New World Notes

Uncanny Valley Expo 2007: Honorable Mentions!

I finally managed to wade through the 40+ entries in this year's Expo and today, unveil the ten I believe deserve honorable mention.  My two standards of selection are realism of the avatar, and more important, the ability to engage on a human level.  The latter category is more subjective, of course, and bound to provoke disagreement.  Fortunately, the final choice won't be up to me: next week, I'll run the ten finalists, and NWN readers will get to vote on the winner among those. 

Meantime, after the break, listed more or less in the order they were received, the Honorable Mention entries!

Uncanny Valley Expo: Elusyve Jewell

Elusyve Jewell's Expo entry "Honesty" was created with a skin from CS Vogue.

See all the Expo avatars here.  All the qualified entries I received have been shown, and so now, we go to the semi-final selection.  Now to figure out how to choose 10 entries from a massive stack of 43.

Uncanny Valley Expo: Gorgeous Yongho

Gorgeous Yongho models and submits "Blue Sky", her Expo entry with a Luth Brodie standing animation and a RaC Skin by Mallory Cowen.  See all the Expo avatars here.

UNCANNY VALLEY EXPO: HAVER COLE (3RD ENTRY)

Haver Cole's third entry features another pose by Luth Brodie ("Fashion 5) and a skin by D-skin. See all the Expo avatars here.

UNCANNY VALLEY EXPO: JON KUBRICK

Jon Kubrick's Expo entry features Christal Flannery.  See all the Expo entries here.

THE UNCANNY VALLEY IS CLOSED

Just a reminder, I'm not taking any more submissions to Uncanny Valley Expo 2007.  The images you've been seeing in recent weeks (and in coming weeks, there's still a lot more left) are those received by the August deadline.   Speaking of which, take a look at this real life celebrity image.  While SL avatars get closer to human believability, RL public figures seem to be getting more avatarized.

UNCANNY VALLEY EXPO: XELLESSANOVA ZENITH

To create her Expo entry, Ms. Zenith used a custom face skin manipulation, custom eyes made bloodshot red, and a custom shape.  "I prefer minor tweaks to the face mesh rather than the often over-the-top expression defaults," she explains. To add she added custom eyebrows and animations ("four threaded to run consecutively through a gesture, over a base pose"). The final combined gesture Xellessanova calls "Go Cry Emo Kid".   See all the Expo avatars here.

UNCANNY VALLEY EXPO: MELANIE774 KIDD

Ms. Kidd created the aptly-titled "Mona Lisa smile" with Luth Brodie's *Luth* Fashion S2-11 modeling pose, and a skin from RaC.  (She also models.)  See all the Expo avatars here.

UNCANNY VALLEY EXPO: HALEY SALOMON (2ND Entry)

Haley Salomon again, in an askance look-- pose from Luth, skin from R and C Skin.  See all the Expo avatars here.  Soon, ten will be nominated for a final vote that'll select the winner(s) of Uncanny Expo 2007!

UNCANNY VALLEY EXPO: MELISSAVP ISLANDER

"No Stress" was created by modeled by Ms. Islander; her skin is by Naughty; the animation is "Sunbathing on deck chair" by Maerlyn Maifair.  See all the Expo avatars here.  Soon, ten will be nominated for a final vote that'll select the winner(s) of Uncanny Expo 2007!