Have Mesh Avatars Destroyed Second Life's Modeling Industry?

That's one of the pretty provocative point of a post by Moni, responding to a provocative YouTube video by SL fashion model Christa Wellens (below), who summarizes and responds to it this way:

Too many models do not want to use mesh, and agencies do not want their models to use mesh parts. This made models expendable, and designers could not sell clothing through these outdated models. Bloggers were up-to-date and had shapes that related to the brands’ consumer base...

Crista talks about how the models and agency owners do not wish to wear mesh body parts. But how about designers who took a long time to make the switch to mesh? I think that had more of an impact on the modeling industry, because the fashion shows catered to those brands. Even if models wore mesh clothing or body parts in their everyday Second Life, they would have to revert to system when they took on a job.

I haven't quite covered the SL modeling industry in recent years but I can definitely say I get way less announcements of runway shows and other modeling events that agencies used to hit me up with all the time. A key issue seems to be mesh takes longer to rez (and not display at all, for some viewers), and so the upgrade to mesh has had a huge unintended consequence to the Second Life community, and economy.

This is all anecdotal, of course, so other perspectives are worth taking in -- in Comments below!

Comments

[Eshi Otawara]

Mesh building process sucked all the joy of spontaneity in my creative process.

[Tillie Ariantho]

Models probably don't want to use mesh because then their "uniqueness" is going away... they think. But look at the photos people post. There are so many options with mesh... people do *not* look uniform with mesh.

[Tillie Ariantho]

Oh and before I forget: the audience of shows was rather small, on some shows the staff was even bigger than the number of visitors. I think modeling never pushed the sales of those designers ever. My guess is that bloggers today have a way larger audience and induce more sales than any SL fashion show.

[Tillie Ariantho]

For a visual history of fashion shows back to 2007 you can have a look here, it's about 550 shows. :P https://www.flickr.com/photos/tillie/collections/72157601922260866/

[Alecks Qinan]

In reading Moni's post I agree that events were uncommon and I also do recall visiting the fashion events but not the runways which I could never rezz (not much of a change on rezzing mesh but better internet provide now) but mostly I did not care to watch avatars walk around but there was a great deal of creativity, to be honest the prices of those clothes were pretty high! Even BAIASTICE was a popular brand which displayed fancy outfits but they did the conversion to mesh and still do well. What about Zaara? She has been in SL ever since I can remember and boy does she keep growing.
In business you have to evolve or drown so I can't say I feel bad for how things run nowadays instead of models we have bloggers and to be honest makes it easier to observe pictures and let's face it just because a model looks good doesn't mean you would look as good. So thanks for DEMO's.
We each have our body size preferences and models in SL are extremely slim to me this alienates just like real life couture does the real consumer. People in the street wear H&M not Armani, for the majority anyways.
Second Life evolved to the mass market just reality and while I agree also with Moni that we have WAY too much products most of those products fall under the same damn category of Short Dress retextured. Have you seen the market of heels and sandals? It's like we only have gladiator style to go for? I am not a designer so I am assuming mesh makes things harder to produce therefore only a selected few seem to be making waves of originality out there.

[xvxRUBYxvx Praga]

I got away from modeling when they started having people pay to vote for their modeling photos. I did enjoy the time I had with one modeling agency, but left when the creator left. My real life become more busy, less time in SL.

I will say as for rezzing in, that goes for any place. I hate going to events out there when people that go to it have over stayed, or camped a place so that other's couldn't visit it. Keeping in mind that there are different time zones so for each ones trying to get in people had to resort to huds that forced recycling trying to get into the sim. Then you get the "jelly" people because they are wearing so much on them that they look like a giant jelly person in your choices of purple, blue, green, yellow.. you name it.

And if you try to temporary derender someone, I found I sometimes only derendered their clothing and not the person, so can you just imagine all the people out there just so they can watch naked mesh people walk around?

I look for realism when I shop and have been in SL over 9 years.
Then you hear about people going over to the OpenSim over Second Life.

There is always someone who is going to complain about something. They want to make lindens. They want free things. They want cheap things..

There are a lot of blogs out there all over the internet, as well as facebook these days.

Business is cutting back in real life as well as more people buy online than in brick and mortar.

The older we get in second life, we realize that our avatar isn't going to look like that in photos for the product being sold.. People are mixing photoshop morph photos of their avi to try to get them one more step up from the next person.

