Chic Aeon

That message shows up fairly often and at least sometimes has nothing to do with banning. I get it now and then and then I try logging in again maybe two minutes later and all is fine. I suggest going with the "log into another sim" idea which would certainly be my next step could I not get in. Log in some place that is usually working like "Smith" or "Plum" (both easy to remember and type in). Note that the message USED to show up very very often, not so much these days.

CPU: Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-5820K CPU @ 3.30GHz (3298.07 MHz) Memory: 16286 MB OS Version: Microsoft Windows 10 64-bit (Build 14393) Graphics Card Vendor: NVIDIA Corporation Graphics Card: GeForce GTX 980/PCIe/SSE2 Windows Graphics Driver Version: 21.21.0013.7653 OpenGL Version: 4.5.0 NVIDIA 376.53 Always run on ultra with various long distances and at LOD2 (for mesh testing purposes) Multiple avatars, busy areas all good. Always have shadows on. No issues with depth of filed on or with fancy smooth shadows. Very high FPS (I have seen 170) I have a solid state drive for programs and secondary hard drive for data but not sure that makes much difference for SL. Maybe.

I don't use Substance Painter but some general hints would be to use a HIGH resolution when capturing (or baking) your initial image. The screenshot idea is indeed bad. My monitor resolution is 2560 and I capture "photos" at over 6000 for example (most photographers and bloggers do this -- well the ones with the pretty pictures. If you are BAKING in item (such as you would in Blender) then use a high resolution there also (I usually use 500 dpi but not everyone's machine can handle that -- still, as clear as you can get). Once you have resized your image to 1024 (don't upload at 2048 as you will just get more blur when SL resizes for you) you will most likely need to sharpen somehow to get those lost pixels looking a bit like they did before. This will depend totally on your graphics software options. I use "High Pass Sharpen" most often and there are adjustments within that I can change depending on need. I agree some folks have glorious photos and textures. It COULD be that they simply have a much better computer and newer software :D. The playing ground is not level. Good luck.

Original inworld building blocks that come as part of the viewer. These are not as efficient as mesh that can be made in a 3D program BUT the viewer has a built in recognition system so they still work well. The prim cube has many more vertices than a simple mesh cube made in Blender or Maya etc. This was so light would refract more realistically. Prim count can often be lowered by changing the default PRIM status to CONVEX HULL but that only works well with simple shapes (not hollowed or cut) as those can end up having areas you cannot walk into (bad physics). That's a start. Prims are still a viable form of building but mesh has taken over in the "high end" market. http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Primitive

Well first of all you did a FANTASTIC job explain with pictures and all the info one could want. So many gold stars (kudos) there. This does seem to be a newish issue and it has been talked about here on the forums before but briefly with no solution. Edit: I was talking about the BLACK breakup that you see on photo #3. Since I am wondering if this is a graphics card issue I am going to paste my specs in here: CPU: Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-5820K CPU @ 3.30GHz (3298.07 MHz) Memory: 16286 MB OS Version: Microsoft Windows 10 64-bit (Build 14393) Graphics Card Vendor: NVIDIA Corporation Graphics Card: GeForce GTX 980/PCIe/SSE2 Windows Graphics Driver Version: 21.21.0013.7653 OpenGL Version: 4.5.0 NVIDIA 376.53 Edit: I use the Firestorm viewer. I noticed this the first time a couple of months ago and it was on a couch "I" had made :D. The same areas that appear black in yours appeared black in mine. My couch was lower poly with higher LOD settings than yours. I thought it might be the texture as mine couch pieces didn't (don't as it still happens now and then) break up with the LODS like yours, it simply lost the texture and became all black. Uploading a new texture didn't help and then I started noticing the same issue on certain prim parts of the house I had moved into (not mine but made by a very competent mesh maker so unlikely a mesh issue itself. As I type I see arton has posted on this. Ah technology and the new forums. Anyway it seems like this is with us for awhile. I had never see the issue before. And I see that arton is talking about the LOD settings and I am concerned with that big black mass LOL. I would like to encourage you to change your LOD settings down to 2 at least. Many to most folks have them set there because they just use the defaults or they cannot turn them up to 4 because of computer issues. The world is VERY different looking at 2 or below and it is good to see how your mesh appears to others. There are some long threads on LODs (one from around last Christmas as I was working on things for Advent) that might be helpful so far as how to upload (not the black issue). I am still seeing the black areas now and then and actually that doesn't seem to be an LOD issue as I am close to both couch and pillars in the walls of the house. So I have no clue about that. I am not a custom LOD maker as my efforts in that (and likely the box modeling style I use) haven't shown that it is an advantage for me. I DO however test at low LOD settings (and leave mine at 2 now). But just in general I try and make my items hold their shape at a much further distance than is necessary - at LOD2. Edit: I agree with arton that this is a typical "problem". I also cam in and out (often halfway across a sim) and seldom move. So I would consider THAT part of your experience normal --- not that it helps if it frustrates you.

