“It’s Up To Us Now.” (DRAFT!) March 11, 2009

NOTE: This was originally planned as Jasper 07, but has been usurped in this position within the Jasper series by another, newer collage of the same name. See here.

“Strange Jasper 07 work, perhaps, Hucka D.”

Hucka D.:

Yes. Queer. 5 of you.

bb:

Baker Blochs, you mean.

Hucka D.:

Yeah. Sorry.

bb:

Should we attempt an interpretation tonight?

Hucka D.:

Feeling groggy still.

bb:

Just 08, 09, and 10 to start from scratch now, Hucka D. And, actually, 10 will make an animation with 1.

Hucka D.:

The next one will go further with TILE. Beyond this one.

bb:

This one may be obviously about Rubi Forest and the relationship to that fairly similarly sized Corsica Island forest that has since been derezzed. Now I find the expanded version of Corsica Island has a Rookwood sim, the greenest sim of the lot now. We know now this may refer directly to the Newborough Warren, with the similarly closely packed corsican pines.

Hucka D.:

There is a relationship. (pause) I think you should wait on this one.

bb:

Thank you.

Old;New December 19, 2008

Hopped over to Gliese to look over the old properties again. Forgot how much I missed the sunsets/sunrises here.

One last view of the Rubi properties before everything was deleted. This angle is interesting because it shows what I would consider the close relationship between my newer pipe system, and former neighbor Zarek Lock’s roller coasters. Although he would probably loath the comparison! (just joking) The main relationship here, or the earlier one, is between the temple and its four sides colored red, green, blue, and yellow, and Zarek’s four square platform system of the same colors standing just to the front/side of the temple (northwest direction). Our properties only bordered at one corner, but there was definitely a relationship.

Then the new location of the temple, and where it should be: way up in the sky. Here you can also see the sky forest now surrounding the temple… I’ll get more into that in a future post or series of posts. *And* I also decided just to perch the Tyta skybox gallery (formerly Wright House Gallery) on top of the temple now. Again just to remind, this houses the last 60 collages of the art 10×10 that I hope to complete this winter (w/ the Wheeler-Jasper series).

Return… December 18, 2008

Behind on text generation again… a couple of days ago, I bought land on AI#1 again, as I’m calling it here once more, at least for a while. Shopped around for a nicer house until I settled on this newer Victorian one, again a Fatima Ur creation, just like the old Victorian house that use to sit on the Gliese lot and was later used in a revised Temple of TILE (the shell of the two duplicate houses are still there in its present form). But this is a more solid design. Really like it, although the house will just be a place that I, as Baker Bloch, sit and look out upon the forest and wilderness surrounding it. Also I want to hang a few pictures in the house, perhaps even, eventually, the projected Wheeler-Jasper collage series coming up.

Backyard of the house here, a small open space in the forest.

View from across the road to the east…

… then up high from the west…

About 1/2 those trees you can see in the snapshot are ones I planted. I simply copied the 4 types of trees that grow in the “natural” forest in the sim just below me and used them to populate my own land. I think it works swell… natural thing to do, as I said.

And then way up in the sky now, we have the transplated Temple of TILE, back from its mainland journey. As I’ll explain in posts to come, there’s now a larger sky complex surrounding this temple, with maybe more to come (!)

p.s.: this thing was a bitch to move, because of the size and multiple creators involved.

Tunnels x 2, 2 November 25, 2008

After admiring the scenery for a spell at the grunge water tower, Baker Bloch retraces his steps back to the new stretch of subway on the properties, and walks the train track to this second pipe opening in the new system, located a little before subway section ends at the Azure tower containing the emitted particles from that mysterious blue orb, still silently spinning and generating inside the westernmost of the 3 belowdeck cargo rooms of The Arab. However, the square opening in the top of this room has been sealed up by the subway system now, although the particles still erupt through the barrier strong as ever, with many still making their way to the lower gallery floors directly above.

I should also mention here that through the opening to the immediate right of the pipe entrance here you still can gain access to the superstructure of The Arab, as well as the ladder leading down to the cargo room with the energy orb.

The second leg of the second pipe system actually lies directly above the third leg of the first system, at least for most of its length. Where the two depart from parallel paths is at the east end of the superstructure of The Arab, where the new pipe abruptly takes a left turn, also skirting the edge of the Azure tower in the process, to allow access to the top of the new subway system, which Baker Bloch is just entering in the snapshot below.

Several chair ringed tables are positioned in this large, open area, and this particular part of the new look reminds me a lot of a similar area at the Azure Island version of the temple. I don’t have a concession stand, drink machines, or video games yet in this area, as on AI, but I’m working on it. Finding prims to do so remains a problem.

