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How to Create Signs W/ PowerPoint?


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Someone suggested making signs using PowerPoint (I think either Void Singer or Rolig Loon). It works pretty well, just create a slide and then do "save as" in png or jpg format. The problem occurs when it is uploaded into SL as a texture. The text appear fine on the uploaded texture, but the rest of the texture is completely transparent. I would prefer the texture to be opaque. What technique should be used for getting an opaque texture out of PowerPoint?

In addition, how long do temporary textures last? They seem to last forever so long as they have been applied to an object. I guess the texture disappears if the object is transferred to someone else? 

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If you don't want any transparency, put an opaque background layer under everything and be sure to save your file as a 24-bit image, not a 32-bit one.

Temporary images will remain until the next time you clear cache.  They are temporary (and free) because they were never uploaded to the servers.  You have been loading them to your graphics card directly from your cache.

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With respect to transparency, I did save as jpeg and that eliminated the transparency problem. However, the images are being uploaded as 1024x512 textures, which I believe is wasteful for just a few lines of text. I looked at one of the images with Irfanview and it said it was 960x740 pixels. Should I resample the images down to 512x256 pixels and then upload?

The temporary images do not seem to be affected by clearing the cache. I clicked on clear cache in Phoenix and restarted and all the temporary images are still there except for one (I uploaded about 20 temporary images). I also logged in with an alt from another computer and all the temporary images were visible to the alt except for the foregoing one temporary image.

If temporary images are being loaded from my cache, doesn't that mean only my avatar is supposed to be able to see the images and nobody else?

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Yes, that's WAY bigger than a texture needs to be for a normal sign.  Unless you have an incredible amount of text (in which case nobody is going to take time to read your sign), you should be able to get away with a texture that is 512 x 256 or even smaller.

As for viewing the temporary textures, remember that you and your alt are sharing the same graphics card and its cache.  If you can see the textures, so can s/he.  Why didn't clearing cach eliminate the textures? I don't know. Maybe your system has a reserve cache that isn't completely cleared??  You've got me. :smileysurprised:

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There is something I am not understanding about temporary textures. I used an alt from a different computer, so I don't see how a cache could be shared, unless the cache is on an LL server and the alt was connected to my primary avatar. I also had a friend visit and the temporary textures were visible to her, and she lives on another continent.

I've noticed with temporary textures, I cannot add them to the inventory of a prim. However, I can put the texture on an object, and put the object in another prim. 

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What I have done in the past was not to load any Power Points screen shots but to create a separate gmail account where I used only for PowerPoints presentations. I, then used the media functionality on the prim which gives direct link to the presentation itself.

Still, this is probably not what you had in mind... it worked for me though.

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Is the media on a prim feature available for all viewers? It might work for some of what I am working on. Some of it is like a PowerPoint presentation with a couple of slides. The rest comprises photos with a plaque providing a brief explanation for each photo.

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Randall Ahren wrote:

Is the media on a prim feature available for all viewers? It might work for some of what I am working on. Some of it is like a PowerPoint presentation with a couple of slides. The rest comprises photos with a plaque providing a brief explanation for each photo.

Hi, full shared media is only really in 2.x viewers. The old parcel media will be in all viewers, it can perform some web functions but without the floating control bar.

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This feature was implemented early 2010 in V2. I don't know much about other viewers but I believe you could do it with Phoenix and Kirstens (I could still be wrong). The easiest way to know this is if the person could do a web search on a prim. Sometimes I logged in to the forums using this same function while building in-world.

You could check with whatever viewers you installed right now and create a prim. The function is under the Texture tab.

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