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Second Life Avatars (in opposition to some views)
15 years ago
Aye, I must disagree with the outlook held specifically on this site and indeed on some other notable web sites that Second Life avatars, whether heavily-customized "stock" avatars or pure one-off never-before-seen ultra-custom ones, aren't art.
For the latter, the answer is obvious: it's a one-of-a-kind deal, made within the limitations of a non-photo-realistic program not designed to take seventy-five bajillion hours doing some hyper-realistic rendering that would make the executives at Pixar blush. That it comes out looking as good as it does is in and of itself simply amazing. We'll not get into the countless hours spent making sure that each part matches a client's personal preferences to the last detail. While this site may find that art, plenty of others do not, mostly because of the rendering limitations of the Second Life client.
As for the former, while not as work-intensive to a single designer, the effort most less financially-well-off folks on SL go through to take a stock, non-custom av, one of which at a minimum hundreds, more likely thousands, of which are sold, and alter, tweak, modify, clothe, jury-rig, etc. until it is bashed, sometimes well and sometimes roughly, into the shape and look of ones' dreams is in and of itself worthy of note. Add unto this the expenditure of real-life money, often in a decent though not insane quantity ($20 to $50), and a LOT of shopping around (in many cases more so than occurs with a one-off custom design), makes these items works of art in and of themselves.
Whether one has "more" or "less" merit artistically when compared to one another is a matter of highly-subjective judgment, but nonetheless, for a program where the limitations seem nearly-crippling, to have created a unique one-off avatar or to have modded an avatar into something it might not originally be is a matter worthy of pride, regardless of origins, and yes, artistic credit.
To those who read this and choose to without thought nor experience disagree, I suggest that you at least make a solid effort to make one of similar quality (as opposed to the anybody-can-do-it slap-dash anything onto itself in a jumble) and if you find yourself spending so little time that it is effortless, then I will respectfully say that you've either lied about doing the work.
To compress this whole long shebang into something a little less tl;dr, SL Av making is art, in ALL forms.
For the latter, the answer is obvious: it's a one-of-a-kind deal, made within the limitations of a non-photo-realistic program not designed to take seventy-five bajillion hours doing some hyper-realistic rendering that would make the executives at Pixar blush. That it comes out looking as good as it does is in and of itself simply amazing. We'll not get into the countless hours spent making sure that each part matches a client's personal preferences to the last detail. While this site may find that art, plenty of others do not, mostly because of the rendering limitations of the Second Life client.
As for the former, while not as work-intensive to a single designer, the effort most less financially-well-off folks on SL go through to take a stock, non-custom av, one of which at a minimum hundreds, more likely thousands, of which are sold, and alter, tweak, modify, clothe, jury-rig, etc. until it is bashed, sometimes well and sometimes roughly, into the shape and look of ones' dreams is in and of itself worthy of note. Add unto this the expenditure of real-life money, often in a decent though not insane quantity ($20 to $50), and a LOT of shopping around (in many cases more so than occurs with a one-off custom design), makes these items works of art in and of themselves.
Whether one has "more" or "less" merit artistically when compared to one another is a matter of highly-subjective judgment, but nonetheless, for a program where the limitations seem nearly-crippling, to have created a unique one-off avatar or to have modded an avatar into something it might not originally be is a matter worthy of pride, regardless of origins, and yes, artistic credit.
To those who read this and choose to without thought nor experience disagree, I suggest that you at least make a solid effort to make one of similar quality (as opposed to the anybody-can-do-it slap-dash anything onto itself in a jumble) and if you find yourself spending so little time that it is effortless, then I will respectfully say that you've either lied about doing the work.
To compress this whole long shebang into something a little less tl;dr, SL Av making is art, in ALL forms.
For example, my friend Kamilah, not only are Her avatars works of art, her home is a Steam punk wet dream given 3D shape and form.
I dare anyone to call her work Stock... It's Fucking art.
I for one am one of those who doesn't have a custom avatar per se. It was not lovingly crafted prim-by-prim and sculpt-by-sculpt solely for my personal enjoyment and pleasure, like some ancient Greek sculpture. Conversely, while the parts within it are ones others DID craft and sell to others, I know of no-one who has the same layout nor combination. Plus a fair shake of mine is custom-retextured, by me, even though the original work is most definitely commercial.
It is this viewpoint, that something that can be built like Legos cannot be art, that I specifically rail against, though admittedly it is a single voice crying rather impotently against the guiding opinion of someone who is a) better known and b) more influential than I am able to hope to be, even at my wildest stretches of imagination.
As I mentioned earlier, Cheska hon, I'd love to find you on SL some time, and to hang out, and now I want to see your friend's work, to look upon it and stare in glad-hearted amazement.
Yours always,
Mika
As I mentioned below, I agree that spamming hundreds of images of poorly-made slight modifications to an av as if FurAffinity was some Second Life MySpace IS wrong. I would never say elsewise. At the same time, I feel most strongly that Second Life is also not a, and I quote, "Character generator software" that does not require talent to produce something good.
On the matter of not being theirs, this touches on something I must wonder about, as it is HIGHLY touchy, both legally and from the standpoint of various people. I must wonder, since one purchases an avatar to wear in public, much like a costume from a store yet less specific (as costumes are rarely completely generic), where this all stands, since it is non-commissioned art essentially (despite being paid for) that you are allowed to buy and publicly display. I'm not as familiar where THAT stands legally on the IP end of things.
In addition to this, my quarrel extends well beyond the virtual walls of FurAffinity to other sites, such as e621.net, where any post of Second Life work, no matter how artistically done, no matter the amount of post-processing, is received with intense, vicious hatred and criticism, along with repeated requests for the poster to leave and not return, coupled with continued (and possibly spoofed) negative voting to make sure the image cannot and will not ever show up on search. While PART of that opinion is spawned by the outlook shared and heartily promulgated on this site, the other part comes, inevitably, of the fact that SL is not and never shall be a photorealistic rendering environment, and this apparently frustrates and disgusts these trolls.
Thus, while I can agree with the comment of NOT using FurAffinity as a Second Life version of MySpace, I must point out that I cannot agree with the other parts of their stated viewpoint.
This is how I feel about it; my custom avatars and structures never got much recognition. So this is the reason why D:
To those who think that, I want to punch them in the face :I It's a shitload of work to build an avatar from the ground-up (Like my Tank and a few other projects), and to heavily modify a premade. To not consider it art is...dumb. :'\