Announcement: Picked the Sims Wallpapers for Nokia App

We had just announced the images that will be included in The Sims Category of the 3D Wallpapers app. Read the announcement

The jury made by Liliana Eden Morosini and Sims2Cri picked about 15 images among the almost 100 wallpapers submitted by the community. Browse, here, all the amazing entries

The images picked by the jury are going to be included in the 3D Wallpapers mobile app. If you own a Nokia smartphone, you can download the 3D Wallpapers app from the Ovi Store

The Sims Wallpapers Contest

We're glad to announce the Sims Wallpapers Contest. A new challenge for Koinup members to enter the hall of fame of digital art!


The Sims Wallpapers Contest is a competition for digital artists that use the Sims (2 & 3), as canvas for creativity. Along with being an incredible tool for machinima "The Sims" (2 & 3) has been lately used by many artists as a tool for digital and fan art creation. Koinup is the 1st place where you can admire some of the most incredible creations made with The Sims 2&3.

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Koinup Cream of the Crop - Contests contests everywhere....

The end of December marked not only the end of the year but a few Koinup contests wrapped up as well. First up was the Winter Fell Photo Contest I blogged about at the beginning of the month. 153 members submitted 113 entries for the judges review and oh my were they stellar. I wouldn't have wanted to have to choose.

Photo by: Rudyn Carter

The above piece is the first place winner, Rudyn Carter with her photo of Winterfell Amaranthine. Second place went to Blondie Uriza and third was KoroCarnell. Click the names to view 2nd and 3rd place winners and view entire collection here: Winter Fell Photo Contest.

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Koinup's Cream of the Crop - True Friendship

The best thing in Secondlife for me has always been the friendships I've made. On a tough RL day, I know my bestests are waiting for me inside to go shake it off by being silly or to listen to me piss and moan. Virtual worlds have made the oceans seem far less vast and forged together unbelievable connections around the world. Koinup's Cream of the Crop today celebrates True Friendship. "Fate chooses your relations, you choose your friends."- Jacques Delille

I cannot tell you what a delight it is perusing the 532 works inside this group made of 191 members. The pics all make me grin from ear to ear and remember all the fun snaps I have taken. I made a slide show in game of all of mine and continually add to them. I'll have to upload them to this group to share with everyone as well. :-)

Photo by: Brunaozao

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Koinup's Cream of the Crop - Burning Life

As our continuing coverage of Burning Life continues this week I bring you Koinup's Cream of the Crop - Burning Life. This is an excellent group to join and add your memories from this year's event and also to browse and get a good look of all there is going on. With 218 works in this grouping posted by 41 members it's a really impressive collection.

There are only a few more days left to such a great event, so I also wanted to provide you a few links on what's going on out on the Burning Life sims so you can time your visit: http://burninglife.secondlife.com/eventsbrowse. Here's your link to the front gate: http://slurl.com/secondlife/Burning%20Life-%20Hualapai/253/3/24%C2%A0. I recommend if you are going with friends grab a tie dyed cart just inside the gate and travel in style.

Machinima by: RockerFaerie

RockerFaerie takes us on a really fantastic journey around a few of the exhibits at this year's event. It's really well shot and put together. If you don't think you have time to make it....at least watch the vid, you'll change your mind. This piece highlights works from Snowy Hoobinoo, Donpatchy Dagostino, Kazuhiro Aridian, and Poid Mahovlich.

Photo by: TaliaTokugawa

TaliaTokugawa's BL Berlin09 is a fantastic shot of one of the many stages out at the Burning Life sims. This particular stage was made by Kazuhiro Aridian...who is the fabulous creator of Europa.

Photo by: LoquaciaLoon

LoquaciaLoon's piece named Moon was shot at Burning Life-12 Mile and is just one of the many freebies available for you this year. Grapho Fullstop, of alpha-tribe, not only includes five marvelous avatars but some corresponding animations and some fabulous fun. Grab the notecard and enjoy this site.

Next week we return to our regular columns so please feel free to PM me on Koinup and tell me all about what's happening in your groups. You never know when you'll be Koinup's Cream of the Crop pick of the week!

