Tag: Ajuda SL Brasil

UPDATED! Second Life Steals, Deals, and Freebies: Updates on Two Long-Running Freebie Stores, The Free Dove and Ajuda SL Brasil

The Free Dove freebie store in Second Life is closing after almost 17 years

I’m still taking a break from blogging, but this morning I came across the news on the Pure Eggs & Spam blog, and I wanted to share it with my readers: Palomma Casanova, the owner of The Free Dove (one of Second Life’s most popular and longest-running freebie stores), has sadly passed away after an illness. I’m going to post the complete text of a notecard sent to The Free Dove group by her colleague, Dollen McMillan:

Hello dear friends of Palomma,

It is with great sadness and pain that I have to announce you that Palomma Casanova left us on Saturday, January 14 after a long illness. This is a shock to me and a huge loss. She fought her illness with all the energy she had and endured the pain very bravely. Her passion for her work and for helping others was admirable.

For almost 12 years, this kind, generous and talented woman was by my side day after day. She will be missed by all of us who had the chance to know her. May she rest peacefully with all my love.

About Free Dove

When the subject of her eventual departure was brought up, Palomma’s response was that Free Dove would POOOOF when it was over for her. Free Dove was her baby, the vehicle that allowed her to express her love of people and her willingness to help them, but she didn’t want it to outlive her. She had created Free Dove in 2006 and when she left, her group had reached nearly 150,000 members, a rare achievement. We will remember her as the generous woman who dedicated 17 years of her life to SL citizens.

I have no idea when Free Dove will disappear. In the meantime, I have blocked all payment boxes for Free Dove shops, I am unable to refund your last payments, but your shops can remain in place until the end comes.

Regarding Christmas trees and Christmas gifts, I will be returning them this Wednesday because the holiday season is over. As for last month’s Hunts panels, I will try to change the textures and replace them with an image to pay homage to Palomma.

Concerning The Free Dove group, you will retain the ability to send notices as long as the building exists, but please don’t abuse and follow Palomma’s rules. The day the building disappears, I will remove the ability to send notices to all.

As for creators’ gifts and the prims belonging to other people, they will all be returned the day the land is abandoned.

Thank you for taking the time to read me.

Dollen McMillan

The Free Dove group notices are full of people posting notes and testimonials about Palomma, as word filters out. I do not have further details about Palomma, but I will also miss her and her tireless work in Second Life. I would advise you that, since we do not know when her freebie store will shut down, pay your visit now.

The Free Dove, along with the freebie store at the Ajuda SL Brasil Portuguese-speaking community gateway sim, were my top two picks for the best freebie stores in Second Life (you can see my full list of recommendations here). And, unfortunately, after a recent visit to Ajuda SL Brasil, I must report that this once-excellent freebie store appears to have fallen on hard(er) times.

There are now many empty walls at the once-excellent freebie store at Ajuda SL Brasil, especially on the first floor, and many vendors I remember from before are missing.

I noticed that of the vendors who once offered fashionable free items here have vanished, leaving many empty walls in the freebie store. Much of what remains is the older, system-layers-and-flexiprims clothing which most Second Life avatars don’t want to wear. There are still a few good mesh clothing finds here and there, such as this outfit I was able to cobble together for an alt (see image, right).

The Nia top is one of a collection of gifts for women from Fran Gustav on the main floor, and the patched and worn Bella blue jeans are a freebie from Dreams, located on the third floor. (Please note that some of the freebies in mesh clothing at Ajuda SL Brasil come in standard sizing, instead of sizes to fit Maitreya Lara and other brands of mesh bodies.)

On my return visit today to double-check the locations of the free clothing in this image, I noticed that there seems to be some effort underway to move content and reorganize the third floor of the store, but still, a lot of fabulous freebies I remember from before are no longer there.

So, I regret to report that one well-known SL freebie store is closing soon, and yet another is not what it used to be. This could be a sign that the era of freebie stores in Second Life is coming to an end.

UPDATE Jan. 19th, 2023: A memorial, with books of condolence which you can sign, has been set up for Palomma Casanova (and her alt, Dyannia!) just inside the main entrance of The Free Dove, if you wish to come and pay your respects:

Also, there is a discussion thread about Palomma Casanova’s passing on the official Second Life community forums, here. As with The Free Dove SL group I mentioned above, people are sharing stories and memories of Palomma and The Free Dove.

UPDATE Jan. 23rd, 2023: Tastic (one of the many SL brands who had free items available through The Free Dove) has created tops for both men and women, to commemorate the run of the venerable freebie store. (By their calculations, The Free Dove actually started in 2005, so that would indeed make it 17 years, a remarkable achievement!)

The tops are free, and you do not need to join a group to get them. Just click on the signs inside the entrance, near the stairs. The tops come in a wide variety of sizes to fit most male and female mesh bodies.

