VanillaSunsets

I would love to see you create and upload a tree to SL and update us here :catwink: I can tell you it is different. You have to get started with a very low level of faces on the trunk to begin with as the leaves take up a lot of faces and will be a rather large object, even when you split those. If you split them in smaller parts the LOD will go down faster, so more work on the LOD's. There are just soooo many variables... And then I don't even count in roots or a base or season changing trunks and leaves. So decimating will not do it... what you start with is pretty much what you end up with. You cannot decimate 1 faced planes that make the leaves and the trunk was already very low poly. So baking out a trunk and branch texture in higher poly will not do the whole trick. This is very complicated stuff if you do not want to cut corners. I would love to see what you come up with, will be very humble if you surprise me and will be a willing pupil:cattongue:

Is there even still a way to make sculpts to be separate objects *EDIT faces* (out of one sculpt)? I read somewhere, sometime, that that was no longer possible unless you go way back in Blender releases? Are sculpts not just as bad on rendering as high dense meshes are? I know at least 1 creator that used sculpts for a very long time, maybe they still do, and indeed makes great trees that way... kinda makes me wanna get the "recipe" so bad! I did try numerous ways of uploading. Tree as a whole, leaves as a whole and link them, trunk, branches, leaves separate... etc., etc... Some make a slight difference, adding a mesh base sometimes did. It is very, very complicated, many factors to consider and test. Yes! textures do make a huge difference, you can get away with 4 to 5 faces around the trunk, but then you have to bake the texture to smooth out the shadows and cannot repeat it. Making it a bit more blurry. Maybe I am just a perfectionist and should put on some neutral eyes and go look at other creator's trees again... and again. @ the OP: try making only 1 or maybe 2 levels of branches and replace the rest by branches made out of textures. Maybe you already figured this out... I get my mesh trees to about 7 LI at about 7m tall, still not satisfied. The fact that everything in SL is way out of scale (too large, tall, big... does not make this easier! Ppl are still kinda used to prim and sculpt and the avarage user does not read into mesh and LI, they just want a low LI.

You have to "simply" take back your build into your inventory. I know nothing in SL is simple... but that is what you have to do.To do so, right click the object and select Take. Next time you want to work on you build again, you rezz it again from inventory. Make sure you name it properly before taking it back, so you know what to look for.

I am in SL to create, I am in SL to explore and be inspired. I am in SL coz I have been for over 12 yrs and I start missing it when I don't log. In that specific order :matte-motes-bashful-cute:

This is done by collapsing some of the lower LOD's or, better yet and more professional, by making the lower LOD's yourself. Collapsing the lower LOD's will get you a much lower LI, BUT, it will not look good for all residents, ones that have not set their viewer's LOD up to about 4 will see your tree or whatever large object transform into ugly triangles once they zoom out. You can test this yourself by either zooming out or lowering your viewer's LOD settings. This is a complicated subject, LOD's and how to handle them! I have made some terrible LOD's when I started out and am still learning. If you let the SL uploader handle your LOD's it can result in some very ugly things. But, used wisely it can do a reasonable job. However, building your own LOD's will almost always get better results. This is not an easy task, it will result in a lot of trail and error. There are some very helpful video's on You Tube and I do advice you to watch those. Creating for SL... wow, it's tempting to take shortcuts and skip a step here and there, but it won't make you feel "good". You will know you cheated. Many residents won't notice, lots have their viewers set to LOD 4 and will see your stuff just perfectly, but there is a trend going on to set LOD's to just 2 (about average) and ppl will see the shortcuts. Some creators do not care and rely on the ppl that have viewer settings up to 4 and they do sell, some sell a lot! But it creates lag, I made items like that but I am learning how to do it in a better way to help SL run better for everyone, even if it is just a lill bit. Another thing to consider is that low LI/prim stuff sells, no matter what. Ppl want to get the most out of their prim count and I get that. SL is expensive after all. You pay big money IRL for a lill piece of server and you want it to be home, look like a home and feel like a home. So... demand is high on LI items. But that does not make it a good thing. Ppl that have older computers can't handle all the high setting and will still see your creation as ugly triangles from a distance. And some newbies will not know how to adjust the LOD settings... well maybe in a few months. Ok, trees... those are very hard, if you want to make them well! I have been toying around with those for a year or so. Trees are large, most of the time, large meshes are punished very harsh by the uploader. The only way to get them a "decent" LI is to collapse the lowest\er LOD into a mix of cross planes and branch textures but that will only work for a straight tree, so not gnarled or angled. Even when you have a straight tree, this is not an easy task. Some software will allow you to take a billboard snapshot but it will always be a lot of fiddling. Also, if you made your mesh tree, some ppl will resize it, most of the time they will enlarge the tree and will pass out while seeing the LI rise like... well, not what they want it to be and complain. So, yeah, trees, I am very welcome to some advice on those too. As I still toy with them, try create some that have a good balance between LI and LOD, I am very looking forward to some advice on those too! I learned how to do the cross planes lower LOD thing but then for season changing that again is a challenge at least! So, jump in... anyone that could shine a light on the whole tree/big meshes LOD thing! Most of the trees I have come across in SL collapse like h*ll, so there are not that many that can teach us, sadly.

