Building Buildings

[IvyTechEngineer]

Hello again,

My "final" model has made me think about a couple of things that bother me that I thought you might be able to give me some advise about regarding building a mountain from a terrain file from SL. First, why didn't the Solidify modifier in Blender increase the geometry of the original model? Ideally what I thought was the shell of the mountain would be increased by 0,5 meters or so, whatever thickness I wanted.  What did I miss? 

I did see a wonderful YouTube video - that is pretty cool but I don't need a landscape because I will you my mountain mesh. He does use a solidify modifier and he does does some sculpting (I have not experience with sculpting).  

 

My current model has an outside and inside section and I am thinking about also adding a floor. I saw one large cave in the Marketplace (https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/Open-Rock-FULL-PERM-MESH/18840836) that was built from three pieces. Maybe I should do the same?

I will probably we add more stuff to the inside like a pool and maybe stalactites and stalagmites. I think maybe I should learn the basics of sculpting but I am not sure how the poly count will be impacted. I might try some sculpting the floor and add some stalactites and stalagmites. 

OBTW, I did notice that some people in the Marketplace actually create cave tunnel kits with multiple models that can be connected together. These seems sort of cool.

[Aquila Kytori]

2 hours ago, IvyTechEngineer said:

First, why didn't the Solidify modifier in Blender increase the geometry of the original model? Ideally what I thought was the shell of the mountain would be increased by 0,5 meters or so, whatever thickness I wanted.  What did I miss? 

Why it didn't import with the same cave wall thickness that you set in the Solidify modifier ?

If you applied the modifier before exporting then there should be no issue.

If you didn't apply the modifier before exporting then you should use the sl + open sim static presets in the Collada options panel when exporting. This sets an option which applies the modifier just for the Collada export which leaves the modifier unapplied on the original model inside Blender.

I thought 0.5m a little bit too thin for a cave wall so in the example below I set the thickness to 1 meter and used the sl + open sim static presets when exporting .........

 

If it was a cave I was building for the inside of your island I would start by selecting the cave opening and just extrude inwards a few meters to create a tunnel like entrance then create the rest of the cave by extruding and adding geometry, building up the shape of the cave as I go along  ......

[IvyTechEngineer]

Thanks I will give that a try. I thought 0.5 meters might be a little small as well but it should have still worked I think. 

In the process of adding some floor geometry around the edge of the cave I thought I could use the Knife and add faces that were exactly 1 meter up from the bottom. Then scale the bottom edge in the X and Y to 95% and it would give me a curled inside wall. How can I align two faces to make them coplanar?

Thanks

[IvyTechEngineer]

OBTW, this misalignment was caused when I attempted to create a the 1 meter faces on the bottom and align them to Z S zero and the moved to -19m vertically

[Aquila Kytori]

I don't really understand what you are trying to do exactly and seems a bit complicated just to add a floor to the cave, perhaps add more screenshots ?

 

 

3 hours ago, IvyTechEngineer said:

How can I align two faces to make them coplanar?

 

I had to look it up. 

The first method shown in the video above ?

Note: To get the LoopTools options to show up in the right click contextual menu you will have to enable the LoopTools (one word) Add_on that comes shipped with Blender.     Edit > Preferences > Add-ons > LoopTools :

 

Edited May 1, 2023 by Aquila Kytori

[Aquila Kytori]

Perhaps you are simply trying to create a bevel (Ctrl B) around the bottom edge of inner cave walls?

[IvyTechEngineer]

Thanks I was missing something but it was not exactly what I was looking at. In CAD tools like Solidworks you can align edges and faces using relationships like vertical, horizonal, parallel, and colinear. It appears that the first approach actually moves the vertices of both faces a little. I will try to add the bevel. 

I am such a dummy, the solidify modifier worked and doubled the geometry so I assume I can texture the inside of the cave now. Need to do a little cleanup.

Thanks Aquila

[IvyTechEngineer]

I think I would like to work on the interior of the mountain cave I built now. Add some stalagmites, stalactites and cave textures and  maybe a small pool. Any suggestions on how to get started? I still need to do some cleanup on the interior of the cave and add some structures. 

