Parametric Deformer update

As I mentioned in my article “Unencumbered by the trappings of real life” I consider Qarl’s Parametric Deformer project to be immensely important to Second Life.

I notice an update in the JIRA that is tracking this that Oz Linden has accepted Qarl’s latest v0.3 submission and committed it to the Official Viewer.

There seems to be a bit of friction between Oz and Qarl, but I think it’s encouraging news that, far from seeking to quash the Parametric Deformer, Linden Lab appear to be working with Qarl to bring us this important update.

 

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Links

https://jira.secondlife.com/browse/STORM-1716


http://modemworld.wordpress.com/2012/04/25/mesh-deformer-0-3-code-available

You do not see what I see

Facelight3000 - everything else is dim lights

Graphics in Second Life Viewers just keep getting better and better. The trouble is, as things improve and we get new technologies, it’s inevitable that older technology is going to work less well or even break.

Several older technologies are currently showing issues – such as system skirts casting an incorrect shadow, likewise invisiprims not working properly any more on the highest graphics settings.

The one that affects me the most, though, are people wearing insanely bright facelights.

Unencumbered by the trappings of real life

Lately I’ve been reading a lot of opinion on Rigged Mesh, and the efforts of Karl Stiefvater (Qarl Fizz, formerly Qarl Linden) to address the fundamental deficiencies of it with the Parametric Deformer project.

That’s been covered elsewhere in great detail and I don’t think I can add much to the debate directly on that although will provide some links at the end.

However, it has got me thinking about what Second Life means to me, what I view as important and how I interact with other people.

Some of the people I meet want to know all about my real life, about how I look or where I live, or how old I am, or any number of other things. And I tell them that, quite apart from privacy, I simply don’t see things like that as having any relevance to my Second Life. And, further, I don’t particularly want them to volunteer anything about themselves either. I’m simply not interested in their “skinvelope” (or, as I have heard others refer to it, their “meatsack” or “meat rider”, which I confess aren’t phrases I’m particularly enamoured with) and want to get to know the real person, unencumbered by the trappings of real life. Some of these people have got quite defensive about my attitude and asked how I can know the real person when I say I don’t want to know the real life person. Some have even called me crazy. Well, allow me to explain what I mean.

AO, AO, it's off to walk we go...

Reblogged from Living in the Modem World:

AOs - Animation Overriders - have been part and parcel of Second Life since not long after the dawn of time (or at least not long after someone figured out how to lose the duckwalk by one means or another).

Today, AOs are a fact of life in SL and come in many forms: some just handle the "basics" - walks, sits, stands; others combine functions, providing a one-stop solution for walks, sits, stands, dances, poofers and other little toys.

Read more… 1,066 more words

Really interesting article. This is the kind of thing that I'd like to write, but I don't have the 'inside info' to do so.

The Art of Prim Reduction (and changing pictures with the click of your mouse)

Introduction

I’ve been trying to reduce my prim count at my home in SL, and one of the things I figured I could improve on is the pictures hanging on my wall. I’ve got 4 walls of pictures, and each has 3-5 pictures on it, each one on its own prim. So I could see some good savings there.

But how to reduce that number?

Well, a picture is just a texture on a prim. And a wall is also just a texture on a prim. So why not combine the two? Bake the pictures onto the texture of the wall itself.

However, unless you really are pinching every single prim, I think it is better to spend an extra prim per wall and create a transparent veneer onto which you bake your pictures. Think of it as a single picture frame prim that happens to contain multiple pictures. I will refer to this as a “veneer prim” or “veneer” for the rest of the article as it covers the wall just like a wood veneer. However, as I will shortly explain, it is actually preferable for it to be smaller than the wall itself but that doesn’t alter the fact that it is a veneer of sorts.

I am not a bowling pin

Another in my series of hints and tips for Second Life. This one is very short and simple.

Have you ever been in a crowded sim, say at a club or a music venue, and somebody TPs in and then, without waiting for anything to rezz, just bulldozes through everyone before (if you’re lucky) they say in open chat “sorry if I barged anyone”?

This is downright rude, in my opinion, and can easily be avoided.