PBR Materials @SL University

[Arielle Popstar]

A video here showing the PBR Materials in the Beta Grid

Some interesting effects but do you think it is a worthy tradeoff to some other basic features they could have worked on instead?

[LittleMe Jewell]

 

[Arielle Popstar]

7 minutes ago, LittleMe Jewell said:

 

This is asking whether residents think it is a worthy tradeoff to some other basic features they could have worked on instead?

That would have been off topic for the other thread.

[Coffee Pancake]

15 hours ago, Arielle Popstar said:

Some interesting effects but do you think it is a worthy tradeoff to some other basic features they could have worked on instead?

PBR is a major step forward for the platform and a precursor to vulkan. It's an industry standard and having it here streamlines creator workflows.

There is nothing more important than this right now and they should have started work on it years ago.

[bigmoe Whitfield]

I created a video of the real time reflections lastnight,  while it needs some tweaking and from what I saw of other builds, and it did not tank my fps any,  I'm okay with this.

[Love Zhaoying]

11 minutes ago, bigmoe Whitfield said:

I created a video of the real time reflections lastnight,  while it needs some tweaking and from what I saw of other builds, and it did not tank my fps any,  I'm okay with this.

/me Grabs a tail brush and stalks you in the video!

[EliseAnne85]

20 hours ago, Arielle Popstar said:

A video here showing the PBR Materials in the Beta Grid

Some interesting effects but do you think it is a worthy tradeoff to some other basic features they could have worked on instead?

Other features such as what, Arielle?  You didn't say.  As far as PBR, it's too early to tell.  Two photos I'm placing below don't thrill me that much but the round ball just has a brass texture on it, no PBR materials yet.  Also, in the video, it says that they hope content creator's will go to the Beta grid (I assume that's Aditi) and test some things out and just play around with it.  When Strawberry Linden asked for a release date, they said 'no definite date for a PBR viewer, just a kind of when it's ready, it's ready' answer.  So, things look nascent here per the photos I took.  But, again, what other things Arielle, I can't mind read what you thinking.

[LittleMe Jewell]

The one thing I know is that folks have been asking for real reflections since waaaaaaaaaaaaay back.

[EliseAnne85]

I haven't listened to the whole video yet...it's a little over a half an hour long.  One thing they kept bringing up was SUBSTANCE PAINTER.  I don't have SUBSTANCE PAINTER but I know it's something like 50 dollars a month.  There seems to be a free SUBSTANCE PAINTER one can sign up for but it's for students and teachers.  I find 50 dollars a month kind of a lot of money for me right now.  

[Arielle Popstar]

7 hours ago, Coffee Pancake said:

PBR is a major step forward for the platform and a precursor to vulkan. It's an industry standard and having it here streamlines creator workflows.

There is nothing more important than this right now and they should have started work on it years ago.

We have lived without it for this long so I am sure we could go a little longer while they go back and put in some basic viewer features that would be helpful to normal residents rather then always focusing major upgrades to the minority of high end content creators. The most important thing the Lab needs to be focusing on it new user retention, not pretty glowing metal balls that may or may not reflect the exterior.

[Arielle Popstar]

2 hours ago, LittleMe Jewell said:

The one thing I know is that folks have been asking for real reflections since waaaaaaaaaaaaay back.

Yes and that would be nice but when watching from about 19 minutes in it sounds like a hit and miss and to what will actually be reflected.

[Arielle Popstar]

2 hours ago, EliseAnne85 said:

Other features such as what, Arielle?  You didn't say.  As far as PBR, it's too early to tell.  Two photos I'm placing below don't thrill me that much but the round ball just has a brass texture on it, no PBR materials yet.  Also, in the video, it says that they hope content creator's will go to the Beta grid (I assume that's Aditi) and test some things out and just play around with it.  When Strawberry Linden asked for a release date, they said 'no definite date for a PBR viewer, just a kind of when it's ready, it's ready' answer.  So, things look nascent here per the photos I took.  But, again, what other things Arielle, I can't mind read what you thinking.