I could not agree more, I think I will do as you do and follow developments before spending anymore on appearance. I am like you very pleased with my look the way it is and am pretty determinate to only upgrade it, not giving up parts of me in the process.

Great answer that reminds me of the days way, way back. When age, looks or where you live did not matter as this was SL! Does this make me very much outdated too...? Or maybe... this is good advice, this is SL, age should/could not matter nor the other RL aspects. Try to make some "very old aged" friends while you look for ones your age, you might be surprised, we are not that different

Wow, how complicated can you make your virtual life these days. Seriously, I do love all the mesh stuff, I make some of it, but some days I wonder if body-wise, this is the way to go... I have some mesh bodies and I do agree, it looks amazing compared to my default avatar, I adore the hands and feet that are so much more detailed! Now I went to check out some new Bento head that was just released and it's awesome but the time it takes to get it to look like you wish...pfff. Ohhh, the head even scared me till I saw that you had to start with some certain shape, that helped, but then I had to re-build my whole body shape. Looking good in SL by these day's standard is just way too much trouble. Once you get the body and head to look right you have to start looking for skins and you get lost once again, some merchants have appliers for your body but not for your head, some merchants have clothing appliers and some not, same goes for mesh clothing. You never know what will actually fit and this is limiting the choices I have. Alpha layers only go so far... When I find something adorable on some hot fashion blog, or even the MP, I have to hope it is not one of those Gatcha items that I can no longer get my hands on AND that the demo does as promised.Now the jelly avatars arrived and I realize a lot of ppl cannot even see me rendered the way I want them to see me. If I were a new resident I would cry... a lot... This is not a rant, I just love the way it all looks, but it seems the platform and what we all wear and want is going in two very separate directions. Is this the way to go? Looking awesome on your own screen but I need to ask friends if they would pls make a render exception for me? Is this Bento thing we are all going to focus on instead of realizing all those way too dense meshes are making us like that emperor from that fairytale... the one that everyone saw naked (jelly doll) and only he saw the beauty. I know about the famous mesh body website that I can check but seriously, I miss the days that I just could go on a shopping spree without checking, checking and checking again. I miss that I could just buy any skin and maybe... just maybe had to adjust my shape just a lill bit! I cannot be the only one that feels this way. Once again, I very much love the mesh bodies and heads, I respect all the work that went into them, nor do I wish to offend anyone but I wish I would wear them for more then just pics.

You have potential. I do love how it looks, especially from the outside! The mood is ok, it feels like you are in a very cold place and the castle looks wonderful. I very much like the lights in the hallway. I would advice you to work a bit on/check you physics, I got stuck walking down the stairs and in some other areas I fell down or could not walk. Also a tiny bit of texturing work to be done, some textures show as very stretched to me. But all n all, I think you could do nice things during the winter holiday as you seem to be good at building ice and snow. One big, important piece of advice... get rid of the lady on the balcony. You are not allowed to bring in copyrighted content to SL.

