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The Death of Mesh


Lilith Heart
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A poem by Lilith Heart – The Death of Mesh

I LOVE MESH.

I am mesh’s number 1 fan.

Give me an M …. Give me an E … Give me an S …. Give an H …. What have you got ….

MESH !!!!! YAAAAAY MESH !! Go mesh Go !!


But …

For me mesh is already DEAD with the current PE

For me a prim count of 500 is no good for a pretty mesh tree

How I hate the horrid sculpty

I really want to make a gorgeous mesh tree

 

Nobody will pay money for a mesh tree that’s 500 PE

Nobody will want my beautiful mesh tree

OH NO! Mesh is dead for me

All because of the silly PE

 

Only 3 sculpty prims equal my 500 PE mesh tree

This seems very unfair to me

I’m begging on hands and knees, make mesh work for creators like me

And get rid of that cruel and restrictive PE

 

No need for physics on my lovely mesh tree

Damn the physics it’s killed mesh for me

All because I make a giant mesh tree!

Oh lovely mesh tree, why are you 500 PE ?

 

Oh Woe is me …. Curse the damn PE

Oh mesh I love you … you make a beautiful tree …

Much better than any sculpty !

Oh woe is me … curse the damn PE

 

The current mesh PE calculations are so expensive, prim-wise … MESH IS A NON STARTER… DOA .. Dead on Arrival !

Mesh as is, is only applicable for the avatar clothing and accessories market, which have no prim limits …. Crazy stuff !

For all land based products, all landscaping items …. plants trees, furniture, houses … anything you rez on land that has a prim limit … SL mesh is basically redundant, because it’s too expensive prim-wise compared to scultpy equivalents

We need mesh most for the LANDSCAPE and ARCHITECTURE of Secondlife, for the grid itself. How the world looks is most important for the next phase of SL.

Unfortunately mesh is not going to make any difference to how the world looks, as we won’t be able to use it in the world, on the land. We will only be able to wear mesh items because the PE for landscape items is too restrictive and expensive prim wise

The look of the Secondlife world is often compared to the latest 3D games and it doesn’t compare well. .We desperately need mesh to improve the look of the SL world to excite and retain new users. 

Please, please Mesh Lindens …. take another look at mesh PE and find a more usable solution so we can all help to make the SL World more beautiful.

Summary ....  PE outrageously high ..... mesh is dead … DOA ….. Dead on Arrival :matte-motes-crying:

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I couldn’t agree more. I tested some medium size mesh trees and the prim count was ridiculous. They were 50 to 90 PE and the sculpty versions would only be 2 or 3 prims in comparison even though the actual tri polycount of the mesh was less than the sculpty.

When I sized the trees bigger, to a natural large tree size, the PE went up to between 300 –400 PE. That makes any large rezzable mesh items, pointless and unusable. And you’re quite right Lilith, that’s exactly where SL needs mesh most, in the world.

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People are so prim sensitive when buying land based objects, PRIM STARVED by the limits set on land. So unfortunately with the current PE mesh will be totally unusable and un-sellable because the high prim count. Simple as that…. Too primmy for land

 

I made 2 test trees.

One was 6749 tri polygons – the equivalent tri polygons of approx 3 full sculpties which would be 6144 tri polygons. Unfortunately the PE for the full size mesh tree was 588 prims, instead of 3 prims like the sculpty version of the tree would be

The second test tree was a smaller 2017 tri polygons – the equivalent of approx 1 full sculpty which would be 2048 polygons. The PE for this mesh tree was 55 prims

I created 3 lods for each tree but no improvement in the PE for either tree.

The PE calculation is making mesh redundant for whole categories of products.

Linden Labs are often concerned about not breaking older and existing content. Perhaps it would be wise for LL to consider whether they are breaking future unborn content with the current PE for mesh

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Hey Drongle,

Actually I noticed a tree on mesh sandbox made by Charlar Linden. It was about 4-5m high, which is about twice as tall as your avarage avatar. So..... it would be considered a small tree .... and it was 138 prims. I'm sure if Charlar Linden sized it up to a decent tree size it would be closer to 300-400 prims easy.

Also noticed a tiny palm tree made by Bao Linden, probably fit inside most people's living rooms. That was 17 prims. Again, I'm sure if Bao sized it up to a beach size outside palm it would be 50 plus prims.