Here is the wiki page on "getting back missing inventory" http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Inventory_loss Note that there have been reports lately of an escalating problem with inventory loss that was NOT retrievable. Good luck!

Are you using the latest version of your viewer? It sounds a bit like what people see when they are viewing Bento heads and hands but don't have a Bento viewer. I haven't seen that on anyone but I am using the lastest version of Firestorm. I guess it could possibly be an issue if you are on one of the pre-release Linden Viewers, but it does sound like a viewer issue. A photo might be helpful for others.

If you want larger than the 512 maximum square upload in that mode you will need to save to your computer and then upload from there. Just one more step. If you do this a lot you might put that suggestion for a change to 1024 in your Firestorm "want" list. I suspect they could make that an option.

A 1024 mainland lot only costs $5 a month which is half of the monthly cost of the premium account now. So if you are willing to pay double the account fee, then it seems like the $5 shouldn't be an issue. You can also rent for much less than that.

You might get more replies if you noted the pay. Also you may find that hourlly isn't the best method of payment. I completed a two sim installation making all the mesh and everything in the sim in five days. So "a few hours a day" forever wouldn't be appropriate. Just a thought *wink*. Good luck on your event!

Well if you are really that new as you seem to be then the easiest thing would be to make another account. You can also reset your avatar (might be good to try that first). In order to appear you need a "skin, hairbase, shape and eyes". I think that is it. Make sure you have all those items on. You can also try picking a new avatar from the avatar list. Avatar> Choose and Avatar and that may solve your issue.

Things are constantly changing and "tightening", partly because of fraud. I have seen other threads where are verified bank account was needed. I have not clue, but you might want to look up "Skrill" or something close to that --- someone will know -- as that is apparently an optional way to buy lindens. The easiest thing if you can would be to attach a bank account to your Paypal :D.

I am pretty sure that full frontal nudity (or anything other than G rated stuff) is acceptable on the forums. You might want to replace that photo with something more clothed and less "exotic" :D.

I just tried too. Firestorm 5.0.1 (52150) I could zoom out forever (well WAY more than I could ever want to) using the mouse wheel. So it isn't a change in Firestorm. I was "editing" my Maitreya hud shown in the photo. My best guess is that you have something turned on or off. Here is my build option settings. And here are my Move and View settings. Maybe "disable minimal camera zoom distance"? is the issue?

Here is where you change the size in Firestorm. You need to choose CUSTOM and then take the check mark out of "constrain" and then type in 1024 x 1024. It doesn't really matter what your screen resolution is; as you can see my default is over 6000 pixels wide and my computer screen is 2560. You WILL LOSE the right and left sides of your screen if you take a square photo. It should show you what your photo will include in the preview. Good luck.

I think that is VERY true. Especially in the US (and indeed in other parts of the world too) we no longer MAKE things. We used to sew our own clothes, and knit, and grow our own veggies (I still do that) but that "home made" aspect has disappeared and I don't think of the loss as a positive thing. Lots of folks don't even know how to cook aside from throwing something in the microwave :D. A few of us have a need to constantly create -- whatever the medium. I used to spend many weeks on a painting, now I work in pixels. A few folks make good money on SL, but many do it as a hobby or as supplemental income. I could make much MUCH more spending my time working in RL (and I suspect most could) but I CHOOSE to be here as most of the time the stress is minimal and I can't say that for RL LOL.

I think that was true. I was using PhotoImpact at the time (I still have a later version on my Win10 computer since it will still work AND it does things that my other graphics program can't) and it took me forever to figure out how to save as a tga file (which my program alluded to as a television format?). Some folks still use tgas but I can't get windows to show the thumbnails in the explorer in that format so I switched to ping long ago.

I am not exactly disagreeing with you, but people still have the same opportunities to create even if they may have to work harder and longer to get those skills honed. Blender is free. Gimp is free. If someones wants to, they can learn to make basic mesh in a week. I just finished a series of tutorials using the Cycles Renderer (harder than the Blender Render) and with a few days of effort they could make some simple things. It certainly took me that long to learn how to make simple things building with prims. But yes, much creation has moved into 3D programs. Even building with prims took lots of experimentation and if you wanted outstanding textures, you painted them yourself in a graphics program, so another skill that needed to be learn (and outside of the SL world). I think the more important point as you say is that we DID build a lot more inworld. That being said, my store is on mainland -- and on the mainland you still see a fair amount of prim building. My neighbors have prim houses and one has been in the process of building theirs for some time now. So people are still creating using the inworld tools. AND if they want that prim experience they can venture over to Opensim where "prims don't count" (the land is so cheap it doesn't matter) and prims are still king for many people. I have been over there for over two years and actually returned to prim building and enjoyed it a lot. I have another video tutorial series on prim building that has been very popular. Those same videos made for Opensim can be used to learn how to build with prims in SL. I am not arguing that the world is the same, it is certainly prettier now, but people can still create. Even in clothing, there is still a market for nicely made texture clothes and the applier interfaces are free, so not a lot of differences in that form of entrepreneurship.

