After Second Life, Can Virtual Worlds Get a Reboot?

[Madelaine McMasters]

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Perrie Juran wrote:

I'm beginning to regret posting that video.

It was never my intention to start a video competition.

It was really intended for another thread.............

/me returns to the peanut gallery and goes back to munching on my goobers.

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It's not a competition, it's a collaboration!

[Kenbro Utu]

What this thread needs is some T1ts!

[Kwakkelde Kwak]

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Perrie Juran wrote:

That's them.

Now if they can find a way to put an Avatar on the ground and that Avatar could interact with the Environment..................they could potentially put SL out of business in very little time.

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"If", now that's very important.

As far as I understand, such voxel engines rely on repetition, where SL relies on diversity. That repetition is possibly why it seems to be so hard to animate voxel based (rigged) objects. However, Phil seems to think it's possible, so who knows?

[Perrie Juran]

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Kwakkelde Kwak wrote:

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Perrie Juran wrote:

That's them.

Now if they can find a way to put an Avatar on the ground and that Avatar could interact with the Environment..................they could potentially put SL out of business in very little time.

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"If", now that's very important.

As far as I understand, such voxel engines rely on repetition, where SL relies on diversity. That repetition is possibly why it seems to be so hard to animate voxel based (rigged) objects. However, Phil seems to think it's possible, so who knows?

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Watching their Demo Video looks very impressive.

Gigapixel Images are very impressive too.

What we don't see on that video is if a workstation loads and responds as quickly.  Or a gaming computer.  I just got done browsing through some Gigapixel images and as you zoom or pan there is "lag," however imperceptible it may be.

Images are easy to do but to "put an Avatar on the ground that could interact with the environment" would require a physics engine.  Integrating the two would be the challenge.

[Czari Zenovka]

Did someone say BADGER!!!!

Edit: Typo

[Czari Zenovka]

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Kenbro Utu wrote:

What this thread needs is some T1ts!

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Awwwwwww :matte-motes-bashful-cute-2:

Part of that video reminded me of two cats I had years ago.  They shared a food bowl & water dish.  The female cat would "wash" (I assume) her paws after using the litter box in the water dish.  I bet that really went over well with the male cat.  No wonder they had some interesting fights...lol.

[Kenbro Utu]

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Czari Zenovka wrote:

Part of that video reminded me of two cats I had years ago.  They shared a food bowl & water dish.  The female cat would "wash" (I assume) her paws after using the litter box in the water dish.  I bet that really went over well with the male cat.  No wonder they had some interesting fights...lol.

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I bet.  Cats are extremely picky about their water too.  They prefer fresh moving water.  I had a cat that would jump up to the sink anytime water was turned on, and would drink from the faucet.  If that was not available, she would stare at the water bowl for ages, looking for what I guess is a clean spot to drink, and it would always be at the very edge of the bowl somewhere.  Maybe sharing the bowl with dogs was the cause...

[Madelaine McMasters]

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Ceka Cianci wrote:

it's one of my most favorite areas..and yes eagles do rock =)

which reminds me of another beautiful bird which i had the pleasure of watching in the wild just because i happened to be looking that direction one day the moment just before it went into a dive...

i've never seen anything like it.. 

it just reached it's peak and turned in the air to aim downward..

then started off slow in a dive..

it looked like a sleek jet with it's wings getting closer to it's body..

then all of a sudden it just bolted downward and was gone in the blink of an eye into the tree top horizon..

i never seen anything so fast in my life..it was beautiful..

the thing that amazed me is i didn't know they existed where we were..and it was just so cool that i got to see it and could have missed it if i would have had my head turned a little to the left or right..

i haven't seen one since..

i don't know what type of falcon it was..but there is no mistaking when you see one do that..that is for sure..

 

 

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I've got red tailed hawks in my neighborhood and a few peregrines have been spotted. Years ago, I saw a hawk swoop down into my yard and grab a bunny. I didn't catch the dive and what I saw was out of the corner of my eye, but it was impressive. After that, I kept watch for them soaring over the fields near my house and I've since seen them scoop up field mice.

When the hawks get near my willows, the starlings (I think they are starlings) will rise up like a little cloud and harass them. There's sometimes one who gets full of him/herself self and just hounds the hawk until he leaves. There's safety in numbers, but not every starling seems to know that. The crows go after them one at a time, easily outmaneuvering them.

Now we've got a couple eagle families along the river and they'll sometimes soar along the Lake Michigan shore. They are so graceful and can soar on the ridge updraft for miles if there's an easterly wind. One went swooping through my willows a few years ago. I thought it was an airplane!

In winter, it's not uncommon to see bunny or mouse tracks heading across the snow, stopping in mid hop surrounded by gentle swirls from the wings of the barn owl that scooped it up so she could eat it on top of my chimney at 2AM.

I've got seagulls here too and love to watch them fish. They'll often dive head first into the water and come up with lunch. Last year I caught one skimming...

It's a tough and wondrous world out there.

[Kwakkelde Kwak]

[Coby Foden]

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Ceka Cianci wrote:

 

so i'm guessing this is their voxels..

