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MESH DEFORMER PROJECT NEEDS YOUR VOICE


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Coby Foden wrote:

 


I'm wondering:

• You say that mesh [avatars] would be better than avatar 2.0 would be.

• To be better mesh avatars would then need more polygons than default avatar 2.0. (How else they could be better?)

• Then, concerning lag, how could the "better" mesh avatars be less laggy that default avatar 2.0 would be?

 

Then there is the problem with mesh avatars, it would most likely turn out to be so that each mesh avatar would need their own specific skins and clothings, not being compatible with each other - more headaches for clothing designers and consumers alike.  You pointed out that the standard avatar is big part of the success of SL - indeed it is so.  With mesh avatars there is no standard.  With default avatar 2.0 there would be the standard again.

I would like see that Linden Lab would finally take the step and implement better default avatar.  It could even be possible to make it so that present default avatar and the new default avatar would co-exist.  Surely it would add complexity for the viewer and server codes, but I think it would not be impossible to make it so.

Over longish period of time the present default avatar would die naturally out of old age as less and less people would be using it, and less and less designers would create accessories for the old avatar.

Even though the present avatar is highly customizable, everybody knows how very bad its mesh is.  As an animator you surely know how easily the mesh breaks even in some slight animations in some places.  It surely would be the time to upgrade the avatar mesh.  Or should we perhaps be satisfied with it forever - as long as SL exist?  My thinking is that mesh avatars are not the solution for the underlying problem.

Well, here's the thing about LL making an Avatar 2.0, most the things they'd need to do are the same as improving a mesh avatar, except the ability for other mesh avatar creators to use those features. If LL worked on the mesh avatar, we could have custom bones added ons. We could have custom morphs. We coud have multiple clothing layers. We coud have everything the SL avatar has and much much more, on any custom made avatar. Then.....all LL has to do is pick a mesh avatar from the marketplace to be the new default, or commission a creator to make 1. The male and female don't even need to be of the same original mesh.

The next step in avatar creation is not in how we did it 10 years ago. Today, we can do it better, and give every creator access to those features. Imagine, LL finishes all the features for mesh avatars, and then they release Avatar 2.0. We could get the sources files from LL, and create our own customly morphed head, maybe an elephant head, and you can sell the morph to any1. This is how Genesis works in Dazstudio. I can morphs a human to a lizard, or a dog, or an alien with 3 fingers. There are literally hundreds of thousands of morphs for the genesis character, and they are easy as pie to make using a zbrush plugin.

Yeah, I'm an animator, and that experience tells me that I've never seen a perfectly created, perfectly rigged, nor perfectly weighted avatar ever in my whole time animating. I have never seen a figure that didn't have a few different issues. I've easily animated hundreds of different avatars on, at least, 15 different platforms or programs. The Genesis figure, in Dazstudio, has won all kinds of awards, and you should see what I have to put up with on that avatar. lol

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Medhue Simoni wrote:


Coby Foden wrote:

 

I'm wondering:

• You say that mesh [avatars] would be better than avatar 2.0 would be.

• To be better mesh avatars would then need more polygons than default avatar 2.0. (How else they could be better?)

• Then, concerning lag, how could the "better" mesh avatars be less laggy that default avatar 2.0 would be?

 

Then there is the problem with mesh avatars, it would most likely turn out to be so that each mesh avatar would need their own specific skins and clothings, not being compatible with each other - more headaches for clothing designers and consumers alike.  You pointed out that the standard avatar is big part of the success of SL - indeed it is so.  With mesh avatars there is no standard.  With default avatar 2.0 there would be the standard again.

I would like see that Linden Lab would finally take the step and implement better default avatar.  It could even be possible to make it so that present default avatar and the new default avatar would co-exist.  Surely it would add complexity for the viewer and server codes, but I think it would not be impossible to make it so.

Over longish period of time the present default avatar would die naturally out of old age as less and less people would be using it, and less and less designers would create accessories for the old avatar.

Even though the present avatar is highly customizable, everybody knows how very bad its mesh is.  As an animator you surely know how easily the mesh breaks even in some slight animations in some places.  It surely would be the time to upgrade the avatar mesh.  Or should we perhaps be satisfied with it forever - as long as SL exist?  My thinking is that mesh avatars are not the solution for the underlying problem.

Well, here's the thing about LL making an Avatar 2.0, most the things they'd need to do are the same as improving a mesh avatar, except the ability for other mesh avatar creators to use those features. If LL worked on the mesh avatar, we could have custom bones added ons. We could have custom morphs. We coud have multiple clothing layers. We coud have everything the SL avatar has and much much more, on any custom made avatar. Then.....all LL has to do is pick a mesh avatar from the marketplace to be the new default, or commission a creator to make 1. The male and female don't even need to be of the same original mesh.