In all honesty. IF you want to try modeling, try it. When you deal with designers they might use you to model their clothes, or they might just want to use you for networking out to your friends to try to bring in consumers.

If I like something I've bought, I share it on my facebook. I will admit, you have to be really good to get a shot of me in something on my facebook ;) I'm fussy like that.

We've gone from system clothing, to rigged, to mesh, who knows what is next!
We are evolving, that's life. Listen to your customers. Some say that they can't find tomboy clothing, but it is easy to find pole dancing attire...

All in all.. it is Second Life. My avatar is not going to slim myself down to a stick. Oh and btw, I don't wear H&M, but I do wear high end clothing because it is tailored for my shape.

I would say if I wish to see anything changed, make sure to keep clothing modifiable so that if it doesn't fit the mesh body, we can do something about it as a consumer.

I would also say, that out of all designers that have left SL, I miss Liv-Glam aka Le Vian the most. Stylish, realistic, and couture. But she has a real life job outside of SL, so Samantha Jones, I salute you and the hard work you put into your clothing designs. I just wish they were modifiable. (maybe if she ever returns)

For new designers, keep up the learning, try new things, and remember, SL has been around a long time. I am sure there is more to see in the future. SL isn't going anywhere thankfully!

Eventually I'll put my hat in the ring and try my hand at mesh, for now though, I'm working on college courses and spending my lindens on my favorite stores. ;)

Oh and for those asking me why I stopped blogging? Some girl in SL decided to take my name I created in 2009 and make her own store after it. Hopefully you'll find some of my favorite links in the blog below helpful.

Happy Shopping!
Ruby

[Alaska Metropolitan]

I think for the SL model agency to survive in modern times, they'd need to really take a look at what they're offering. In times past, a fashion show was a fun way to showcase an entire collection on release. That doesn't happen so much anymore. It's fast fashion now ;-) with lots of event releases. Fashion shows still make sense for shopping events, charity auctions, etc. But the max number of folks that could TP in and watch a show live hasn't changed! It's still really low. To get lots of virtual eyeballs on a brand, agencies could do more video production, catalogues and lookbooks, etc. I feel like part of the decline is just an industry that didn't innovate as much as it could have.

There's ways around lag with mesh bodies in any case so I'm not sure why agencies would be anti-mesh. You can set up a specific copy of your body and head for the show and remove its scripts. You can buy a low LI body. Etc.

[D]

It is not destroyed, it is not dead... it just has changed!

To have fashion shows, we need designers ready to stop selling in events to devote themselves to create stuff for shows.

regarding the video, I answer it in my blog:

https://euridiceqork.wordpress.com/2017/06/29/fashion-world-in-sl-a-dead-world/

[Dusky]

I have attended a few fashion shows as a spectator (I even saw my avatar in Tillie's gallery linked above - that was a surprise), but never derived much pleasure out of the experience due to the SL's infamous lag.

SL modeling is/was a self-important, SL celebrity-obsessed community that grew too fast. The flood of modeling school scams, the constant cliquish drama and infighting, extremely limited work opportunities, and a population of disappointed graduates are why SL modeling is stagnant. Mesh can not take most of the blame.

I say stagnant instead of dead, because a group of creative fashionistas could revive and evolve the modeling scene into what it truly is - a role-playing experience - instead of a viable business marketing service, and eliminate the dependence on designer participation.

"To have fashion shows, we need designers ready to stop selling in events to devote themselves to create stuff for shows." is exactly what I am referring to when I said self-important. If the SL modeling community needs designers to sacrifice income streams in order for it to have purpose, then it deserves to be in the stagnant state that it is in.

[Patchouli Woollahra]

Eshi:

Mesh doesn't have to be done purely out of Second Life. Options exist to export prims and textures that you own in full out in COLLADA format for further refinement and ARC reduction work.

[Sansarya]

Frankly I'd rather watch a YouTube video than try to squeeze into a large event with the lag, slow loading textures, and overcrowded sim. Maybe designers of couture SL clothing could create machinima fashion shows to show a collection, post it on YouTube, and then post links to the in-world store and the Marketplace links. As it is now in SL, big events (Collabor88, Uber, Fameshed, etc.) are difficult to shop in the first week because of the lag, so I skip them. In world fashion shows aren't likely to draw me as spectator or shopper for the same reason.

[kin]

Yeah, because I tried to go into SL again after 3 years and the mesh thing is incomprehensible. So I guess bye again.