This is a first of a series to present an overview of the different ways clothes are made in Second Life.

There are multiple ways clothes can be created in Second Life: adding custom colors and pattern textures, creating UV mapped garments and fashion items created from prims. You not only need to know the different ways clothes are made but if you want to create or try to give away or sell clothing in SL you also need to understand file permissions.

Clothes can be created from the basic APPEARANCE menu and built-in TEXTURES available to everyone from the SL LIBRARY folder in your INVENTORY. You can enhance your SL garments by adding your own custom TEXTURES to make the APPEARANCE garments more unique. You can add custom tattoos and unique avatar clothing by getting a set of UV MAP files  and using a program like Photoshop or Gimp [free] to create custom clothing for your avatar, and finally you can add loads of fashion items by learning to use the BUILD tool in SL. You can make single and multiple linked prims that turn into shoes, hair, belts, necklaces, earrings, bracelets, pins and lots of other customized fashion accessories.

BASIC CLOTHING FROM THE APPEARANCE MENU

The fist and most simple way to make clothing in Second Life is to create garments in the APPEARANCE menu. When you create articles of clothing using the APPEARANCE you can save each individual article of new clothing you create before you exit the APPEARANCE menu. Here is a YOUTUBE video from Torley Linden that introduces you to using APPEARANCE.

 

BASICS: Editing your appearance - Second Life Video TuTORial

When you are in the APPEARANCE MENU you can add colors and tints to your garment and you can access the universal Second Life LIBRARY folder in your inventory to place a TEXTURE file on to the garment you are creating. The TEXTURES in your LIBRARY folder are available to everyone in Second Life. You can also create your own custom textures and upload them to SL for L$10. You will notice that some texture files do not have all over texture patterns on them – they are shaped and formed like your avatar. These are custom avatar garments that were created using UV maps of your avatar. If you received some textures or custom garments for free in Second Life – you should take note of the fact that some of the file permissions for these items may be set to no-copy or no- modify or no-transfer.  You can easily see what the file permissions are set to by right mouse clicking on the file in your INVENTORY and reviewing the permissions That is why it is best to create your own content in SL  – because then “you” can set all the permissions. Previously set file permissions are the reason why you may run into a bit of confusion and difficulty if you try to make modifications to UV garments you either purchased or got for free in SL and try to save additional copies in APPEARANCE by making an outfit or try to make a copy of the file from your INVENTORY or try to give [transfer] it to someone else.

New articles of clothing you create in SL are all located in your CLOTHING folder in your INVENTORY. Fashion items you got for free or purchased may be placed into your INVENTORY in it’s own folder. You can mouse-click and drag any other folder containing fashion outfits  to be a sub-folder in your clothing folder. You can easily rename any file you created in your INVENTORY by right clicking on it and selecting RENAME.  You can create a new SUB-FOLDER under your CLOTHING FOLDER by right mouse clicking on your CLOTHING FOLDER and selecting NEW FOLDER and naming it. You can move the files by dragging and dropping them to a new location.

WEAR & TAKE OFF CLOTHING FROM APPEARANCE

To wear an article of clothing from your inventory – right click on the file and select WEAR. There are multiple ways to take an article of clothing off that was created in APPEARANCE. You can go to EDIT>TAKE OFF CLOTHING>SELECT THE ARTICLE YOU WANT TO TAKE OFF; you can right mouse click on your avatar and select TAKE OFF>CLOTHES>SELECT THE ITEM TO REMOVE or you can right click on the files itself in your inventory and select TAKE OFF.

Here is a link to a video I just created that will review for you how to organize your CLOTHING folder in SL. Organize Your Clothing Folder in Second Life.

Next post will provide and overview of TEXTURES in SL.

There is a reason that my posts have not been frequent since the spring semester ended. I have been focusing on developing two on-line courses for fall 2008. One is totally in world and on ANGEL. See post titled: Register for College Level Intro to Virtual Fashion in SL [fall 08'] I would like to invite Fashion professors from other countries that would like to sponsor a fashion student for an independent study to participate in this class with me. If you are interested - please e-mail me at polvinem@buffalostate.edu. Learning to conceptualize, work and develop in a free 3D virtual application like Second Life will introduce fashion students for the transformative changes that are currently underway in the global fashion industry. If students gain a comfort level working in a virtual world, their learning curve for a multidimensional product development application will be substantially reduced.

I have also been “officially” retooling over to the multidimensional OptiTex technology; it is the next logical step to prepare future professionals for the 3D transformational changes that are currently taking place in the global fashion industry. I have a twenty year CAD/CAM technology background that includes retooling, developing course materials and teaching surface/textile design for industry, computer pattern making, marker making and more recently 3D fashion applications.