Plenty of things have been mentioned as potential upgrades to benefit the regular resident like enhanced inworld building tools, a Backspace/revert function in the viewer, a better Inventory UI. An easier more streamlined demo and shopping experience, better marketplace functions, etc etc. A number of those would have a much greater effect on our overall inworld experience and even a boon to the creator then prettier lights and reflections.

2 hours ago, EliseAnne85 said:

I haven't listened to the whole video yet...it's a little over a half an hour long.  One thing they kept bringing up was SUBSTANCE PAINTER.  I don't have SUBSTANCE PAINTER but I know it's something like 50 dollars a month.  There seems to be a free SUBSTANCE PAINTER one can sign up for but it's for students and teachers.  I find 50 dollars a month kind of a lot of money for me right now.  

If so then it will be a feature only accessible to a minority of high end creators and developers.

Edited February 11, 2023 by Arielle Popstar

[benchthis]

14 minutes ago, Arielle Popstar said:

We have lived without it for this long so I am sure we could go a little longer while they go back and put in some basic viewer features that would be helpful to normal residents rather then always focusing major upgrades to the minority of high end content creators. The most important thing the Lab needs to be focusing on it new user retention, not pretty glowing metal balls that may or may not reflect the exterior.

these are not just glowing metal balls. imagine geometic wallpaper patterns with metallic and reflection, flooring. When new residents see the power of PBR they will stick around.  

[Arielle Popstar]

1 minute ago, benchthis said:

these are not just glowing metal balls. imagine geometic wallpaper patterns with metallic and reflection, flooring. When new residents see the power of PBR they will stick around.  

You really think people leave because S/L isn't pretty enough as it already is? What other user created world has the ability to look as good as S/L can be made to now already?

[benchthis]

You'll notice PBR in this video in the ballroom on the floor mostly but disney's latest creations it's all over the place and it looks beautiful. 

 

Edited February 11, 2023 by benchthis

[benchthis]

17 minutes ago, Arielle Popstar said:

2 hours ago, EliseAnne85 said:

I haven't listened to the whole video yet...it's a little over a half an hour long.  One thing they kept bringing up was SUBSTANCE PAINTER.  I don't have SUBSTANCE PAINTER but I know it's something like 50 dollars a month.  There seems to be a free SUBSTANCE PAINTER one can sign up for but it's for students and teachers.  I find 50 dollars a month kind of a lot of money for me right now.  

If so then it will be a feature only accessible to a minority of high end creators and developers.

I personally use ipad pro with apple pencil and dabble with the affordable app called procreate and also got into nomad. There's bunch of programs that do not require subscriptions that are affordable. Procrate added I think it was last year where users can paint directly on 3D objects and get the UV Map from procreate  Sculpt in nomad put that file in procreate paint it back n forth. Tedious. Everything is tedious. Even Ipad pros and pencils are coming down in price some of the newer ipads support procreate without being pro. 

[Orwar]

2 hours ago, EliseAnne85 said:

One thing they kept bringing up was SUBSTANCE PAINTER.  I don't have SUBSTANCE PAINTER but I know it's something like 50 dollars a month.  There seems to be a free SUBSTANCE PAINTER one can sign up for but it's for students and teachers.  I find 50 dollars a month kind of a lot of money for me right now.  

   Substance Painter isn't the only program available though, it's the 'industry standard' much like Photoshop (which is also too pricey for a lot of people). You can do the same stuff in Blender, which is free, but the workflow is a bit more fiddly, or Agama which is also a free program for creating PBR materials.

[Rick Nightingale]

Yes, there are alternatives. Adobe's offering is way out of my league.

What I think would be useful from LL, rather than a "look at this shiny" video is a tutorial on using Blender to make PBR materials. It's a pig to get your head around, and having it explained step by step by someone from LL, so that it is LL specific, would be invaluable to many.

Substance painter is fine for those who earn big bucks in SL already, but if LL just focuses on that it leaves many of the rest of us out in the cold and stumbling around in the dark.

Edited February 11, 2023 by Rick Daylight

[benchthis]

This has some pretty good demonistrations of what PBR will look like. The cool thing about how SL is doing it is way easier for me to understand than setting it up in blender. I never learned PBR in blender because of the nods and was too confusing. With this SL system at least I was able to create my first PBR material today. That's crazy cool. They're goal is to make it user friendly. I don't have substance painter. I moded a material I had but just goofing around. Getting the material file was little wonky. 

