Linden Home Decorating - LOD Discussion

[LittleMe Jewell]

I know we've talked about this -- likely in a variety of threads here - but I cannot seem to find any of those conversations.  I try to save posts that I might want to refer back to, but apparently I didn't with this topic.

We all want to save on LI as much as we can.  However, I also don't want my items breaking up too soon. 

I'm looking at the pergolas that I added to the back and trying to figure out if I should replace them with something else, though I love the soft look the fabric gives them.  The first picture below shows them at about the furthest distance I can cam out without either of them breaking up.  The second picture is then cammed out until just before the lower one breaks up -- it is larger, so it breaks up later than the first.  The final picture then shows the closest distance at which they both break up.  I didn't actually measure the distance of any of these picture points, but the view of the surrounding area should give you a rough idea of distance.  The pictures were all taken with my LOD set at 1.5, which I think is the default for the SL viewer.

 

 

 

Do you care how quickly things break up for others or are you really only concerned with how it looks to you viewer with your typical settings?  If you do try to keep things looking good for others, I'm interested in what you consider to be an acceptable break-up distance.   Do you accept a quicker break-up point for landscaping/decorating items versus the actual home architectural pieces (even the LL smaller landscaping items are visible from quite far away)? 

Any opinions on whether I should replace one or both of the pergolas, despite how much I like them?

[karynmaria]

Well I can admit that I do get annoyed when things break up,  but sometimes I think that is because my draw distance is set too low.  I do like my place to look nice for others, but at the end of the day I am the one that has to be happy with the look of it and how much the breakup annoys me.

Right now I am just trying to get my house decorated the way I like it with the things I have now.  I think once I finally settle on a look and style I will try to buy other things that have better LOD.

Personally, I think if you like the pergolas you should keep them.

Edited September 7, 2019 by karynmaria

[Clara Hollyberry]

I like your pergola. I wouldn't be looking at them (or anything) any further away than 100m anyway. What's close to me is what I am focused on. I would keep the pergola.

[Chic Aeon]

One of my neighbors had a pergola with drapery (not sure it was that one and don't know who makes it :D). It seemed to break up much faster than yours. I run at LOD2 and "I" like to see things form far away.   When I was running LEA6 I tried to be especially careful as there were new folks there with the Linden viewer and the 1.25 default LOD setting (at least at that time).

 

But even when it is just ME in my desert pad, I don't want things to break up. Honestly LODs are my pet peeve -- way above too heavy textures (they do actually load eventually for most everyone) or even heavy mesh. All are "bad" but the LODs  BREAK THE IMMERSION (a common saying from Sansar where VR immersion is everything).   We don't think about that as much here in SL, but when you DO think about it you can see the importance. Anything that disrupts the "fantasy" and jars you into remembering that you are not really THERE but on your keyboard  --- well not good.

 

I very quickly blacklisted my neighbor's draped pergola so I don't know if it is still there.  :D.    Now to be fair, most folks aren't going to be camming around in the sky like an airplane (well a lot of us do but that really isn't all the REALISTIC so I will put that part further down on my personal list).  A better test would be to drive up to your house from various directions and look and see what you neighbors see.  Note what the person behind you sees from their back yard.   Test at LOD2 for sure (Firestorm default) and 1.25 if you are brave.  Linden Lab went to a lot of work to make the trees and houses and such long distance so it seems like we should at least TRY to do a good job outside LOL.     

 

One trick that can be used is to semi- hide cute but poorly made items  behind something else or inside a partially enclosed area so that people will most likely see it from a CLOSE distance and not far away anyway.  You can also hide some things (not your pergola) with bushes and trees so people see THOSE things from a distance with the LODs being fine up close.  You can also make things LARGER (bushes and such) and that will usually help the breakup. It of course usually increases your land impact too. 

 

 

[Marianne Little]

I have seen worse. I have seen things break up when I have LOD set to 2 or 3 or even 4.

And yours is visible quite a bit away.

I think that people who fly over is not my concern. I care more about what people who pass by on the ground can see. I believe trees and other builds hide your pergolas until they are so close that there is no LOD issues.

It is so many things we can't control. Draw distance, graphic card, performance. Over in General Discussions, one want recommendations for a 100 USD laptop for SL. I think only old school prims can show up clearly on one of those.

I suppose my conclusion is... keep them.

 

Edited September 7, 2019 by Marianne Little
removed some odd words

[Brat Spicy]

Very annoying indeed. Personally I would keep them, they are great. My LOD rule is that I have to see all what i have on my plot (from corner to corner), because some stuff even breaks if you a inch away... Drives me nuts.