The 360 degree rotational images that are possible with this system can be used for marketing or pre-marketing. Perhaps even using the digital 3D imagary for a mass personalization retail marketing application like MVM’s BrandMe. Developing a fashion product in digital format from square one will save time, cut costs and facilitate marketing of the product on line in addition to collaborating directly with the manufacturer in 3D to eliminate costly development miscommunication errors.

I would like to integrate the OptiTex cutting-edge CAD/CAM Marker, PDS and Modulate programs in the curriculum. The reasons why I selected OptiTex to retool on are listed in my blog posting titled: Technology Day at FIT: Teaching and learning in Four Dimensions.

I have been working on it for the past three-four weeks now and it’s a totally amazing application! I am planning to develop some basic pattern development and modification tutorials, so I thought I would begin by sharing a bit of the stitching, simulation and 3D viewing for a basic sloper video [posted above] that I created following the instructions from Helen Joseph Armstrong’s Patternmaking for Fashion Design. The Optitex online support Wiki is both an exceptional learning and teaching tool, it will facilitate quick response retooling for educators and industry.

Oh by the way - the fabric pattern in the video above was from a portion of a Second Life screen shot during a visit last evening with Bettina Tizzy [and some close colleagues from FIT] at CHakryn Forest. Bettina founded the working group “Not Possible IRL,” : 1) To identify, showcase and promote content creation in virtual worlds that would not be possible in Real Life; 2) To seek and disseminate knowledge that empowers content creators; and 3) To advocate for better recognition and protection of the rights of content creators in virtual environments. Here are some FLICKER links to NPIRL [Not Possible In real Life]  : Situations Not Possible in Real Life (NPIRL) and Avatars Not Possible in Real Life (NPIRL).

Here is the one screenshot I took…

…and here one of the textures [that I used in the video above] that I developed from the image above in Photoshop.

Here are two more from the same inspiration…

As I stated during my presentation at Technology Day at FIT, RMIT and Ryerson, if fashion education does not initiate the type of quick response solution (that students are taught with regards to the real world) to the unprecedented transformational technology shift that is taking place over to 3D, they run the serious risk of becoming redundant and obsolete and could actually be the driving force for industry to develop private training institutes.”

The primary focus of this Virtual Fashion Technology blog is to document the transition and expansion from 2D traditional to 2D Digital to 3D virtual for apparel textile product design, development and retailing. Retooling on a multidimensional fashion product development application will be a major contribution.

[UPDATE: CLICK HERE  for tenative course content]

This Adobe Pattern Development for Industry class was developed after a specialized custom course development request I received from a well known global retailer several years ago. I developed and taught it to designers that had a variety of CAD backgrounds that needed to know how to use off-the-shelf CS to develop and prepare designs for industry.

This course prepares students and/or professionals techniques to use Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator to develop, separate, clean and recolor graphics and pattern repeats [that are ready for production] for a variety of fashion products.

It is an excellent course for expansion of Adobe skills for a specialized production end use.

 
A basic knowledge of introductory functions of Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator are necessary to successfully complete this course. OpenCourseWare videos with audio  are available: Level One: Introduction to Adobe Photoshop Functions  and Level One: Introduction to Adobe Illustrator Functions

 
If you are interested in registering for this online college credit course FTT304 (1439) - please contact Buffalo State College Admissions. If you want to apply for college credit to be transfered out or do not want college credit - register as a non-matriculated student. Contact me if you have a problem registering.

Here is a LINK to some student work from several years ago.
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Course Code:  FTT304-1439
Offered by:  Buffalo / University College
Taught by:  Elaine Polvinen
Credits:  3

Course Description:
Creation of original motifs for printed fashion fabrics that are marketable for women’s, men’s, or children’s wear; professional methods of transforming media into digital format to separate, clean, develop basic repeats, and color combinations using Adobe Creative Suite based on awareness of current trends, color impact, marketability, and industry standards.

• Design and development of colors, prints, and fabric simulations.
• Re-coloring and designing of prints, plaids, stripes - a variety of patterns.
• Scanning and cleaning up prints to assist with executing a specific number of screens.
• Execution of flat and tonal color separations.
• Creation of a variety of repeats patterns in Photoshop and Illustrator.
• Creation of print and color chips for manufacturer spec packages.
• Creation of mini-boards for client presentations.

Prerequisites:
FTT 208 or instructor permission [student needs to have an introductory knowledge of Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator to successfully complete this course.] CS, CS2 or CS3 of Adobe Illustrator or Photoshop will work for this class. You can locate educational pricing HERE.

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I am also offering a College Level Intro to Virtual Fashion in Second Life [fall 08']