Tag Archives: Ex Machina

Tokyo after Dark

by

Being still in my dark period, I was in a dark casual mood today 😉

I love the “VoDoo” ears so much, I had to do another post with them. I am not a fan of elf ears for everyday looks but sometimes – for what ever reason – I love them not just for a fantasy style.

Today I wanted to showcase one of Ex Machina’s awesome buildings. I rarely saw better structures that are made with more love for the details, than the designs from Hatris Panacek, owner and designer of Ex Machina. It is no secret , that I adore her work, otherwise we never would have asked her to make a custom built store building and most of it’s interior for us. Hattie has amazing skills when it comes to building and as well to texturing. She works so hard to get her realistic looking surfaces done and it pays of every time she does a new release. The “Tokyo after Dark” building is one of her latest creations. On her vendor she states, that his is the first in a set of urban, Japanese, cyberpunk styled buildings. That mean for me we can hope on more of those, which would make me super duper happy, because I LOVE that kind of style 😉

For my pictures I used 2 of the buildings and the amazing street components she delivers with the building. I just turned one of the buildings 90 degrees, so I could showcase the front and the backside as well – I really loved the stair case in the back a lot. I snapped over 10 pictures and I liked all of them. Making a decision was really not easy this time. When I started I just wanted to showcase the amazing “VoDoo” ears and the awesome “Tokyo after Dark” building. But the more I was fooling around with a style the more I got my vibe for that dark urban look. I used the amazing “Bella Leather Pants” from [Gos]. I already blogged those before, but in a more sweet casual style and I wanted to try if they do work for some more dark looks as well – They do!

What as well caught my attention a lot was the new tattoo from Mister Razzor. I love when tattoos go up till parts of the head, but not many are really seamless. The “Dante” tattoo, which was released at the Black Fair not too long ago, did not disappoint in that matter 🙂

Again I am wearing my everyday head from LeLutka. I know the “Simone” bento head was one of the first heads, that LeLutka released when the new bento generation of heads came out, but it is still my absolute favorite one, even if I more and more enjoy the new Korina head as well *winks*

The “Simone” head with a skin from the Skinnery became kinda my trademark. When I first put on the “Simone” head, I wasn’t really sold on the first try, as it looked very young with the default skin from Glam Affair. Since I am in Second Life now for over 10 years I wanted a more adult look for my pixels. I did a lot of things and I did grow up lightly too during my Second Life journey. That I wanted to mirror with my avatar as well. I remember very well the moment when I put on “my” skin. As models we all had quite some trouble when the first mesh heads came out and we all looked the same more or less, while we were told ALWAYS, tht our face would be our trademark in the modeling business. But the bento generation changed that “issues” pretty fast, when we were able again to at least customize our heads a little more again. From that moment on I was in love with my “Simone” head. I tried all the new bento heads from various brands but none was able to satisfy my needs as LeLutka did. What I do love the most on the “Simone” head (and as well on the Korina one), that it is not the usual mainstream beauty. It does have edges and give – depending on the skin – a very characteristic look. With my Skinnery skin and some face modifications from Izzie’s, I was completely sold with my new look and never really changed it drastically again – just some minor shape and other changes here and there 😉

Clothing

Top: [CX] – “Mucronate Top – Leather” (Maitreya)

Pants: [Gos] – “Bella Leather Pants & Belt” (Maitreya)

Shoes & Leggings: Eudora 3D – “Aerendyl Boots” (Maitreya)

Gloves: Wicca’s Originals – “Roadie Gloves” (Maitreya)

Accessories

Glasses: BONDI – “The Extrovert Sunglasses”

Collar: VOBE – “Stzar Prision Choker”

Piercing: [CX] – “Drop Septum”

Hair & Makeup

Hair: Dura – “Collaboration02_Bob2” (Gacha, Common)

Makeup: Zibska – “Noir Pack 06” (LeLutka Applier)

Lipstick: alaskametro<3 – London” (LeLutka Applier)