I don't care about what others see. With that said, I do sometimes derender bad LOD stuff my neighbours have, simply because that mess annoys me.

[Sylvia Tamalyn]

I vote you should keep them. I think the distance at which they still look good at that low LOD setting is quite acceptable. More important to me is the fact that you LIKE them. 

(I have a recliner that breaks up at LOD 4 when looked at from down a short hallway, but I don't care. I like that chair, so it stays)

[LittleMe Jewell]

1 hour ago, Chic Aeon said:

A better test would be to drive up to your house from various directions and look and see what you neighbors see.  Note what the person behind you sees from their back yard. 

Good idea.   Luckily I live in one of the original areas that is close to a low mountain range.  Thus it was decorated with a lot of trees, so not much in the way of long distance open views - which I personally love. Since that part is the back of the house, nothing back there is visible from the front walkway.  Walking all around the house, both pergolas are visible from decent ranges from most spots where Linden trees are not blocking the view.  The only exceptions are one view from outside one corner of the yard and one spot along one side of the yard, where both lose the upper pergola - and both of those spots happen to be a littler sparser on trees than the rest of the area around me.  A couple of trees of my own will take care of that.

If I bump my LOD setting to 2, there is no ground level view that loses them - mostly because any view far enough away to have them break up is obscured by the Linden trees.  At LOD of 2, they only break up from above and then not until about 125 m high.  

Thus I'm happy enough and will keep them - at least until I see something that grabs me more.

Edited September 7, 2019 by LittleMe Jewell

[Beth Macbain]

I barely even know what LOD is other than I keep mine on 4 whatever that means.

Does my place look good to me? Yep! Does it look good to others? I have no idea since I'm not others. I don't think all that many people really pay attention, and if they are, chances are they're going to cam in close to take a look at things anyway. 

[Blush Bravin]

When I'm building a structure I will cam out pretty far to be sure that all exterior portions of the build do not poof or distort too quickly. But when it comes to deco objects in my yard I'm not likely to check for distance. I want to be able to walk across the street from my house and not have my flowers, bushes, or trees poofing or distorting, but I'm not checking from two or three doors down. That's just too far. I don't normally set my view range much more than 80 meters anyway when I'm just hanging out at home. I don't really care too much about my neighbors things poofing to be honest. I'm much more concerned about them having too many high rez textures causing my performance to drop than I am about mesh that poofs. I keep my LOD set to 2 btw. When I see a creator include a note instructing the purchaser to set LOD to 4 in order for the mesh to rez properly, it's a red flag telling me to skip that purchase.

[Raspberry Crystal]

Poor LOD exterior stuff drives me nuts! Belli has raised my expectations. I would be happy to cut down on the number of objects I have in order to get more robust trees etc. @LittleMe Jewell your add-ons are working a lot better than many yard horrors I see (including my own). What can we do?

[Marianne Little]

15 minutes ago, Raspberry Crystal said:

Poor LOD exterior stuff drives me nuts! Belli has raised my expectations. I would be happy to cut down on the number of objects I have in order to get more robust trees etc. @LittleMe Jewell your add-ons are working a lot better than many yard horrors I see (including my own). What can we do?

I miss having a place to look at demos. Only Bellisseria residents can build add-ons. I saw some models of the houses on the Marketplace, but they don't look detailed enough for add-ons. And it's not allowed for us to use the parcels for selling.

It is only possible to see issues if we can see it before we buy. Or read honest interviews. Many people use LOD 4 all the time, so they don't see it, or they don't think what others can see, is an issue. I am more or less one of the latter ones, though I have some standards.

I saw a very cheap full permissions script on the MP. It makes an object delete itself after the amount of time you set in the script. Maybe demos like that would help. But only responsible sellers would offer a demo.

[Blush Bravin]

4 hours ago, Marianne Little said:

I miss having a place to look at demos. Only Bellisseria residents can build add-ons. I saw some models of the houses on the Marketplace, but they don't look detailed enough for add-ons. And it's not allowed for us to use the parcels for selling.

It is only possible to see issues if we can see it before we buy. Or read honest interviews. Many people use LOD 4 all the time, so they don't see it, or they don't think what others can see, is an issue. I am more or less one of the latter ones, though I have some standards.

I saw a very cheap full permissions script on the MP. It makes an object delete itself after the amount of time you set in the script. Maybe demos like that would help. But only responsible sellers would offer a demo.

I imagine that creators have demo rezzers at their shops. I know I do. You can go to the shop rez the demo and then see how far out you can cam before the thing poofs. If there is no in-world display of the product I'm not so sure I would buy it.