P.S. these tops will also be available at The Free Dove, next to the memorial to Palomma Casanova I mentioned above, until the store shuts down. Thanks, Tastic!

UPDATE Jan. 27th, 2023: Shelby Monitor posted an update to The Free Dove group yesterday:

Patch Linden will keep Palomma’s Park as a memorial and will not change. [The] Free Dove has 90 [days] till [it] will be no longer [be around]. The store will remain open and untouched till then, and we receive further notice from Linden Lab.

Her land will go to market, and I hope possibly to purchase the land and be able to make a place for people to get help, and
hopefully I can find designers to put [out] free gifts to help those in need.

Thank You everyone for all your support.
Shelby Monitor

Second Life Steals, Deals, and Freebies: Beautiful Free Ballgowns!

I just stumbled across a fabulous fashion freebie for female avatars, and I decided to use it as an excuse to write up an entire blogpost about all the places in Second Life you can pick up a full-length mesh ballgown, for free! Clip and save for when you need something for a formal, black-tie event (or even if you just feel like swanning around SL in a full-blown battleship ballgown; hey, it’s your Second Life, express yourself any way you want!)

The freebie is from the newly-rebranded store, Dead Doll (formerly known as Dead Dollz), which has set up in a brand new location and is offering a gift to celebrate. If you join the SeraphimSL.com group for free and click the panel shown below, you can pick up the simple, elegant Etta strapless gown for free:

The Etta gown comes in a fatpack of sixteen colours as shown. Here, Vanity Fair models it with a black lace bolero from United Colors (not free; I purchased the fatpack of this bolero, waiting for the perfect gown to pair it with). Sheer perfection!

Another place where you can pick up some free gowns is the excellent freebie store at Ajuda SL Brasil. Up on the third floor is a large display by VIPs Creations, where in the top row of panels are three different styles of full-length gowns:

This lovely strapless gown with a subtle pattern is by VIPs Creations, and comes in four colours as shown, and even includes the shoes:

Another place to pick up a simple, classic ballgown is the generous freebie store at Hilly Haalan, where you can find this Nadia gown in fifteen colours (you will need to join the Hilly Haalan store group for free to pick up all the freebies here).

While some gowns are the right length for high heels, the Nadia gown works best with flats. Fortunately, at Hilly Haalan you can also pick up a free set of Amy flats which come in a variety of colours to match this ballgown perfectly!

Another little-known spot where you can pick up ballgowns in orange, red, and blue is !Soul, a store which has set up shop in a skybox high above the newbie orientation centre called New Resident Island (here’s the exact SLURL). If you join the !Soul group for free, you can pick up dozens of free gifts of women’s clothing, hair, footwear, and system/Bakes on Mesh skins. Everything in the store is free!

The apparel at !Soul comes in standard sizes, but ballgowns are the kind of clothing that you can easily alpha out your pelvic area and legs anyway, so they will always fit! (You might have to adjust your bust size slightly, though.)

Here is the blue ballgown from !Soul, with the optional fur stole. Looking elegant for zero Linden dollars!

Of course, you can sometimes pick up free ballgowns at the entrances to many of the finer dance establishments in Second Life, such as this gown from the newly-reopened Frank’s Jazz Club (which appears to have started up again just to try and wrench business away from the upstart Frank’s (more information here):

And, of course, there are several beautiful ballgowns to be had at The Free Dove (remember that you have to join The Free Dove group for free in order to get these freebies). Palomma Casanova, the owner of The Free Dove, has reorganized her venerable freebie store by designer, so you will have to wander around a bit to find all the ballgowns. However, there is still a small women’s formalwear section near the back entrance (SLURL):

Nearby is a display by Lurve, which features two very different gowns:

And close by, the Tiffany Designs display at The Free Dove has a couple of lovely full-length ballgowns, perfect for your next swanky soirée:

In fact, you can also pick up a couple of free ballgowns at Tiffany’s main store location (one is mesh and the other is an applier gown; no group is needed):

Take a look at the shimmering, daringly low-cut Nia ballgown in champagne, one of the free gown gifts at Tiffany Designs!

So there you have it—elegance on (less than) a dime!

Remember that the Etta ballgown fatpack gift at Dead Doll is likely a time-limited offer, and that Palomma Casanova frequently rotates the stock at The Free Dove, so please don’t delay picking up these gowns and stashing them in your inventory for your next major event. Happy freebie shopping!

Second Life Steals, Deals, and Freebies: Where to Find Free Mesh Eyes and Free Textures for Bakes on Mesh Eyes

They say that the eyes are the windows to the soul. A realistic pair of eyes can make a big difference in how lifelike your avatar can look. For example, I actually went out and bought the eyes from the styling credits, after seeing this stunning Second Life avatar portrait!