The next step in avatar creation is not in how we did it 10 years ago. Today, we can do it better, and give every creator access to those features. Imagine, LL finishes all the features for mesh avatars, and then they release Avatar 2.0. We could get the sources files from LL, and create our own customly morphed head, maybe an elephant head, and you can sell the morph to any1. This is how Genesis works in Dazstudio. I can morphs a human to a lizard, or a dog, or an alien with 3 fingers. There are literally hundreds of thousands of morphs for the genesis character, and they are easy as pie to make using a zbrush plugin.

Yeah, I'm an animator, and that experience tells me that I've never seen a perfectly created, perfectly rigged, nor perfectly weighted avatar ever in my whole time animating. I have never seen a figure that didn't have a few different issues. I've easily animated hundreds of different avatars on, at least, 15 different platforms or programs. The Genesis figure, in Dazstudio, has won all kinds of awards, and you should see what I have to put up with on that avatar. lol

Okay, kids - let's get one thing straight:

THE DEFAULT AVATAR IS ALREADY A MESH AVATAR, and has always been. It's just not very GOOD. So Avatar 2.0 would also be a mesh avatar. You're arguing whether you have six eggs or half a dozen.

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Theresa Tennyson wrote:

 

Okay, kids - let's get one thing straight:

THE DEFAULT AVATAR IS ALREADY A MESH AVATAR, and has always been.

Of course this is totally clear and true.  Every object and the SL avatar is mesh.

When people talk generally about "mesh" or "mesh avatars" they mean mesh created outside SL by users and imported to SL by users.

No claim is made that the default SL avatar or prims would be something else than mesh. :matte-motes-big-grin:

 

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Since this topic is the Mesh Deformer, I'll bring the conversation back around.

Yesterday, I got Avastar for Blender. I've played with it before, over a year ago, but I had way too many animation things to do to really get into it. I made some clothing items real quick. Actually, I made them in 3ds Max, as my Blender skills aren't that good yet, and then brought those into Blender.

Today, I got the latest Deformer viewer and uploaded some clothing. OMG, I loved it. I wanted to just go make all my own clothing, upload them all and just use that viewer from now on. I'm a guy. I don't really care that much about what I wear. I have the same about of clothing in RL, that I have in SL, which is not much. So, I can only imagine how this would be for a woman. I could make any mesh clothing fit however I wanted. If the jacket is made to be tight fitting, it doesn't matter. I can make it loose fitting. The deformer turned what is now a horrid experience that could never be a pleasant thing, to something you would actually enjoy, because you can do things that are unthinkable in RL, and it just fits when you put it on.

I said it on the Jira, but I'll say it here also. WTF is wrong with you LL!!

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Hi Medhue,

I hope you are right about the Qarl thing.

I just watched an interview with Rod Humble and I really think it was the first possible reason for the delay I put fourth.  It seems Rod really wants to improve the overall performance of SL and all hands are working towards that goal.

Here's the link to the video: 

Improvements could be made to the existing default avatar without breaking content or adding vertices.

I agree that any new default avatar that was to be significantly better for deforming mesh would probably have way more vertices and cause more lag something that should be avoided.

What I like to see instead of an official default 2.0 avatar from LL is allow custom mesh avatar's uploaded by residents to have access to all the layers that the default avatar someone is currently wearing.

If that customs avatar mesh drove the clothing deformation then any clothing from any designer would fit it automatically.

I had mentioned to Qarl, way back in a pod cast I did with him on Metareality, an idea I had called Deformer Underwear.  My idea was to let residents create invisible mesh layer or underwear which the default avatars mesh would deform and then use the now deformed invisible underwear mesh to deform any mesh clothing someone was wearing.  By having more vertices evenly spread out in the deformer underwear and only in the areas that the designer wanted, such as just under the clothes, it would more evenly deform the clothes themselves.

Qarl was actually intrigued with the idea but said it was too late to get it out in the first version of the deformer but that it could be an option in version 2.0 of the deformer.

In this case instead of making the underwear mesh invisible just make it the custom avatar mesh.  The custom mesh probably having more vertices more evenly spread out would deform the clothes better.  Now I do believe there should be a limit on the number of vertices a custom mesh avatar could have to keep lag reasonable.

Custom mesh avatars could use the same UV layout or pattern as the default avatars have now.  That way all existing content would still work on the new custom mesh avatars.  Since the default avatars mesh would be deforming the mesh avatar directly all the editing appearance sliders would also automatically work.

