Good LOD outdoor furniture and items

[Raspberry Crystal]

I've been frustrated in my search for outdoor items that have reasonable behaviour when seen at a distance. Some items seem to explode into triangles when seen from just outside my plot.

I love taking photos, and the basic linden homes behave really well when seen from afar, and it's a shame to spoil the look with flickery furniture and plants.

Not looking for miracles, or ultra low Land impact,  but something basic which doesn't fall apart when at the slightest provocation.

Any ideas?

[Elena Blossom]

Hi Rasp. Both Apple Fall and DaD work well for me, have you checked them?

[Raspberry Crystal]

42 minutes ago, Elena Core said:

Hi Rasp. Both Apple Fall and DaD work well for me, have you checked them?

Thanks Elena, I didn't realise that either of those did outdoor items, I'll give them a try!

[Elena Blossom]

Apple Fall doesnt have that much, but they have been lately releasing some rustic items that work for outdoors; DaD has some really nice ones

Also, check Moss & Mink! They have the Betty garden set, which is great

[Chic Aeon]

Agree with Apple Fall and DaD. Sway's items (very different look than those mentioned) also work well long distance and are often used in Belli builds by the Moles.  Sway's are also very low land impact.   D-Lab (also a very different style) are always good too.  

[Chic Aeon]

3 minutes ago, Elena Core said:

Apple Fall doesnt have that much, but they have been lately releasing some rustic items that work for outdoors; DaD has some really nice ones

Also, check Moss & Mink! They have the Betty garden set, which is great

To the OP.  Be sure and view any items you may want to buy from the same distance you want to see them from. For me (using LOD2 setting) the aforementioned brand's items fall apart very quickly -- Apple Fall, DaD and Sway's do not. 

 

A reminder that different people have their LOD viewer settings at different levels. If someone had their LODs set at 4 (or OMG higher) then everything will always look great even though that top setting slows and often overheats most computers).  I used LOD4 for many years not understanding that doing so was what burned up my power supplies (shakes head - how dumb).   

 

While we don't know what setting the OP uses, we do know it isn't 4 :D.   

[Elena Blossom]

True @Chic Aeon

[Raspberry Crystal]

2 hours ago, Chic Aeon said:

A reminder that different people have their LOD viewer settings at different levels. If someone had their LODs set at 4 (or OMG higher) then everything will always look great even though that top setting slows and often overheats most computers).  I used LOD4 for many years not understanding that doing so was what burned up my power supplies (shakes head - how dumb).   

 

While we don't know what setting the OP uses, we do know it isn't 4 :D.   

My LOD is 2.

It's weird to me how sometimes things in the same set can behave very differently, I bought a sofa and passed on the matching armchair because they behaved so differently at a distance, yet to look the chair seemed like the same mesh 'squished' and retextured.
My feeling is that tight curves cause a problem, see also the cushion (pillow) of doom scenario where a perfectly good couch is ruined by a ill considered accessory (which of course will have a baked on shadow behind it and somehow won't look right even if you swap the offending object for something better). 

I don't model myself, but from observation I think some creators are over ambitious when it comes to adding details and then over-compressing their model to get a low LI.

I'm grateful for all leads given, it narrows down the search!

[LittleMe Jewell]

28 minutes ago, Raspberry Crystal said:

It's weird to me how sometimes things in the same set can behave very differently, I bought a sofa and passed on the matching armchair because they behaved so differently at a distance, yet to look the chair seemed like the same mesh 'squished' and retextured.

Part of when an objects switches LOD levels is based on the size of the mesh. Chairs are smaller than sofas, so will often switch to the next lower level sooner.  

I've had similar disappointments with mesh sofas that looked good from far away, but were oversized for my avatar.  When I shrunk them down, they started disappearing sooner.   When looking at a sofa in the store, if it looks too large, then I'll check the chair and figure that a resized sofa will fall somewhere between the existing sofa and chair, as far as when it will likely start to disintegrate.

[Chic Aeon]

36 minutes ago, Raspberry Crystal said:

My LOD is 2.