Fiona Haworth
Guest Author - Koinup.com
Staff Blogger - Phantom’s Republic
Co-Owner - Prim Pads
Twitter - Fiona_Haworth

Koinup's Cream of the Crop - Virtual Worlds Untouched

So last week I took you on a tour to see some heavily post processed works of art. This week I bring you Koinup's Cream of the Crop pick of Virtual Worlds Untouched. This group was created to showcase virtually raw shots that were not just mundane in nature but superior snaps made by composing and lighting the shot just right in game.

The 33 members of this group use the tools in game as well as using their creative eye or classic photography rules to compose beautiful shots that just makes our jaw drop. For some great ways to spruce up your raw photos while shooting try some of these resources:

• Secondlife sky/water settings - http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/WindLight_settings
• Classic Photography Rules - http://tinyurl.com/ygavqmu or this one is a bit more funny but it emphasizes the point http://tinyurl.com/rxpmzc
  

Photo by: Musique

Musique has done a fabulous job composing and lighting this shot called Immerse Yourself in Fashion. The backdrop in game perfectly accents the model. And I really love the butterflies in the contrasting color.

Photo by: TheaMaiman

Thea Maiman has picked the popular sim of Bitterblue where it's always raining. The choice in place and the overall composition of this shot makes it a real winner. I really like how the lights look.

Photo by: Crystalship-Rehula

I love Crystalship-Rehula's entire collection of work. Here she shows off Memories of Blue. What a fabulous in game effect that makes it more ethereal looking.

Please feel free to PM me on Koinup and tell me all about what's happening in your groups. You never know when you'll be Koinup's Cream of the Crop pick of the week!

Fiona Haworth
Guest Author - Koinup.com
Staff Blogger - Phantom’s Republic
Co-Owner - Prim Pads
Twitter - Fiona_Haworth

Koinup's Cream of the Crop - Heavy Image Treatments

Today on Koinup's Cream of the Crop I bring you the group called Heavy Image Treatments. This fab group of individuals are more than photographers. They use the screen capture as a jumping off point then manipulate it with a photo editing program making the picture into a wonderful work of art.

The Admin, SysperiaPoppy, writes "What interests me is not the shot itself, but what the artist wishes to do with that moment: How they feel, what they want to communicate and what means they use to do that." This group has 59 wildly creative members who have submitted over 650 works to the collection. For those of you who haven't tried your hand at such things, like me, there are tons of tutorials on the web about manipulating photos. I know after seeing some of these I'm gonna give it a try! Here are a few sites I found that may help you try your hand at it: Layering SL Snapshops in Photoshop, 30+ Most Wanted Photo Manipulation Tutorials and 75+ Huge Compilation of Stunning Photo Manipulation Tutorials.

Photo by: Tessybaby

Tessybaby's Time and Space is a great example of layering a texture on top of a photo and really dramatically changing the piece. It is a really fabulously composed original photo or a nicely composed collage; either way this piece really pops.

Photo by: NeveryLorakeet

NeveryLorakeet's Dreaming the Sky is just fantastic! I can't tell where the photo starts nor ends. This is one of those pieces that just embodies photo manipulation techniques. I love it!

Photo by: Photoliv42

Photoliv42's Flight of Icarus is another really brilliant piece. It looks more painted than photographed. Really lovely use of layering and filtering.

Please feel free to PM me on Koinup and tell me all about what's happening in your groups. You never know when you'll be Koinup's Cream of the Crop pick of the week!

Fiona Haworth
Guest Author - Koinup.com
Staff Blogger - Phantom’s Republic
Co-Owner - Prim Pads
Twitter - Fiona_Haworth

Koinup's Cream of the Crop - Summer

As summer just closes for those of us in the Northern Hemisphere and the feeds fill up with more sweaters, I bring to you a group filled with summer memories. Koinup's Cream of the Crop - Summer brings us pictures full of bikini clad girls, surfer boys, sunshine, green grass, sandy beaches, pool parties, picnics, and backyard barbecues.