I started watching this lots of pretty things PBR this uploaded 7 years ago. 

  

[EliseAnne85]

36 minutes ago, Orwar said:

   Substance Painter isn't the only program available though, it's the 'industry standard' much like Photoshop (which is also too pricey for a lot of people). You can do the same stuff in Blender, which is free, but the workflow is a bit more fiddly, or Agama which is also a free program for creating PBR materials.

Yeah, I've looked around for free ones.  But, I hate Blender and it hates me.  I have always been a Photoshop person.  I'm searching now how to make PBR in Photoshop wherein I'm still in the totally confused stage.

This is all so new.  I don't want to spend time on learning a whole other program personally.  I've heard PBR is easy.  So something may turn up for those of us who cannot afford SUBSTANCE PAINTER.  Fifty dollars a month in a high inflationary environment is just too much.  But, thanks for adding free choices.  I'll look into Agama.

[benchthis]

Here's some more PBR eye candy.

 

[Fluffy Sharkfin]

49 minutes ago, Arielle Popstar said:

You really think people leave because S/L isn't pretty enough as it already is? What other user created world has the ability to look as good as S/L can be made to now already?

I doubt new users care who created the world any more than they care about the individual designers and developers responsible for creating whatever game they buy next, they're probably more concerned with how it looks.

16 minutes ago, Rick Daylight said:

Substance painter is fine for those who earn big bucks in SL already, but if LL just focuses on that it leaves many of the rest of us out in the cold and stumbling around in the dark.

Substance Painter is great for game developers and production studios, especially where there's a need to maintain continuity while texturing a large number of assets, however you also need to learn to use Substance Designer (which is the app used to create materials/substances) otherwise you're limited to pre-existing materials available in the PBR library and essentially texturing becomes a matter of dragging and dropping presets, masking and layering and the tweaking of a seemingly endless number of sliders.

4 minutes ago, EliseAnne85 said:

Yeah, I've looked around for free ones.  But, I hate Blender and it hates me.  I have always been a Photoshop person.  I'm searching now how to make PBR in Photoshop wherein I'm still in the totally confused stage.

I'd definitely recommend 3DCoat Textura to anyone wanting to work with PBR materials, especially if they want to do any hand painting and/or have experience with Photoshop since there are a lot of similarities between the two in terms of features and workflow (also at €95 for a full license,  6 x €20 payments for rent to own or €10 a month subscription the price is far more reasonable).

There are other alternatives to Substance Painter so if 3D Coat doesn't appeal you could always try something like ArmorPaint or Quixel Mixer

 

[Rick Nightingale]

Well if we're posting glamour shots... I just made my first PBR material using Blender, from a wooden panel model I made ages ago. It's applied to a flat panel here, as it is in the Medium and lower LODs. The High LOD model is the detailed 3D model that the material was baked from to use on the lower models. You can't see the change when it swaps from the actual, 3D panel to the flat one. It needs a bit of tweaking - the inset vertical slots at the top are a bit too reflective in the PBR version; in my old version they look darker and not reflective. Not a bad start though.

 

and the 'real thing' - the detailed high LOD model, with the same PBR material on it:

 

Edited February 11, 2023 by Rick Daylight

[Gavin Hird]

While PBR can be used to create both lifelike and beautiful content, it is another rev on removing content creation from inside of SecondLife to subscription based software that is beyond the reach of many residents; both for financial and technical reason.  SecondLife becomes more and more the doll house where you place your shiny things and puppets, and not the collective building experience that enticed so many in the beginning. 

[Love Zhaoying]

1 minute ago, Gavin Hird said:

While PBR can be used to create both lifelike and beautiful content, it is another rev on removing content creation from inside of SecondLife to subscription based software that is beyond the reach of many residents; both for financial and technical reason.  SecondLife becomes more and more the doll house where you place your shiny things and puppets, and not the collective building experience that enticed so many in the beginning. 

..no?