These eyes are not free; they are the Darcey eyes in forest green by Suicidal Unborn

Many people, even after they upgrade from a classic, system avatar to a mesh body, opt to keep the system eyes. Others choose to use the mesh eyes that come bundled with the Bento mesh head they have purchased (Catwa, The Genus Project, Akeruka, etc.). In many cases, those mesh eyes now support Bakes on Mesh, which means that you can wear system/Bakes on Mesh textures on your mesh eyes.

Today, we are going to look at places to pick up free mesh eyes and system eyes that will work well with Bakes on Mesh-compatible mesh eyes!

Ajuda SL Brasil

First, teleport to the Ajuda SL Brasil, home to the biggest and best freebie store on the grid, and pick up two sets of mesh eyes, which can be found opposite the Altamura Valentina mesh body:

Now, I must admit that I am not a fan of mesh eyes unless they already come bundled with a specific brand of mesh head; if they are standalone mesh eyes, I have often found that you have to go through an aggravating adjustment process until they look right in any given mesh head. Also, you will have to hunt down an eyes-only alpha when using these mesh eyes to replace your system eyes (if you were lucky enough to pick up the recent free group gift of the Freya unisex Bento mesh head from Catwa, there is an eyes-only alpha in the “CATWA BOM Skin A Makeup Alpha Pack” box, which you need to unpack in order to use).

In the bag on the floor at Ajuda SL Brasil are these beautiful Yuitza mesh eyes in a light brown colour:

And here are the Dossier realistic mesh eyes, which come with a HUD with six colour options:

Free Eyes from Shopping Events

One place where you can often pick up free eyes is at regular shopping events. For example, at the Gift Boardwalk for Second Life’s 17th Birthday (SL17B) celebrations, you can pick up a set of six dark-coloured eyes from ND/MD:

Here is one of the six colours, which come in both system/Bakes on Mesh eyes, mesh eyes, and an Omega applier:

And just look at these absolutely gorgeous Sahara eyes by Avi-Glam, which come in two shades of light brown and are available at their booth here at the SL17B Shop and Hop event. They come in both classic system and mesh versions (Catwa, Genus, LeLutka, and Omega). 

The Second Life Marketplace

Another place to get free mesh eyes is the SL Marketplace. For example, you can pick up this Sunrise set of mesh eyes in eight different colours from Eyden & Yves for zero Lindens (see image, right).

Lu Cosmetics has a number of free mesh eyes available in the SL Marketplace as well.

Sweet’s also has a nice set of free system and mesh eyes.

There’s also a free wearable demo of the Vermeer mesh and system eyes in amethyst purple, which come in four different iris sizes (the mesh eyes are HUD driven).

Eyes from the Second Life Starter Avatars

One of the places which people constantly overlook when searching for free eyes are the set of starter avatars which Linden Lab provides to Second Life users! Please note that, in order to use these eyes, you will first need to select and load the starter avatar (remember to save your current avatar look before you do this!).

If you are using the Firestorm SL viewer, just select Choose an avatar from the Avatar menu in the upper left-hand corner of your screen:

Then just click on the button under each avatar to load it up and wear it.

I recommend just setting aside ten minutes in a quiet, in-world spot, and going through and loading up all the starter avatars at least once; that way you will be able to see what they look like, take notes on what components (hair, clothing, shoes, accessories, etc.) which you might be able to reuse, and all the system eyes will be available, each located in a folder with the starter avatar’s name under the Clothing folder in your SL inventory window (see image, right):

Once you have done that, you can elect to use only the system eyes from that starter avatar folder with whatever avatar look you are building, either as is, or as a texture for Bakes on Mesh eyes (as I have done here with the BoM eyes which come with the Cat Calm mesh head this avatar is wearing, from the Genesis Lab store).

Here are pictures of what some of these eyes look like (listed with the name of the Second Life starter avatar they were taken from).

Anna

Amy

Bitsy

I find I turn to the beautiful dark brown Bitsy eyes often, especially when styling a Black, Indigenous and People of Color (BIPOC) avatar!

Carla

Chris

Daisy

Dylan

Elizabeth

Feng

Aren’t these eyes gorgeous??

Gabriel

Gretchen

Jesse

Kara

Leah

Leonard

Morgan

Petrol Sue

Rhiannon

Thomas

Wyatt

So, as you can see, you already have a great selection of realistic eyes to choose from, already in your Second Life inventory! Hopefully these pictures will help you choose the perfect pair of peepers for your avatar!

UPDATED! Taking a Second Look at the Viva Full-Mesh Avatar: Why the Mesh Head and Body Wars Are Just Getting Started in Second Life

A month ago, I first wrote about the Viva Full Featured Mesh Avatar (Level 3), available for free on the SL Marketplace. After playing around with the Kalhene Ariadna full-body mesh avatar, and documenting its strengths and weaknesses (notably, a lack of alpha sections on the HUD and support for clothing alphas), I came back to the Viva mesh body with a renewed appreciation for all the work the creator had put into it. The HUD truly is amazing, allowing you to combine both alpha sections and clothing alphas to make just about any outfit fit!