I love this repository of nearly 460 photos. It's like looking through tons of vacation photos and reminiscing about all the good times. It can be a real challenge to capture the essence of season but Summer’s 136 group have done it fabulously. For those of you missing summer already….the beauty of our virtual worlds are that it can always be in season. Don your beach clothes and add your fun photos to this great collection!

Photo by: Dimitri

Dimitri's Rosana & Lin is just one in many summertime themed works in his collection. Dimitri does a fantastic job of capturing the fun of the season. His Sims avis are seen doing everything from pool parties to picnics.

Photo by: rubyOkelly

Ruby's entry for the PureAngel contest is one that really captures the summertime feeling. Items like the sunlight on her face and water and the shadow of the palm makes this a really stellar piece.

Photo by: Kleinfeld

Kleinfeld is another artist whose works really revolve around summertime activities in Secondlife. I particularly liked this piece as you could see the sunlight effect on the subjects body.

Please feel free to PM me on Koinup and tell me all about what's happening in your groups. You never know when you'll be Koinup's Cream of the Crop pick of the week!

Fiona Haworth
Guest Author - Koinup.com
Staff Blogger - Phantom’s Republic
Co-Owner - Prim Pads
Twitter - Fiona_Haworth

Koinup's Cream of the Crop - Black and White Works

On today’s Koinup’s Cream of the Crop I choose an art form I just have had a love affair with since high school – Black and White Works. Just over a 100 years after the first color photograph was produced, we still hold a torch for monochromatic images. Black and white images are powerful, elegant, special, and romantic. They can create beauty out of otherwise mundane images. Black and White photography requires that the photographer concentrate on different elements of a photograph like contrast, shapes, negative space and lighting.

Black and White Works celebrates this beautiful art form with a multiple world group. Since we cannot produce raw black and white images from in game, the screen captures need to be converted in a photo editor for a bit of post production prior to publication. This talented group currently has 90 members and 290 fab images in its collection and serves as homage to the humble beginnings of photography and how beautiful our virtual world can be in only one color.

Photo by: brickhousefrog

Brickhousefrog's Don't Mess w a Brick highlights the subject in a way a color photograph never could have done. The contrast of this piece displays it's real power.

Photo by: novadyszel

Novadyszel's Railroad Track shows how making a photograph black and white can make it from something fairly mundane into a thing of beauty.

Photo by: MaggyWorld

MaggyWorld's Black & White Shadow plays with shapes and negative/positive space in a peice. Really nicely done!

Please feel free to PM fiona_haworth on Koinup and tell me all about what's happening in your groups. I'd love to feature your group on Koinup's Cream of the Crop pick of the week!

Fiona Haworth
Guest Author - Koinup.com
Staff Blogger - Phantom’s Republic
Co-Owner - Prim Pads
Twitter - Fiona_Haworth

Koinup Cream of the Crop - Dystopian Society

While I very much view my virtual life as some attempt to find my own private idaho (utopia or paradise in other words)....this week's Koinup Cream of the Crop - Dystopian Society highlights the very opposite. Dystopia portrays themes like cyber-tech, poverty, oppression, violence, societal chaos, dehumanization, totalitarian government, rampant disease, and post-apocalypse.

Dystopia allows us to explore fears of future states or different directions humanity can take if not careful in its decisions. These themes are prevalent in tons of science fiction books and movies. The Dystopian Society group contains tons of pieces along the same lines. The group guides the participants to think of movies/books/ideas like 1984, Blade Runner, Gulliver's Travels, Brave New World, Logan's Run, Pink Floyd's The Wall, cyperpunk, steampunk, etc .

Currently, the Dystopian Society group only has about 39 members and 125 works, but I think SL, SIMS and WoW all have some great places where this theme could easily be explored and more content contributed to this small fantastic collection.

Photo By: LookatmyBack

LookatmyBack's Running towards the end! is a fabulous example of what this group is all about. It features a pretty common element of human oppression. I love Look's comment "No avatars have been harmed to take this snapshot! They're just scripted dolls and statues! Any blood stain is a fake! It's virtual tomato sauce! ^_^" LOL!