Body & Tattoo

Head: LeLutka – “Simone 3.3”

Body: Maitreya – “Lara 4.1”

Ears: .:E.A.Studio:. (Eclipse Art Studio) – “Ears VoDoo”

Tattoo: Mister Razzor – “Dante” (OMEGA Applier)

Poses & Props

Set: Ex Machina – “Tokyo after Dark – The iKON”

Poses: Foxcity

Model & Photographer

Wicca Merlin

Dreams or Reality?

by

I know I’ll never know a peaceful night again
Afraid they’ll hear me
They don’t fear me
Punishment for me of a moral crime
The debt was never paid completely
[Disturbed]

I am sure you know what I mean… those “memories” that never leave us even if their clarity fades and they get kinda blurry?
Those things we do not really want to remember, but we can’t completely forget?
I do have those and from time to time they do knock me out for a while. The older I become, the more those memories become emotions and I do forget the exact moment of my life. Sometimes they do feel like faded or blurred echoes. Sometimes they even feel kinda unreal to me, even if I know, that it happened. Exactly that kind of feelings I wanted to bring on my pictures and to me it worked 🙂
I was trying and thinking about that for a longer time, but I never felt like it came out right.
The poses from Le Poppycock, which I found while I was looking for another pose set, gave me the idea, how I could manage to picture my feelings. To bring emotions on pictures, is always a hard challenge for me as I feel it very difficult to bring those on a static picture. Emotions are very personal and everybody will have different impressions and/or expressions of a certain picture.
To me it was the outfit from Enfant Terible, an innocent, sweet dancer outfit with ballet shoes, the dark vibe of the dark vibe of the Asylum from Ex Machina and the morbid skeleton paired with the amazing poses from Le Poppycock, that made the perfect contrast and as well the controversial and mixed feelings I do have with such moments. I did abstain from strong make up to give the whole look a more pure and fragile look. The lightly messy hair from no.match was perfect for the style as well, it underlined the desperation in some way for me with all the wisps and strands of hair.

The “Welcome Home Asylum” from Ex Machina is an amazing background for pictures. It does have 2 different cells and a hallway in front of it. The backdrop has 4 active light sources – 2 in the cells and 2 in the hallway – which can be turned off or edited through your edit window. The whole backdrop looks best, if you turn advanced lightning on, as all textures are baked and use advanced lightning model materials. But even without that high graphic settings it looks stunning and detailed. I really adore Hatti’s texturing skills… Hatris Panacek, owner and genius designer of Ex Machina, states herself that she was inspired by the horrors of the insane asylums of the past catching those creepy atmospheres you can still find in some abandoned structures around the world. I just wanted to share those non edited peeks on the backdrop, because my pictures are dark and I did not want to miss to show all those lovely details of the backdrop – at least the 2 rooms that I used for this pictures. For the other one I will have another post soon 😉

Outfit

Outfit: Enfant Terrible – “Skye Dancer” (Gacha) – NEW @ Epiphany

Makeup & Hair

Hair: no.match – “No.Modify”
Eyeshadow: Zibska – “Noir Pack 06” (LeLutka Applier)
Lipstick: alaskametro<3 – “London” (LeLutka Applier)
Makeup:

Body & Tattoo

Head: LeLutka – “Simone 3.3”
Body: Maitreya – “Lara 4.1”
Ears: .:E.A.Studio:. – “Thauron”

Poses & Props

Poses (incl. Skeleton): Le Poppycock – “Necromantic” (Gacha)
Background: Ex Machina – “Welcome Home Asylum PhotoScene v1.1”

Model & Photographer

Painting – I swear it was supposed to be on the Canvas!

by

TUNES

Have yourself a merry little Christmas
Let your heart be light
Next year all our troubles will be out of sight
Have yourself a merry little Christmas
Make the yuletide gay
Next year all our troubles will be miles away
Once again as in olden days
Happy golden days of yore
Faithful friends who are dear to us
Will be near to us once more
Someday soon we all will be together
If the fates allow
Until then we’ll have to muddle through somehow
So have yourself a merry little Christmas now
[Judy Garland]