[Alyona Su]

I think it's an acceptable distance before break-up - farther away would be better, surely. But that's an acceptable distance and it also breaks apart gracefully. It's when things fall apart at 30 meters or less, or when large items (the main feature) falls apart like most of the laughably giant yachts in Blake Sea, etc. As for building components, there isn't always a demo to see (such as add-ons like this) - and even then, depending how they are displayed can make it difficult to check LOD (in a showroom, for example, preventing you from camping far away, etc.

The reason I say the OP example is acceptable is even when flying over, it seems to appear at a decent distance. It's funny when thing s pop into view right when you're on top of them. Of course, "acceptable" doesn't't mean "wanted" - so if you're like me then yes: find another LOL

[Blush Bravin]

2 hours ago, Alyona Su said:

As for building components, there isn't always a demo to see (such as add-ons like this) - and even then, depending how they are displayed can make it difficult to check LOD (in a showroom, for example, preventing you from camping far away, etc.

I'd derez that showroom so I could cam out as far as I like. Heck I derez a lot of stuff when shopping because I'm not there to look at the "pretty" surroundings. I want to see the product I'm interested in purchasing.

[LittleMe Jewell]

12 minutes ago, Blush Bravin said:

I'd derez that showroom so I could cam out as far as I like. Heck I derez a lot of stuff when shopping because I'm not there to look at the "pretty" surroundings. I want to see the product I'm interested in purchasing.

I do this all the time.  Whether at an event or someone's store, if I derez everything getting in the way of me camming out however far I want to go.  I really need a hotkey for derendering so I can just click something and hit the single key and it is gone.

[Morena Tully]

LOD only matters to me on outside things. It seems your pergola is fine, really. From the distance it's breaking up at your low setting, someone's focus would be on something closer anyway. One thing I am seeing more of, that I absolutely love, is creators including 2 versions when you buy.. Low LOD for low LI, or higher for higher LI. My latest was a little dock. I could use the 2LI one, but opted for the 9LI one, so it wouldn't be a triangle to passing boats. If all creators gave us this option, SL would be so much easier to decorate. I know it's a little more work, but is it really so much more?

[Raevyn Addams]

On 9/8/2019 at 3:58 AM, Marianne Little said:

I think that people who fly over is not my concern. I care more about what people who pass by on the ground can see. I believe trees and other builds hide your pergolas until they are so close that there is no LOD issues.

^ I pretty much agree with this.

My LOD is kept at 2 so I build to that. I can't control what others do or what settings they have and I'd certainly go mad trying to accommodate for all, so I see 2 as a good middle ground in my personal opinion. I'm also conscious of what my neighbours see or those passing by since there is a steady stream of traffic in the region I live, but I don't really think about those flying overhead; it's more the ground or water travelers I'm considering. It doesn't do well to cam around and see jagged triangles everywhere, especially when bumping up DD or LOD can be a laggy or crashy exercise. Internal walls or even outside decor (providing it's not too obvious) aren't as big an issue as I doubt people are generally looking inside from too far away, but again as a general rule of thumb I stick to a LOD of 2 just in case. Of course it's also a matter of weighing up LOD and LI too since higher LOD's tend to be heavier LI. When I buy items I'm conscious of the LI as well as the LOD, so if I personally think something is "too heavy" in prims but is really cheap I still won't buy it. I'd rather spend extra to have the extra prims and a reasonable LOD. Not everyone would. It's trying to strike a balance I'm happy to live with and something I think my neighbours could tolerate too.

These are as far as I can cam out with my extensions before they crumble (wrap-around porch, top patio half-roof, brick entertainment area fence, fire pit).

^ LOD 1.25, DD 160 

^ LOD 2, DD 160

The wrap-around porch holds steady as it is the largest so the last to crumble. The top patio half-roof and side brick fence crumble first. While I don't like the fact any of it crumbles I think ensuring the largest section (the wrap-around porch) is seen from a reasonable distance is more important. As people we don't generally have the ability to see 300 meters ahead of us in clear detail, so I take that approach to builds. Maybe not everyone agrees. Reasonable is subjective and a matter of personal opinion I suppose.

For the record one of my neighbours have that same (or very similar) pergola you mentioned in your OP (you can see it right there above the orange tree middle/bottom of the pictures). The LOD is pretty shoddy. But to be honest I don't often cam out from afar looking in. From my home and yard  see no issue. It would be different if I were flying overhead or looking over from the beach or pool perhaps. Honestly though I don't think everyone really cares about what others see, just what they themselves can see. 🤔

Forgot to add that I also agree that if you like your pergolas you should keep them. It's all about what you can live with or think is acceptable after all.

Edited September 9, 2019 by RaeLeeH
Forgot to answer question!