Avatar sizes

[Coby Foden]

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Phil Deakins wrote:

 

It's the use of the word 'meter' that's caused it all. If LL had chosen a different word, or made one up, for the unit of length, then there would be no way to relate SL measurements to RL measurements, and avatar heights would simply be seen as being normal. It's because people consider an SL meter to be the same length as an RL meter that some people think of avatars as being generally taller than RL people, and they don;t like it. But if they assume that the SL meter is not the same as the RL meter, then the problem goes away.

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Maybe you didn't see post in the other thread where I showed that SL meter and design software meter and RL meter all indeed are equal in length.  Unfotunately my post among many others got deleted there.

The word for 'meter' for SL length unit is not the problem.  SL region is measured in SL meters.  Region sides are 256 SL meters long.  You can fit exactly 256 prim cubes [1 x 1 x 1 SL meters] side by side to region edge.  No more, no less.  This shows that SL build editor uses the same SL meter by which region sizes are measured.

Then I went on to show that if you design a mesh cube [1 x 1 x 1 design software meters] in 3D software, import it to SL, you will find that it is exactly the same size as the prim cube [1 x 1 x 1 SL meters] created in SL.  So the design software meter and SL meter are equal length.

The I showed that if you print that mesh cube designed in 3D software with a 3D printer and then measure the cube with metric tape measure you'll find that it is exactly 1 x 1 x 1 RL meters in size.

Therefore the only rational conclusion is that:

1 SLm = 1 DSm = 1 RLm

In all these environments the length for the unit 'meter' are exactly the same.

 

(SLm = SL meter)

(DSm = design software meter)

(RLm = RL meter)

It would have been very silly for Linden Lab to choose some arbitrary length unit.  They made a very good decision in selecting a unit (exactly the same unit) what is already widely used in RL.

 

 

(Maybe I should add the words AVATAR SIZES here so that this post will not be considered off topic and thus be a candidate for deletion...) :matte-motes-big-grin:

 

 

[Trinity Yazimoto]

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Phil Deakins wrote:

 

I can't be in this thread much longer but all I really wanted to say is that there are two excellent ways of doing away with the RL/SL size argument altogether, and I posted those in the OP. I like the second one best - the one where SL naturally evolved its scales according to the world that it is, and its scales should not be equated with any other world, such as RL. This is the SL world. It is not the RL world and it doesn't make any attempt to be the RL world.

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i agree with your point of view...

[Coby Foden]

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Phil Deakins wrote:

 

Trying to make SL sizes the same as RL sizes is fighting a losing battle, because SL is a different world which isn't suitable for RL sizes and trying to make it work is too awkward to even bother with.

Those are two ways of removing the RL person vs SL avatar height thing.

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If the length measurement in SL was for example was called [unit] instead of [meter].  How would that made things any better?

We would be questioning things like "what is the average standard height in [units] for female avatar and for male avatar?".  I'm sure there would not be any general agreement about the avatar height.  Some would say "it's the default avatar when you make a new shape".  Some would say "no, no, it's the average height of all those avatars on the grid; the average of just how the heights have evolved over the time".

If there was no commonly accepted idea of the proper size how one could build anything in right scale?  By eyeballing things, and guessing "hmm... this size might be ok, perhaps"?  Then as we now have mesh import, it would make things more complicated with if there was some random length unit in SL.  We would need to know exactly what would be the right conversion factor netween SL units and design software units.  As meter is already widely used length unit all over it surely was the right decision to use it also in SL.

You're right in saying that SL is not RL.  But units are units and it is very good that there is a definite exact correlation between units in different environments.  There is absolutely no reason to invent new arbitrary units even for virtual world.

[Perrie Juran]

Where the problem really lays is that we need a base line to build from.

The original default Avatar was very tall as measured in meters and everyone started building around it.

If the original base line had been shorter, original building would have adjusted accordingly.

And there might have been better use of resources.

People are trying to change that base line now. 

It is not a perfect system because of visual concerns and perspective.

We just want to improve it.

I like many think it can be done.  But it is a long and tedious process.

[Phil Deakins]

I did see your post, Coby, and I replied to it, but it, and yours, went the way of all the other good posts in that thread.

In a nutshell, my reply was that I made the RLm != SLm statement following a suggestion of mine to treat them as different lengths - same as I did in the OP of this thread. That way, the whole RL scale argument doesn't even come up.

