Janine "Iris Ophelia" Hawkins' ongoing review of gaming and virtual world style
I'm a little bit in love with the sweeping waves and swirly curls in the latest release from Second Life hair brand Magika. It's romantic but flawless, in just the right amount of disarray to look 'natural' without looking... Well, too natural. This is exactly what I want from the mesh haistyles topping off my avatar on a daily basis, but that's not the case for everyone.
My mother's a big fan of L fashion too, and our tastes in virtual hair tend to clash. For her, if a style doesn't have any flow or movement to it, it's pretty much off the table. That's not to say that's she's living in the pre-mesh past with her pixel perms, but she still certainly appreciates a dash of flexi here and there under all that mesh. A feature that's a dealbreaker for her is something I don't think I've ever even noticed among all the styles I own.
There's even more variation than that, though. I have friends who loathe chunky, "piecy" styles and others who wear them constantly. Some won't consider buying from a designer if they don't have a full range of dip-dyed texture options, while others never stray from their signature color. Even the least fashion-frenzied among us seem to be pretty picky about our avatar hair.
That's why today I want to know how you like to wear your Second Life hair? Are there features you can't live without/won't touch with a 10-foot prim pole, or are you pretty easygoing as long as you can find that perfect shade of auburn? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
Janine Hawkins (@bleatingheart on Twitter, Iris Ophelia in Second Life) has been writing about virtual worlds and video games for nearly a decade, and has had her work featured on Paste, Kotaku, Jezebel and The Mary Sue.
Short, sleek, sexy. Good mesh short hair is hard to come by.
Posted by: Vaki | Tuesday, January 06, 2015 at 11:43 AM
I change my hair color ever 6 months or so it seems, but I always stay with longer layers-no bangs with a bit of a wave to them. One thing I wished designers did was create a set of hair styles that were all one cut, but done in different "do's". Example: A line of hair that looked like the same person but one up-do, with hat, ponytail, with barrettes, bed head and other styles.
Posted by: Selena Anansi | Tuesday, January 06, 2015 at 11:49 AM
Depends how well its fits my avatar shape, some amazing syles look awful on my shape and great on others.
I am not a fan of straight spaghetti hair but neither the Shirley Temple curls. The style on your pick is too much for me for example.
Another thing that irks me are hairs that look great front but on the back there is no hair and makes me feel weird so hairless on the back.
Some stores have certain habits of having this overly pressed scalps, once in a while they come up with something that fits me but generally I wear the DEMO without much hope.
Posted by: Aradia Enoch | Tuesday, January 06, 2015 at 11:56 AM
Under a hat.
Posted by: Adeon Writer | Tuesday, January 06, 2015 at 12:15 PM
Under a hat.
Posted by: Adeon Writer | Tuesday, January 06, 2015 at 12:15 PM
Long, mostly straight with a bit of a wave. Sometimes I'll switch it up and do an updo or something shorter, but that's what's most common. However, it **must** allow me to tint it. If I buy something to find out I can't tint it, I won't buy from that designer again.
Posted by: Arwyn Quandry | Tuesday, January 06, 2015 at 12:21 PM
I don't want my hair too messy or piecey, a little bit is fine. I prefer wavy to curly, and I'm not usually into braids. I don't want my hair too "Flyaway", I want it to look "conditioned".
I am VERY picky about my haircolor since my entire look was originally based on the old ETD Mahogany shade (preferring the late 2007 version of the shade). I wear dark flame in Wasabi Pills, and whatever the equivalent to the old "Blood" color is in the new Truth system without color names. Those Truth colors need names! In Analog Dog I would wear the "Fox" or "Crono" shades.
I have to tint some hair, Elikatira and Mina hair being examples, to get it the right shade. Neither brand has a red dark enough.
I do sometimes go blonde, I have a few Truth "Light Blonde" packs (and a few other blonde styles) for that purpose.
Posted by: CronoCloud Creeggan | Tuesday, January 06, 2015 at 12:57 PM
Flexi black Dreads in SL, bald-headed freak IRL.
Posted by: Iggy | Tuesday, January 06, 2015 at 02:35 PM
what Selena said about do's please
Posted by: irihapeti | Tuesday, January 06, 2015 at 04:44 PM
Since i have multiple avs that have different styles it varies. Adia is short and black, she used to do both blonde and black, but she for all her 7 years has picked black short hair.