Photo by: Doubledown Tandino

Doubledown Tandino's peice was taken at Poetik and features Bryn Oh's robot. It rather reminded me of the film A.I. Artifical Intelligence and the world of rouge mechas.

Photo by: Arowhena

Arowhena's Arthas is a fab piece from World of Warcraft and leaves one thinking of an alternate reality.

Please feel free to PM me on Koinup and tell me all about what's happening in your groups. You never know when you'll be Koinup's Cream of the Crop pick of the week!

Fiona Haworth
Guest Author - Koinup.com
Staff Blogger - Phantom’s Republic
Co-Owner - Prim Pads
Twitter - Fiona_Haworth

Koinup’s Cream of the Crop - Not Possible IRL

Today on Koinup’s Cream of the Crop I’d like to feature a group that not only do I belong to on Koinup but one I am also a member of in SL. Not Possible IRL first gained my attention as a blog about virtual art, architecture, and products that one could never see in real life. Bettina Tizzy’s blog, in game group, and Koinup group all follow through on that very theme. The one thing I’ve always enjoyed about being a part of this group of individuals is the promotion of art for art’s sake.

Koinup's NPIRL group has 72 members and 372 amazing pieces of art. It's a great repository to peruse when you have some time. Additionally, I suggest reading Bettina's blog. It's at great way to spend a few hours or more and you'll find out about a ton of things to do in game. The Not Possible IRL group is open enrollment and has a 500L join fee. Bettina sends out a weekly notice with tons going on.

Photo by: LeaSupermarine

I love the mixed reality used in LeaSupermarine's Just Hold Me (Precious Treasure). Additionally the subject matter is just wonderfully fanciful.

Photo by: Bettinatizzy

Bettinatizzy's Kazuhiro's Seadryke and Dravyn was a pic for one of Bettina's blogs. The seadryke is SO SO SO fab. Check out Bettina's write up here.

Photo by: ariel_brearly

I've become a real fan of Ariel's from flipping through all these pics for this gig. Think Tank is just one of the many in Ariel's collection. I love the surrealism of all her art.

Please feel free to PM me on Koinup and tell me all about what's happening in your groups. You never know when you'll be Koinup's Cream of the Crop pick of the week!

Fiona Haworth
Guest Author - Koinup.com
Staff Blogger - Phantom’s Republic
Co-Owner - Prim Pads
Twitter - Fiona_Haworth

Koinup's Cream of the Crop - Historical Works

Humans by and large learn and retain greatly via visuals. History is one of those things without media becomes a mundane fact memorizing exercise. Creative individuals can be inspired by a study of history to use recorded facts along with a few graphic inputs to develop a picture of how things may have been.

Koinup's Historical Works Group is for pieces set in historical, ancient and times past. From Victorian to Stoneage, real or fantasy. These pieces provide a fantastic window into the perceived past. This small group of 22 members has over 200 posts and is looking for another moderator to ensure pieces stay within the theme. Additionally, they have started a discussion topic. Not bad for a group that just got started a few months ago. Looks like they are off to a running start on fostering a lovely community full of historical themes.

Photo by: Link

Link's Dreaming, Just Try Dreaming... is a tribute to WWII. Link composed a really lovely piece complete with appropriate attire and surroundings. Definitely has a nostalgic feeling to it.

Photo by: MedeAthena

MedeAthena's The Mirror expresses days gone by not only a very victorian themed subject matter but also with the monochromatic tones of the piece.

Photo by: Jasper

Jasper's Malick Gay I shows some wonderful past era expression and beautiful depth of field. This work also contains a snippet of a story that Jasper illustrates both visually and textually.

Please feel free to PM me on Koinup and tell me all about what's happening in your groups. You never know when you'll be Koinup's Cream of the Crop pick of the week!

Fiona Haworth
Guest Author - Koinup.com
Staff Blogger - Phantom’s Republic
Co-Owner - Prim Pads
Twitter - Fiona_Haworth

Koinup's Cream of the Crop - Fantasy Art

Koinup’s Cream of the Crop for this week is the Fantasy Art group. Loosely defined, fantasy art depicts creatures and themes that are magical or supernatural in overall subject matter. Over the years, I’ve spent numerous hours looking at fantasy art on sites like Epilogue, Deviant Art and Elfwood. In my humble opinion, nothing more has changed the face of this genre than than works being produced with elements directly from 3D games like Sims, WoW, and Secondlife.