[Imnotgoing Sideways]

You left out fixing the camera.  My avatar fits in the house, my camera fits in the house, and everything is to scale according to my RL living conditions.  ()

https://my.secondlife.com/imnotgoing.sideways/snapshots/4f03f16b5b0f3142d8000001

Heck.. My RL bed, including headboard shelf, is 9x6.  I'd need space to walk around it. ()

 

 

[Phil Deakins]

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Trinity Yazimoto wrote:

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Phil Deakins wrote:

 

I can't be in this thread much longer but all I really wanted to say is that there are two excellent ways of doing away with the RL/SL size argument altogether, and I posted those in the OP. I like the second one best - the one where SL naturally evolved its scales according to the world that it is, and its scales should not be equated with any other world, such as RL. This is the SL world. It is not the RL world and it doesn't make any attempt to be the RL world.

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i agree with your point of view...

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Thank you, Trinity. Now about that audition....

[Phil Deakins]

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Coby Foden wrote:

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Phil Deakins wrote:

 

Trying to make SL sizes the same as RL sizes is fighting a losing battle, because SL is a different world which isn't suitable for RL sizes and trying to make it work is too awkward to even bother with.

Those are two ways of removing the RL person vs SL avatar height thing.

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If the length measurement in SL was for example was called [

unit

] instead of [

meter

].  How would that made things any better?

It would mean that nobody would be saying that avatars are too tall because they are 8'. I.e. RL measurements wouldn't come into it because there is no common unit to measure by.

You're right in saying that SL is not RL.  But units are units and it is very good that there is a definite exact correlation between units in different environments.  There is absolutely no reason to invent new arbitrary units even for virtual world.

But it's not very good to correlate units in 2 different worlds when nothing of the 2 worlds ever meet. The reason why it would have been better to invent a unit for SL is because it would have avoided the frequent RL size / SL size discussions and arguments. The size of things in one world is completely irrelevant to the size fo things in another world, when nothing of the one world is ever in the other world, and vice versa.

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[Trinity Yazimoto]

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Phil Deakins wrote:

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Thank you, Trinity. Now about that audition....

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heheheheh, i dont forget Phil...; its planed but need some organization.... im going to ask Czari if she accept to be judge with me hehehehhehe

[Phil Deakins]

You're right. I didn't mention the camera position. It was discussed a lot in the other thread in which I said that, during an old thread on this topic, I actually made a 12'x12' room and put an RL-scaled bed in it (just a prim). That was all I put in it even though an RL room of that size would have a lot more furniture in it than just a bed. I adjusted the camera every way I could and found that manoevering in that room was so awkward that it just didn't work. One or two people suggested using the mouselook view, or a pseudo-mouselook view, but they are 2-handed operations, which meant that it was nowhere near as simple and easy as the way things are now - default camera and larger rooms so that furniture can be negotiated very easily.

[Phil Deakins]

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Trinity Yazimoto wrote:

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Phil Deakins wrote:

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Thank you, Trinity. Now about that audition....

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heheheheh, i dont forget Phil...; its planed but need some organization.... im going to ask Czari if she accept to be judge with me hehehehhehe

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Judge? What will you be judging? I need to know

[Trinity Yazimoto]

well its all about absolute and relative units. no more. Absolute units are indeed the same as in RL, but they dont match when its about relative units.

Again....ones CANT see same as RL throught a 2d screen that has on top 4 limiteds sides. This cant be possible. Now, if ones put on each of its rl eyes frames that will limit your look, maybe ones will have the same sensation than when ones look with your SL cam and ones will see the limits of such view.

 

That s said, well if we try to make SL exactly as RL, so what do we do with tiny/petite avatars, and with furries..?. i ve never seen any in RL maybe i should go more outside lol....

[Trinity Yazimoto]

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Phil Deakins wrote:

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Trinity Yazimoto wrote:

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Phil Deakins wrote:

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Thank you, Trinity. Now about that audition....

---

 

heheheheh, i dont forget Phil...; its planed but need some organization.... im going to ask Czari if she accept to be judge with me hehehehhehe

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Judge? What will you be judging? I need to know

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well its an audition you know....

wow sorry, i just see my bad mistake in my web dictionnary... i was meaning jury lol....

so for having scared you... no no , you wont be judged lol... its just an audtion not a court lol...

sorry again... my bad english lol

[Perrie Juran]

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Trinity Yazimoto wrote:

well its all about absolute and relative units. no more. Absolute units are indeed the same as in RL, but they dont match when its about relative units.