I would eventually love to see custom skeletons and morphs for completely new human and non-human avatars.

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  • 1 month later...
  • 2 months later...


Coby Foden wrote:


00stevey wrote:

DEFORM US ALREADY

But please don't do it like what has happened in some Inworldz tests. :smileysurprised:

We would all be
scre...
  erm... mixed up.

Thank you. :matte-motes-big-grin:

 

Please inform us Coby? I'm about to release a pair of mesh deforming jeans and tanktop in InWorldz. To me, things seem to be working beautifully. Is there anything I should know?

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Medhue Simoni wrote:

Please inform us Coby? I'm about to release a pair of mesh deforming jeans and tanktop in InWorldz. To me, things seem to be working beautifully. Is there anything I should know?

The other day Nalates mentioned in her blog some problems with the deformer that are being reported by users in InWorldz.   See in particular the section headed "The Deformer Works".

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Medhue Simoni wrote:

 

Please inform us Coby? I'm about to release a pair of mesh deforming jeans and tanktop in InWorldz. To me, things seem to be working beautifully. Is there anything I should know?

Well, I read about what you saw there. The thing that when there were two avatars the dress worn on one avatar tried to deform the jeans on other avatar.

What if that happens in crowded place? Wouldn't it be a total mess? It would be interesting to see what actually happens when a crowd of people are wearing deformable mesh clothes. Have such tests been made?

I surely would love to see the deformer implemented in SL provided that the thing I mentioned here would not ruin things.

 

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First....... WTF!

I stopped reading Nalates' blog because she is constantly defending LL. Now, I've defended LL on numerous occasions, but never so blindly as Nal. I read her blog this time, as I was hoping to get info. NO info at all. Her 1 reference to deformer problems comes directly from MEEEEE.

Don't ask me why this is a secret, as it's right there in the jira for every1 to see. I don't really know anymore about the deformer than any1 else, other than I have actually spent the time to sit down and make clothing for it. When Qarl wrote his comment in the jira, I immediately went to the jira and posted a comment.

In that comment, I talked about how I was wandering InWorldz looking for some1 else selling mesh deformer clothing. When I found 1 store that had it, the mall owner approached me, and she was wearing that mesh deforming dress. To me, she looked completely fine, as did I. To her, my mesh jeans were switching between my avatar shape and hers.

This, of course, perplexed me and I went back to my work area and decided to run my other pc and create an alt with it to log in with. So, I created this new account, logged in, and gave my new alt the jeans to wear. On each computer, the main avatar's jeans were fine, but the 2nd avatar's jeans, on each computer, was switching between deforms. I then head off to sleep.

The next day, after doing numerous other things, I log into InWorldz again on 2 different computers. The switching between deforms is now gone. Both of the jeans on both avatars worked fine. That is the whole story, and it doesn't mean the deformer has any problems at all. What it could mean, is that mesh deforms might need some kind of rebake. Maybe there is a problem, but we can't know that for sure with only what I've experienced.

As I said earlier, LL has plans. They just aren't sharing them with us. We can speculate all we want about why LL won't do this or that, but until we know what they aren't wanting to share, we are just speculating. The mesh deformer is now, finally, going thru it's testing stage. I'm sure it will be adjusted. It's part of the process. At this point, it really doesn't matter what LL does, as far as the deformer goes. We'll see what happens in InWorldz.

My personal opinion is that the deformer works freaking awesome. It does exactly what it is supposed to do. As a creator, feel like I have a decent amount of control over the process. As a user of virtual worlds, the clothing works as I would expect it to work, and was simply wearing 2 items, the mesh and alpha. With SL pants layers and shirt layers, the user can even change how their mesh deformed clothing fits.

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Oh, and I want to say a few things about the default SL avatar. Does it have issues? Wow, big surprise! As I have said before, I have never found an avatar that did not have major issues. The problems of the SL avatar are minor, at best. Unlike other worlds, which claim universal compatibility across all the major 3d programs, SL's default is actually compatible in almost every software. Sure, much of that is also due to 3rd party developers. So, if we give up on the SL default, then you give up on all those options.

On the other hand, if LL simply opens up all the features of the Default and allow us to use those features on our own mesh avatars, then we have the best of both worlds. The biggest features that mesh avatar creators are lacking, are adding bones, and uploading custome shape morphs. Imagine uploading your own slider that changes your mesh avatar's shape, or making expressions for them. Literally, you add in these 2 features, and the mesh avatars are equal to and better than the SL default could ever be.

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