The Fantasy Art group on Koinup is a wildly creative bunch that holds their own in terms of inventiveness in this school of work. Most of them are true works of art done with some photoshop magic and other art tools to accomplish the end result. The 54 members of this group have submitted 501 aweinspiring pieces well worth browsing through.

Photo by: Magggg

Magggg is one of the finest contributors to Koinup in regards to fantasy art. On numerous occasions I see Magggg’s work upon logging into Koinup. In Magggg's And blue will come for you... she mixes both the SIMS and SL to achieve the desired outcome.

Photo by: Trixibelle

Trixibelle's Give Praise to the Goddess of Stormy Seas is the epitome of the fantasy art genre. A supernatural deity complete with the power to rule the skies and seas in order to upset the mere mortals. Trixibelle used elements from secondlife and renderosity to complete this fantastic piece.

Photo by: _MiraGe_

_MiraGe_'s Fairytale displays a very common theme among within the fantasy art genre; beauty and the beast. Tastefully done with an angelic beauty and a potentially menacing dragon as the beast. Her piece contains elements from the Sims and deviant art.

If your group is having a contest or an event, please PM me on Koinup and let me know. I'd love to cover all the fun to be had in joining such expressive groups of people from all over.

Fiona Haworth
Guest Author - Koinup.com
Staff Blogger - Phantom’s Republic
Co-Owner - Prim Pads
Twitter - Fiona_Haworth

Koinup's Cream of the Crop - Portraits

Since the inception of photography and even much further back via paintings and sculptures, people have commissioned portraits. The purpose was to capture an essence of the subject; a mood, an expression, a likeness. Immortalization via art. Portraits became important remembrances of the affections for the subject of the work.

Koinup's Portraits is a fabulous repository of these affections for our avatars. Spanning multiple worlds from IMVU to SIMS to SL, the works contained within run the gamut from really raw to extremely digitally enhanced. However it maintains the overall theme of portrait expressionism throughout. This group is super active with well over 2700 works and 250 members. It serves as a reminder as to how popular portrait photography still is today.

Photo by: Kady

Kady's Per dire cos'hai fatto di me, non ho la voce translated means "What to say that me, I do not know the voice" Well in this case the picture speaks for her and no amount of words could say it better.

Photo by: Mira

Mira's piece simply called Mira Piano1 shows us that portrait photography can be much more than shots of the subjects face. This work shows us some real insight into the subject it captures that expression I was talking about above.

Photo by: B_Rodrigues

Here is another fabulous example of non-traditional portraiture. B_Rodrigues' Breno Rodrigues really captivates the viewer and draws them in to explore all this subject has to offer. Although I get a bit lost in his blue eyes. ;-)

There are so many more in this huge group it's well worth a look. Take a few snaps of your own and add them. Show everyone your affection for your avatar. I've added mine! :D

If your group is having a contest or an event, please PM me on Koinup and let me know. I'd love to cover all the fun to be had in joining such expressive groups of people from all over. -Fi

Fiona Haworth
Guest Author - Koinup.com
Staff Blogger - Phantom’s Republic
Co-Owner - Prim Pads
Twitter - Fiona_Haworth

The most gorgeous virtual girls

Sometime we hangout in virtual worlds to seek for the ideal beauty and if we don't find the way, we use them to "create" such a beauty. Particolarly the female beauty doesn't cease to amaze us both in real and virtual worlds.



Image by Nith85, created with the Sims 2

Machinima music videos and surreal clips on Hiperia 3d news

This week, the Koinup blog partner Hiperia 3d News feature a couple of amazing machinimas. The first is a really well done sims music video called "Flo Rida - Jump Ft. Nelly Furtado" (made by samanthabiel) and the other is "The Dream With In" a cool and surreal machinima created by Freeta Kayo

Read the story and watch the videos

The Sims as a Machinima tool

Watch this video! It showcase the potential of the Sims 2 Engine as a powerful Machinima tool!