Kitty started off as a ginger, but I went to blonde for a while, using basically any hair I liked and was off flexi a year out of the mesh release. However, she is much more about long twee styles and now, almost exclusively, pastels that change, usually a dark purple I notice though. I like thick broad strokes hair with not a lot of individual chunks of hair and smooth textures. I like to support indie brands (I was a blogger for Little Bones a few years ago, but is Little Bones indie now?), but often hair is too manipulated and the textures are harsh and stringy. In terms of volume I am somewhere in the middle. Truth has always been too excessive in terms of length and volume, but my happy medium has been Exile for a while now (plus textures are great). Never been a huge fan of magika, but that hair seems about what I like, if a little big.
Posted by: Kitty Revolver | Tuesday, January 06, 2015 at 06:18 PM
It sounds like CronoCloud and I use the same color that originated with ETD Mahogany back in the day. I stick pretty close to that same color too and have since 2007 or so.
I used to change styles daily before mesh hair. but since mesh I have problems finding any hair I like. Then a friend bought a hair from Analog Dog that I fell in love with. It's long and curly with fly aways all over the place. It looks great sailing. I keep trying to find new styles but always come back to the same one my friend gave me. Most mesh hair looks flat to me.
Posted by: Amanda Dallin | Tuesday, January 06, 2015 at 09:51 PM
Always a ginger. I wear varying shades of ginger...but always a ginger. Truth gingers are my favorite. I don't like flexi hair, because it just doesn't look natural. Perhaps with better technology in upcoming virtual world platforms will allow for better hair movement technology. But we just don't have it in Second Life. As far as styles, I wear a variety of those. I mostly love long hair best. I'm very picky about scale and how the hair drapes over the body. I love Truth, because they offer 3 different sizes for their hair that drapes in the front. You can usually find a perfect, natural-looking fit. I HATE chunky, sloppy-looking mesh. Yes, some of the more intricate detailed hair can be higher in poly count, but ...it's a sacrifice I'm willing to make, ha.
I love updoes, curly styles, long styles, but they styles I really don't like are the long styles where all the hair is swept up front, off the back. I just don't like the way it looks.
Posted by: Tracy RedAngel | Wednesday, January 07, 2015 at 04:13 AM
Color: Blonde rye, sometimes with pink strips.
Type: Mesh.
needs to be copy/mod for being able to delete the scripts, if used.
Style: Short, must show earlobes for the earrings.
Long, must not hide my breasts nor my back.
I did manage to get a real long portfolio of different hair styles and colors along the years but nowadays i only change between less then 20.
Posted by: zz bottom | Wednesday, January 07, 2015 at 05:16 AM
And i do change hair at least once a day:)
(the need to be mesh is easy, it must have a low avatar draw eight and sculpted hair is insanely high compared with the mesh brands i use, in fact only 2 now, Wasabi pills and Truth.
Posted by: zz bottom | Wednesday, January 07, 2015 at 05:19 AM
Magika is the best hair just love it!, rigged hair above shoulder length is for me,
Posted by: Resident | Wednesday, January 07, 2015 at 06:57 AM
1 - Always as natural a shade of red as you can get. Designers are surprisingly bad at getting a real shade ~ too pink, too dark, too blonde, too orange, too not right.
2 - Bangs. I just don't have the forehead for an unnatural hair line (another designer issue). If I find a bang-less style I love, the addition of tintable wispy bangs by Robin Sojourner makes it just right.
3 - My fave is a wavy bob. Braids and shoulder length are good too. Never overly long .... just doesn't look right.
Posted by: Rose Mackie | Wednesday, January 07, 2015 at 12:23 PM
Dreads if in bipedal form - and only after running around with a wooly hat on if anything for years. Just a shame my fave maker cut down their male line :(
Posted by: shirc desantis | Friday, January 09, 2015 at 03:39 AM
I used to love trying out varieties of detailed, intricate hair styles. My mother was a hair dresser and I've always appreciated the nonverbal language of styled hair. D!va was always a favorite: immaculately placed braids, some of which I eventually came to realize to have celtic or slavic (Ukrainian!) connotations; naturalistic loosened strands that brought out a late-evening look that made me feel as if I were looking in a mirror---feel, not actually looking, so no uncanny valley. Truth Hawks had so many styles that resembled my RL shapes: which may be why they bored me a little. Now I wear the simplest hairs: the straight out ones from Rowne, unchanged for months, which feels practical, just like for RL.
I get into crises, increasingly it seems, in SL, when friends are missing; there's no live music that draws me; even the must-see links from Hamlet impress me in distant, overwhelmingly solitary ways; new friends (not newbies) seem to behave and speak as if SL and its residents existed primarily for a vague, narcissistic self-entertainment, somehow at someone else's expense; and I realize that my own self-absorption with dress and styling is, well, self-absorption. So, instead, I log out, call my sister or get some more work done or get to the dance studio or schedule some volunteer time at the hospital.
Posted by: Gealya aeon | Monday, January 12, 2015 at 04:05 AM