It's weird to me how sometimes things in the same set can behave very differently, I bought a sofa and passed on the matching armchair because they behaved so differently at a distance, yet to look the chair seemed like the same mesh 'squished' and retextured.
My feeling is that tight curves cause a problem, see also the cushion (pillow) of doom scenario where a perfectly good couch is ruined by a ill considered accessory (which of course will have a baked on shadow behind it and somehow won't look right even if you swap the offending object for something better). 

I don't model myself, but from observation I think some creators are over ambitious when it comes to adding details and then over-compressing their model to get a low LI.

I'm grateful for all leads given, it narrows down the search!

It isn't so weird when you consider that a lot (seems like more all the time) creators are purchasing mesh  on the web (now legal so far as SL is concerned but not always legal to use in SL if the creators read the TOS of the model site :D.  

So IF they are sent the dae rather than the active files (only an assumption on my part) then whoever made the dae made the upload choices and those can't be changed. IF they actually go the active files (for Blender or Maya or whatever) then it is up to them to upload "correctly" (each creator has there own idea on this).  That is why one brand can often have a huge difference in the LODs within their brand and within a set. 

 

IF an object is joined in the software BEFORE uploading then items can still break apart - depending on whether the person uploading is testing  for viewing at lower LODs (many apparently don't)  but from my inspections of the type of objects you mention, most are comprised of MANY parts.  Logically this seems very strange -- unless of course they are simply putting together objects from different creators and adding their own textures.  There are only a few prominent brands that appear to be uploading a complete model with textures.  That is a happy anecdotal "static". Again, now all legal.  

 

Anyone that has watched the mesh board in the past know that I am really serious about having items that don't break up from a distance. Of all the things that I believe folks do wrong (notice the "I believe" part) the LODs bother me the most. BUT there is a significant part of the grid populous that runs on LOD4 and for them, those items work great. They are often high land impact because many of the models available for purchase are made for photos and not for games.    

 

I will say however that some of the folks that have this heavy mesh also have some glorious textures and a wonderful sense of style.   So I am happy they are here and I do use their items (the good LOD ones :D) sparingly. 

And the couch phenomena  follows the mesh rule that larger items will break up at a father distance than small. That is why sometimes you will notice small items with tiny transparent boxes attached to them. Those boxes "trick" the server into thinking folks can see it from farther away and so it doesn't break up as easily.   

 

OK that was Mesh Viewing 101 for the day.   Oh, one more thing since this is in the Linden Homes thread. While the Linden Home and landscaping can be very "primmy", it is because those item are meant to be seen by ALL the folks that log into SL.  That is not the case of things made for the general populous. Some creators take care to make things for LOD1 and some -- like me -- design for LOD2 but want things to be seen from LONG away.  Realistically unless some really knows what they are doing (and some of the Moles are exceptionally talented at this) it is very difficult to make those super pretty things that are ALSO low land impact and can ALSO been seen from far away.  It IS possible, but SL is  not a grid of pros being paid high wages.  

Not proofreading so just wander through my normal typos LOL.  

[Pussycat Catnap]

4 hours ago, Chic Aeon said:

A reminder that different people have their LOD viewer settings at different levels. If someone had their LODs set at 4 (or OMG higher) then everything will always look great even though that top setting slows and often overheats most computers).  I used LOD4 for many years not understanding that doing so was what burned up my power supplies (shakes head - how dumb).  

Not so dumb. Countless guides were telling us to do that and the people making those guides either didn't know themselves.

I'm not sure if it was a policy change or just the chance of me reading different sources - but the first time I saw a Linden ever explain that LOD 4 was bad was sometime after the 'M. Linden' era when they were on a project about improving the unified user experience or something - maybe as recent as 2012 - 2014 somewhere.

There are STILL a lot of resident guides / product notecards out there telling people to set it at 4...

 

Edited August 8, 2020 by Pussycat Catnap

[LittleMe Jewell]

13 minutes ago, Pussycat Catnap said:

There are STILL a lot of resident guides / product notecards out there telling people to set it at 4...

