Environmental Enhancement Project (aka EEP!) Feedback Thread

[Bellimora]

I was playing with the EEP viewer in the main grid.  I found out it had a XML importer for skies and I was like "OH!  I can import all these skies in the firestorm folder" so I started doing that.

As I did that I would get errors occasionally as it failed to save the asset to the SL servers.

I didn't think much of it until I logged in the next day on a not-eep viewer.  I had a texture in my Settings folder for every failed sky.

I also have a folder fulla firestorm skies and a heap of sky redundancies because that's how firestorm do.  Over 600 of those darn things!

I filed a JIRA, here:  https://jira.secondlife.com/browse/BUG-225754

[Bellimora]

I was tinkering.  Weird popped out.

 

 

[Bellimora]

I IMPROVED IT!

 

Also, A NEW CHALLENGER APPROACHES!

 

[Macrocosm Draegonne]

1 hour ago, Bellimora said:

I IMPROVED IT!

OMG love! Lol Eeeps  going to be so awesome!!

I hope someday we can use animated .png and .gifs for the sun/moon   Or even simply be able to animate it via script, maybe slight rotation in place with pulsing light or something.

it looks like one of my cats when he was a kitten, RIP.  Innan ❤️

 

 

Edited November 3, 2018 by Macrocosm Draegonne

[Bellimora]

After playing with the tools some I think we need a means of changing the light origin from sun to moon in some fashion.  For static skies you can always hide the sun and align it against the moon.  However when you are doing a day/night sequence all the skies are interpolated so you need to do fancy sleight of hand to somehow slide the sun over the world swiftly enough to pop up under the moon as it comes up without it looking weird.  

Some sort of switch or something in sky settings.  

[Macrocosm Draegonne]

38 minutes ago, Bellimora said:

After playing with the tools some I think we need a means of changing the light origin from sun to moon in some fashion.  For static skies you can always hide the sun and align it against the moon.  However when you are doing a day/night sequence all the skies are interpolated so you need to do fancy sleight of hand to somehow slide the sun over the world swiftly enough to pop up under the moon as it comes up without it looking weird.  

Some sort of switch or something in sky settings.  

If you look in Jira there is a topic on having instant transitions, as well as being able to set the time of a transition, which is awesome!  I can hardly wait for that feature since it could mean so much.

[Bellimora]

Weird question: ON the thought of a switch to flick the light source from sun to moon:  If we were able to flick off the projector light in the sky would we get ourselves the ability to have another shadow-projecting light source on the scene (like 3 light projector prims on an object).  Or is that something that's too involved to do easily?

Either way it would be nice to be able to shut off the sky-projector for in-door windlights and focus on ambient and point lights and save us some FPS spent not rendering all that sunlight shadow we are blocking out  

[Macrocosm Draegonne]

1 hour ago, Bellimora said:

Weird question: ON the thought of a switch to flick the light source from sun to moon:  If we were able to flick off the projector light in the sky would we get ourselves the ability to have another shadow-projecting light source on the scene (like 3 light projector prims on an object).  Or is that something that's too involved to do easily?

Either way it would be nice to be able to shut off the sky-projector for in-door windlights and focus on ambient and point lights and save us some FPS spent not rendering all that sunlight shadow we are blocking out  

Yes I have made an indoor preset, moon/sky/stars are totally black, zero light is output, then I used projector lights to mimic sun coming thru the entrance or windows, based on the sun/moon time of whats outside in the external parcel, that has another full windlight setting.

This is why im keen to have the instant transition, and ability to time transitions, just as you are.

Edited November 3, 2018 by Macrocosm Draegonne

[Macrocosm Draegonne]

23 hours ago, Bellimora said:

Weird question: ON the thought of a switch to flick the light source from sun to moon:  If we were able to flick off the projector light in the sky would we get ourselves the ability to have another shadow-projecting light source on the scene (like 3 light projector prims on an object).  Or is that something that's too involved to do easily? 

Either way it would be nice to be able to shut off the sky-projector for in-door windlights and focus on ambient and point lights and save us some FPS spent not rendering all that sunlight shadow we are blocking out  

I think I misread that the first time.  The answer I believe is Yes, since the projector light limitation is a passively forced thing by the system, the SUN/Moon take two off right out the gate, so if those are gone any two other projector lights in the scene should automatically be then in use.  I will have to test! Edit: Of course those wont be as powerfull, Sun/Moon seems to fill the whole sim.

Edited November 4, 2018 by Macrocosm Draegonne

[Callum Meriman]

On 11/4/2018 at 4:24 AM, Bellimora said:

I IMPROVED IT!

I know what's going up in my regions!

You are pawesome Bellimora, thank you

Edit: Wonder what Nyancat clouds would look like

Edited November 5, 2018 by Callum Meriman

[Bellimora]

The region Denby is currently running RC Snack so it's EEP enabled on the main grid.  This means you can head over there with the EEP viewer, make some custom skies and stash them in your inventory.

A not-EEP viewer will not be able to handle that inventory and just hide it.  So my Alchemy Viewer can not comprehend the true nature of cat-sky so it conceals it from me for fear of what might happen if I unleash it.

So if anyone wants a freaky sky I made pester me, Bellimora Resident.

[Bellimora]

Thoughts after toying around:  could use the ability to make the sun/moon rotate.  Either just pointing off at some arbitrary direction (like a lunar phase always pointing it's bright-side sunwards.)  Or just making something rotate continually (like a glare-sun texture rotating).  Filed a JIRA for it if it interests you. https://jira.secondlife.com/browse/BUG-225780

[Rider Linden]

12 hours ago, Bellimora said:

Thoughts after toying around:  could use the ability to make the sun/moon rotate.  Either just pointing off at some arbitrary direction (like a lunar phase always pointing it's bright-side sunwards.)  Or just making something rotate continually (like a glare-sun texture rotating).  Filed a JIRA for it if it interests you. https://jira.secondlife.com/browse/BUG-225780

Thanks for the JIRA.  That will make sure it stays on my radar.  I think it is possible, but give me some time to consider how we'd do it.

