Hello hello!

[VelvetSoul]

Greetings everyone, I'm new here and not knowing where else to start I figured I'd make an introductory post/topic, so here we go.

I go by Velvet, I'm in my late 20s soon to be early 30s; and I use they/them pronouns.

I'm a huge nerd when it comes to the internet and online spaces, I love nothing more than exploring virtual worlds. One of my favorite hobbies is taking photos in virtual spaces. As odd as it may sound, being able to use virtual reality to actually walk around virtual worlds and take pictures in VR feels so different than just taking a screenshot. Sometimes I'll take the time to edit the ones I really like just to add a little extra something to them. However, when I'm not exploring virtual worlds; I tend to spend a good bit of time listening to music, playing games; and desperately trying to catch up on my backlog of anime to watch. I'll be sure to fill out my profile with specific interests and such but for now that's a good summary.

Some of my Virtual Reality photography if you're curious about it, though admittedly these are usually at proper 1080x1920 so I apologize if they're hard to see well:



Some things you should know about me:

- I use these silly emoticons far too often (。・∀・)ノ I just find them neat.
- I'm always happy to make a new friend.
- I write entirely too much but when it comes to speaking I'm something of a social mute.

I haven't made a public website yet, mostly because I originally just made my website for myself. Now the reason has expanded into wanting to figure out how to make something nicer looking if I'm going to put something out onto the web, so I'm trying to learn before I go linking to something I'm not proud of.

I love creating for the sake of entertaining, I'm an entertainer at heart; and it bleeds into everything I do. There's a joy in not just making something you're proud of, but something that brings others joy; or something that can make them think. I try not to sound pretentious about it; but I love to evoke emotion through a piece. Whether it's writing something that gets people interested in a new hobby, or finding the perfect angle to convey the moody loneliness of an empty VR lobby. I feel strongly that creating something that can evoke such emotions is a way of leaving the world a slightly more artistic and hopefully happy place than I had entered it. Though, in way more mundane words; I also just think it's fun to create something, I get to bring something into the world; and share the thoughts in my head with others.

Anyways, thanks for having me here! \(╹ڡ╹ )/

[Paprika]

(。・∀・)ノ Hi !

Welcome to the melonland forum ! I hope you'll have fun around ! We're starting to be a large group, it's super cool !

[sokil]

hi, welcome to melonland!!

i also love exploring virtual worlds! my friend bart and i will sometimes spend hours going through different worlds on vrchat - it's a lot of fun. people make some really freakin' cool stuff! do you have any favorite virtual worlds that you've stumbled upon?

i totally get you on the anime backlog; i've basically tossed mine out the window for the time being so i could watch dungeon meshi are you watching anything at the moment and, if so, how are you liking it?

[VelvetSoul]

i also love exploring virtual worlds! my friend bart and i will sometimes spend hours going through different worlds on vrchat - it's a lot of fun. people make some really freakin' cool stuff! do you have any favorite virtual worlds that you've stumbled upon?

Favorites are always hard for me I'm bad at making decisions like that (￣m￣）
However! I recently came across the Organism series by DrMorro; I can't speak on all of what he's made but Organism, as well as Epilogue Chapter 1 and 2 are absolute mint.

They're not horror maps, but they have layers of surrealism and seem to aim to tell a story of some kind that is largely up to the viewer's interpretation as it lacks any words. The atmosphere in these worlds is fantastic! They've been a great source of inspiration to me when it comes to my own creations. Though I admit I've not gotten quite good enough to make worlds that are nearly as impressive just yet.

Other than that, I am horribly bias but my partner and I have a world that's currently private since we're still learning the ropes of world creation. We got into making Avatars about a year ago, and found it enjoyable to create stuff for our friends to use; giving them something more of a personal identity than just having to pick up Avatars from various worlds where they can find them or something. Naturally we decided the logical next step would be to figure out how to make a world, we currently just have a small house that contains images taken from our various VRChat adventures with friends, it's nice to have a place to relax and look back on memories of the times we've spent with the gang. I'd argue it's my favorite for sentimental reasons and such, but outside of my personal bias; and in terms of actual intrigue I gotta hand it to DrMorro.

