How do I stop shadows from appearing on my avatar's face/body?

[unicorncube]

On realistic avatars, I think shadows look pretty nice on avatars but on my avatars which are cartoon-inspired I think they make the avatar look far worse than it should. Is there a preference I can fiddle with to turn avatar shadows off? Thanks in advance. 

[Scylla Rhiadra]

Turning off Advanced Lighting Model (ALM) in graphics preferences should mostly do it, I think. Alternately, you can wear point lights as invisible attachments to fade out shadows by casting direct light over your body.

[unicorncube]

2 minutes ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

Turning off Advanced Lighting Model (ALM) in graphics preferences should mostly do it, I think. Alternately, you can wear point lights as invisible attachments to fade out shadows by casting direct light over your body.

Thank you so much. I turned off ALM and for at least one avatar (that I've tested so far) it made a huge difference. 

[Rhonda Huntress]

One quick and easy thing to try is Ctrl Shift Y
This will change your windlight settings to Midday.   That will help chase the shadows away.

Unfortunately anything you do will affect your view only, tho.  Everyone else will see shadows or lighting depending on their settings.  Even face lights will not show up for anyone who has "render attached lighting" turned off.

[Talligurl]

1 hour ago, Rhonda Huntress said:

Even face lights will not show up for anyone who has "render attached lighting" turned off.

Oh wow thanks, I did not know I could do this, I find those things so annoying, I usually just derender people who wear them.

[unicorncube]

1 hour ago, Rhonda Huntress said:

One quick and easy thing to try is Ctrl Shift Y
This will change your windlight settings to Midday.   That will help chase the shadows away.

Unfortunately anything you do will affect your view only, tho.  Everyone else will see shadows or lighting depending on their settings.  Even face lights will not show up for anyone who has "render attached lighting" turned off.

Thank you. I'm a bit sad it will only affect my viewer but its better than nothing I guess

[Scylla Rhiadra]

19 minutes ago, unicorncube said:

Thank you. I'm a bit sad it will only affect my viewer but its better than nothing I guess

Unfortunately, it's not just you of course. The viewers empower users to see pretty much anything the way that they want. If your avatar complexity is above the limit someone has set on their viewer, for instance, your avi will appear as dark blue or black silhouette.

Now, one very good remedy is to post pictures of your avi, as you see it, in one of the "vanity" threads here, so we can all enjoy your look!

(*hint hint*)

[Rhonda Huntress]

35 minutes ago, Talligurl said:

Oh wow thanks, I did not know I could do this, I find those things so annoying, I usually just derender people who wear them.

You can toggle it by going to Develop > Rendering > Render Attached Lighting. 

[Mollymews]

you might want to look again at wearing a facelight

the secret to good face lights is making them really subtle. To get the shadow wash out effect that you are wanting

not sure if you know how to make your own, so I just put here how I go about it

1) rez a prim. Name it "facelight". Take it back into inventory. Then attach it to your chin.
2) while wearing it then Edit it and move the prim out a bit in front of your face, then:
3) Object panel: set all X,Y,Z size to 0.01
4) Features panel:
- tick Light. (you will light up like a xmas tree to begin with)
- set Intensity to 0.5, Radius to 0.5, Falloff to 0.5. Leave FOV, Focus, Ambiance at 0.0
- you are now in the area of where you want to be in terms of light. So that nobody will hardly even know that you are wearing a facelight. Just that you look gorgeous
- then starting playing with the values. Tiny bit up or down depending on what effect you exactly want
- other thing is to play with moving the facelight prim, up, down, closer or further away from your face
- the other other thing is to subtley color tint the light to better match your skin/makeup. Next to the Light tick is the Color button
5) When all done, then Texture panel:
- set the prim to a Transparent texture which is in Inventory\Library, or Blank texture and set Transparency to 100

6) detach the facelight so that the changes you made will stick, then re-attach and you good

when you have different avatars then can make a facelight specific tailored for each. And/or for different outfits/makeups

a caveat:  we can use the Point light option on the Features panel to do this also. The downside is that Point lights only work as point lights when ALM is turned on. When not they act like normal lights. So I prefer to make mine as normal lights so that the light effect is consistent across all graphics settings

[unicorncube]