After a rough week I finally can do a post again 🙂

The time before Christmas seems to be a hard time for many people. I feel it a lot lately with the kids at school. The quiet time, the time of love and family – for some it seems to be the opposite of that. Maybe it is because they miss that feelings at home, or they do have problems they try to hide the whole year and when Christmas comes close they start to realize even more. I do not know what it is, but some do need more attention and care. I try as much to give them what they need, in a way I am allowed to, but I realized it really soaks a lot of power and energy off myself – more than usual and more than in any other year before. That means to me I need to find moments and ways to refill my own ‘batteries’ and making pictures in Second Life is one of them 🙂

I had the great pleasure to meet Hattie Panacek – owner and builder/designer of Ex Machina – when she agreed to built us our new custom made Mainstore for Wicca’s Wardrobe. I never dared to even think about her as the builder for our store, as I know she usually not does any custom builts. Salt from Salt and Pepper encouraged me to ask her and even offered herself as reference. I hesitated for a while… I looked around to maybe find a store that would fit to us, our designs and our imaginations, but all that I found had one of those criteria but not more than one at the same time.

So I gathered my courage, took a deep breath and opened an IM to Hattie. I kinda was prepared to get a no to my request, but what I had to loose? I was a little worried, that she would be too busy to answer and so I thought it would take a while for her to come back on me and after I typed my proposal I closed the IM – maybe I just closed it so fast, as I was scared about the answer *snickers*

You know what?!?!?! It turned out to be one of the most amazing talk I had in Second Life. She replied kinda instant and I nearly fainted as I really didn’t expect that. She got our vision after just a few seconds and already had even some ideas for it. When she said she looked at our stuffs and liked the way we design and some of the stiff we do… I really was close to just pass out *giggles*. She pointed out some things and even did let our vision grow with her input. It felt like I would talk to an old friend – unbelievable. I always admired her work, her ideas and building skills and as well her incredible textures. She makes things look like used and not just shiny and nice – even if she certainly can do that as well 😉 I just really really adore her way to do things. The more we talked when we met for sneak previews of what she was building for us, or for some more talks about specific things for the built, the more she became a friend to me as well and we discovered, that we share a lot of things, thoughts and likings.

One day she showed me her newest release for an event and I instantly loved it. I already did showcase the right side of that amazing backdrop before (https://wiccamerlin.de/late-autumn-soon-i-need-to-turn-on-the-heating-again/) and today it is time for the left side 😉

I am talking about the “Atelier Baudelaire – By Ex Machina” backdrop.

The left side is a neat little atelier of a painting artist – according to Hattie the whole backdrop was inspired by the great French poet Charles Baudelaire. The backdrop has it’s own lights but since it is modify you can even turn them off if you want to use your own light setting. Did you ever see such an amazing love for the detail for just a corner of one room? The different paintings, the cool ‘used look’ details for the walls even behind the paintings and then the cardboard with the brushes and spilled paint… simply incredible and stunning. The more you look at that stunning backdrop the more details you will find like the awesome pipes at the ceiling. As well the materials are super awesome! If you are able to turn on materials the whole backdrop is like a new experience again. It does look already cool without but if you turn the advanced lighting model on in your graphics it does look like as you could even feel the little crackles or the bricks at the wall when you touch it – just breathtaking!