Plants and trees traditionally have no physics. Even if they are large objects there's no good reason why the PEs are coming out so enormous ?

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Simply put, the Linden Labs business model is to sell shared hosting aka, Land.  Land is allocated by prim allotment. Less prims means less revenues from Land. 

Years ago Z Linden, their former CFO came out and said that the Exchange was their primary income center where he was quickly debated by the other executives saying that land was their income center.  I would think better utilization of all income centers would be more profitable and as such, the need to maintain the Prim as their unit of economics for the business model would become a mute point while at the same time, providing for a better user experience for all.

But we may never see this.  Linden Labs sell prims.

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I said it ages ago.. Mesh for those who want them...Me I want more in world building options... the ability to have a decent range of triangular prims would be a good start and why are features like tapering and slicing arranged so that you can only apply them to one set of axes ??

Would being able to slice a prim anywhere between two points be so difficult to achieve ?

And what about being able to round the corners on prims... ??

Mesh simply takes the onus away from Lindens to provide more in world building options....

I can think of many new building features but you ccant even get near the boys with the technical knowledge to find out if theyre feasible. And we dont seem to hear anything at all about whats going to happened to inworld building which appears to be trapped in a static bubble with very little new since I joined 4 years ago...

Mesh also take the fun of building inworld away you dont do the building in world (something I thought lindens would have wanted to promote) and you dont see your constructs take shape until you paid to import the pieces...

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The first thing I want to say is that I love your trees and plants Lilith. I am a customer and a fan, and there are many Heart products on my sims. I am glad you are looking at mesh.

I think it is too early to pronounce mesh dead. It has not yet been released to the main grid, and the Lindens continue to tinker and bang under the hood, making adjustments and testing.

We as creators are continuing to figure things out and we are learning how to optimize mesh for the best product at the lowest Prim Equivalency. We learn from each other, and I am grateful to everyone who has been so helpful in this forum.

I watched Gaia's latest tutorial video, and did not realize how important the lowest LOD number was for smaller sized items. I tried reuploading a couple of things, and was able to achieve lower prim count with what I learned from her.

Don't give up and don't count mesh out just yet. I am greatly encouraged.

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"Linden Labs sell prims"

Prims and server space. Moreover, some hyped, somehow comparable projects based on a different conception failed miserably, as Blue Mars, which did not manage to gain much more than 200 people delivering hardly enough attractive content for more than a few thousand sporadic visitors. Within three years.  IMVU is not really comparable because "land" or serverside stuff like physics and and and does not really exist there, it´s just a  low end 3D chatroom. While content creation is badly restricted due to core functionality and IP troubles. While Unity 3D just is about re-discovering the prim as a basical element, which is decisive for a direct access to creativity tools. Opensim based worlds which use the prim economy system obviously seem to work, only for lower prices. So it would be pretty hazardous for LL to destruct a working income system for something which failed elsewhere before.

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Maelstrom Janus wrote:

I said it ages ago.. Mesh for those who want them...Me I want more in world building options... the ability to have a decent range of triangular prims would be a good start and why are features like tapering and slicing arranged so that you can only apply them to one set of axes ??

Would being able to slice a prim anywhere between two points be so difficult to achieve ?

And what about being able to round the corners on prims... ??

Mesh simply takes the onus away from Lindens to provide more in world building options....

There's a whole lot of irony in you saying you don't want mesh then asking for the ability to edit prims as if they were meshes.

 

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On a positive note, Lilith, the PE reported on the edit floater at the moment is from the server. The main server is affected by the diameter-instead-of-radius bug*, which makes the PE increase twice as fast with size as it should. The experimental server, which is on sanboxes 20, 21, 27 & 28, has the bug fixed. So that is the place to go for the currently intended numbers (which may still change, of course).  The maximum PE plateau is still at the same level, but is reached at about 50x50x50 for a cube instead of 25x25x25. A 25x25x25 mesh I just tested is 30 PE on the main server but only 8 on the experimental server. So you can expect the costs of a 25 m bulbous tree, or a 35m spindly tree, to fall by a similar proportion. A 64 m tree will not be affected though.

* there was a jira, but it disappeared, so I can't give you the link.

