Realism in Virtual

[Nadir Taov]

I've been tinkering with the Kirsten V2 viewer lately and discovered DoF / Shadows working very well on it ... and best of all, it actually saves properly to disk! (I was used to the broken shadow clients of the 1.23 era).

Anyways, I took some time taking snaps w/ the goal of capturing avatars in their most natural state ... I wanted to see how realistic the photos can get in the SL.

After a few days of observing and playing paparazzi, I came to two personal conclusions: 1) The level of diversity among avatars (even just in Human form) is simply incredible, 2) w/ mocap so popular, AO's these days really don't sit still!

I used my 3D nav mouse and did some light zooming at times. These are a few straight / unedited snaps:

I've posted most of my work on my flickr if you're interested in seeing more! http://www.flickr.com/photos/nadirtaov/

I think if I played more with the atmospheric settings, like adding bit more haze to the distance and a little less bright light on the avatars themselves, I could get a more natural feel. Any other ideas?

 

[Wildcat Furse]

aww Nadir, these pictures are so beautiful, hopefully I get my new PC soon so I can use shadows too....please find my flickr page here *meows*

[Jenni Darkwatch]

Shadows indeed make a big difference. Also... in my opinion, avi quality and accessory quality has improved in the last year or so.

[Penny Patton]

Better windlight settings, definitely. Windlight settings make all the difference. A bit of haze also helps to create depth. Really, with good windlight settings you can make SL look completely different.

 

Anyways, disclaimer, the following suggestions are only ideas for getting more realistic images out of SL.

 

Other than that, if you're really intent on going for realism I'd recommend going over avatar shapes with a fine toothed comb. Most SL avatar shapes are anything but. I don't mean that they're too "idealistic" either. With no proportion guides in the appearance editor, unintuitively skewed proportion sliders, and poorly proportioned starter shapes nearly every avatar in SL has arms that are too short, legs that are too long, heads, hands and feet that are way too small and other proportion foibles which cause SL avatars to look "off" no matter how detailed the skin, clothing and attachments.

Fixing av proportions also helps to make poses and animations look more natural. Most SL animations, especially those made using mocap, are made using models or people with correct human proportions. Apply animations made with correct proportions in mind to an avatar shape where the proportions are way off and you run into issues and awkwardness. Avatar arms poking into your torso, or floating awkwardly in space when your hands should be on your hips. Feet sinking into the ground or floating above it.  Multiple avatars in a group pose? Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee. Definitely running into issues there.

 Also, most of the pictures shown here are of avatars standing and not directly interacting with the environment in any way. That's really the only way to get much realism unless you build your own scenes.(And I know you build fantastic scenes.)  if you want to build some scenes for taking screenshots in with the intent of trying to make it look realistic, try to scale everything consistently with your subjects, and try not to have multiple avatars in a scene if there's 2-3 feet difference between them (common in SL where "human" avatars range from 5' tall to almost 9' tall).

 Not saying the avatars themselves have to be properly scaled, just consistently scaled with each other and the environment. The most common scaling issues in SL, aside from lack of consistent avatars, are that even when furnishings (chairs, tables, etcetera) are scaled around avatar sizes, environments (houses, office buildings, even vehicles) tend to be scaled up much larger, making even SL's generally gargantuan avatars seem like midgets in comparison. Sometimes people wind up unconciously scaling up furniture and other decorative items too to match the environment. The reason people don't scale down environments is due to the SL camera, which kinda forces larger rooms on us.

 Also, I'd play with the depth of field effect more, try not to abuse it and use too much blur in your photos. Often, just a touch is more than enough. Especially when you combine it with good windlight effects to build on the sense of atmosphere and depth to the image.

 Again, I am not saying these are things you should or need to do, just things that could help in getting more realistic looking screenshots out of SL.

[Rhonda Huntress]

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jjccc Coronet wrote:

cool pics i found that if you go into the pheonix viewer folder in app data folder under windlight folder there is a follder called skies and you can copy all of the sky xml and then paste them into any other viewer but dont replace the existing ones if you try it. This will open up your possibilities for te perfect image

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http://analutetia.com/2008/04/20/windlight-presets/

These are the ones I use and you will find they are pretty much the standard included in almost any viewer except for ones from LL.

[Jo Yardley]

I love the shadows, unfortunately they only work on viewer 2 and only very very very slow.

Only use it for the odd picture;