There are still TONS of notecards included in products telling people to set it to 8 or higher.  That requires debug settings in Firestorm and doesn't hold across logins -- not even sure you can set it to that in the LL viewer.  So newbies see those notecards and try to act on them, assuming that the creators of said notecards know best.

[Pussycat Catnap]

1 hour ago, LittleMe Jewell said:

There are still TONS of notecards included in products telling people to set it to 8 or higher.  That requires debug settings in Firestorm and doesn't hold across logins -- not even sure you can set it to that in the LL viewer.  So newbies see those notecards and try to act on them, assuming that the creators of said notecards know best.

Yeah, I used to recommend something like that on my blog. I rode up that hill pretty hard and argued the point.

When I found out how wrong that was and why - I changed it.

Gotta stand for what you stand for, but also move on when you learn otherwise.

Firestorm, to their credit - changed the viewer some years ago to keep dialing the LOD down on new logins. I vaguely remember when that change occurred. I "think" they were first to do it, but not sure - nonetheless it's very good that they do.

[Pussycat Catnap]

2 hours ago, Raspberry Crystal said:

It's weird to me how sometimes things in the same set can behave very differently, I bought a sofa and passed on the matching armchair because they behaved so differently at a distance, yet to look the chair seemed like the same mesh 'squished' and retextured.

I believe it's all based on settings one makes in blender and then choices made when uploading.

Modellers try all kinds of tricks to make the land impact cost lower - and one of the most popular is tossing a single triangle into some LOD values and then telling a customer to use LOD 4 so they don't see your hack.

You may have encountered a set where the different pieces of furniture were uploaded by different artists, or made some time apart, before and after a modeller learned a better way of doing things... or it could just be something weird...

I'm always suspicious of any shop that advertises something like "1 prim" or "1 land impact" and I look and cannot figure out why or how they did that - it makes me suspect there's some hack going on that is going to cost me on the GPU / CPU / fan-speed / computer temperature end...

 

Edited August 8, 2020 by Pussycat Catnap

[animats]

I recently visited a sim which has a large palace and gardens. There's lots of statuary and such. The small objects all have lowest LODs with one triangle and disappear at distance. The effect is creepy. You walk around, and stuff appears ahead of you, while other stuff disappears behind you. It's like you're being stalked.

[Fay Starlight]

wow, this was helpful---been running around on max LOD. 

Going to try a two setting.

O.o

[LittleMe Jewell]

4 hours ago, Pussycat Catnap said:

Yeah, I used to recommend something like that on my blog. I rode up that hill pretty hard and argued the point.

When I found out how wrong that was and why - I changed it.

Gotta stand for what you stand for, but also move on when you learn otherwise.

Firestorm, to their credit - changed the viewer some years ago to keep dialing the LOD down on new logins. I vaguely remember when that change occurred. I "think" they were first to do it, but not sure - nonetheless it's very good that they do.

I still sometimes bump my up to 4 when I'm doing hunts.  So many of the hunt items are horrid LOD and the only way to see them is to bump the viewer LOD setting or actually be damn near standing on top of the item.

[Syo Emerald]

I could only give a shop I would avoid...but I don't know if thats within forum rules? Their content collapsed for me even within their own store.

[Raspberry Crystal]

37 minutes ago, Syo Emerald said:

I could only give a shop I would avoid...but I don't know if thats within forum rules? Their content collapsed for me even within their own store.

I'm open to messages!

Thank you everyone for the detailed information, it really helps to have more understanding.

13 hours ago, Pussycat Catnap said:

I believe it's all based on settings one makes in blender and then choices made when uploading.

Modellers try all kinds of tricks to make the land impact cost lower - and one of the most popular is tossing a single triangle into some LOD values and then telling a customer to use LOD 4 so they don't see your hack.

 

I didn't realise that this is what was happening! I saw a thread in the main forum that said correct behaviour for long distance / small objects was a flat image, and that would be so much better than the disruptive triangles.
I bought an house addon recently which was nicely made, but the windows used (full perm retextures I believe) seemed to only have one short distance which worked properly. A flat image of the same window would have been SO much better.
I would think a lot of content creators are at the mercy of whoever made the base meshes they need to get the look required.