Thanks

[IvyTechEngineer]

I am restarting the mountain model again and was reviewing my notes on what has already been done. I made two versions of the mountain: a floating mountain and a hollow mountain. The floating mountain has a floor with an inside of 424 tris and outside 473 tris.  The hollow mountain has no floor (for now) with an inside of 483 tris and outside 525 tris.  

Next I would like to do a few things like add low poly rocks around the cave openings. I have been watching a few YouTube videos and I focus on the size of the mesh and whether ngons get created when creating a mesh. 

Option 1 - add rocks around the opening.

Video 1 - Low Poly Rocks - Quick & Easy - Detailed Version 

This is a great video and I worked with this but bevel has a tendency to add ngons that need to be converted to tris and quads I think. Is this correct?

There is a Rock generator 

Video 2 - Making realistic rocks in Blender 2.9+ using Blender rock generator addon

This looks pretty cool but the size of the mesh is very large so this would probably not work in Second Life. Has anyone worked with this addon?

Option 2 - build geometry around the opening directly. This seems to work but sometimes I get some weird geometry. This was done using the Blender knife and which will add vertices and edges around the cave entrance. The select all the faces around the opening and extrude. After the extrude you will need to add faces to the inside of the cave wall around the edge. Also, if you extrude each face individually you will need to go back and merge vertices because the extrudes will be individually normal to the face being extruded. Is there a way to extrude without needed to add the inside face? 

Final questions,

1.) Is there a way to find the where the origin is for an objects that you want to link in Second Life? I have just "used" the same origin for all the linked objects based on the original mesh model.

2.) Sometimes seem to not look right because of the lighting. Is there a way to a way to turn that off? I think I can change it by the view to eliminate shadows by switching to a different view. 

 

3.) Is there a way to add an object on a face? Object get added at the origin. 

Thanks

Ivy Tech Engineer

[ChinRey]

2 hours ago, IvyTechEngineer said:

Video 1 - Low Poly Rocks - Quick & Easy - Detailed Version 

 

This is a great video and I worked with this but bevel has a tendency to add ngons that need to be converted to tris and quads I think. Is this correct?

That's an interesting method. Yes, you'll have to triangulate before you export and you also have to remember to use smooth normals but it's not a bad way to create irregular shapes like rocks.

2 hours ago, IvyTechEngineer said:

Video 2 - Making realistic rocks in Blender 2.9+ using Blender rock generator addon

 

This looks pretty cool but the size of the mesh is very large so this would probably not work in Second Life.

Wow, that's a lot of polys! You can always decimate the shape of course but you'd have to do it very heavily so the first method is probably the one of them that is the easiest to use.

There are several other ways to make rocks. I usually start with a relatively high poly sphere (maybe around 500-1000 vertices), resize it along one or two axises, randomize the vertice locations and use limited dissolve and manual vertice delete to reshape and reduce the complexity down to a sensible level.

Which method you choose doesnt' really matter as long as you can get a shape and a tri count you're happy with. With a good texture it's quite possible to make very good looking rock with a tri count less than 50 and even as low as 20.

 

2 hours ago, IvyTechEngineer said:

Option 1 - add rocks around the opening.
...

Option 2 - build geometry around the opening directly.

Option 3 - do both.

Add some very simple geometry around the opening as a base and pile a few simple rock onto it for additional details.

 

2 hours ago, IvyTechEngineer said:

1.) Is there a way to find the where the origin is for an objects that you want to link in Second Life? I have just "used" the same origin for all the linked objects based on the original mesh model.

The origin of an object in Second Life is right in the middle of the bounding box, that is right in the middle between the outermost vertices along each axis. I don't know of an easy way to find it in Blender and I too woul love to learn fit here is one.

 

2 hours ago, IvyTechEngineer said:

2.) Sometimes seem to not look right because of the lighting. Is there a way to a way to turn that off? I think I can change it by the view to eliminate shadows by switching to a different view. 

 

That solution won't survive exporting. What you need to do is triangulate everything before you export. You can't really trust the automatic functions for irregular shapes like this unless you really know what you're doing.