From The Sims to Second Life and vice versa. These are Virtual identities

Lets go on with the tour on the virtual identities. Regarding Koinup members that cross art within various virtual worlds, you can't miss the amazing work of Magggg. She is a well known artist, very acknowledged in the Sims 2 artistic scene, and recently she started to work also with Second Life artistic tools.

Crossing media and worlds is sort of constant in many koinup members

Here, you can admire a recent artwork called She goes her own way created with the Sims 2



in the image above instead a wonderful avatar portrait created within Second Life, called Hymne a la Beautè

The most "Femme Fatale" created with The Sims

Have a look at this incredible image, "Now you've got to kiss me"
created by Magggg




People sometimes raise the bar of creativity and explore new areas, using means you have never think about.....

Koinup Interviews: when Sims Art meet photography

The Sims 2 Art scene is incredibly rich and vibrant. Ticticc13 is a well known, skilled and excelent Sims Artist

She has a long experience in the Sims Creativity scene. She run a website devoted to her creations and helped us as judge in the Koinup Sims 2 Spring Contest

You can browse here her fantastic stream of photos

Here's the Interview

Q: When you're creating new artworks, where do you draw ideas and inspiration from?
A: I draw mine mostly from movies, TV commercials, Music Videos, Books and things I see around me... Everyday life happenings... Even the most boring to the most exciting... Whether I'm drinking coffee here, or waiting for the day out of work, I observe almost everything... From kids I see in the morning, until late nights when I'm still up. Even simple gestures of my officemates can inspire me. ;)



Q: What advice would you give to newcomers and beginners with The Sims Art and photography?

A: I think every Simmer knows where to go... There's two kind of Sims 2 Art for me... One involves drawing and photomanipulation and the other one, pure in-game photography. Even though I favor the latter, my advice is not to limit yourselves in just one style. Be creative and don't be afraid to experiment. Trust your work. Know the Sims 2 game, and learn from the experts the trick of the trade. Not only with virtual world artists but also pro-photographers and digital painters. Aim to be the best. Always.

Q: What are you favourite tools for editing? Is there some cool tricks about photo editing and/or your artistic style you'd love share with friends ?

A: My all time favorite editing software has always been Photoimpact. I also use two others, Photoshop - when I need to do super heavy edits or Photomatix Pro when I want to generate Sims 2 HDR's (High Dynamic Range images). For drawing and minor enhancements, I use a Wacom Graphire tablet. As for tricks, I made an editing tutorial recently for everyone which can be downloaded freely from The Sims Resource or in my Flickr. Of course, I'll be very, very happy to see images edited with my technique and hope you find it useful as much as I do.

Style, pretty variable depending on mood, but I absolutely love modern-contempo theme in realistic settings. Don't limit yourselves to just one style. ;)


Q: Tell me your absolute 3 fav works on Koinup and why you love them

A: I'd say Pale Rain by Sephiramy. I love the full composition of it. The colors, the drawing, the Sim models she used and the theme. SHe never fails to amaze me. (pale rain is also one of the winner of the Sims 2 Spring Contest)

Spring Itog by KateK. I love the composition as well and the carefree way she edited it.

Wishing in Spring by Celestialshores. Because of its simplicity and everything was effectively done in-game.

Q: Two Koinup members you should recommended for the next Koinup Interview and why?

A: Celestialshores - I have always adored her simplistic but very effective in-game photography.

Sephiramy - is the finest Sims 2 frankensteining artist for me.

Q: What are your upcoming artistic projects?

A: I'm currently working on a Sims 2 Machinima. Besides editing Sims 2 in-game screenshots, it's also one of my favorite things to do with the Sims 2.

Q: Along with The Sims, are you exploring and testing other worlds or games as tools for creativity

A: Hmmm, I did with the other EA/Maxis game 'Spore.' I would like to try my hand on Second Life sometime.

Go ahead and browse some other fantastic TicTicc13 works