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There's video about Sony's EverQuest Next game. The world is built using voxels. The users actually can build voxel stuff with ingame tools. Maybe Philip's new world will have similar approach?

In the video at 40 minutes mark there's a short demo of ingame voxel build tool in action.

EverQuest Next

World made by using voxels looks pretty amazing. Awesome! :matte-motes-big-grin:

[Madelaine McMasters]

Ceka, I just stumbled across an interesting comparison of the flight characteristics of Ravens and Peregrines...

As I mentioned earlier, when a hawk enters my yard, its either a cloud of starlings or a lone crow/raven who harasses it until it leaves. The crows are fantastic to watch. They will flip, roll and tumble around the hawk, who hasn't got a chance and ultimately soars off in frustration. Meanwhile, all the crow's buddies are in the trees yelling encouragement, or profanities, like rabid Packer fans at a Vikings game, but without the green and gold tummies and the cheese hats.

Crows are dignified, ya know... all dressed in black, like Johnny Cash.

[Dillon Levenque]

Very cool video. Crows can be predatious too, of course.

We used to camp in the redwoods every year and in the morning when all the campers started cooking breakfast the trees would be full of Steller's jays, mouthing off and hoping for a dropped pancake. The experienced ones would just fly down and land on your picnic table, giving you that hopeful look that only a jay can do well. They'd stay in the trees afterward, and once I heard just an absolute shriekfest. Turned out a crow had arrived and the jays wanted everyone to be aware of that.

Peregrines are native to the West Coast, among other places. Once on a visit to Morro Bay I had seen something about peregrines nesting on the rock (they call it Morro Rock and yes I do know that Morro is a Spanish word for rock; don't blame me: blame the 19th century Anglos) and while out there saw a bunch of telescopes all pointed halfway up. They were generous enough to let me take a peek. There's also a nesting pair that arrives high up on a building in San Jose (might be City Hall, but for sure it's in the city government complex). They've had hatchlings for several years. There's a webcam but it looks quiet now; I think the chicks were born several months back. http://sanjose.granicus.com/MediaPlayer.php?publish_id=91

One of the best things I ever saw involved a blackbird and a redtailed hawk. Blackbirds might be the most aggressively protective beings on the planet, as anyone who's been near a blackbird nest in season can tell you. The males will attack anyone and everyone who gets within range. Dogs, cats, humans, probably bears, maybe even cars. They go nuts.

Anyway, I was driving along a road that had big high streetlights but was bordering open fields. A hawk was perched on the arm between the pole and the lamp, just watching. Hawks love high perches where they can see without having to all that flying around in circles business. Just as I noticed the hawk (I tend to look for them) a blackbird dropped out of the sky at about Mach 3, stooping on the hawk! He struck him square in the shoulder and knocked him completely off his perch, feathers flying in all directions. It was awesome.

[Madelaine McMasters]

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Dillon Levenque wrote:

Very cool video. Crows can be predatious too, of course.

We used to camp in the redwoods every year and in the morning when all the campers started cooking breakfast the trees would be full of Steller's jays, mouthing off and hoping for a dropped pancake. The experienced ones would just fly down and land on your picnic table, giving you that hopeful look that only a jay can do well. They'd stay in the trees afterward, and once I heard just an absolute shriekfest. Turned out a crow had arrived and the jays wanted everyone to be aware of that.

Peregrines are native to the West Coast, among other places. Once on a visit to Morro Bay I had seen something about peregrines nesting on the rock (they call it Morro Rock and yes I do know that Morro is a Spanish word for rock; don't blame me: blame the 19th century Anglos) and while out there saw a bunch of telescopes all pointed halfway up. They were generous enough to let me take a peek. There's also a nesting pair that arrives high up on a building in San Jose (might be City Hall, but for sure it's in the city government complex). They've had hatchlings for several years. There's a webcam but it looks quiet now; I think the chicks were born several months back.

http://sanjose.granicus.com/MediaPlayer.php?publish_id=91

One of the best things I ever saw involved a blackbird and a redtailed hawk. Blackbirds might be the most aggressively protective beings on the planet, as anyone who's been near a blackbird nest in season can tell you. The males will attack anyone and everyone who gets within range. Dogs, cats, humans, probably bears, maybe even cars. They go nuts.

Anyway, I was driving along a road that had big high streetlights but was bordering open fields. A hawk was perched on the arm between the pole and the lamp, just watching. Hawks love high perches where they can see without having to all that flying around in circles business. Just as I noticed the hawk (I tend to look for them) a blackbird dropped out of the sky at about Mach 3, stooping on the hawk! He struck him square in the shoulder and knocked him completely off his perch, feathers flying in all directions. It was awesome.

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WE Energies, the local electric/gas utility, runs several falcon-cams on their power plant chimneys, where they provide nesting boxes.

http://www.we-energies.com/environmental/protect_wildlife.htm

Raptors are the antithesis of turkeys. Raptor chicks are ugly and the adults are beautiful. Turkey chicks are adorable and the adults are just embarassing.

Falcon baby...

Falcon ready for prom night...

 

Turkey baby...

Turkey ready for prom night...