Also, merge or delete vertices that are too close to each other or crate too sharp angles.

2 hours ago, IvyTechEngineer said:

3.) Is there a way to add an object on a face? Object get added at the origin.

Not sure what you mean: in Blender or in SL?

[Aquila Kytori]

12 hours ago, ChinRey said:

The origin of an object in Second Life is right in the middle of the bounding box, that is right in the middle between the outermost vertices along each axis. I don't know of an easy way to find it in Blender and I too would love to learn fit here is one.

how to display Bounding Box of an object : Object Properties > Viewport Display > check Bounds (Box).

 

To find the center  of the Bounding Box :

1. set Transform Pivot Point to Bounding Box Center.
2. Select mesh.
3. Shift S to open Snap pie menu and choose the Cursor to Selected option. the 3D Curser is now at center.
4. Deselect everything.
5. Shft A to open add mesh object and choose the Cube.
6. With only the cube selected M to open Merge menu and choose the At Center option. now we have a single vertex at the center of the BB.

With this vertex selected you can find its X Y Z position from the Transform N side panel.

 

15 hours ago, IvyTechEngineer said:

3.) Is there a way to add an object on a face? Object get added at the origin. 

Objects get added at the 3D Cursor.

Its possible to add objects and snap them to the face of other objects but I would need to look that up with Google and its way to late in the day for me to do that 

Usually I find it sufficient to place the 3D cursor where I want to add the new mesh and Shft A > Add mesh.

Example: Select a vertex > Shftl S  to open pie menu and choose Cursor to Selected > Shft A to open Add menu and choose mesh primitive.

 

 

Edited to add :

As mentioned above objects are added at the position of the 3D cursor. To reposition the 3D cursor in the viewport : Hold down the Shift key and move the mouse cursor to where you want the new position of the 3D cursor to be then press the Middle Mouse button.

Edited August 19, 2023 by Aquila Kytori

[IvyTechEngineer]

On 8/18/2023 at 4:30 PM, ChinRey said:

That's an interesting method. Yes, you'll have to triangulate before you export and you also have to remember to use smooth normals but it's not a bad way to create irregular shapes like rocks.

Wow, that's a lot of polys! You can always decimate the shape of course but you'd have to do it very heavily so the first method is probably the one of them that is the easiest to use.

There are several other ways to make rocks. I usually start with a relatively high poly sphere (maybe around 500-1000 vertices), resize it along one or two axises, randomize the vertice locations and use limited dissolve and manual vertice delete to reshape and reduce the complexity down to a sensible level.

Which method you choose doesnt' really matter as long as you can get a shape and a tri count you're happy with. With a good texture it's quite possible to make very good looking rock with a tri count less than 50 and even as low as 20.

 

Option 3 - do both.

Add some very simple geometry around the opening as a base and pile a few simple rock onto it for additional details.

 

The origin of an object in Second Life is right in the middle of the bounding box, that is right in the middle between the outermost vertices along each axis. I don't know of an easy way to find it in Blender and I too woul love to learn fit here is one.

 

That solution won't survive exporting. What you need to do is triangulate everything before you export. You can't really trust the automatic functions for irregular shapes like this unless you really know what you're doing.

Also, merge or delete vertices that are too close to each other or crate too sharp angles.

Not sure what you mean: in Blender or in SL?

Thanks for your advice. I think that some of my issue was not all the lower vertices we at the same Z value. Origins also seems to cause me problems because in CAD program drawing are more precise and the location of the origin is more important. I did discover a couple of new trick that I never picked up on that should improve my drawings. In the past when I subdivided an edge I could move the new vertices without moving in all three directions. However a double GG seems to allow for the sliding of the vertices along the edge which is quite helpful.  I have also figured out that the bevel of the edge was the way to provide a change to the contour of the bottom of the cave inside edge. This was very helpful. 

I started this morning to draw some stalactites and stalagmites using cones and cut the sections in half. 

I am not sure I totally like what I have but I could merge the inside and outside of the bottom and top together to build the whole mountain. Still working on the stalactites and stalagmites for the top and the top cave entrance. Turns out the approach I used for the bottom doesn't quite work because when I extrude faces from the normal planes it doesn't look very good. 

