viewed in the store. Still, I've seen some people make amazing skins with the BUBU, or just generally do amazing things, like what Edge is working on for his Halloween BUBU, which is an actual transforming Werewolf.
Edge Axel: I'm pretty proud of the werewolf so far. I learnt a lot scripting the transformation. It's far from done, though. Let's just hope I can get it out at Halloween. Haha.
Logan Skytower: And that, to me, just shows how far you can push the BUBU, ya know? That people can just go absolutely nuts on it, completely change their appearance. I get more of a kick out of seeing others work than making something myself.

Trinity Dechou: So by opening it up and allowing others to do their own things and add their own styles the mixture of BUBUs grows and helps you to develop them further perhaps?
Edge Axel: I like the fact that the Bubu can be used as a learning tool, rather than an avatar - too!
Logan Skytower: Oh, absolutely. See, my imagination only goes so far, but for instance, Helena Stringer, another business associate of mine, has made these super cute Cthulhu BUBU's that are just a complete departure from anything I'd ever do, and to see that, and see what she's done with it, to me, just shows the diversity and the enormously broad appeal it can have.

Trinity Dechou: What sort of feedback have you had for the BUBU?
Logan Skytower: Loads, absolutely loads. From people IMing me asking where I got it because it was so cute, to people telling me two, three times a day that I should make this or that skin. Overall, so far, the reception has been amazing. Just, the people who get one seem to love it, since it's also just... a little crazy. It's a strange, tiny, insane avatar with no real limits besides imagination.

Trinity Dechou: And presumably more and more people want to make their own additions and skins for their newly found avatars, roughly do you know how many others are making products for the Bubu?
Edge Axel: I think just about everyone that's picked up a Bubu has at some point made something for it, or modded an existing object to fit it.
Logan Skytower: I know exactly, at the moment. I'm still keeping track of everyone who makes skins. There is, of course, Edge Industries, who makes rideable creatures and vehicles and who knows what else to come. There's Helena Stringer of the Stringer Mausoleum, who makes insane mythical skins for them. There's Erricson Turbo who makes game related skins for the BUBU, besides his own amazing scifi/anime products, he has a Halo skin in 3 colors and a Resident Evil skin. There's Voodoo Buwan, of VooBu Skins who just opened his own little store, selling BUBU skins based on pop culture figures and that's it, really :) And, like Edge said, everyone who got one has at some point modded the BUBU in some form or way, yeah.

Trinity Dechou: Have you faced any hurdles along the way and if so, what?
Logan Skytower: Well, the biggest hurdles have definitely been the learning curve and the finding a place to sell them. I rarely do things small, so not this time either. So I wanted to open with a big store in a nice, big place. Started at VSN, the Virtual Sports Nexus, and due to problems, namely, that sim was closing down, I had to move and went over to Caisteal, FSG, the Furry Sandbox group, and for both these sims I've had to rebuild my store by the owner to "fit more with the style". At first, you take offense to that... but I understood it. It was still a hurdle though. I eventually left Caisteal because it was being rebuilt and it was quite simply taking too long and I was taking a hit, sales wise. And thus, thanks to the Amnesia club, I ended up here, at Stonehaven.
Edge Axel: Yeah, it's a little bit saddening when you need to change your store to fit the sim it's in, though - completely understandable.
Logan Skytower: Which is, why, at some point, I hope to be able to have a BUBU sim, but at the moment, it's just a dream. But we'll get there, I'm sure.
Edge Axel: We dream a lot - we were talking about having a Bubu themed theme-park in said sim. Haha. That's a long way away, though.
Logan Skytower: A long, long way away, yep. But it'd be good. So very, very good.