3 hours ago, Mollymews said:

you might want to look again at wearing a facelight

the secret to good face lights is making them really subtle. To get the shadow wash out effect that you are wanting

not sure if you know how to make your own, so I just put here how I go about it

1) rez a prim. Name it "facelight". Take it back into inventory. Then attach it to your chin.
2) while wearing it then Edit it and move the prim out a bit in front of your face, then:
3) Object panel: set all X,Y,Z size to 0.01
4) Features panel:
- tick Light. (you will light up like a xmas tree to begin with)
- set Intensity to 0.5, Radius to 0.5, Falloff to 0.5. Leave FOV, Focus, Ambiance at 0.0
- you are now in the area of where you want to be in terms of light. So that nobody will hardly even know that you are wearing a facelight. Just that you look gorgeous
- then starting playing with the values. Tiny bit up or down depending on what effect you exactly want
- other thing is to play with moving the facelight prim, up, down, closer or further away from your face
- the other other thing is to subtley color tint the light to better match your skin/makeup. Next to the Light tick is the Color button
5) When all done, then Texture panel:
- set the prim to a Transparent texture which is in Inventory\Library, or Blank texture and set Transparency to 100

6) detach the facelight so that the changes you made will stick, then re-attach and you good

when you have different avatars then can make a facelight specific tailored for each. And/or for different outfits/makeups

a caveat:  we can use the Point light option on the Features panel to do this also. The downside is that Point lights only work as point lights when ALM is turned on. When not they act like normal lights. So I prefer to make mine as normal lights so that the light effect is consistent across all graphics settings

Thanks! I learned something new today. I had no idea how to make a facelight so this might come in handy as the previous one I bought looked awful and I deleted it. 

[Mollymews]

3 hours ago, unicorncube said:

Thanks! I learned something new today. I had no idea how to make a facelight so this might come in handy as the previous one I bought looked awful and I deleted it. 

more than likely the one you had just used the default Light values. Which has Intensity 1.0 (full strength) and Radius 10.0, which reflects light off everything within 10 meters of our avatar - xmas tree bright. It is this that gives face lights a bad reputation as xmas tree bright pretty much drives everyone nuts

[Nalates Urriah]

@unicorncube Facelights of the older type are an annoyance to other users even when done right. So, if you chose to make face lights as described above, test them with ALM on and off to be sure you aren't making too much a problem for others.

Newer facelights are made using Projectors. See http://blog.nalates.net/2016/10/04/second-life-the-new-facelight/ to understand the difference.

[Mollymews]

agree with Nalates to test any type of face light under the various graphics options.  I just mention that projectors are point lights and only work as projectors/point lights under ALM, and work like normal lights when not ALM

[BelindaN]

Can I just ask what the Advanced Lighting Model does?

Example: I have a dark red shiny dress. With ALM on, while in a club, it lost most of the red and almost looked gold, being very reflective of the surroundings.

Is it that simple?

[Theresa Tennyson]

13 hours ago, unicorncube said:

On realistic avatars, I think shadows look pretty nice on avatars but on my avatars which are cartoon-inspired I think they make the avatar look far worse than it should. Is there a preference I can fiddle with to turn avatar shadows off? Thanks in advance. 

If your avatar is modifiable and you are looking for an extremely flat "cartoon" look you can try to make your avatar and clothing full-bright. This will look odd in many places but it can be very effective in the right setting - that's how the various "brony" regions/avatars are set up in Second Life.

[Maitimo]

Another way (which will work for you, but won't affect other users) is to change your Windlight (environment) settings.

Instead of using a default mid-day, create a new Sky setting, like this.

In the World menu click Environment editor, Sky Presets and New preset

Give your new preset a name and click the Lighting tab

Click on the coloured box under "Sun-Moon color". The colour picker will pop up; choose a dark colour.

Do the same for Ambient, but choose a light colour.

Finally, tick the box "Make this preset my new sky setting" and click Save.

You can play with the levels of darkness and lightness, and the hue, to suit your preference, but colours tending towards grey will work best.  All the other settings are up to you; play with them or leave them alone, it won't matter.  The key thing is that the Ambient colour is lighter than Sun/Moon colour.

If you use Firestorm there are some presets like this already made; try "AnaLutetia - AvatarOpt" or  "Nam's Optimal Skin & Prim", but there are a few others as well.

Edited May 16, 2019 by Matty Luminos

[steeljane42]

11 hours ago, BelindaN said:

Can I just ask what the Advanced Lighting Model does?

Example: I have a dark red shiny dress. With ALM on, while in a club, it lost most of the red and almost looked gold, being very reflective of the surroundings.

Is it that simple?

Without too many tech details: you can see materials with it enabled. https://community.secondlife.com/knowledgebase/english/materials-normal-and-specular-mapping-r1352/

So leather shoes will actually look like leather, latex will look shiny and your red dress will reflect the lights (given all of them actually have materials). Depending on how item is made it can look different or absolutely plain without ALM. Unless your PC has some difficulties with having ALM on (even older/weaker machines shouldn't, if you keep shadows disabled) I wouldn't suggest turning it off ever.