 

All the paintings, paint buckets and brushes reminded me of a fun mesh head/body applier of paint from Izzie’s I always wanted to use and never found the right chance to do so. The same I had with the super cool and amazing Paintball gacha set – I had no one yet playing that with me – where I had Redclaw shooting at me to get the paint splatter effect on the top 😉 I guess I drove him nuts with that, as I wanted too have as many colors as possible on my short and he had to change between the guns all the time until I liked the way the paint applied to myself and the shirt *giggles*

Overall todays pictures where a lot of fun and I wasn’t able in a long time to just fool around with items, poses and things as my RL kept me so much. I hope the next days it will be a little easier going and I have more room for creative pictures and stuff to fool around with and getting inspired again 😉

Outfit

Shirt: Salt & Pepper (S&P) – “Paintball Tank” (Maitreya, Gacha, Common)

Pants: Neve – “Pant – Destroy” (Maitreya)

Shoes: DECO – “Classic Sneaks”

Hair & Makeup

Hair: [INK] – “Colored Pencil w/Tanbarumori” (Gacha, Common)

Makeup: alaskametro<3 – “Bali Eyeshadow” (LeLutka Applier)

Body & Tattoo

Head: LeLutka – “Simone 3.3”

Body: Maitreya – “Lara 4.1”

Tattoo: Izzie’s – “Color Explosion” (LeLutka/Maitreya Applier)

Poses & Props

Poses: Le Poppycock – “Just Alice” (with ladder, paint bucket & brush)

Backdrop: Ex Machina – “Atelier Baudelaire”

Model & Photographer

Wicca Merlin

Late Autumn – Soon I need to turn on the Heating again!

by

Pose: – “Blasphemous Sister” (hand animation altered)

Todays post is filled with items from people I highly value, respect and I am happy to be able to call some of them friends as well 🙂

After I had a blast with creepy and unusual looks, I thought it would be time for a autumn casual one – not that I will give up on the other though!

First of all I would like to mention the backdrop. The “Atelier Baudelaire” backdrop again shows the incredible skills of Hattie Panacek. I rarely saw such amazing detailed and realistic textures, as you can see it on all of her creations. What I do love the most is that she not just does clean and tidy textures, she allows as well non perfect and dirty spots. To me that gives the designs even more life and realistic feelings – nothing is perfect in RL and if it is it looks like a display in a warehouse but not like a realistic “used” place. Especially if you have materials on, her designs will blow you away in a good way!

The “Atelier Baudelaire” backdrop is a huge loft looking backdrop with 2 sides. The right side you can see on my todays pictures. It shows the desk of an artist or designer while the left side shows the actual working place of an artist- soon I will showcase the other side as well, but that backdrop perfectly shows, that you can use it for more than just one picture if you just use the right angles and crops. I do like it a lot, when you can use a backdrop more than once. Often enough you only can use backdrops only once, as they will be recognized instantly again on your flickr or blog.

Pose: Foxcity – “On Point-4m”

The amazing coat was made by Salt & Pepper for the UBER event. The coat can be worn with or without the turtleneck shirt and certainly you have a color HUD to mix and match the whole design to your likings. Certainly you can color the shirt and the coat separately. What I loved the most on that coat was the texture. All the tiny leather details and the lightly used look completely caught my attention.

The hair was made by no.match and it was released for the last round of Tres Chic, but I am sure you will find it at the main store by now. The hair is a more loose style with a huge hair band that brings the hair down the left shoulder to the front. To me it looked perfect, it did underline the loose look of the trench coat so nicely. I love the hair textures of no.match a lot and especially the blond pack has a blond tone that I completely fell in love with. I do like the fact as well that you have a so called “Essential” pack for nearly every hair style. Even if my personal favorite blonde is not included in that one, it gives you the possibility to have more than one color, even if you do not want to buy the whole fatpack. Sometimes I want more than just color, for different possibilities on pictures, but a full fatpack sometimes is too expensive for a hair style you just want to use for a picture 😉

But now I need to work on the picture for the left side of the amazing “Atelier Baudelaire”… I hope you enjoyed my first fall/winter post, even if it was a more casual looking one again 😉

Pose: Le Poppycock – “Keep On Believing”

Outfit

Coat: Salt & Pepper – “Trench Noemi” (Maitreya) – NEW @ UBER

Leggings: lassitude & ennui – “Hisa Leather Leggings” (Maitreya Applier)

