HOW TO: Bar Band

One of the fun things that we like to do occasionally is to pretend we are actually playing the music that a DJ streams or the radio plays. To make this easy to do I added to the Bar XPOSE a Band. Well, you and other members are the Band, but the XPOSE provides positioning and some of the instruments needed.

When you look in the Bar XPOSE menu you will see the 'Band' button.

Click the button and the band equipment and positioners rezz around the DJ spot at the bar. Here I am at the DJ spot with the rezzed band equipment around me.

The equipment consists of two microphones (one female and the other male), a singer positioner/animator, a drum set, two guitar positioner/animators and two back-up dancer positioners/animators. Eleven people (two singers, two guitarists, one drummer and six back-up dancers) plus a DJ can be in the Band at one time. 

Here is a description of how each part of the Band works:

SINGERS

The microphones are colored with the red for the female and blue for the male singer. Sit on the positioner located on the floor behind the microphone stand and a menu appears. Here is the female menu.

These positioners also animate your avatar. You can move like you are singing a slow, medium speed or fast song or just waiting swaying with the music. 

The male microphone and positioner/animator has male animations and the female positoner/animator has female animations.

GUITARISTS

There are two guitar positioners/animators with one on the left of the drums and the other on the right. You have to supply your own guitar. Eventually we will make a NotTooHot guitar for you to use, but for now we don't have it. The guitar positioner/animator is like the singer positioner/animator except the animations are all guitar animations. You may need to edit slightly the position of your guitar after wearing it.

DRUMMER

Sit on the drummers seat and you get a menu.

Choose Getsticks for the drum sticks. Once you wear them, use the GetHUD button to be given the drummer HUD. Wear the HUD to be able to do all the drummer animations.

DANCERS

There are two Dancer Positioner/Animators. One is next to each of the Guitarist spots on the bar. Like all the positioner/animators you sit on the circle and are presented with a menu. Each positioner/animator has three seats which you can choose and a variety of dances that one to three dancers perform in sync.

When you are finished with the Band, just open up the Bar XPOSE and select STOP to de-rezz the Band.

xxx
Nottoo

HOW TO: WORKOUT Positioner

Every day Monday through Friday we have WORKOUT at the Club to dance and talk in a circle. I started WORKOUT in 2008 at the old Not Too Hot Club and it was a popular event. At that time we used 16 pose balls arranged in a circle. To join the WORKOUT all a person had to do was sit on a pose ball and accept the dance HUD invitation from the leader. When there were fewer than 16 people that meant that ugly pose balls were left hanging in the air.

To solve this I made a 16 Dancer Positioner using the Hironics MPC system. The Positioner is in the Bar XPOSE and can be rezzed either on the floor to the left of the bar or the right using the XPOSE menu.

Here I am with the rezzed Positioner. See it as the partly transparent circle on the floor subtly inscribed '16 Dance Positioner.'

To use it just sit on the circle. As soon as you do you are positioned at the first location on the circle called Seat 1.

If you click on the circle again, you can change seats or adjust your z-direction height. Here is a picture from today's WORKOUT with Toffee, Ili, Thal and me dancing in our Christmas outfits.

Ili is leading the dancing in this photo and we are perfectly lined up over one quadrant of the circle.

When you are finished using the 16 Dancer Positioner, just use the Stop button in the Bar XPOSE to remove it. If you would like a 16 Dancer Positioner, let me know.

xxx
Nottoo

HOW TO: Bar Dancing

I love Bar Dancing. 

Bar Dancing is dancing on the bar. Almost from the beginning of my SL I have bar danced ... first at Juke Joint Blues, then at the original Not Too Hot. Here is a photo by Wisdom Whiteberry of a group of us bar dancing in April 2008.

You can Bar Dance at the NotTooHot Club any time. It can be done impromptu by just hopping on the bar and dancing away. We used to have fun dancing and knocking people off the bar. Of course, for some getting on the bar is a challenge.

Over the years we have become more sophisticated bar dancers. With synchronized dancing through HUD's we wanted to line up and all dance together. At the old Not Too Hot we used a line up of pose balls for positioning. That made it easy to get on the bar, but had the disadvantage of looking cluttered with unused pose balls hanging in the air.

With the new NotTooHot, I have placed a Bar Dancing Positioner in the Bar XPOSE. 

On the XPOSE menu click on Bar DancerR or Bar DancerL to place a square on the right side of the bar or the left. Here I am looking at the partially transparent square on the right side with the lettering 'Bar Dancer' on it. 

The XPOSE rezzes this square, which is a positioner for placing people in line on the bar.

If you move your cursor over the Bar Dancer Positioner, you see a hand. Sit on the Bar Dancer Positioner and you are magically placed on the bar. If there is more than one dancer using the poisitoner, the dancers are automatically lined up. 

In addition to placing you on the bar, you see a blue menu (with Firestorm).

The menu gives different arrangements for the dancers (up to eight at one time) and allows for height adjustment also. All of the bar dancers have full access to the menu. Of course, you need a Dance HUD or the Dance Ball to dance.

Happy bar dancing!!!

xxx
Nottoo

HOW TO: Bar Items

Bar Items are simply the beer cans and bottles and wine glasses that sometimes are arranged on the bar. This also includes the beer dispenser. Here is a picture of some of these bar items.

One of the subtleties of the club is that we only serve beer from Holland (Heineken) or Argentina (Quilmes) and you will see that on the glasses and bottles as well as the beer dispenser. That's because Riddle is from Holland and Nottoo is from Argentina.

The wine is from Argentina and is Malbec.

If you want to sit or stand at the bar near a glass or bottle, you can rezz these Bar Items using the Bar XPOSE.

HOW TO: Bar XPOSE

An XPOSE is a system that is used in many items in SL such as furniture including sofas, sex beds and lots of things that have one or more avatars being animated. The XPOSE system not only allows for the animation of avatars, it also allows precise rezzing of objects. At NotTooHot we use an XPOSE to manage the rezzing and de-rezzing of items associated with the bar.

The NotTooHot Bar XPOSE is located under the bar at the Club just below the DJ equipment.

Here is a photo from behind the bar. See the black square under the bar. That's the Bar XPOSE. When you move your cursor over the square, a small hand appears. Left click and you get a blue menu in the upper right (with Firestorm). Here is an example of the menu as of this writing.

The menu leads to different items that are stored in the rezzer. Clicking on a button rezzes that item on or near the bar. Usually clicking on a different item de-rezzes the currently rezzed item and replaces it with the clicked item. To remove everything that has been rezzed, just click on the 'STOP' button. Here is the empty bar, with Marv just hanging out.

Any member can rezz items to have fun. Please de-rezz the item when you are finished. If you want something specific added to the XPOSE, let me know.

I will identify items that are added to the Bar XPOSE and give more information about their use in separate notes.

xxx
Nottoo