[Bellimora]

Since we be doing JIRAs I made one of my previous request for a light projector source change. https://jira.secondlife.com/browse/BUG-225785

If you want to be really fancy, on top of the options "moon" and "sun" add a third option "auto" and have it just default to sun, unless sun is below the horizon and moon is above it, in which case moon.

Currently EEP is making night-cycles awfully dark since the moon no longer casts light like it does in non-eep-land.

[Bellimora]

Ok, you can definitely marketplace skies, because I threw the cat-sky up as a free item, have fun.  It includes a static sky with both ceiling and basement cat visible and a day cycle where they stay opposed.

https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/Catastrophe-Sky/15971840

Today I learned that putting the word "*****" in your marketplace listing keywords forces it to adult rating.  That's ***** as in a 5 letter word beginning with p that refers to felines and a slang term for a specific location of the female anatomy.

Edited November 8, 2018 by Bellimora

[Bellimora]

https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/Katamari-Sky/15972100

And there's the listing for a free copy of the katamari sky.  Tempted to work out day cycles for the slithering and bloodshot skies and sell those for something like 250 a piece since they look kinda fetching.

SO, which linden or where do I JIRA/suggest to get a marketplace item category for environmental enhancements?

[Rider Linden]

A word of caution, be careful about selling EEP settings right now in the marketplace since they are only visible to people using an EEP viewer and will only work on EEP enabled regions.

 

[Bellimora]

Well yeah.  Including big warnings about that.  And the handout includes a notecard saying "You need an EEP enabled viewer to even see the contents of this folder" and the stuff on the market is all free.  Gotta figure out a good time to throw the stuff with actual price tags on the market.  

[Bellimora]

New EEP suggestion.  Jira: https://jira.secondlife.com/browse/BUG-225793

Long story short 

 look at that post and look at how I had to edit the gas giant to make it look more natural against the sky.  I think it would be beneficial if it were a toggleable option for how sun/moon objects are rendered.

Bonus points if you can use the alpha-channel of the image to determine if stars are blotted out at any particular point.

[Bellimora]

Rendering bug found:  https://jira.secondlife.com/browse/BUG-225834 Basically if you got an object intersecting the water plane reflections get weird especially if it's a long bright object.  

Also found out I had a reply from Rider on one of my jiras sitting there for 2 days.  Sorry Rider

I normally don't go and snag a beta viewer and test ride it a lot, but this is a real fun feature.  I can't wait until it starts rolling out for the other mainland servers.  I really like where this is going.

Edited November 17, 2018 by Bellimora

[JayNathan]

Hi, I'd love to be able to try the EPP, I'm a creator of windlights and recently I've released some stars.
Is there any way to test this new project?

 

Here my new stars: 

 

Thankss

[Bellimora]

4 hours ago, JayNathan said:

Hi, I'd love to be able to try the EPP, I'm a creator of windlights and recently I've released some stars.
Is there any way to test this new project?

 

Here my new stars: 

 

Thankss 

 

 

Step one go here and download the EEP viewer:  http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Linden_Lab_Official:Alternate_Viewers

Step two get to an EEP enabled region: Two options:

-Option 1:  Get yourself on the beta grid and get to the sim EEPTesting.  This option is kinda better for full hands on testing because that sim is filled with parcels for sale that you can use your imaginary beta-not-money to buy and test fully.  Drawback:  any skies you make exist on beta grid and not main grid so you'll have to remake all that stuff on the main grid later.

-Option 2:  Go to one of the following sims on the main grid:  Hoppotropolis, Hippo Hollow, Denby, Longfellow, Hanley, Cirano.  While you can not own a parcel on those sims likely you can set a windlight to display for you only and work on it in those sims and snaps creenshots with it.  Benefit:  you get to make and stash your windlights ahead of time.

If you want to show off your windlights there's a thread here that I discovered only after posting a couple on this thread. 

[JayNathan]

5 hours ago, Bellimora said:

Step one go here and download the EEP viewer:  http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Linden_Lab_Official:Alternate_Viewers

Step two get to an EEP enabled region: Two options:

-Option 1:  Get yourself on the beta grid and get to the sim EEPTesting.  This option is kinda better for full hands on testing because that sim is filled with parcels for sale that you can use your imaginary beta-not-money to buy and test fully.  Drawback:  any skies you make exist on beta grid and not main grid so you'll have to remake all that stuff on the main grid later.

-Option 2:  Go to one of the following sims on the main grid:  Hoppotropolis, Hippo Hollow, Denby, Longfellow, Hanley, Cirano.  While you can not own a parcel on those sims likely you can set a windlight to display for you only and work on it in those sims and snaps creenshots with it.  Benefit:  you get to make and stash your windlights ahead of time.

If you want to show off your windlights there's a thread here that I discovered only after posting a couple on this thread. 

Thank you so much  ♥

[Whirly Fizzle]

On 11/17/2018 at 11:47 PM, JayNathan said:

Here my new stars: 

That cloud texture is gorgeous! Thanks for making that.

It works great in the EEP viewer.

I posted some piccies here after I EEPed it.

 

Edited November 19, 2018 by Whirly Fizzle

[Bellimora]

I just noticed if you compare current default noon day against EEP default noon day eep default Noon is a lot more dreary and weak.

Is the lightning change intentional?

I thought about JIRAing it but I didn't want to JIRA an intentional change...

Noon Day current official LL viewer:  

Noon Day EEP viewer: