The Virtual Fashion Project
Sponsored by the Research Foundation
04.05.07

The Second Life Fashion project is a series of projects designed to introduce fashion students to the concept of virtual reality as it relates to fashion. It will provide a transition for fashion students from 2D to 3D design and development. Virtual reality as a pre-production tool is an emerging reality in the fashion world. This type of total software system integrates garment design, surface design, fit, construction and 3D virtual presentation – before a real prototype is made.

This 3D virtual reality project in Second Life and Virtual Fashion applications will prepare students for the impending changeover into the 3D integrated pre-production integrated package that is currently emerging in the industry. It will also pave the way for exploration into the possibilities of development of long distance student collaborations.

In this initial project fashion students research virtual fashion designers that have developed fashion design businesses in SL. Fashion students also develop and see their own surface and garment designs in 3 dimensional reality in SL, develop their presentation skills in 3D, learn how to prepare and sell virtual goods in SL, and develop a final fashion presentation and/or exhibition in SL.

The fashion students began the SL project by learning the basics of creating an avatar [virtual representation of the user], navigating on the ground and in the air, organizing files and changing appearance in Second Life. When they felt more comfortable about the basics they began to make different outfits using the Appearance function. Once they created an outfit they liked they learned how to pose and photograph their fashionable avatar in SL and prepare the posed image for inclusion on a Web page that was created to introduce all the Fashion CAD project student avatars.

Afterwards their first customized project was placing their design on to a t-shirt that was carefully located on the SL avatar UV map. Students posed and photographed their avatars with the new t-shirts and uploaded the edited images back to SL to create mannequins of their customized shirt that contain the actual virtual t-shirt pictured for other guests to take.

Fashion students also will be incorporating Jozef Bajus [DES] fiber design student work into their SL Fashion project. Fiber design student works were prepared and uploaded to SL to be used as surface textures for coordinated apparel outfits fashion students are developing for the SL fashion project. The fiber student textures will be available for other visitors to the Buffalo State Island to use in SL.

Fashion students will create sequentially more challenging fashion outfits using their own designs that were created earlier in the class wile learning other applications. They will also use explore the use of additional 3D virtual design applications to develop additional more complex garment designs.

Students will contribute to the development of animated video clips and/or Web pages of garment collection. Students will place their customized fashion mannequin in a Fashion CAD exhibit on the Buffalo State Island for anyone to copy the outfits to use for their avatar. They also plan to finalize their project with a fashion show in SL

During the course of this project Fashion CAD students are contributing to development of a Web presentation that will document the process we experienced with this SL project so others can use is as a prototype for their SL exploration.