At the other (south) end of this open area, Baker finds the 3rd and last leg of the new system, leading him to a secret entrance off a type of west porch of the temple cube itself. Quite a climb to reach it, though (about a 23 degree climb, if I remember correctly).

Baker Bloch holds his breath while temporarily being submerged in the water that fills this entrance, also a brand new addition to the temple. The watery condition quickly ends, however, as Blochs turns to his left down this new, “secret” passageway in the temple. Whether this remains just a “mere” secret passageway or turns into something else — storage area perhaps? — remains in the future. But for now the L shaped passage allows access to the 2nd floor of the temple from the pipe system, giving us now *2* ways to enter the temple in a secret way through these systems.

Baker Bloch has to ascend the branch of that huge tree in the northwest part of the temple to enter the passageway from the temple. Secret entrance indeed!

Tunnels x 2, 1 November 25, 2008

Well, some might say that it’s a condition of a little too much time on my hands, but at any rate I’ve created a whole *2nd* system of pipes for the Gallery at the Temple of TILE, which, in many ways, mirrors the layout and overall functions of the first system. Sort of.

Below, Baker Bloch has entered the first leg of the first system, using it to walk down to the new mural featuring Ozmo replacing you-know-who (you-know-who). In looking up, Blochs notices again the presence of additional pipes and other objects in the sky above him now.

Continuing to walk through the first system of pipes to its logical conclusion in the lowest level of the gallery proper (through that “phantom” Oz Christmas ornament photograph), he sees more evidence of the changes: a giant pipe now sits right outside the far window of the space he’s just entered; actually pokes through the window nearest the mouth part.

This mouth represents the beginning of the second system. Baker Bloch knows he can reach the pipe mouth very quickly by walking through the gallery room to his right and then heading through the opening in the wall to that outer foyer with the Blinkerton-style Land of Oz pictures, pictured here before the new pipe system was put in place.

Below is the new look with the open pipe end or mouth.

Blochs confidently enters the new system, but finds it rather dark and unlighted in comparison to the first. Where are Baker Blinker’s lights she promised to install in the new system, he wonders?

He finally finds one of these white halogen lights, but only when reaching this large opening to his left. Another subway system, and by appearances a little longer than even the one that’s, in essence, now part of the first pipe system.

Baker decides to ignore this subway for now and continue straight and then around a corner to…

The grunge water tower located at almost the extreme southwest corner of the Rubi properties. From here he takes in the spectacular view of the new-look temple and its vast series of pipes. Again, Baker finds the sight incredibly pleasing, although others may deem it too grungy or ugly in general. Whatever tickles your fancy, I suppose. I *am* glad I fixed the back side of the temple cube so the back of one of the Victorian houses within didn’t show through. Looks better now for sure with the smooth, continuous (blue) tiles returned, a look originally created for the temple at its Azure Island location. In fact, there are several things about the new pipe system that remind me of this old AI skybox, as I’ll get to in a minute.

The south view from the grunge water tower now looks out over some kind of new Christmas themed store. Quite a large and open winter wonderland!

Tunnels x 2, 2

Tunnels!, Couple Exterior Shots November 19, 2008

Related: second system of tunnels completed!

Tunnels!, 3 November 19, 2008

Understanding that there’s no other way to walk off The Arab except to dive into the pipe mouth on the the edge of the deck he just exited from, he takes the plug into the pipe system once again.

He exits the system to the right at the bottom of the first turn to enter what he knows is Esbum’s provided new digs, very similar in feel and look — kind of — to her old room in the Azure Island TILE temple. Since creating these snapshots, Esbum herself has looked around the room and “porch”, with its viewing chair [her beloved "First Chair"], and tentatively given the thumbs up to the Bakers. Mind you, she still has some reservations about the more open air aspect to the space than with her old room. But at the same time it’s about as far out of the way as you can get on the property space but still be in basically the center of things. She has easy access to both the grounds, as we’ve seen, and also the gallery itself, as will be apparent shortly. So overall it is a positive review by Esbum.

Below, Baker Bloch looks around Esbum’s new room, complete with her slum bed, slum dresser, and Elvis picture (also transferred from the old temple). She personally requested the Elvis picture be included in the new digs — the younger Elvis picture of his two in the Azure Islands temple.

In the below snapshot, Baker Bloch is also standing to the left of the entrance to the third and last section of the Rubi gallery pipe system. As in the second section, the slant is again upward at around a 20 degree angle or so.

Baker Bloch looks back at Esbum’s First Chair from inside the newest passage. That’s the hull of The Arab poking through the pipe wall to his right, as well as a section of the giant spearhead cypress tree that use to be in the Temple of TILE during its Azure Island incarnation.