A big thing for me that I don't see a lot of people discuss when it comes to VRChat is that as someone who did take the time to learn how to make things for it, I fear a lot of the "magic" is gone for me. Not in the sense that I don't appreciate things anymore, just that I see them differently. As an example of what I mean; recently my partner and I tried out the PaperVRChat world which gives you a 2D view of your avatar in the paper mario style, it's very cute and we liked it a lot. However during our time there, I looked over to my right, way out of bounds; and saw my partner standing in space. At this point I began to explain how I thought the world was functioning, and she quickly joined in speculating and giving her own insight. This is how we view a lot of things that I feel other users, primarily users who don't work with unity/VRChat creations; likely don't see it. I cannot stress enough that I don't mean that in a sense of superiority or anything, what I mean is that when we look at a machine, we see it as gears and motors, while someone else may be able to just say "wow cool machine!" Enjoying the sum of it's parts for what it is in the end, instead of the individual components that make it up. I don't think we have a "better" or "worse" way of looking at it per se, just a different perspective on it. We're still really interested in the worlds, mechanics, and systems at play; but we've lost the ability to just look beyond the question of "how did they do that?" If that makes any sense.

DrMorro's worlds are the first time in a long time when I've been able to just get immersed in a world and forget all of that, I think the closest I got was while exploring Prologue Chapter 1 I made the remark of "I do want to see what this map looks like in unity..." given how large the map is, and how it loops back on itself a lot; it raised a lot of curiosity from me in regards to how it all looks when viewed from a different angle. However, that thought was quickly replaced by the ever present feeling of "whoa check this thing out" as we rounded a corner and were given another surreal landscape to marvel at. It's nice to be able to sort of let go of that "creative" mind set and just enjoy something; which I find harder to do than I should admittedly.

i totally get you on the anime backlog; i've basically tossed mine out the window for the time being so i could watch dungeon meshi are you watching anything at the moment and, if so, how are you liking it?

Oh man, we're in the same boat it seems! I recently just finished season 1 of Dungeon Meshi it's a good one! d=(￣▽￣*)b
I've been mostly trying to catch up on old classics I've not seen or never finished, but I had to, same as you; put them on hold to keep up with Dungeon Meshi since literally everyone I knew was watching it and I didn't want spoilers lol.

That being said my partner has me watching Wolf's Rain right now as it's one she grew up with. It's an interesting one but arguably not for the reasons it should be lol. I love the art style, and it absolutely kills me that the voice actor for Kiryu from Yakuza is in it too. If you don't know, it's a sort of dystopian sci-fi fantasy and while I don't know all the facts about it yet as I'm still early on, the general premise follows a pack of wolves, who have some kind of magic that makes humans see them as other humans instead of as wolves. I have no idea why, so far it has not been explained; but the thing that kills me is they still do things with their hands. Sometimes this is shown to the audience as them using their mouths, since it's not like a werewolf situation, it's just an illusion. However this raises the question, when they eat burgers how are they using both their hands and their mouths? When they speak, are the wolves literally just speaking or does the barking just translate somehow? Also there's a flower that is also a person?? This anime is really weird, and has that great "edgy charm" of the early 2000's (which makes sense considering it aired in 2003) but admittedly I love that the characters aren't all just cookie cutter copies of each other. You actually have some cool fashion among the main cast. I have to hand it to my partner for putting up with me constantly asking "wait they're a wolf right? How did they do that? How are they holding that? IS THE WOLF STANDING ON TWO LEGS RIGHT NOW?!" every 5 minutes while we're watching the show. It's one of those shows where, if my partner wasn't so into it I probably wouldn't watch it myself, but I don't dislike it; primarily because I have someone to watch it with who unironically enjoys it and doesn't mind me finding it a bit silly. I'd arguably say I like it, but it's one of those shows where if you ask me to list a top 5 or something, it's not going to be on there. Great art style, honestly a pretty interesting concept for a story if a little confusing; and ultimately a refreshing anime to watch after trying to catch up on current season anime.

