Hide/unhide piece of mesh function

[Chiaro22]

Is there a hide/unhide function in the Second Life editor?

When I upload a mesh from Blender, I need to (from within Second Life) edit a part that is blocked from view by another part, and haven't found any way to get to it yet. Is there a Wireframe mode, like in Blender, or a different way?

[Sassy Romano]

No, you just have to perform camera gymnastics to get up close and inside the bit you need to get at.  It also helps to disable camera constraints in the Advanced menu of the viewer.

[Chiaro22]

Ok, that's a pity, but thanks for a quick answer.

At least now I don't have to google around in vain for a week or two, eh...I'll try your suggestions.

 

[Chic Aeon]

Depending on what you are making and your needs, you can upload the mesh as a LINKSET rather than a joined object. That way you can "unlink" in world and then do your thing and then relink. That might work. Hard to say since we don't know particulars.

There IS a wireframe mode in SL but not sure if you can edit in that mode. I have only used it for finding things when on hunts - LOL.   Ctrl + Shift + R will get you wireframe.

 

[Drongle McMahon]

Why? Generally, if part is hidden from view, then I can't think of any reason to edit it (since the only editing you can do is changing the texture). There is one notable exception - when you are using hidden triangles to store textures used at the lower LODs bu not visible on the high LOD. In that case, the SL face carrying that texture will be visible and selectable at the lowest LOD. To get at that without being too far away, just set RenderVolumeLODFactor to zero (Show Debug Settings in the Advanced menu). You might have to do a quick out-in zoom to get the LOD to switch, but usuall;y not. If there are faces only accessible at other LODs, you can find intermediate settings where that cause tose LODs to be shown. You can also use scripts to change the diffuse textures, but not normal and specular maps (yet).

[IvanBenjammin]

If you're talking about material faces (if you're not, ignore me!), you might be able to select all and then deselect all parts you can see, leaving you with the hidden part still selected.

[BlackMagi Darkwatch]

I can think of another reason...  In the case of a slide-show viewer you can pre-load textures onto the hidden faces for faster loading to the viewer.  Camera gymnastics as already mentioned above was the way that I went 

Black

[BlackMagi Darkwatch]

Hi Chiaro22, thinking about it some more (and I wish I had thought about this for my own project!) you could use llSetPrimitiveParams & FACE_COLOR in a loop to highlight the faces one-by-one.  As you already know the exterior face numbers (using the build floater in Firestorm in my case) you can set tiem 100% transparent.  Once you know the face number you can then do whatever it is you're trying to achieve either by the already mentioned gymnastics or by script.

 

Black

[Aquila Kytori]

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Drongle McMahon wrote:

Why? Generally, if part is hidden from view, then I can't think of any reason to edit it (since the only editing you can do is changing the texture).

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Ummmm ....... a panel behind glass , the light bulb or reflector inside a vehicles front/rear lights, liquid inside a bottle, Schrodinger's cat ...............

Ok i haven't done the cat experiment because i like cats but for the others you can use an extra triangle with the same material and "hidden" on the underside of the model somwhere.

 

[Drongle McMahon]

Ah yes. I forgot about glass. I nerver had more than one thing inside. So for those, I simply apply the inside texture to everything (ie no face selection), and then apply the remaining accessible ones with face selection, as usual.