Trinity Dechou: Nice, Getting a new avatar and brand out into the public in SL can be quite hard, can you explain the ways you've tried to increase the visibility of BUBU?
Logan Skytower: Oh, absolutely. For that, I have to thank Achariya Maktoum, Helena Stringer, Selos Dae, Aikea Rieko and Terry Toland. Achariya just gave me a gameplan, essentially, which was to gain visibility, tease the public, via IHeartSL.com with teaser images. And to contact some "popular" designers to create Limited Edition launch skins, which turned out to become Helena Stringer of Stringer Mausoleum, Aikea Rieko of Plastik and Selos Dae of TRAP skins. And Terry Toland has been blog covering the BUBU from day one, on her own personal blog. Helena managed to get all her groups to show up on launch day and all of that has just been an amazing experience.
Edge Axel: I ran around and threatened people, telling them if they don't buy Logan's product - I'd come to their house and stab them with a potato! ..I'm kidding :D

Trinity Dechou: Obviously it's been very well received by the community and the other designers what's on the cards for the future of BUBU?
Edge Axel: Rocketships, laser-beams, flying squirrels! Yes. We're going there. :D Well, I might - I don't know about Logan.. Hehe.
Logan Skytower: Oof, that's actually a tough question. I don't have a particular path to take the BUBU. I just sorta... make it up as I go. The army stuff was just an experiment, turned out nicely and I released it. Then there's the LoveSuit series which just came out which was a suggestion by a friend, he told me to make it and... yeah. I just sorta do my own thing and hope that people like it and keep liking it. I know one thing on my gameplan at the moment and that is that there are new Limited Edition skins coming, for Halloween.
Edge Axel: I'm hoping aliens will invade. I haven't had any luck convincing Logan yet, though!
Logan Skytower: I have yet to make a proper alien skin, without looking too much like Greenies.

Trinity Dechou: Well thanks guys for a lovely new avatar with great potential for customisation and a wonderfully fun afternoon and interview
Logan Skytower: You too, absolutely, and thank you for interviewing us!
Edge Axel: Thanks a bunch. It's been fun. :D

Once in a while, I like to indulge in what's commonly known as island hopping. Just teleporting from one random point on the map, to another, exploring what I find as I go. When scouring across the map, I started to notice and think about the places I could see that had actually created their particular sim in order that it would have a particular look, when viewed from the map view. With this in mind, I then set myself a quest to find the best examples of these across the Grid, so I could share them with you here:

Pawaii is the HQ of D&D Dogs, who create canine avatars and companions. As such, they have shaped their home island in the shape of a giant doggy pawprint.











This cute froggy shaped island is umi, and is basically a luxury beach club for you to lounge around on. However, be warned that when I went there, the place was empty and most of the items there were deeded to "o0 Club Nude 0o" so there is a risk of being confronted by a gang of nudists.









Mute is the home of RL and SL musical performer Richard Hawley, and as such he has chosen to make the main part of the land on the sim in the form of a giant version of his prized Eddie Cochran Anniversary Edition Gretsch Guitar.










Sanctum Eternum is obviously the love nest of a private couple, who deem to keep this heart, as well as the passionate goings on that may happen there, private. Since the sim is accessible by invite only, appreciate this one from the map view. Or, if you wish to make your own sim this romantic, the Raw file for this heart can be found here.








The beautiful dolphin from which Dolphin Reef gets it's name, is actually up for rent at the moment. So, if you want the prestige of setting up home on the body of a giant aquatic creature, and have 31,000$L or $120 a month burning a hole in your pocket, head on over, and make the owner an offer.









When DAZ (or Digital Art Zone) were looking to build their headquarters, Polygon Point, they look to have gone to Raw file creators Sim Bliss, for this fantastic snowflake design. The poses or animations that they make are mostly to be found on the sim to the west, so one can only assume that the spectacle and winter scenery here is to attract passing traffic.









There are many beautiful sights in the huge Winterfell estate of sims, but I will admit to being particularly fond of the adorable Winterfell Libris, an enormous crescent moon reef, surrounded by star shaped islands, and a wonderful fairytale feel throughout.










Of course, no talk of stunningly shaped island sims would be complete without mentioning the astoundingly ambitious and amazingly well put together Rouge, the burlesque style club and gallery created in the shape of it's owner, CodeBastard Redgrave.










Lamonti is the Headquarters of Lamont International, which owns Furniture Island, which lies directly to the north of it. When glancing across this sim, I almost skimmed straight past it, until I spied the skillfully created feminine silhouette in it's north east corner.