I'm not one who enjoys complaining so I don't want to just riff on "modern anime" but I don't personally care much for modern anime styles; I appreciate more artistic interpretation but I don't talk on it much. Mostly because my favorite styles come from the 80's and 90's which feels extremely generic of me to say lol.

Hopefully you're enjoying Dungeon Meshi! It's a wild ride, but one that makes me want to fight off my ADHD long enough to actually read the manga (which I admit is only difficult for me because of you know, the ADHD.) I assume given your pfp that you are in fact enjoying it but I wish to send good regards anyways lol.

[sokil]

Favorites are always hard for me I'm bad at making decisions like that (￣m￣）
However! I recently came across the Organism series by DrMorro; I can't speak on all of what he's made but Organism, as well as Epilogue Chapter 1 and 2 are absolute mint.

They're not horror maps, but they have layers of surrealism and seem to aim to tell a story of some kind that is largely up to the viewer's interpretation as it lacks any words. The atmosphere in these worlds is fantastic! They've been a great source of inspiration to me when it comes to my own creations. Though I admit I've not gotten quite good enough to make worlds that are nearly as impressive just yet.

Other than that, I am horribly bias but my partner and I have a world that's currently private since we're still learning the ropes of world creation. We got into making Avatars about a year ago, and found it enjoyable to create stuff for our friends to use; giving them something more of a personal identity than just having to pick up Avatars from various worlds where they can find them or something. Naturally we decided the logical next step would be to figure out how to make a world, we currently just have a small house that contains images taken from our various VRChat adventures with friends, it's nice to have a place to relax and look back on memories of the times we've spent with the gang. I'd argue it's my favorite for sentimental reasons and such, but outside of my personal bias; and in terms of actual intrigue I gotta hand it to DrMorro.

A big thing for me that I don't see a lot of people discuss when it comes to VRChat is that as someone who did take the time to learn how to make things for it, I fear a lot of the "magic" is gone for me. Not in the sense that I don't appreciate things anymore, just that I see them differently. As an example of what I mean; recently my partner and I tried out the PaperVRChat world which gives you a 2D view of your avatar in the paper mario style, it's very cute and we liked it a lot. However during our time there, I looked over to my right, way out of bounds; and saw my partner standing in space. At this point I began to explain how I thought the world was functioning, and she quickly joined in speculating and giving her own insight. This is how we view a lot of things that I feel other users, primarily users who don't work with unity/VRChat creations; likely don't see it. I cannot stress enough that I don't mean that in a sense of superiority or anything, what I mean is that when we look at a machine, we see it as gears and motors, while someone else may be able to just say "wow cool machine!" Enjoying the sum of it's parts for what it is in the end, instead of the individual components that make it up. I don't think we have a "better" or "worse" way of looking at it per se, just a different perspective on it. We're still really interested in the worlds, mechanics, and systems at play; but we've lost the ability to just look beyond the question of "how did they do that?" If that makes any sense.

DrMorro's worlds are the first time in a long time when I've been able to just get immersed in a world and forget all of that, I think the closest I got was while exploring Prologue Chapter 1 I made the remark of "I do want to see what this map looks like in unity..." given how large the map is, and how it loops back on itself a lot; it raised a lot of curiosity from me in regards to how it all looks when viewed from a different angle. However, that thought was quickly replaced by the ever present feeling of "whoa check this thing out" as we rounded a corner and were given another surreal landscape to marvel at. It's nice to be able to sort of let go of that "creative" mind set and just enjoy something; which I find harder to do than I should admittedly.

the organism series were actually some of the first worlds i explored! i was blown away by just how much there is to see in them - and i still think there's stuff i haven't seen. those are worlds i could spend hours in just wandering aimlessly and seeing what i stumble upon. bart and i also explored some of drmorro's other worlds, though if i recall correctly they weren't anything like organism; the ones i remember were mostly taken from old photos of where he lived and an apartment in that area - sort of like memory photobook worlds, i suppose would be the best way to put it. where organism felt unnerving and a bit spooky at times, these other worlds felt more home-y and warm.

i must admit that i'm not really one for entering a map and attempting to think about how it works; i spend more time exploring and appreciating the worlds i visit. i think i might start taking this approach next time i play and see how much i can wrap my head around :O i would love to take a crack at crafting my own world (and avatars) sometime! it sounds like you're having a really nice time creating your own world and avatars with your partner; it sounds really cozy ^^

Oh man, we're in the same boat it seems! I recently just finished season 1 of Dungeon Meshi it's a good one! d=(￣▽￣*)b
I've been mostly trying to catch up on old classics I've not seen or never finished, but I had to, same as you; put them on hold to keep up with Dungeon Meshi since literally everyone I knew was watching it and I didn't want spoilers lol.