[Christhiana]

If you want to uphold the same standards LL/Moles use for building for (outdoors) Bellisseria you should test your LODs at a setting of 1.0
Balancing your LODs can be a lot of experimenting at first, but you will get a feeling for it after a while.
I Myself try to have no visible LOD switching at a LOD factor of 2 and make sure things still look good at a setting of 1.0 with a 256m viewing distance.

 

[LittleMe Jewell]

I understand (mostly) the reasons for why objects disappear or start breaking up at various distances.  

Maybe someone can explain the opposite -- why some items disappear as I zoom in on them.

[Chic Aeon]

7 hours ago, Christhiana said:

If you want to uphold the same standards LL/Moles use for building for (outdoors) Bellisseria you should test your LODs at a setting of 1.0
Balancing your LODs can be a lot of experimenting at first, but you will get a feeling for it after a while.
I Myself try to have no visible LOD switching at a LOD factor of 2 and make sure things still look good at a setting of 1.0 with a 256m viewing distance.

 

OK. LOL.  I am going to ASSUME you are talking about houses?   You can't actually see a vase of flowers across a whole sim.  I too make things for LOD2 but they are viewable most of the time from a longer distance than "needed".  As someone noted there really needs to be a balance. 

 

Since you mention the Moles, I went over to Belli to test. I can certainly see the houses at 256 with LOD2 and LOD1 and the trees. I cannot see ANY LINDEN PLANTS in the far distance at LOD2 let alone LOD1.   But do we really need to see the pretty hydrangias and roses all the way across the sim? Do we need to see the benches?   We can't see small detailed objects in the real world at that distance. 

 

I just want to be clear for folks trying to understand. 

 

Let's look at the Mole trees with spectacular LODs.    Those trees are up to 119 land impact.  If a CREATOR (even if just using it themselves and not selling) made items on that "primmy" scale -- the would never sell. Or only to maybe 3 percent of the populous that have 30,000 land impact to play with.   If I can see something half way across a sim I am pretty happy. This includes smallish objects like cars (hard to find those) and bushes etc.  At the same time, someone might be very happy with items that are low land impact and that DO fall apart quickly --- this if they were only going to use them in a 1024 surround setting.   

 

Quite a few creators are now making both high and low land impact items (outdoor furniture mostly) for that reason.  

[Fay Starlight]

On 8/8/2020 at 11:25 AM, Pussycat Catnap said:

Not so dumb. Countless guides were telling us to do that and the people making those guides either didn't know themselves.

I'm not sure if it was a policy change or just the chance of me reading different sources - but the first time I saw a Linden ever explain that LOD 4 was bad was sometime after the 'M. Linden' era when they were on a project about improving the unified user experience or something - maybe as recent as 2012 - 2014 somewhere.

There are STILL a lot of resident guides / product notecards out there telling people to set it at 4...

 

Yes I have seen a few notecard with instructions to crank the LOD to highest setting ---so I have been

Edited August 9, 2020 by Fay Starlight

[Christhiana]

3 hours ago, Chic Aeon said:

OK. LOL.  I am going to ASSUME you are talking about houses?   You can't actually see a vase of flowers across a whole sim.  I too make things for LOD2 but they are viewable most of the time from a longer distance than "needed".  As someone noted there really needs to be a balance. 

That viewing distance was my personal viewing distance I test at. And of course a vase or small item doesn't have to be seen from that distance, but I do check that smaller items fade away into the distance nicely. 

 

 

[Raspberry Crystal]

14 hours ago, Chic Aeon said:

 

 

Quite a few creators are now making both high and low land impact items (outdoor furniture mostly) for that reason.  

Ooh who (and how do I search for that?)

@Christhiana 'fading away nicely' is a huge bonus. After more furniture poking around I realise that disappearing altogether looks a lot better than creating photo ruining jagged triangles. I have one of your house shells btw, and it works wonderfully.