Again....ones CANT see same as RL throught a 2d screen that has on top 4 limiteds sides. This cant be possible. Now, if ones put on each of its rl eyes frames that will limit your look, maybe ones will have the same sensation than when ones look with your SL cam and ones will see the limits of such view.

 

That s said, well if we try to make SL exactly as RL, so what do we do with tiny/petite avatars, and with furries..?. i ve never seen any in RL maybe i should go more outside lol....

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I am reminded here of something Torley said on a remotely related topic:

 

"Providing sensible presets and distributing them widely would empower a lot of people to realize that mmm, they can be used, shall I say, tastefully? Otherwise some peeps might just get the wrong impression. I'm a big fan of strong starting points."

The original presets may have not been the best choice.

[Pussycat Catnap]

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Phil Deakins wrote:

There was an interesting dicussion in another thread about avatar sizes as compared to RL people's sizes.

Unfortunately it was all removed

, perhaps because it was off-topic for the thread. I know it's an old chestnut but some things were posted in the thread that I thought were were very interesting - not only because I posted them

, but I think they are valid. So I'm starting a new thread for it. I may not be able to post much in it but I don't want to let it slip by.

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One of the forum mods is aggressively removing posts that have too much tutorial info or links under the advertising rule...

If that thread had links in it, that may be why it got zapped...

 

[Hugsy Penguin]

Personally, I would love to see real-life proportions (with suitable camera placement) for avatars and everything else become the norm in SL.  You can fit more stuff on the same amount of land.  Plus, when you're building something, you won't have to "eyeball" the size of the thing to get it right.  There's just all kinds of goodness to it.

This can be done be educating people on how out of proportion their avatars are.  Then teach them how to scale their avatars properly.

NONE of this should be forced on anyone.  It's just educating people on scale and letting them decide whether they want to live a 1:1 life or a 1:1.3 life.

[161488303349]

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Phil Deakins wrote:

You're right. I didn't mention the camera position. It was discussed a lot in the other thread in which I said that, during an old thread on this topic, I actually made a 12'x12' room and put an RL-scaled bed in it (just a prim). That was all I put in it even though an RL room of that size would have a lot more furniture in it than just a bed. I adjusted the camera every way I could and found that manoevering in that room was so awkward that it just didn't work. One or two people suggested using the mouselook view, or a pseudo-mouselook view, but they are 2-handed operations, which meant that it was nowhere near as simple and easy as the way things are now - default camera and larger rooms so that furniture can be negotiated very easily.

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when you use one hand then you do everything linear fashion. one thing at a time

like:

walk with arrow key (forward )

take hand off keyboard to stop

put hand on mouse. right click Sit.

hand on keyboard. adjust camera view. (ALT key + arrow or mouse)

back on mouse. click Stand

on keyboard. and walk

 

is nothing wrong to do this way. is the way that most people who learn 3D games/worlds SLstyle do it at the start

+

 can know almost immediately a total inexperienced new person to 3D world by the way they move. they move in straight lines. stop. turn. then move again

more experienced players in other 3D worlds coming to SL are more fluid in how they move. they already know how to use WASD, arrow keys or W+mouse to use in combination. like they turn while they move

the inexperienced newbies soon learn how to move by using more than one key at a time to walk fluid. like W+A or W+D (Up+Left) (Up+Right)

then many of them go on to learn how to use keys + mouse simultaneously as well. then they learn can move and click at the same time. which makes your interactions not only with your avatar but also with what is in the world more fluid

+

the biggest single indicator of a users experience is what happens when an avatar takes off and flys. inexperienced user will go up. turn. then move

experienced user will do a running jump takeoff and turn all at the same time. double-tap W + E + A or D

1 bc it looks cool to do that way. but 2 also it lets other experienced players in the game know that you are experienced player  yourself without having to say anything (:

+

is the same with clicking on stuff

example: at this unnamed shopping sim (for fear of deletion) they got walls with 2 rows of mini mania boards on them. in the hallways. most people who learn SL style. stop in front of the boards. pan their camera and click them all

others tho will walk thru the halls and click them as they move. super shopper style. is heaps of freebie gift boards at that sim so soon learn how to shop them really fast  (:

 

[Coby Foden]

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Phil Deakins wrote:

 

But it's not very good to correlate units in 2 different worlds when nothing of the 2 worlds ever meet. The reason why it would have been better to invent a unit for SL is because it would have avoided the frequent RL size / SL size discussions and arguments. The size of things in one world is completely irrelevant to the size fo things in another world, when nothing of the one world is ever in the other world, and vice versa.