[IvyTechEngineer]

On 8/18/2023 at 7:10 PM, Aquila Kytori said:

how to display Bounding Box of an object : Object Properties > Viewport Display > check Bounds (Box).

 

To find the center  of the Bounding Box :

1. set Transform Pivot Point to Bounding Box Center.
2. Select mesh.
3. Shift S to open Snap pie menu and choose the Cursor to Selected option. the 3D Curser is now at center.
4. Deselect everything.
5. Shft A to open add mesh object and choose the Cube.
6. With only the cube selected M to open Merge menu and choose the At Center option. now we have a single vertex at the center of the BB.

With this vertex selected you can find its X Y Z position from the Transform N side panel.

 

Objects get added at the 3D Cursor.

Its possible to add objects and snap them to the face of other objects but I would need to look that up with Google and its way to late in the day for me to do that 

Usually I find it sufficient to place the 3D cursor where I want to add the new mesh and Shft A > Add mesh.

Example: Select a vertex > Shftl S  to open pie menu and choose Cursor to Selected > Shft A to open Add menu and choose mesh primitive.

 

 

Edited to add :

As mentioned above objects are added at the position of the 3D cursor. To reposition the 3D cursor in the viewport : Hold down the Shift key and move the mouse cursor to where you want the new position of the 3D cursor to be then press the Middle Mouse button.

Thanks for the info, I will need to study your response more closely to understand it.  

[Aquila Kytori]

Suggestions for creating simple stalactites and stalagmites:

Get yourself some reference images. Stalagmites tend to be very stunted shapes compared to the longer stalactites.

Create the stalactites and stalagmites in pairs. The drip from the stalactite falls directly on the stalagmite below it so keep them on the same centers.

Start with a single circle of 6 to 8 vertices. The fewer vertices will make editing simpler.

Duplicate this circle > extrude down to form a cylinder (this is the base mesh for the stalactite) Duplicate the lower edge ring of this cylinder and drag it down to form the base of the stalagmite.

The rest is just editing these 2 base meshes to create 3 or 4 versions of each pair of stalactite/stalagmites and then arranging them as required. See screenshot below. :

 

Edited August 21, 2023 by Aquila Kytori

[IvyTechEngineer]

12 hours ago, Aquila Kytori said:

Suggestions for creating simple stalactites and stalagmites:

Get yourself some reference images. Stalagmites tend to be very stunted shapes compared to the longer stalactites.

Create the stalactites and stalagmites in pairs. The drip from the stalactite falls directly on the stalagmite below it so keep them on the same centers.

Start with a single circle of 6 to 8 vertices. The fewer vertices will make editing simpler.

Duplicate this circle > extrude down to form a cylinder (this is the base mesh for the stalactite) Duplicate the lower edge ring of this cylinder and drag it down to form the base of the stalagmite.

The rest is just editing these 2 base meshes to create 3 or 4 versions of each pair of stalactite/stalagmites and then arranging them as required. See screenshot below. :

 

I like yours much better. I will give it a try. Yours looks like they have a smaller geometry. Any suggestions on textures for them?

[IvyTechEngineer]

Typically I do a Smart UV Project unwrap on the object and add an image as a texture and then in Texture Paint mode use the Image Editor and then I can paint on either the object or the uv map. The images can then be saved (maybe it could also be tweaked in Photoshop or other painting program). 

I know the picture is not 2048 by 2048 so I am not sure if it will work if it was uploaded to SL. 

Also, at one time some one said you could have up to 8 materials for an object. How does that work? 

Thanks

Ivy Tech Engineer 

[Aquila Kytori]

On 8/22/2023 at 3:16 PM, IvyTechEngineer said:

Typically I do a Smart UV Project unwrap on the object and add an image as a texture and then in Texture Paint mode use the Image Editor and then I can paint on either the object or the uv map.

 

I mostly mark seams then use the basic UV unwrap and edit the resulting islands.

But I have never attempted to texture stalactites/stalagmites before . Best is use which ever method works best for you. 

