Low LI Jungle Landscaping?

[Piikoi]

I love really dense jungle landscapes in RL. I've seen some fun ones in SL, but when trying to landscape my place I find that the trees, bushes, etc add up super quickly and I max out on LI allowed in the parcel. I don't even really care too much about a house, just give me a little clearing in a thick jungle. Can anyone recommend any low-prim jungle landscaping stores? Most of the stores I've seen have very old nearly 2-D builds, specific tree varieties that are high-LI or no copy, or "fantasy" forest items. All of these can be pretty, but I'd really like to find some lower impact stuff that looks closer to the real deal.

A friend recommended that I surround my parcel with a jungle background, in hopes that this might allow for less landscaping (so I would stay within my LI cap), but I want to be a good neighbor to the fine folks in my sim and not put a background around my parcel.

[EliseAnne85]

11 minutes ago, Piikoi said:

I love really dense jungle landscapes in RL. I've seen some fun ones in SL, but when trying to landscape my place I find that the trees, bushes, etc add up super quickly and I max out on LI allowed in the parcel. I don't even really care too much about a house, just give me a little clearing in a thick jungle. Can anyone recommend any low-prim jungle landscaping stores? Most of the stores I've seen have very old nearly 2-D builds, specific tree varieties that are high-LI or no copy, or "fantasy" forest items. All of these can be pretty, but I'd really like to find some lower impact stuff that looks closer to the real deal.

A friend recommended that I surround my parcel with a jungle background, in hopes that this might allow for less landscaping (so I would stay within my LI cap), but I want to be a good neighbor to the fine folks in my sim and not put a background around my parcel.

For super low impact stuff I've always used Anna Erotica's stuff.  Check out her store.  She has some really great items for background for super cheap, many items cost 1 linden.

https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/AnnaErotica-12-Palm-Trees-3-prim/7817276

[Scylla Rhiadra]

You might also check out Alex Bader's Studio Skye. I know they have at least a couple of tropical plants sets, and one palm tree set. They are superb quality and my experience of them is that they are quite low in LI, given how much coverage they provide. They're not so cheap, but also not (in my view) overly pricey, given what you get.

https://marketplace.secondlife.com/stores/14830

[EliseAnne85]

Also, if you like some of Anna Erotica's tropical plants but want a jungle look, just put the pot down into the ground and have the plant sticking out above ground.  Her tropical plants are super cheap and super low impact as well.  

[Rick Nightingale]

Ditto both of the above. I use some Anna Erotica trees here to 'fill in' with more land impacty trees in front, and some Skye stuff. Skye has the best waterfall and river kits in SL I think.

Edited February 16, 2023 by Rick Daylight

[Scylla Rhiadra]

16 minutes ago, Rick Daylight said:

Ditto both of the above. I use some Anna Erotica trees here to 'fill in' with more land impacty trees in front, and some Skye stuff. Skye has the best waterfall and river kits in SL I think.

I have their pine forest kit. It completely blew me away: not only is it versatile and beautiful, but it is also quite reasonable in terms of LI.

I have my eye on their water kit, which I'm planning to buy soon (probably even this week). I have never seen such well rendered streams and rivers in SL.

[Alwin Alcott]

this is mainly  made with Skye / Heart / Reid Parkin ( this last one quite low li plants, smaller trees and flowers) pics are taken with Nam's optimal skin and prim light setting, no processing afterwards

it's situated on mainland.. so it's  a bit of green blob in the mainly abandoned region i live in.

[Marianne Little]

LOVE has some 1 Li forest packs. Not in jungle theme, but with ordinary foliage, and a fir option. I show you the spring version. It is easy to mix several shapes, to make it look more natural.

They are much better in the background than a screen. https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/LOVE-1-PRIM-FOREST-PACK-SUMMER/16896680

LOVE has a bamboo pack, and it is not only 1 Li trees, but the smallest group is 5 trees, and it is supposed to be 1 Li, as I read the ad. I have not seen them inworld. https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/LOVE-BAMBOO-FOREST-PACK-PRICE-PROMISE/21590943

LOVE also has shrubs, they are nice fillers in between.

DDD has bamboo too. They are not super big. Some shapes go up in Li as soon as you try to stretch. But at least one can be stretched larger and stay 1 Li. And it looks good. https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/Breezy-Bamboo-Forest-Set-10x-Animated-1-LI-Mesh-Plants/22782233

These low poly trees from DDD are old, but good.They must be some of the first mesh trees in SL. They are big, the foliage is very good, the trunk is a little meh, but I have tried them with various bark textures and they take seamless textures well. https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/DDD-Low-Poly-Tree-Pack/5918968

 

[Marianne Little]

8 hours ago, EliseAnne85 said:

Also, if you like some of Anna Erotica's tropical plants but want a jungle look, just put the pot down into the ground and have the plant sticking out above ground.  Her tropical plants are super cheap and super low impact as well.  