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But they do meet.  We have humans in RL, we have human avatars in SL.  And other stuff too what we see in RL, they are in SL too.  I don't get the idea why virtual world would need some arbitrary measuring system having no correlation to anything at all.

An arbitrary measuring system would not solve the problem of second life rampant scaling.  There would still be small avatars and there would be giant avatars.  And the builders would choose the scale for their designs whatever each builder would think feels right for them.  It would be exactly the same situation as it is now (only difference being that we couldn't compare avatar sizes to RL human sizes - easily).

However, because we can import mesh, we still would need to know what is the conversion factor between design software units and SL units to be able to make mesh designs in the right size for SL   This conversion factor would also reveal us what are SL units in comparison to RL units (meter).

 

What Linden Lab made wrong was:

 

• The default avatar was made too tall

• The default camera placement is way too high

• Linden Lab's first building size instructions suggested to make BIG houses (builder's tape measure)

• Linden Lab was never interested to instruct residents about the importance of correct scale of things

Thus people in general got the idea that the scale does not matter, it's totally irrelevant in SL.

"Your world - Your what ever scale" :smileytongue:

 

 

I think there is a secret plot behind this overscaling of avatars and objects in SL.  Linden Lab guys in the beginning were very wise.  They made the regions in the size of 256 m x 256 m.  Then somebody got a very bright idea:  "Hey guys, if we make the avatars also to exact average sizes measured in meters as they are in RL, they would need a certain amount of land to feel comfortable in they houses.  But let's make the default avatar bigger than the average guy in RL.  Then guess what, they need to make their houses way bigger than in RL.  And the fun part is that they would need to buy more land to fit their big houses (more $$$ to us).  The more bigger the residents tweak their avatars, so much better for us.  We can also make the viewer to show smaller measurement for avatar height instead of the real height.  LOL... Shh.. do not reveal these secrets of ours to any of the residents."

[161488303349]

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Coby Foden wrote:

I think there is a secret plot behind this overscaling of avatars and objects in SL.  Linden Lab guys in the beginning were very wise.  They made the regions in the size of 256 m x 256 m.  Then somebody got a very bright idea: 

"Hey guys, if we make the avatars also to exact average sizes measured in meters as they are in RL, they would need a certain amount of land to feel comfortable in they houses.  But let's make the default avatar bigger than the average guy in RL.  Then guess what, they need to make their houses way bigger than in RL.  And the fun part is that they would need to buy more land to fit their big houses (more $$$ to us).  The more bigger the residents tweak their avatars, so much better for us.  We can also make the viewer to show smaller measurement for avatar height instead of the real height.  LOL... Shh.. do not reveal these secrets of ours to any of the residents."

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jejejjejeeje (:

i love a good conspiracy so i am defo gunna believe that one (:

 

[161488303349]

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Pussycat Catnap wrote:

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Phil Deakins wrote:

There was an interesting dicussion in another thread about avatar sizes as compared to RL people's sizes.

Unfortunately it was all removed

, perhaps because it was off-topic for the thread. I know it's an old chestnut but some things were posted in the thread that I thought were were very interesting - not only because I posted them

, but I think they are valid. So I'm starting a new thread for it. I may not be able to post much in it but I don't want to let it slip by.

---

One of the forum mods is aggressively removing posts that have too much tutorial info or links under the advertising rule...

If that thread had links in it, that may be why it got zapped...