Some map visible land constructs are not islands, or even above the water. IYC Addiction is a Furry dedicated club and mall, and to try to catch the eye, they have dug underwater trenches, proudly displaying their name, and even a massive pawprint, and doodled kitty face.









Finally, if all this is feeling a little elitist, and you're thinking, "Yes, these rich residents who can afford their own sims can create own map visible landmasses, but we mere mortals have no such ability", then let me humbly present to you the mainland sim Corinaldo, where I own a couple of empty openwater 512 parcels. See if you can spot the initials of both my partner, Allanah Tomsen, and my self.







If all this has whetted your appetite, then remember that the world map is only a mouseclick away, and once you start scanning, you never quite know what you might find.

Faithful reader, if the name Aimee Trescothick seems familiar to you, it may be from the occasions during the past few Trin and Voo shows, when Trin’s partner takes it upon herself to blow us all up, or run us over with a tank. However, it’s become more and more noticeable that very many residents know our sweet little Aims for her superb and innovative programming work, which has been making quite the name for her. This past week, she has been getting so much attention, that we decided that an interview was in order, to get a better perspective on the divine Ms Trescothick, and her own particular Second Life Story.

However, Aimee is know for not being the biggest self publicist inworld, and is almost notoriously shy when talking about herself, so in a first for me, I traveled in the real world for the interview, down to an undisclosed location in deepest Kernow (or Cornwall for our non Cornish readership). Once there, Aimee and I also logged into SL, and sat down at the Rez office on the Kernow sim where she and Trin live, and had a chat:

Voodoo – You've been a Second Life resident for almost four years now. What initially attracted you to SL?

Aimee – I actually first heard of Second Life while researching a sleep disorder. I happened to read someone comparing it to Lucid Dreaming, as a place that you can shape to fit your imagination, a description that intrigued me. I'd watched the field of virtual worlds develop with interest since I studied Computer Engineering in the early '90s, and tried various ones from time to time, but generally got bored once I'd seen everything and found nothing left to do. This sounded much more what I had been looking for, an actual world I could take a part in, rather than just another game. I have lost a lot more sleep to it ever since!

Voodoo - When I first met you, I knew you as an artist and flag maker on Kiva, the Lava Pit sim. Since then, it seems you have experimented with quite a few interests in-world?

Aimee – Around the same time I found Second Life I was made redundant from a job in research and development at a graphics card manufacturer. I enjoy experimenting and continually learning everything I can about the world around me, so finding myself without the creative outlet that my employment had provided, I was drawn into creating and scripting within Second Life. Having found a warm welcome from the regulars at the Lava Pit, I tended to do my building while hanging out there. Those experiments, and the friendships forged at the old Lava Pit eventually brought me a real life career.

Voodoo – Oh, yes, Kiva brought you into contact with Lord Leafblower, Founder of the Lava Pit club, and owner of Boxapixels?

Aimee – Yes, he asked me initially to help building an in-world presence for a large communications company, and later to build a flag-ship store for his sideline, the Lava Inside brand of gadgets. Through doing that work I eventually joined Boxapixels as its virtual worlds specialist.

Voodoo –You have gained quite a following for the Open Source work you have been doing on the Second Life viewer. How did you get involved in this?

Aimee – I have? :) I got involved through curiosity mostly, I saw fixing bugs as an opportunity to learn about it, and see what made it tick under the surface. A big leap forward for me came with the introduction of the Space Navigator as a method of controlling my avatar in Second Life, that acted as a catalyst for me. It was great to suddenly be able to move so much more freely, anyone that hasn't tried it is really missing out :) It was a big improvement, but I could still see limitations, where I knew it was capable of more. So I started creating a long list of JIRA entries on ways it could be made even better. Realizing that as it affected relatively few users, and at the time was probably a low priority within the Lab as they were making a concerted effort to improve client stability, I started working my way through fixing them myself.

Voodoo – Since then, you have developed quite a few other changes or improvements for the Second Life viewers. What sorts of things that you have been working on have ended up on release?

