new to building, need some advice :)

[benneh]

hey everyone, i decided i might try to make models for Second Life after a friend suggested it to me

 

i have 2 years experience with 3DSMax so i know my way around it and have that side of things covered, i can install the exporter and do that, so thats covered

 

because im new to second life and its building side, i need a little advice on a few things

is there a way to preview a model before you pay to upload to second life? or is it just a case of make sure its right first time before uploading?

 

also if i make objects for an avatars accessories, how will i know theyre placed correctly if i want to sell them? do accessories need any coding or can they be simple prims?

 

any advice would be appreciated on starting building :)

 

thanks

[Identity Euler]

Hi,

It is great that you are interested in creation in Second Life!

Yes, you can preview your creations for free on beta grid called Aditi. At the moment you can even preview mesh there. The files for mesh are Collada files (.dae). If you want to import mesh you need to find Mesh sandbox on Aditi.

You can sell your creations on Marketplace. You can adjust prim to avatar and the position of prims will be the same when other person attach it. However please keep in mind that you will have to deal with scripts also eg  scripts for resize or color change. There are ready scripts for creators to buy but you need to check it. When all is ready you just pack it into one prim/box and sell it at Marketplace. The person who  buys it unpack the box and have all prims in one folder and can attach them. I highly recommend to see Torley's tutorials about Second Life on youtube. There are also very well organized help groups for builders. I would recommend Builders Brewery.

In your case you will be much more developed in 3D design but you will lack of basic information about creation in Second Life. You can catch up with tutorials available on youtube. You should also love SL wiki available here.

[benneh]

ah thanks for your helpful response!

i looked up Aditi but couldnt find anything like a viewer or a mesh sandbox? what i found was a company, is that right or have i found the wrong place

 

also, ive got PrimComposer for 3DSMax, do i need to model using prims, or can i model normally and convert to prim or use it as a mesh?

 

[EDIT]

oh wait..i searched Aditi and found it in game, maybe i took it a little too seriously about searching haha

 

how would i upload somthing to SL for free? when i look under the "Build" toolbar, under upload the only one i can select is Bulk, and PrimComposer exported a .hpa which is unrecognised by the upload thing

 

i think i went wrong somewhere..

[Luc Starsider]

Hi benneh.

Welcome to SL. Identity are right about mesh in SL. The wiki she linked to have lots of information. Here is a link to the mesh page on the wiki.

Also, check out the mesh forum right here in the community. Tons of info available, for any 3d program.

When you get as far as logging in to Aditi to look at and try to upload models, you want to search for one of the Mesh enabled sandboxes. (Just type mesh in search and you should find them without problems.)

Good luck!

- Luc -

[benneh]

thanks for your reply luc, i looked at the wiki page and it says to change my password with AGNI to get onto Aditi? what does it mean by this?

also i found a thread through google with links to aditi maps, but im not sure how to connect to such adressess

how could i connect to an adress like this: secondlife://Aditi/secondlife/Mesh Sandbox 13/

[Drongle McMahon]

If it's mesh you are interested in, you need to know that they are not yet available on the main grid, which is called Agni. They have been in development for more than 18 months. We are hoping they will come to the main grid soon.

To start experimenting, you need to use a special mesh-enabled version of the development viewer. This can be found at http://automated-builds-secondlife-com.s3.amazonaws.com/hg/repo/mesh-development/latest.html. It is rebuilt several times a day and may have bugs. Then you need to log in to the beta grid, called Aditi. You can do this by selecting advanced mode in the viewer, telling it, in Me->Preferences to show login grid choice on the login screen, and selecting Aditi in the drop-down list that appears. Finally, you have to teleport to a mesh-enabled region. These can be found by searching for "mesh" in the World Map. Go to one called Mesh Sandbox ...

However, before you do any of that, you would be well advised to read all you can stomach from the links on the mesh wiki page, http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Mesh. This is all quite a bit out-of-date, especially the details of the upload mesh dialog (and the new simplified wizard), but still has useful information. These two can be invoked from the Build menu; Build->Upload->Model (wizard). You might also like to read some stuff from the mesh forum here. Best of all, you can look at the (not yet complete but still very worthwhile) mesh tutorials at the Machinimatrix site.

If you want to use the strange but ingenious simplified meshes, specific to SL, called sculpted prims, or sculpties, you can find out about those at Machinimatrix too. These can be used on the main grid too, but there is quite a lot to learn before you can make good ones, even for the experienced meshonaut.

PS. If you haven't been in world yet, you should also download the standard viewer (they can co-exist) to wander around the main grid a bit to see what's going on.

[benneh]

ah you are a life saver, this is what i needed to know! i wasnt aware about the grid names, ill get downloading and reading on all this!

 

thank you so much for the help drongle and everyone else