You actually walk around the front of The Arab here to proceed, with the ship poking through on either side of the front. Here’s the pokey-through part on the other side, with even a bit of the deck sticking out this time. Not really a big enough slice to walk upon, and even little Hucka D. could only manage to squeeze down less than half of its approx. 10 meter length. But on the other hand if it was much wider you’d have trouble getting past it on the pipe side to continue.

By the way, Baker Bloch is now in the longest straightaway in the pipe system, measuring over 40 meters in length.

Then when visiting the system a little after Baker Bloch pieced it together, Baker Blinker decided, on a whim, to rez this Uncle Milton Ant Farm she’d had in her inventory for forever and place it on the deck slice here, just because she hadn’t had an opportunity to display the rather neat object yet in any build. The narrow deck seemed a decent enough place to start. Weird thing: my good friend Headburro *Antfarm* was, on that very day, celebrating his 2nd *Rez*day in SL, but I only found out about the latter Antfarm-rezzing conjunction several hours later, when HBA sent me a notecard on the subject. Strange how oddities like this happen with such regularity in SL.

Then at the end of the long straightaway — surprise! — you will find yourself entering the lowest level of the Gallery at the Temple of TILE, staring directly at an Edna-style Blinkerton photo.

But when you walk into the gallery here and turn around, no trace of the tunnel can be seen. This illusion was created, in the main (in retrospect anyway), to make Esbum’s room inside The Arab a more private place. You can get back through the wall into the tunnels, but you, of course, have to know it’s there in the first place to do so.

And with that we’ve reached the end of our Rubi gallery/temple tunnel tour! Hope you enjoyed it.

Couple of exterior shots to finish.

Tunnels!, 2 November 19, 2008

The second pipeway is about the same length as the first Baker has already walked through. Blochs quickly enters a straight passageway very similar to the first encountered, except we have about a 20 degree upward slant here instead of a downward slant.

Passing some interestingly placed green hued rocks, Baker Bloch rounds another corner and finds this opening to the left, much like there’s an opening to his left in passageway #1 at about this point, leading into what remains of the subway area. In fact, the first opening lies almost directly below this particular opening. But just as before, Baker decides to ignore this left opening for the moment to see what lies in the passage that continues around another quick corner.

Taking him up a final steep, short section to…

…the deck of The Arab. This is one of the functions of the pipe system, then: to allow easier access to this ship, including the deck, superstructure, and the 3 belowdecks cargo rooms.

I’ve already covered The Arab’s strangest and most apparent quality in this earlier post, so I’ll just finish this particular post off with some snapshots of Baker Bloch on the deck region looking at various parts of the pipe system, some he’s explored but with obvious stretches of pipe yet to be examined.

Tunnels!, 3.

Tunnels!, 1 November 19, 2008

I had to delete the southern tip of the subway and also derez the NOOB statue, and table/rug/chairs positioned on it, but I think it was worth the sacrifice. Because now I have a *tunnel system* at the Rubi gallery. I’ve been very lucky to incorporate about all the earlier Azure Island builds into the new properties, including the Temple of TILE, the Edwardston Station Gallery, and even the older treehouse skybox. Two things obviously missing from this list are B_Hivia (still working on that), and then the Arcadia Asylum additions to the first Temple of TILE, including the pipes that use to wrap entirely around the circumference of the temple. I don’t think I’m going to include other aspects of Arcadia’s work added to the original temple, which basically means parts of the large sewer system she designed. But the pipes I did miss — just didn’t know how to incorporate them into the new gallery until now. A simple repeat of the pipe wrapping process from the Azure Island version didn’t seem practical. For one thing, the dimensions of the property wouldn’t allow such a duplication. However, I’ve now created what’s probably an even better way to use these pipe pieces, in a more functional and aesthetic manner — as far as you can take aesthetics with mere pipe pieces that is.

Let’s take a look, then, at what’s been done. When you enter the gallery grounds through the “front door”, teleporting atop the north part of the subway system, what you had greeting you before was just the art gallery kiosk and then the spiral walkway which led one either up or down — suppose I should put some more direction signs there, come to think of it. Then last week or so, I decided to add a ground teleporter beside the spiral walkway, giving visitors quicker and more obvious access to several temple loctaions, including the Charleston, SC room, the Pocahontas, VA floor, and the Temple Center (complete with a new Xmas tree and primitive animated train now!). Then just a day or two ago, when I did all the pipe linking, it just so happened that one of the mouths of the pipe system seem to fit well on the other side of this northern subway piece, allowing another access point to and from the entry level in addition to the spiral walkway and teleporter.