Aimee – Besides the Space Navigator improvements, mostly minor UI improvements and fixes, or things under the surface. Like turning off the mic automatically when ending voice IM calls, so you don't broadcast your private conversations (or the sound of eating your lunch) to the world, and clean-up of the code that drives the mini-map, to make it cleaner and more efficient, and to enable the community translators to translate text associated with it. I mostly try to pick up small tweaks, that will gradually add up to improve people's every day experience, in the hope that it will free up a little of the Lab's resources, helping them to concentrate on the real game-changing stuff. Most of my recent Open Source work, is going into Linden Lab's Snowglobe project, such as the increased zoom range of the mini-map there for example. I really just enjoy the chance to talk to and work along side some really talented people, both the other Open Source developers, and within the Lab, who I find I learn a lot from. The demos shown at SLCC gave just a little taster of some of the seriously awesome stuff the Lab are keeping up their sleeve right now, for Viewer 2.0 and beyond. I can't wait to see what's just around the corner.

Voodoo – Most recently you've gained quite a lot of attention for your work with the new media plugins. Imagine me a drooling technophobic child, can you explain what this is?

Aimee – Linden Lab announced at SLCC the release of the LLMedia Plug-in API, which is a way of allowing outside programmers to more easily extend the client, intended mostly as a way to expand the types of media Second Life can handle beyond Quicktime videos and basic web pages. When I got my hands on the initial developer release of the Plug-in API viewer and the Linden test application for developing and debugging them, I made a quick video just of what could be done with the Linden supplied plug-ins, to show a couple of the other Open Source developers what I was seeing. Before I knew it, the video had been shared around much more widely than I anticipated, even finding its way onto New World Notes. It created quite a large positive reaction, and that spurred me on to see what I could do with it myself. Through my work at Boxapixels I regularly have clients asking for better collaboration facilities within the virtual world. So as a first attempt while learning the API, I decided to make something of a Frankstein style experiment, and over a weekend spliced in the VNC remote desktop sharing protocol. I then posted another video of it in action, just to demonstrate the potential of the new API, and the ease with which it makes it possible to develop these sorts of projects. the reaction to that was phenomenal.

Voodoo – What kind of possibilities could this unlock for in-world residents?

Aimee – It makes it possible to view the desktop of another computer live on the surface of a prim in Second Life, the same way you would normally view a video stream. So as a fun example, I have a virtual replica Apple Mac on my Second Life desk, showing the display of my real one. In future it will also be possible to interact with it using your mouse and keyboard, it already works while running it in the Linden plug-in test software – as can be seen in my videos, but the support for those functions doesn't appear to be available quite yet in the client itself. More useful examples would be collaborating on shared documents, live software demonstrations in-world, or remote assistance, enabling people providing in-world training to see “over the shoulder” of the people they are teaching. The sort of capabilities that are provided by web conferencing applications such as Cisco's Webex, or AT&T Connect, but in the more flexible and inviting environment of the virtual world.

Voodoo – What kind of feedback have you received?

Aimee – I knew these facilities would be popular within the business and education communities, but as someone who generally avoids publicity and hides in the background, the amount of attention that it got has taken me a little by surprise! The messages of support and encouragement I have received have been fantastic, it felt a little like I'd unintentionally stumbled upon the Holy Grail. I have been told be several Lindens that the video has created quite a buzz while being passed around within the Lab too, which is flattering, really though the part I played is quite minimal. I just provided the glue between the VNC software and the new Linden API which between them do the real work, without them this would have been much harder to achieve.

Voodoo – Finally, can you give us a heads up on the sort of things you are working on now, and what is on the horizon for you?

Aimee – Well, for now, while this project is working already, there is still a fair amount of work to do to bring it up to stable production quality, ready for public consumption. So with the demand, I think I'd better finish it before I move on to anything else :) There are still other things I have in mind to further the joystick input support, and my other pet project the mini-map. As a registered Apple developer I have used Snow Leopard through the beta program for some time now, I would like to spend some time looking at improving the performance of the Second Life client using the new technologies found there, as I believe there is much to be gained. I do have a number of ideas for other media plug-ins I will be playing with, but it will mostly be a matter of pushing boundaries, trying different things, and seeing what grows out of it all.

All photos and videos used with kind permission of Aimee Trescothick. All rights reserved.