 

Texture with horizontal banding. (A greyscale image can be tinted in-world to match the colour of the cave roof.) :

For a stalactite which sometimes seems to have horizontal streaks, (see screenshot above) I would find a texture with a similar horizontal banding and then UV unwrap and edit the UV's to align with the texture :

1. Mark a single longitudinal UV seam.
2. Select all and U > Unwrap.
3. In the UV editor > rotate UV island to be vertical.
4. Select the center vertical edge loop and align its vertices to the X axis. RMB to open the UV Context Menu and choose the Align X option.
5. Repeat for all the Horizontal edge loops in the UV island, RMB > Align to Y
6. Check it with the texture.

 

This is only one stalactite but in reality the 3 versions of the stalactites/stalagmites (see previous post) would be UV unwrapped together then all other stalactites would be duplicated from them and edited in the 3D viewer to have slightly different shapes. Duplicating after the UV unwrap and edit   would mean the new modified stalactites would not need UV unwrapping / editing again.

When finished editing the Uv's select the islands and Pin them using the P key. This will prevent them getting accidentally UV unwrapped (altered)  if, later you are unwrapping some other part.

P to Pin.

Alt P to Unpin.

A quick way to add a little more detail to the texture is to use it in combination with a normal map. For the above example I used https://cpetry.github.io/NormalMap-Online/  to convert the greyscale texture to a Normal map. There are many other available online.

 

Edited August 23, 2023 by Aquila Kytori

[Aquila Kytori]

On 8/22/2023 at 3:16 PM, IvyTechEngineer said:

Also, at one time some one said you could have up to 8 materials for an object. How does that work? 

Yes max 8 material slots per object.

All you need to do to assign faces of the mesh to a new materials is:

1. Add the new materials to the list of materials using the little + icon in the Material Properties panel.
2. Give the new materials an appropriate name.
3. In Edit mode select the faces of the object that you want to use the new material and hit the Assign button.
4. Repeat for any other faces that require a different material.

 

When UV unwrapping the object you can

• select all and UV unwrap. this will result in all the material faces being unwrapped to a single UV space.
• or select one material and UV unwrap. This result in this one material having its own UV space. Then select the nest materials faces and Unwrap, resulting in anothe UV space for this material.

So an object can me mapped to a single UV space using max of one 1024² image texture or each material mapped to its own UV space which could mean the same object could be textured using up to 8 different 1024² image textures.

Edited August 23, 2023 by Aquila Kytori

[IvyTechEngineer]

On 8/23/2023 at 3:24 PM, Aquila Kytori said:

Yes max 8 material slots per object.

All you need to do to assign faces of the mesh to a new materials is:

1. Add the new materials to the list of materials using the little + icon in the Material Properties panel.
2. Give the new materials an appropriate name.
3. In Edit mode select the faces of the object that you want to use the new material and hit the Assign button.
4. Repeat for any other faces that require a different material.

 

When UV unwrapping the object you can

• select all and UV unwrap. this will result in all the material faces being unwrapped to a single UV space.
• or select one material and UV unwrap. This result in this one material having its own UV space. Then select the nest materials faces and Unwrap, resulting in anothe UV space for this material.

So an object can me mapped to a single UV space using max of one 1024² image texture or each material mapped to its own UV space which could mean the same object could be textured using up to 8 different 1024² image textures.

Thanks, so can I use multiple images for the materials? Like one image for the floor and one for the walls?

[IvyTechEngineer]

On 8/23/2023 at 2:47 PM, Aquila Kytori said:

 

I mostly mark seams then use the basic UV unwrap and edit the resulting islands.

But I have never attempted to texture stalactites/stalagmites before . Best is use which ever method works best for you. 

 

Texture with horizontal banding. (A greyscale image can be tinted in-world to match the colour of the cave roof.) :

For a stalactite which sometimes seems to have horizontal streaks, (see screenshot above) I would find a texture with a similar horizontal banding and then UV unwrap and edit the UV's to align with the texture :

1. Mark a single longitudinal UV seam.
2. Select all and U > Unwrap.
3. In the UV editor > rotate UV island to be vertical.
4. Select the center vertical edge loop and align its vertices to the X axis. RMB to open the UV Context Menu and choose the Align X option.
5. Repeat for all the Horizontal edge loops in the UV island, RMB > Align to Y
6. Check it with the texture.