 

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i had a look back and had a remember

the deletions started from the comment/suggestion that you and Penny are invalid to chat about realism bc of your anthro avatars. every post that was replied to off that got deleted as well. is fair ok for that post to get deleted and some of the responses to it. include my own

is just a pity about all the good posts underneath that had nothing to with that. that got chucked in the bin as well

oh! well

 

 

 

[161488303349]

in the other thread we chat about the shape ruler vs prim ruler. and about how would be good if linden made it so that the measurement value (meters/feet) in the shape editor was the same as the prim ruler. i would like that if they did

+

other one was we chat about the shape/outfits editor itself and what other kinds of editors would be good

this one is amazing. i would def love to have one like this in SL

[Pussycat Catnap]

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16 wrote:

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i had a look back and had a remember

the deletions started from the comment/suggestion that you and Penny are invalid to chat about realism bc of your anthro avatars. every post that was replied to off that got deleted as well. is fair ok for that post to get deleted and some of the responses to it. include my own

is just a pity about all the good posts underneath that had nothing to with that. that got chucked in the bin as well

oh! well 

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I completely missed that discussion...

Had no idea anyone ever even said that, let alone who or why.

And didn't know a Neko was considered anthro. But I've got a lot of alts - human, neko, usagi, and assorted furries. I suspect whoever it was has never even looked at my feed screenshots or flickr, and has no actual idea what my avatar looks like... (hint: recent images on the flickr are furry, but more recent images on the feed are my newest Neko concept, my end of 2012 makeover - and proportions are the same for a human or a furry unless you're talking something extreme like a dragon - even they tend to use the same proportions, and then add on a long neck: look at source material in comics/cartoons).

 

 

 

[Pussycat Catnap]

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Phil Deakins wrote:

It's the use of the word 'meter' that's caused it all. If LL had chosen a different word, or made one up, for the unit of length, then there would be no way to relate SL measurements to RL measurements, and avatar heights would simply be seen as being normal. It's because people consider an SL meter to be the same length as an RL meter that some people think of avatars as being generally taller than RL people, and they don;t like it. But if they assume that the SL meter is not the same as the RL meter, then the problem goes away.

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But that's not even really the issue.

 

Heights might be seen as normal if that were the case, but proportions would still be disgustingly incorrect.

 

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Orca Flotta wrote:

Actually lately I see more and more "natural" sized  and proportioned avies all over the grid. And the builders are adjusting their weird sized builds to the new realism as well. Most modern furniture doesn't make me look like a dwarf anymore.

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My blog article on proportions gets a crazy amount of hits every day. I assume Penny's articles are the same.

I don't really care about height like she does - but I go nuts about proportion. The end result is the same though due to messed up sliders causing T-Rez arms when you get too tall. So me and Penny arrive at the same place for slightly different reasons.

The hit counts on my blog tell me that a lot of people are concerned about having a good shape - ie: proportional. So I'm not surprised that I too see more and more of them inworld over the last year or so.

Mind you, while Penny states that if we all scaled down giants would be possible. I do not agree on this. If we all scaled down, "giants" would still be stuck with messed up sliders... For me, the solution to all of this can only come from LL's fixing the arm and hand sliders (the hand slider should be for width, not length. Hands are always the size of your chin to mid forhead, but men have thicker hands - which the SL hands copy. All SL hands are man hands... even on the female avatar...).

 

[Pussycat Catnap]

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Imnotgoing Sideways wrote:

Shamefully, there are a ton of camera position and angle options which aren't in the preferences panel.  My own camera is adjust via two debug settings.  I keep a notecard inworld with the settings.  Next time I'm on, I'll post them here.  (

)

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I like my camera just behind my avatar by one body length and about butt level, angled slightly up or slightly down. Here are my personal settings:

CameraOffsetRearView

X: -2.5

Y: -0.100

Z: -0.300

FocusOffsetRearView

X: 0.4

Y: -0.100

Z: 0.100

I cannot stress how important this Camera one is. It will make SL look a heck of a lot more like a 3D world looks in most games – which allow for objects to not seem as cramped as they tend to in Second Life.

The above are from the "Show Debug Settings" under the Advanced menu:

 

Finish it off by adjusting view angle and distance in preferences to avoid how the default settings can fishbowl the edges of your screen:

See my sig for the full guide to this, on getting started in SL.

 

[Limonella Sorbet]

I don't care what size anyone else thinks my avatar should be. My avatar is not realistic any more than Barbie is. My avatar looks great in her Barbie clothes and that is all I care about. If someone else does not like it they don't have to look.

We all know what real people look like! We all know they come in all shapes sizes heights & weights. If people want to ignore real measurements whether it's long arms long legs short arms short legs wide hips whatever that is their perogative. 

People need to know their opinion is just THEIR opinion & is not worth as much to others as they think!