Sunday, July 29, 2007

AO-ver Done

In the world of SL creations - the AO (or Animation Overrider) is the most easily abused. Why? For one its nearly always on. The only time anyone says "ao off" is when they are about to do a different animation, such as dance. I would consider AOs a fairly new thing. Early '05 brought attention to the fact that "Hey this stand is fuckin lame!" as well as the laughable default run. So everyone rushed out to get their Wet Ikon in order to start lining up poses to cram the thing with.

At first they were all static poses, and though it was funny to watch someone switch from one pose to another with a swift jerky movement - it was better than standing with your fists in your hips. As most everyone knows, the freebie poses are awesomely bad but for the most part - that's all we had to work with. In mid/late 05 perhaps has late as early 06 ushered in the animated pose. Boy did we all flock like white trash to Hooters for those!

"These are great" I had thought when I purchased my first animated pose from a vendor at the old Naughty Designs store. I think I still use it, even! At any rate a few other folks jumped on the animated stand-wagon and it was almost fun to stand around with a big group in suspense "Ooooh what stand is SHE gonna do next?!?" though those days are long gone.

The poses had gone from jerking from pose to pose to the fluid movement of stands that no one would ever really do, to the new craze: realism. I'm all about bringing realism to SL in most cases ... but I swear to the stars if one more person does a thirty second stretch while I'm talking to them that I'm gonna choke a bitch. Seriously!

I have no idea who makes this ao animation/pose. I just know that they have clearly made a good amount of money off it. Everywhere I go there is at least one neko girl, white trash barbie, or girl with a weave that has it in their AO. Why? Isn't it considered rude to yawn while someone is talking? So when did it become socially acceptable? Did I miss something?!

You know the pose. They stand, pull their arms in close before straightening out their arms to their sides and slowly reach for the sky. The avatar momentarily stands there in their blissful "better than sex" stretch before their arms lower slowly and they put both hands on their love handles (or lack thereof), bringing the animation to an end. I had prepared a video demonstration, but got a bit over saturated with the animation between seeing it everywhere in SL as well as editing footage of it to make a video. I feel that's a bit unnecessary though, as I'm positive everyone knows the pose I'm talking about.

This sequence drives me absolutely bonkers. I can't stand to look at it! When someone is stretching like that it makes me want to pull out a dropkick animation. Stop doing that while I'm talking to you! I could totally see it being used in a gesture or something of that nature .. but in an AO?! Please.

If your SL is so boring that you need an animation to convey that you're tired, bored, unenthused etc ... you need to go hang in a sandbox. What's worse is there are different variations of this same pose floating around. Evidently its the 'thing' to have because I see so many with their AOs just stretching away ... but I personally don't see the appeal. Again it goes back to the 'rude' factor. No, I don't claim to be a socialite or even be able to hold a steady conversation without dumping the clutch and switching the gears to something random ... but don't friggin' yawn and stretch while we're talking! Even if you are legitimately interested in what I'm saying ... your AO says otherwise.

Seriously? I'm all for AOs conveying your mood. By all means switch your poses up as often as you feel necessary .. but save the yawns, stretches, ass scratching and nut adjusting for your poseballs at your house. For conversational purposes, pack your AO with interesting poses that are aesthetically pleasing or at least mildly entertaining. And who said you couldn't put a dance animation in an AO?! Do it! Be free!

Maybe I just take my typing conversations a bit too seriously - and I know in the world of IMs and voice chat that most likely the person I'm talking to has gotten distracted at more than one turn in the road ... but don't remind me of that by yawning and/or stretching for half a damn minute!


15 comments:

Gillian Waldman said...

LMAO. I hate that AO with a passion! When I first came to SL, I didn't understand why people kept stopping, checking both directions (wtf??) and then stretching all the frikking time over and over. 1) What are they checking both directions for? Checking to see if anyone is around before they stretch? 2) Why is everyone so tired??

Good one 'cuz yeah, this totally confounds me. That and why do 90% of the men look like bouncers?

Anonymous said...

I'm totally with you on the ridiculous things people put in their AOs! Along with the yawning there are the silly flexing men too!
Long ago I had a twirlwhirl animation in my AO. I put it in because I thought it conveyed the happy go lucky part of me. I took it out though when one of my friends was kind enough to tell me they felt like I wasn't listening to them! I've been really picky about what goes in my AO ever since.

Unknown said...

And then you'll love this news... a few posts above yours on Fashion World on SL there is an announcement--ZHAO II has just been released, so now there is room for 12 "stands" rather than the old 5. Now one has room for all of the different yawns and stretches.