 

This is only one stalactite but in reality the 3 versions of the stalactites/stalagmites (see previous post) would be UV unwrapped together then all other stalactites would be duplicated from them and edited in the 3D viewer to have slightly different shapes. Duplicating after the UV unwrap and edit   would mean the new modified stalactites would not need UV unwrapping / editing again.

When finished editing the Uv's select the islands and Pin them using the P key. This will prevent them getting accidentally UV unwrapped (altered)  if, later you are unwrapping some other part.

P to Pin.

Alt P to Unpin.

A quick way to add a little more detail to the texture is to use it in combination with a normal map. For the above example I used https://cpetry.github.io/NormalMap-Online/  to convert the greyscale texture to a Normal map. There are many other available online.

 

Cool, I will try to duplicate it. it. Looks like some pretty low poly models. 

[IvyTechEngineer]

Hello again,

I wanted to try to build a building instead of buying it from the Marketplace. My previous efforts has resulted in pretty dense mesh models. Several years ago I built the small house that was describe in Chic Aeon's YouTube video - 

 

It was probably one of the first things I build. I built it in SL and in Solidworks. I just downloaded both DAE files and the sloppy prim sm house.dae model has 984 tris. While the the Solidworks small house was only had 188 tris. 

Not sure if I am doing something wrong but I thought the SL built model would have fewer tris. 

Also, when I downloaded the models using Firestorm is there a way to also get the physics model?

Thanks

Ivy

 

[Aquila Kytori]

On 9/21/2023 at 10:03 PM, IvyTechEngineer said:

It was probably one of the first things I build. I built it in SL and in Solidworks. I just downloaded both DAE files and the sloppy prim sm house.dae model has 984 tris. While the the Solidworks small house was only had 188 tris. 

Not sure if I am doing something wrong but I thought the SL built model would have fewer tris. 

The reason why the exported prim build has a high triangle count is because a simple prim cube is made up of 48 triangles.

The tri count can be reduced to 12 triangles if, before exporting from SL, you reduce the LOD Factor in the Firestorm viewer to 0.000. (or zoom way way out from the prim before selecting and exporting).

 

Export of a prim cube from SL with the LOD Factor set to 2.000 :

 

and imported into Blender, (note the high vertex count because each side of the cube is separated from the others) :

 

With the LOD Factor set to 0.000 :

 

and imported into Blender :

 

On the other hand your Chic building created in Solidworks at 188 triangles sounds very efficient. My Chic Build built in Blender comes in at similar number of tris, 198 :

 

It  would be interesting to see a screen-shot of the Solidworks build when imported into Blender in edit mode.

 

On 9/21/2023 at 10:03 PM, IvyTechEngineer said:

Also, when I downloaded the models using Firestorm is there a way to also get the physics model?

Only if you create it with prims first, (a simplified version of the visual building, for example no window openings in the walls) export from SL and bring into Blender to do some editing.

When importing the build back to SL, In Step 1: of the Physics tab of the mesh uploader, load up this physics build and in Step 2: hit the Analyze button, as explained in Chic's video.....

[IvyTechEngineer]

I do have some very high level mesh models that were created in Solidworks but I think in this case the model created in Solidworks has a lower level mesh. 

[IvyTechEngineer]

I have another question for you guys about build a kiosk for my island. Sometimes people visit my island and I want to share more than a notecard. I also want to share advertisement for the engineering programs we have at the college. I created 5 web browser object and set the urls to the 5 programs we offer but was wondering if anyone has built a kiosk in SL that links to RW objects that the visitor could take with them outside of SL? 

[IvyTechEngineer]

I am thinking about building a very tall building in SL to house 200 student posters. That would be 17 floors and maybe 100 meters tall. Is there an easy way to build a large building in SL? I think I need to keep track of the XYZ position and XYZ size. Suggestions? I know there is a 64 meter limit as well. Is there a way around this? I want the base to be 30 meters squared with about 4 to 6 meters height per floor ...

Thanks

IvyTech