And also, you can select the texture on only the pot and set it to 100% transparent. This can be useful on uneven ground, where the planter will be visible unless you place it very deep. Like on a slope/hill.

It is very easy to edit her stuff, and very easy to retexture.

Edited February 16, 2023 by Marianne Little
added more about slope/hill

[Luna Bliss]

I know you asked for store recommendations, but I want to give some design advice, as that's what I do.

A low-prim jungle is almost an oxymoron. hehe

What I do, however, to minimize the damage, is place the old-style plane plants (either graphics on sculpt planes or mesh planes) to the back where they can be somewhat jumbled together and not viewed in such detail, and I save the higher LI plants (some amazingly beautiful ones are out there!) for the front of the design (front of the path through the jungle or whatever).

And yes, those flat borders are an eyesore and insulting to neighbors I think -- better to have some of these large 'plane plants' for them to view.

Edited February 16, 2023 by Luna Bliss

[EliseAnne85]

58 minutes ago, Luna Bliss said:

I know you asked for store recommendations, but I want to give some design advice, as that's what I do.

A low-prim jungle is almost an oxymoron. hehe

What I do, however, to minimize the damage, is place the old-style plane plants (either graphics on sculpt planes or mesh planes) to the back where they can be somewhat jumbled together and not viewed in such detail, and I save the higher LI plants (some amazingly beautiful ones are out there!) for the front of the design (front of the path through the jungle or whatever).

And yes, those flat borders are an eyesore and insulting to neighbors I think -- better to have some of these large 'plane plants' for them to view.

Yes, this exactly. ^^^ 

I wanted to add:   I've used Anna Erotica's 1 LI row of 6 pine trees as a kind of privacy wall and then added lunaria's bushes inbetween the pine trees and it was fantastic privacy and much better for the neighbors than a privacy screen.  Lunaria often has fantasy lights attached to their items but when I used the bushes the lights can be unlinked from the bushes and then one has just plain bushes, no lights.  I can't find the exact bushes I bought right now as I'm not inworld, so I'll just put the link below.  I'd assume most of her lights can be unlinked and removed.  She has some good stuff for privacy at low prim.

https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/Anna-Erotica-6-Pine-Trees-1-Prim/7830214

https://marketplace.secondlife.com/stores/121409

Edited February 16, 2023 by EliseAnne85

[ChinRey]

51 minutes ago, Luna Bliss said:

A low-prim jungle is almost an oxymoron. hehe

It doesn't have to be but yes, usually it is.

51 minutes ago, Luna Bliss said:

What I do, however, to minimize the damage, is place the old-style plane plants (either graphics on sculpt planes or mesh planes) to the back where they can be somewhat jumbled together and not viewed in such detail, and I save the higher LI plants (some amazingly beautiful ones are out there!) for the front of the design (front of the path through the jungle or whatever).

That's the way to go, think in layers. I usually build up vegetation in four, five or even six layers. I posted a thread about it here a while ago. Warning: This is a very long and "technical" post, it's a bit outdated and it doesn't say much about LI. I mainly work on opensim now so I'm more concerned about actual resource usage than SL's often misleading land impact numbers.

I don't buy plants since I can always make better ones myself if I need them but if I did, the makers and brands I would check out first would be:

• Skye and possibly Oswell Wayfarer for the relatively low lag filler plants
• Lilith Heart and Nadine Reverie for upfront high detail plants
• T-Spot, Reid Parkins, United Inshcon and JubJub Forder for both

Edited February 16, 2023 by ChinRey

[Luna Bliss]

5 minutes ago, ChinRey said:

Skye, United Inshcon and possibly Oswell Wayfarer for the relatively low lag filler plants

And you have a lot of great filler plants on planes too!  That is, if you still have a store!?

[ChinRey]

13 minutes ago, Luna Bliss said:

That is, if you still have a store!?

I do but I haven't added anything to them for years so none of my more recent builds are available in SL. I may change my mind in the future but Second Life is simply too small a market for the kind of meshes I make for it to be worth the time and effort.

Apart from some basic crossed sheet ones I've never made any jungle plants anyway so it's not relevant for this thread.

Edited February 16, 2023 by ChinRey

[Ingrid Ingersoll]

I feel like if you want a really full feeling jungle you'll have to mix texture plants and trees (which are low prim but I don't love anymore) with mesh plantings. As a few other people have pointed out, use the texture plants and trees as filler and don't make them the focus.

[Fluffy Sharkfin]

It's a shame more creators don't make proper use of materials since they can make a staggering amount of difference when creating foliage using flat polygons with textures.

For example, here's a set of very basic hand-painted leaves...

add a normal map and tweak the specular/roughness a little and this is the result...

By adding curvature and a little gloss you can turn a flat plane into a seemingly high-poly surface and completely transform even low poly/LI content into something you'd consider using as a centerpiece.

[Piikoi]

Thanks everyone for the great ideas!