I reread you post just now saying that you saved as png and targa to make sure you had no alpha, but you can of course have an alpha on EITHER ping and targa, so I am going to post this anyway and if it doesn't help you, maybe it will helps someone else. There is currently a bug in Blender (if you are using Blender) that will save a baked texture (if you are baking textures LOL -- see we needed more info) into an ALPHA texture if you resave or rebake to the same texture plane. It is easy to miss this is happening. VERY easy to miss until you start seeing effects as you mention. So check both your main diffuse texture and your specular texture and make sure that they do NOT have an alpha layer. You can save them again without an alpha channel in your graphics program. It is truly a pain and has been around for a little while and I HOPE they fix this but meanwhile just make sure you are saving an RGB file and not an RGBA file. Eventually it becomes second nature. If that isn't it, I have no clue.

I think this could still be a viable exercise. I have never purchased money, and my "big sister" avatar only purchased a bit and then paid it back to herself in a week -- hence I have cash out abilities. But BOTH of us made our way without outside investments. We camped and hunted and went to classes and got free textures, we set up small shops that become larger shops as people bought things. Back in the beginning there was no Marketplace, everyone shopped in world and indeed the world was much smaller. It was doable then; it is doable now. TODAY, I would (and have) chased crystals to earn lindens for uploads. I would hit the texture midnight boards so that I wouldn't have to upload much. I would build some things from prims and sell them cheaply on the Marketplace (prim builds STILL sell; I can attest to that) and I would find a tiny little shop as needed for a few lindens a week (I have seen them as low as $30 an on an exceptional day for free). In our real world things can seem pretty bleak and those of us long out of high school worry about the "kids" and often voice our sadness at what they will have to deal with. It is my contention that each generation has likely felt the same way. Sometimes we move forward; sometimes we move back. But the possibilities are still in SL. The methods to get there have changed a bit, but it still is possible to start a business with no RL backing.

This is a great thread. I agree with about half and disagree with about half and they sometimes overlap :D. First off -- mesh to prims whether done with some of the original -- when mesh was new -- "tools" that could be purchased or now with the viewer export -- makes mesh, true. But it is (word deleted before I typed it) BAD and very unoptimized mesh. Now you can make a different kind of bad mesh within Blender or Maya etc, but LOL -- at least there is the option of actually making "game asset" mesh. Anyone who has optimized a prim to mesh export (and I have for the experience) knows it is much faster to just build it within the program. Second -- I too made prim boots and sold boots and made a lot of money with those boots and yes, they we damn hard to make. They did not however take me years of forty hour weeks to learn the skills *wink*. So, for the folks that somehow can crank out glorious low poly mesh with lovely textures in less than a week, I applaud them. That is not the path of the majority however. It DOES take a lot of time and effort and DESIRE to learn all this new stuff :D. Third -- Downloading a free or purchased mesh file, adding textures within a 3D program and uploading into Second Life is against the SL TOS and also against most (I didn't find a one that said it was OK) of the royalty free sites. Very long recent thread on this. Not going there again. I spent a ton of my best times in SL building classes back in the day. I made some great friends there and while many of the folks teaching were not actual "teachers" in that passing on of knowledge sense, I somehow picked up enough to teach myself after a point. I do miss those days, but as some folks have said -- even ten years ago there were plenty of folks that didn't want to create. They just wanted to play and dance and enjoy some adult activities. So that part hasn't changed. It may SEEM like there are a lot less creators these days, but you would be surprised how many there really are. Going around to the event venues shows that off well. New folks are learning and I applaud them for that -- and try and help when I can. Anyone joining Second Life these days can still create and can still earn money. They just need the desire and the willingness to stick with the learning curve. That really was true in the beginning too. Ask the folks that made skins and lingerie :D.

It is rolling restart day this week -- so some sims will be down temporarily (sometimes as much as 30 minutes). Try logging into another sim.

I SOOOOOOO wish people wouldn't think that the rezzing inside the house issue is intrinsic to mesh builds. It is NOT. It is only that the mesh maker used bad physics as Whirly said, didn't research (TONS on the Mesh forum about how to solve the issue) or TEST (even adding a prim to the floor would solve the issue) if they didn't make a correct physics model. It is NOT the fault of MESH!!!! LOL. Before you buy your next house ASK the builder if you can rez items on the floor!

I don't have a Belleza body but different skin appliers will give you different looks. There may be a "glossy" slider. There is a shine and shimmer setting for Maitreya. I am not sure if it has effect on skin appliers or only the default skin. My head applier "glossy" only affects the default head skin that came with it. Keep looking at your hud and you may discover some little button.

You should simply be thankful that you don't apparently LIVE in the country with the Patriot Act. The most you can loose is some money. Most of us have lost many of our freedoms.