Accessories

Bracelet (right): Kunglers – “Isis – Malachite”

Bracelet (left): Kunglers – “Bromelia – Ebony”

Rings: FORMANAILS – “Rings 1” (Maitreya, Bento)

Nails: FORMANAILS – “Stiletto 1” (Maitreya, Bento)

Hair & Makeup

Makeup & Lipstick: alaskametro<3 – “Fall Runway” (LeLutka Applier)

Hair: no.match – “No.Caution”

Body & Tattoo

Head: LeLutka – “Simone 3.0”

Eyes: IKON – “Hope Eyes – Quicksilver”

Body: Maitreya – “Lara 4.1”

Face: Izzie’s – “Pores & Blemishes” (LeLutka Applier)

Poses & Props

Poses: <EMOZIONE>, Foxcity & Le Poppycock

Backdrop: Ex Machina – “Atelier Baudelaire”

Model & Photographer

Wicca Merlin

“Before he shuts me down…”

by

I do love collaborations and if one of your personal photography idols asks you, if you would have an idea that would go with his actual styling… that feels like Christmas, easter and birthday together :p

I always admire people with strong visions, intense emotions, powerful moments and driving colors. As well I am amazed by peoples skills in doing raw shots and how they post process their pictures. It is exciting to see what gets snapped in world and then see what the end results are for the picture, that mostly turns into an art piece then 😉

So, you can imagine how excited I got, when Master Nefekalum came into my IM box and asked, if I would have an idea for a styling to what he just had put together. He as well sent me a gyazo of his look and when I saw it, immediately the movie Ex Machina came to my mind. The Android girl Ava and Caleb, who has to judge whether Ava is genuinely capable of thought and consciousness, and if he can relate to Ava despite knowing she is artificial.

When I told Master Nefekalum about it, he seemed interested. So I did hurry to put a style together, to show him what I was thinking of. When I sent him the gyazo he had some minor ideas to adjust my look and then he TPed me over to his studio. It is always exciting to me, when I see how other photographers work and I always try to be as easy to work with as I can, to not disturb or interrupt other peoples ideas and visions.

It is so amazing to see how others picture your look and what they do see in your styling. Sometimes it even can go a complete different direction, than you initially thought about.

This time it did not and Master Nefekalum liked my little vision to his style and I was speechless, when I saw the picture and the perfect title he did. So today I just adapted the title of my post to hims and I hope he will not mind it 😉

I would like to thank Master Nefekalum for this amazing moment and picture! I secretly hope he will have a situation or style that he will see me fit into again in the future maybe 😉

Master Nefekalum’s Style details:

https://ephemeralskye.com/2018/04/04/before-i-shut-you-down/

You definitely should take a look at his amazing work work on his flickr or blog  to see all his amazing art work!

My Stylecard:

Outfit & Accessories:

Corset: Pixicat – “Temptation Corset – Dark” (Gacha, RARE, XS Size)

Collar: .:Avanti:. – “Nayomi Collar”

Shoes: [CX] – “Implant Revived – Trashed Steel” (Maitreya)

Spine: Salt & Pepper – “Skeleton Spine” (Maitreya)

Rings: Meva – “Maitreya Bento Rings – Silver” (Maitreya)

Claws: Meva – “Bento Claws – Silver”

Hair & Makeup:

Hair: A&Y Cybernetics – “Cyro”

Body & Tattoos:

Head: LeLutka – “Simone 3.0”

Body: Maitreya – “Lara 4.1”

Upper Arms & Legs, Nip Cover & Panties: [V-Tech] – “Forbidden Experiment Set” (Maitreya)

Skin: *YS&YS* – “Ginny Zafiro Skin” (LeLutka/Maitreya Applier)

Teck Skin Appliers: *YS&YS* – “Pris” (LeLutka/Maitreya Applier)

Eyes (right): CURELESS[+] – “Surgical Eyes”

Photographer:

Master Nefekalum (Ephemeral Skye)