NYT: People and Their Avatars

The NYT published a beautiful series of portraits by Robbie Cooper in this weekend's magazine about people and their avatars, in virtual environments such as Second Life and Everquest. Follow the link for more pictures

The interesting is to witness how the created avatar is very closely tied to the personality of its creator in one of two ways:

• The avatar can be based on the user’s true physical appearance by keeping the same external characteristics such as color of eyes and skin tone, style of haircut and more...
• The avatar can present a desired but imaginary appearance: thinner, younger, more muscular, curvier, the opposite sex and more...