For example, here is one of my alts, who wears an Akeruka Lulu Bento mesh head (one of their early group gifts), which I have grown attached to and wanted to keep. I originally wore it with a classic, SL system body; Akeruka had provided system skins to match the entire range of the Lulu head’s available skin tones. And for a long time I was happy with that.

But today, I decided to upgrade this avatar to a full mesh body, and while I was thinking about how best to do that for an inexpensively as possible, I remembered the free Viva Bento, Bakes-on-Mesh compatible mesh body and decided to try that again. (I wasn’t too crazy about the head that came included with the Viva mesh body, but that is a separate attachment, and you can use literally any head with it.)

Here is what she looks like now:

The only problem I encountered was that the system skins that came with the Akeruka Lulu head were older, and as a result there were white spots at the nail bases of the mesh fingers. To fix this, I used the free set of Bakes on Mesh feet and finger fixes available at League (exact SLURL):

This avatar is wearing:

Mesh Head: Lulu by Akeruka (L$1 group gift, no longer available; the Akeruka group costs L$150 to join).

Mesh Body: the Viva Full Featured Mesh Avatar (Level 3) from the SL Marketplace.

Skin: I used one of the system skins that came with the Lulu head in a matching skin tone, adding the League Bakes on Mesh finger fix in the pale colour, which was the closest match.

Hair: Chella by Analog Dog (I picked this hairstyle with scarf as a free gift at previous gacha event)

Necklace: Metamorpheses Temple Necklace (a gift from the 2019 BURN2 celebration of Burning Man in Second Life)

Top: Cream embroidered peasant blouse by Petite Mort (this is one of my favourite freebies, available from the excellent freebie store at Ajuda SL Brasil).

Jeans: Skinny jeans from Mara’s Mysteries (a free hunt gift, no longer available).

Flats: Amy flats by Hilly Haalan (free group gift from their freebie store; the group is free to join; I found that the Viva mesh body’s flat feet are compatible with both Maitreya and Belleza flat shoes, but the Belleza ones fit a bit better so I used those)

Bag: Boho Bliss fringe bag (with hold pose) from a previous Witchwood hunt (Witchwood is the sim where the Petite Mort and Oubliette stores are located, and they regularly hold small hunts; I believe I paid only L$10 for this delightful bag!)

TOTAL COST FOR THIS AVATAR: Only L$161! (L$150 to join the Akeruka group, L$1 for the Lulu Bento mesh head, and L$10 for the bag)

I am very pleased with the result of this makeover! After my experiences working with both the Viva and the Ariadna mesh bodies, I can say this: with the advent of competition from free or inexpensive Bakes-on-Mesh compatible, Bento bodies, we are getting closer and closer to the time when stores charging (and users paying) thousands of Linden dollars for a mesh head and/or body is going to become harder and harder to justify. Yes, I know it’s a bold statement; hear me out.

The Viva and Ariadna mesh bodies are just the first shots fired in a war for marketshare between the established, big-name brands (Catwa, LeLutka, Maitreya, Belleza, Signature, Slink, etc.) and the smaller, nimbler upstarts. For now, the big-name brands have better designer support and offer more options, but, as we see with the fully-featured HUD that the Viva mesh body offers, that gap is starting to narrow!

I’d strongly encourage you to take a look at the Viva and Ariadna mesh bodies on the SL Marketplace, and give them both a test run. Although they are not perfect, they do give an indication of the direction the market is moving. The days of paying L$10,000 or more for a full-body mesh avatar may be numbered!

UPDATE June 11th, 2020: The Kalhene Ariadna mesh body has just updated to version 2.0, with alpha layer support (SL Marketplace link). It now has a HUD with alpha cuts and skin shininess levels, addressing some of my most serious concerns about the product.

In these final two pictures, I have combined the beautiful head from the Kalhene Ariadna mesh body with the Viva mesh body, using one of the Bakes on Mesh skins that came with the recent Limited Advanced head group gift from Akeruka:

Looking fabulous for zero Lindens! The Viva mesh body offers many more features on their included superHUD (such as a better selection of alpha sections to choose from, five different fingernail lengths, and three foot height options), which the Kalhene Ariadna body does not have. Here I just picked the shortest nails, in a natural nail colour, to go with this makeup-free look.

One particularly nice feature is the option to alpha out the wrists but not the hands, as I did for this long-sleeved minidress (a gift from Little Fox at the recent Cosmopolitan shopping event anniversary round). Surprisingly few HUDs that come with mesh bodies allow this—even the expensive brand names!