That being said my partner has me watching Wolf's Rain right now as it's one she grew up with. It's an interesting one but arguably not for the reasons it should be lol. I love the art style, and it absolutely kills me that the voice actor for Kiryu from Yakuza is in it too. If you don't know, it's a sort of dystopian sci-fi fantasy and while I don't know all the facts about it yet as I'm still early on, the general premise follows a pack of wolves, who have some kind of magic that makes humans see them as other humans instead of as wolves. I have no idea why, so far it has not been explained; but the thing that kills me is they still do things with their hands. Sometimes this is shown to the audience as them using their mouths, since it's not like a werewolf situation, it's just an illusion. However this raises the question, when they eat burgers how are they using both their hands and their mouths? When they speak, are the wolves literally just speaking or does the barking just translate somehow? Also there's a flower that is also a person?? This anime is really weird, and has that great "edgy charm" of the early 2000's (which makes sense considering it aired in 2003) but admittedly I love that the characters aren't all just cookie cutter copies of each other. You actually have some cool fashion among the main cast. I have to hand it to my partner for putting up with me constantly asking "wait they're a wolf right? How did they do that? How are they holding that? IS THE WOLF STANDING ON TWO LEGS RIGHT NOW?!" every 5 minutes while we're watching the show. It's one of those shows where, if my partner wasn't so into it I probably wouldn't watch it myself, but I don't dislike it; primarily because I have someone to watch it with who unironically enjoys it and doesn't mind me finding it a bit silly. I'd arguably say I like it, but it's one of those shows where if you ask me to list a top 5 or something, it's not going to be on there. Great art style, honestly a pretty interesting concept for a story if a little confusing; and ultimately a refreshing anime to watch after trying to catch up on current season anime.

I'm not one who enjoys complaining so I don't want to just riff on "modern anime" but I don't personally care much for modern anime styles; I appreciate more artistic interpretation but I don't talk on it much. Mostly because my favorite styles come from the 80's and 90's which feels extremely generic of me to say lol.

Hopefully you're enjoying Dungeon Meshi! It's a wild ride, but one that makes me want to fight off my ADHD long enough to actually read the manga (which I admit is only difficult for me because of you know, the ADHD.) I assume given your pfp that you are in fact enjoying it but I wish to send good regards anyways lol.

yeah, i'm really enjoying dungeon meshi!! :D i think i'm going to try to finish it throughout this week since i don't have a whole lot going on. it's such a fun series; quite different from the other animes i've watched which are arguably more "serious" (for lack of a better term) like cowboy bebop or hellsing. i just saw some gifs from dungeon meshi on my tumblr one day and figured i would give it a try since i was looking for something new to watch. also, i know what you mean about reading through the manga; i've kept it open in another tab for the times i think i might actually be able to sit down and read through something, but i don't think i made it past page four yet xD one day, though!

WOW, wolf's rain is a name i have not heard in a LOOOONG time! truthfully, i've never seen this series myself, only some gifs/stills in passing and maybe some clips or AMVs... i had honestly forgotten all about it until you brought it up again. many years ago in the spaces i used to frequent, i knew a lot of people who were really into wolf's rain. that unlocked some memories. i'm glad that you seem to be enjoying it! i totally agree about the art style and the premise - both are very cool. i'll have to give this series a proper try one day after all the years of exposure to it and somehow not absorbing anything other than knowing what the characters look like i had no idea that kiryu from yakuza was a voice actor in this series; that alone might get me to watch it because that sounds kind of hilarious.