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"the ability to edit prims as if they were meshes"

They are meshes, lol. Only a different kind. And it makes no sense to make almost exactly the same stuff one can make with prims or by sculpt maps for any other reasons than lower prim count OR better performance. If PE kills the sense of a lower prim count and leaves open better performance, why not? While i doubt that anyone but the Lindens themselves really can know about the technical background and specifications which define performance on Linden Lab servers.

But Lilith clearly pointed out the creator´s dilemma, and the creator´s dilemma in SL is that a 512 sqm prim parcel offers 117 prims and not more. And that the people who pay Lilith´s store sim by buying her trees count prims first and last quality or- beware - check performance. Lilith could make tremendous prim trees, trees you hardly can match with a 3D modelling tool, but - prim count, you know.

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Quote me the bit where I said I dont want mesh ..... Meshes and what Id like to see happen with In world building ( as far as Im aware you cant build inworld with meshes you have to import them..) are two different things all together I just see meshes as being  used instead of further developing in world building....

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Maelstrom Janus wrote:

Quote me the bit where I said I dont want mesh .....

I did, was in the first line.


Meshes and what Id like to see happen with In world building ( as far as Im aware you cant build inworld with meshes you have to import them..) are two different things all together I just see meshes as being  used instead of further developing in world building....

What you're asking for is the ability to create meshes inworld.

 

 

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From what I can gather making meshes involves a lot of creation using software  you then import the result (at cost ) presumably that means if something needs 500 pieces as I understood lillith to mean its going to cost 5000 lindens... which Im sure has the top dogs at Lindens drooling like crazy... of course if you can rez a prim in world and then cut shape and mould it and see the results instantly that extra income doesnt exist....

And if you didnt make a piece for your build correctly you simply start again restting the figures on your menu - if youre an inworld builder no need even to learn new software youre simply building on what you know....

 

 

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Maelstrom, If you haven't already please go download Google Sketchup, a beautiful and elegant mesh modeling tool that is simple to use and a thousand times more powerful than building with SL prims. 

http://sketchup.google.com/

Mesh is wonderous and with tools like Google sketchup you can make mesh content for Secondlife that's more efficient polygon-wise than prims or sculpties. What would take you 10 hrs building in Sl prims ... you could build 20 mins with Google Sketchup or any pro 3D tool.

It's only the mesh PE (the prim count for mesh)  that's standing in the way of a new, visually exciting and wonderful phase for SL

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Sketchup? Google Collada is not even compatible with SL collada (at least when i tried it the last time). And i find it much less innovative than the SL tools, but maybe that´s only me cause i use SL tools since five years and Sketchup only for two years sporadically.

One *definately* has to pay for some essential Sketchup add-ons one will need and talking of "optimising meshes": It does all but optimise anything. Forget Sketchup. Scratch it. No go.

The *only* affordable tool which might work sufficiently for the *ambitioned* hobbyist is Blender. And Blender has a much steeper learning curve than entire SL has, hopping on poseballs included.

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prims are not mesh. prims are a very simple solid modeler (CAD tool). They are converted to mesh for display by a gpu. Prims are not mesh. It would indeed be nice if the SL editor have more solid modeling options. I'd especially like boolean operations for cutting arbitrary holes in walls.

Sketchup is also more of a solid modeler, and not really a mesh tool. it doesn't really do curves though

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"making the SL editor have more solid modeling options would be great, especially booleans for cutting holes in prims"

Well, i am pretty sure that we´ll see the birth of some third party in-world prim to mesh converter if Linden Lab shows mercy with the meshies and reduces the PE. Otherwise even this won´t make much sense for anyone to use it (Honestly, who but a few in SL really care or know about "performance"). So yes, a few more tool options would be excellent, but they did not push tool development for fours years at all, so i wonder if they´ll ever do so again.

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Sketch up is fantastic for beginners who want to do Mesh for SL. And it's easy to build in Sketchup then import the model to Blender to export it for SL. I've been looking forward to mesh since it was announced but the PE count is so primmy on medium to large mesh objects, I agree that mesh is crippled or only half alive with the dreaded mesh PE calculations

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Yeh, that´s a wonderful example for a perfect workflow, really! Thosuands of ambitioned hobbyists will be highly encouraged to learn Sketchup, Blender and SL for making a simple cube appearing on a SL sim. Didn´t Linden Lab desperately try to get some more noobs over the past two years?

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