Carissa Crimson said...

The pose you are referring to is from the LostDog DNA animation override.

It has always driven me a bit bonkers to see it myself...however...if an avi does enjoy a good stretch to ease the shoulders and neck from any tension created by marathon shopping, I would suggest the cute (and keyword here) SUBTLE lil stretching Bird Girl animation from maitreya. Just my 2 pennies worth.

Orchid said...

Beth .. why? Why on earth would you tell everyone that they now have double (plus one) room for more stretching and dick adjusting. Has anyone else seen that man-pose? Where he reaches down, does a lil re-arrangement then gives the ol feller a yank?

GOD! I'll just stick to my 5 pose AO because its taken me this long just to be almost content with the poses that are in it now (though I'm still not fond of them because they aren't "me").

I can just see it now. The next Naughty release of skins .. all the noobie type chicks in blinging boots with bad weaves are gonna flock in with their not five but TWELVE freebie animations. Jerkin' around like meth heads. I can't wait!

ROFL

Anonymous said...

Hearm hear! I don't mind having a couple more options for stands, but you sure won't catch me doing the stupid yawn and stretch thing....talk about rude!

I just wish I could find good sit animations that fit properly on the chairs instead of having me hovering a foot above or with one cheek off the edge.

Joonie said...

Oh this is tooooo funny. I had that AO w/ the stretch! I know, I know...finally got rid of it although no one complained directly to me. It just seemed so rude..esp when you are..um..talking..you know...seriously.

Ack!

Anonymous said...

Personally, I love all those animations you mention. Hell I have one where my avatar checks the time and taps her watch.

If I'm hanging with people who find such poses rude or annoying, I think I need them more than ever. Why? because that would mean I'm hanging with the most boring people in the game.

Anonymous said...

Whew. So glad to know I am not the only person who really finds that stretching pose distracting!! I think it should be modified to only work after 9pm SLT or if your avatar as been logged on for more than five consecutive hours. Otherwise, it's just rude and makes me tired every time I see it.

Although, as if I should really complain - I don't use an AO, which is probably just as annoying for some people, heh.

Orchid said...

Lilli - I'm totally for random animations. Hell I have a one where I hop back and forth. I'm only referring to the different variants of the yawn and stretch. I would even stick an animation in my AO where I do a 'bra adjustment' or something ..

I'm just sick of seeing the stretching thing out and about. I totally agree with Wrath on the timing of the animation. Put an alarm clock on that thing!

Joonie I really doubt anyone would complain to your face because they were secretly all plotting on running out and buying it .. right before stopping off to buy a weave Just kidding .. about the weave.

Anonymous said...

GOD! I'll just stick to my 5 pose AO because its taken me this long just to be almost content with the poses that are in it now

There's nothing in the new AO that forces you to use more poses than you want :)

ZHAO-II has some improvements over the previous version. Most important being lower script load on the sim, so I'm hoping people who are using ZHAO switch to ZHAO-II. It also gives the user more control over some things, which may or may not be useful to everyone.

Here's the release announcement.

And to set the record straight - it allows 12 poses for sits, walks, and ground-sits. It allows as many stands as you want, until the script runs out of memory. So unfortunately, people have even more options for stretching and dick adjusting than originally reported :)

Ziggy

theshadow said...

I so hate those to... I even went so far as to strip these annoying 'hand behind my head and chest thrust forward' anims from my AO and replaced them with stands I liked... Who really stands with their hand behind their heads and sticks out their breasts at people...? Well except maybe streetwomen... >_>

October Hush said...

And this is why you don't use an AO out-of-the-box. It costs more money (ok, a LOT more money) to buy your anims/poses a la carte, but it's so worth it. I'm still looking for the perfect "landing" animation, personally.

Anonymous said...

That exact AO is the reason my best friend started making AO systems.

Anonymous said...

Well I hate to say it but there's a few AO postures I can't stand.

1) The yawn/stretch one that Orchid already mentioned.
2) The 'looking at my watch' one mentioned by lilli (because to me it looks like you're looking at your watch and thinking "Hmmm, how long do I have before I can leave this loser?"
3) The male 'package check' also already mentioned.
4) The little 'cross legged' cutesy pose on many female AO's. Do you ladies all have to pee or something? Yeah that's what it looks like to me.

Luckily my AO is a mixture of 3 different AO's that I've melded together. And I'll admit that it took a LOT of trial and error (and Lindens) to get it exactly the way I want it.