In the picture below, you can kind of get an idea how all this is set up. Baker Bloch stands at the entry point, with the art kiosk to his back, the teleporter directly in front of him, and the entry to the spiral walkway to his left. A little further away, to his right, is the pipe entrance discussed above.

Baker Bloch enters the pipe’s mouth and quickly turns a corner to a straight section leading downward at about a 20 degree angle. This is already different from the Azure Island pipe system because in that system all the pipes were lined up horizontally on the same plane. In the new system we have very little that is horizontally level. Instead you’ll find mainly sloping areas very similar to this particular passage.

Baker Bloch walks through a blowing newspaper mysteriously placed in the center of the passage he’s in. He is reminded of something similar in the the pipes of Azure Islands, but it seems there was more stuff blowing around in that old location. Truth is, it’s the same Arcadia Asylum designed object {Zeitungen”), except I decided to delete all of the blowing objects except this one to save on prims.

Baker passes another corner, turning right this time, and quickly finds himself outside again beside the new mural centered by Ozmo. Now he’s *pretending* that he missed the second pipeway, as many people would do walking down from the entry level in this manner.

However, he knows that it is inside the subway system that he passed on his left just before going outside. So he retraces his steps a bit to take the below snapshot.

And then takes another snapshot at the entrance to the second part of the overall system, to the left of the filing cabinet placed towards the back of the subway section here.

As they say: onward and upward!

Random Things… November 18, 2008

More shots from the underwater realm at Chikepe. Pictured below are 2 coral arches that I missed before, lined up with each other to the south of the main ruins.

A night shot of the Edwardston Station Gallery skybox from the western edge of the Rubi forest.

Several times in the last week or so I’ve found myself pulled back to the old Azure Islands haunts. This would be the main Azure Island… just popping around and seeing what’s changed since I lived there. Seems so long ago, but it’s only been a bit over 3 months since I left. But I have a feeling I can never return. Besides the neighborhood looks so deserted even in comparison to when I moved there in April. Very sad.

Below is a snapshot of some of the desolated landscape you find on the main Azure Island now, where before you found houses and pleasant domestic living. Granted that a wasteland has its own type of aesthetic I can dig, but it comes to a point where you have to ask yourself: what do you want to get out of your SL experience? Do you want to live in a well over half deserted island with zoning restrictions added on top, or do you want to move to the mess that is the mainlands which, however, offers little zoning restrictions outside of some common courtesy rules (some of which I’ve probably violated at this point)? Once I found the Rubi properties, I knew I had to make the leap from off-mainland to mainland, and *probably* for good. But I got a whole lot out of my Azure Island experience — it really is an ideal place to live in SL if you just want to *live* and not do anything else. I see now that I had to choose the galleries and temple over living in relative peace and isolation, though.

I still miss it.

Although probably close to half of the properties on the main Azure Island are up for sale, there are still some pleasant domestic spots, such as this walled field of flowers in Gacrux.

Moving back to the mainlands and Bay City in particular now, there’s this whole Mole mythology that I missed upon my brief explorations of Bay City prior to last week, obviously tied into such things as these Mole Ruins on the western edge of Falconmoon…

… and this statue of what’s called “Sir Mole”, also in Falconmoon.

So I’ve decided to make it a point to explore the Bay City area in a thorough manner sometime quite soon, much like Baker Bloch did at Nautilus Island/City. Bay City’s not quite as large as that area, and admittedly I’m not as attracted to strict urban areas. But I’ll give it a shot. Bay City really is a nicely crafted region, although the property prices are *way* out of my league (just as they are now in Nautilus).

Moving on… I found another “Arab” type vessel underwater on the Sansara continent. I can’t remember which sim now, unfortunately. But this one guarded by flesh eating piranas so Baker Bloch (after getting part of his leg gnawed into!) decides that further exploration would not be prudent.

I also find myself being drawn back to the Nautilus Island region, and I promise an update of online resources pertaining to that island in the near future as well. Here Baker Bloch explores some of the northernmost of the new sims, all 100% water sims. What I may do is focus more on the underwater regions around the Nautilus island in any new, personal updates. I also want to report more on some of the interal water sims of the Nautilus continent north of the new regions, places that I was exploring just before the sudden appearance of the island to the south.

Baker Bloch briefly revisits the island itself, then, sitting on this forested northeast corner and taking in the nightime vista over the new sea.

Baker Bloch can resist teleporting into a couple of other places on the island, including this lounging area just north of the mile long canal cutting into the island from the west. But he didn’t stay long.

I have a feeling there’s much more to be found in and around that island.

I’ve also worked some on the gallery, adding this interesting mural obviously based on Da Vinci’s The Last Supper. That’s Ozma’s brother Ozmo filling in for the main player.