~The Eyes Have It~

~JJ~ is chock-full of releases lately (oh, there are even more to tell you about later) and the latest is a collection of eyes for your cherished avatar.

These eyes are no regular system eyes!

Initially, I designed a set of different eyes that would be used by the system eyes and would be tintable via the Edit feature in SL.  Those eyes were great, by all means, but after finishing the set I felt like I wasn't hitting the mark with just how customizable the eyes could get.  I decided to hold the release and keep working until I was happy.

I am very happy now!  The newest eyes are prim-based, so they are compatible with all viewers and easy to manipulate by the user.  Of course, a few manipulations require some Edit mode tweaks - such as changing the position, rotation and overall size of the eye prims.  Aside from the minor things that tend to be set once - and made very unique for each personality - the rest is HUD-driven.  And by "the rest" I mean a ton of things!

These eyes are currently available in five different styles: Window, Reflect, Catch, UV and Reptile for all your particular tastes and preferences.

Customizable Eyes HUD

The HUD is very simple and powerful.  It can be attached and used to customize the eyes and then detached so that it doesn't take up a ton of room on your viewer.  Aside from its functionality, it's sharp-looking and intuitive and it features many slider-based controls that allow you to make instant detailed selections of settings without pouring through clunky menus and stepped controls.

Speaking of the controls, here's what you'll see on your HUD:

First, there is a graphical representation of your eye.  As changes are made, you can see the image of the eye adjust itself in real-time!

Below that, there is a selector that allows you to choose between editing the iris portion of the eyes or the sclera, the "white part" of the eyeball.  These parts are editable independantly so you can get the most customization bang for the buck.

Next is a control that allows you to select whether the part will be Fullbright or shaded to allow environmental lighting effects to be rendered on the eye.

Right next to that is a scale slider where you can choose the texture size of the iris (or the sclera if you please) and make your eyes small and beady or large and doe-eyed - or anything in between!

On a side note, slider controls can be clicked-and-dragged for minute adjustments.  This method is not recommended as it creates script lag and possible delays in showing the changes as they take effect.  It is good for smaller adjustments and ideal for single-click edits.  It's there in case you want to try it out and could always improve if SL speeds up their script functions.  You never know.

Moving on down the HUD, you will see a set of buttons that allow you to choose the shiny attributes of the selected part.  All four levels of shine are available to choose from and they affect the sclera portion of the eye (since the iris is alpha-based for which SL does not provide shiny abilities).  This feature gives your eye that glossy look that is dynamic to the camera.

Farther down is a slider that controls the amount of glow on the indicated parts!  This versatile effect really gives eyes a surreal quality that work great in the dark (and in the light too).  These changes are not visible on the HUD sample image because HUDs cannot display Windlight Glow settings, but you can still monitor the changes real-time in-world right there on your avatar - where it counts.

At the very bottom of the HUD is an extremely robust color selection grid that allows you to dial-in any color that exists with ease!  Using precise hue, saturation, value sliders, this portion of the HUD represents every color possible and translates it into an RGB value that is sent to your selected eyeball part.  Also, in the lower-lefthand corner of the color selector grid is a box that displays the pure color selected and can be clicked on to send you the RGB vector so you can pinpoint the exact color to use for yourself (because those tintable shoes and belt will HAVE to match the eyes!) - just select the vector in private chat and paste it where you need it!

The five styles of the ~JJ~ Customizable Eyes are also available in a smaller size for your Petites Mesh Avatar!  See the ~JJ~ store in the SL Marketplace to find yours.  But more on Petites later...

~Love~

Jeanette Doobie