Option1: If the group knows and agrees it can be done... ask them how that was done Option2: Ask the creator of the body Option3: Look for a taller mesh body or request one to be made for you on the forum

If you have maxed out the sliders for your standard SL avatar, you are literally maxed out on options for that avatar. If you want to be bigger/taller you will need to say goodbye to that avatar and get yourself a mesh avatar created by other residents. There are some on the Marketplace.

@ Callum She writes the notecard did NOT have any stream details or any login. So, yes, send a notecard. While you wait for an answer, you could check marketplace reviews, look up the resident in in-world search. Most of the time you will recognize an honest merchant quick enough. A dishonest one is a bit harder to catch but there are some clue's most of the time.

Lorem Ipsum V2?

Could it be you have, by accident, changed your Windlight Settings and changed the water setting?

There is a pretty large community in SL that RP's vampires and werewolves. It's not not considered kinky by most. To be seen as kinky is not so much a matter of what your avatar looks like. It is mostly determined by the way you interact with others and where you hang out.

That is a good graphics card and that setup sounds ok to run SL viewers:matte-motes-bashful-cute-2:

Depends on your configuration, especially the graphics card can make a huge difference! We could use more specifics about your configuration to tell you more.

Given the accounts have almost the same name and both have a very empty profile... I have been around SL for a long time... the thought comes to mind that these are alt accounts with the same "owner". Your gift is likely received by the right person, just on an alt account.

Alwin is very right. SL runs terrible without dedicated memory, might as well run it on your smartphone. The friends that advised you might be settling for very poor performance or never experienced how the viewer should run. Be mad at your friends who gave you poor advice and the techies that probably never actually ran the viewer and just want to sell you that notebook, instead of ppl that give honest advice. Intergraded grfx card do not do the trick, if they do (poorly), they will not last long. In other words, you better sell this one or return it and get a notebook with dedicated grfx memory.

This is so nice, awesome posts and I will add mine as soon as I have got some spare time! I hope this post will get very long :matte-motes-big-grin:

Maybe you forgot that not everyone has a great rig but still are advised to raise LOD but are not told it takes a lot out of your system? They will get lagged and have all kinds of problems like overheating, fans going crazy. Most will assume SL is not suitable and quit or will indeed srew up their system. Nothing bad can happen... if you are on a system like yours or mine, true. I am going to put this post to a rest as far as my responses. You seem to get more fun out of getting on the barricade's then you get out of helping posters. I wish you well.

I rarely make ppl feel like they are some dope, well, on a rare occasion I do but that generally says more about them then it does about me. In other words, I did not try to make you feel like that. You assume this. I did give subjects like this a lot of thought actually. I come from a very mixed background IRL and had ppl around me variable from leaning towards communism to very materialistic ppl that owned their own businesses. also, I read a lot... meaning a LOT! So again, you are the one making assumptions. I am all for change if it is for the better, sometimes some powers are in the hands the wrong person. But I am also pro structure, society need some structure, it needs laws, generally ppl need things to be clear. If you do not agree, it's really ok. I am feeling a political and/or moral discussion coming up and I would like to pass on that as those are both endless discussions.

I link a lot of ppl to this video lately. It explains LOD, why we need LOD and why it is a bad idea to set them that high. It is made by a well informed and respected resident who really knows what he's talking about.

I know you have mentioned in another post that you are about to release your own mesh body. How would you feel if you saw that body, just weeks after your release, being sold by another resident, for a very low price? How would you feel if this resulted into your sales dropping to almost zero, even tho you made this, you spend weeks working trough problems, texturing and stuff...? Can you honestly say you would be perfectly fine with that coz you do not believe in copyrights?

shaniqua Sahara wrote: how did people, artists, inventors and the like survive for thousands of years? Well, without ppl that downloaded, maybe? They would sell things called records and ppl would pay for them. Before records ppl would pay to visit a live performance and were willing to pay be there.:catwink: