Indigo Mertel

Blender 2.57, the first feature complete stable release is released! http://www.blender.org/development/release-logs/blender-257/

This may interest SL builders: Packt Publishing is an UK-based publisher of many books on IT, including books on Blender 3D, The Gimp, Inkscape. It is currently running a special offer on select books for the month of April. Discounts are 20% off for print books and 30% off for ebooks. Find the link here: Fiery Red http://bit.ly/elGqCy

Nah! Really?!? A SL region has been named after Sylva Koscina??? Surprising... For those who don't know her, Sylva Koscina was a Yugoslavian-born (Zagreb, now Croatia) actress quite popular in Italy. She acted in several films from the '50s to early '90s. Many of them B-movies, but she also acted in movies directed by important Italian directors such as Dino Risi, Pietro Germi, Alberto Lattuada, Luigi Comencini, Ettore Scola and others. She also acted in US movies with Kirk Douglas and Paul Newman.

Awesome! Thank you, Icarus

Hi Gaia, thank you for the good news. One question: will Primstar have features to support mesh building as well? Or, is it only focused on sculpts?

Mowry Bay is a geographical area, Marianne, not a monument. Historically it has been called so for a number of years. Perhaps landmark wasn't the proper word to be used, sorry about that.

@Icarus, I like the way you marked the East River area. It's an acceptable compromise. I still recommend adding a reference to Mowry Bay. It's a historical landmark. Do we have permission to use your map (with proper credits) once finished? I'd love to display it in our City Hall.

Robin, I have filed a reference to your tutorial on MetaLibrary

Con la fibra ottica di Fastweb a Milano si hanno 10 Mbps in download e 9 Mbps in upload, misurati con Speedtest. Naturalmente con server distanti (tipo USA) i numeri diminuiscono parecchio. Infatti è necessario considerare anche dove si trovano i server a cui ci si collega.

Liisa and Marianne are right, Toysoldier. As Marianne pointed out, Lalo Telling did an extensive research of the origins of the Second Life grid in a number of posts on his blog. Recommended reading for anyone who is into SL history.

Icarus, thank you for your post on the ERC, much appreciated. For fairness, I have to point out that the last picture titled Mowry is not part of the East River Community. The place is the Mowry Bay Yacht Club, which is not part of the community. As for your map revision, thank you but I think my suggestion makes more sense. What I suggests has to do with historical reasons and how residents name the area, not to promote our community. Also, the area I indicated is relative to the rivers flowing there and it is larger than the actual community. Our community is about 3-4 regions smaller. Anyway, it's your project, you asked for feedback but ultimately it's your decision.

Che c'entra l'IBM?

Un paio di giorni fa ho letto un articolo riguardo a un provider canadese che deliberatamente rallenta certi servizi tipo lo streaming musicale a causa della quantità di banda che consumano. Probabilmente non c'entra niente con il tuo caso, ma potrebbe essere una possibile risposta. Lo stream musicale va a scatti solo quando usi SL? Hai provato ad usare un servizio stream qualsiasi senza usare SL?

Hi cat-ographer Based on the posts in the thread several areas bear names after what residents call them so I think we are on solid ground

Just to offer some background to RL, Gaeta is a town located in the Latium region (Lazio, in Italian) about 120 km from Rome and 80 km from Naples. It's the location of a NATO base and a port for the US's Sixth Fleet. I wonder why LL picked the name for the continent. Maybe someone at the lab served in the Sixth Fleet.

Awesome job, Icarus. Your map looks great. I have a couple of suggestions.I have marked the areas in your map: The area marked red, part of the Hidden Lakes and Great lakes areas, are what in our community call the East River, hence the name of our community located there: the East River Community. This has been so since 2008 ( http://eastrivercommunity.posterous.com/pages/about-us-5 ) The large bay north-west of the East River marked green is the location of one of the oldest yacht club in SL, if not the oldest, the Mowry Bay Yacht Club (MBYC). The MBYC is a historical landmark for the sailing community. The bay there has always been called by residents and sailors of the sailing community as Mowry Bay. I believe it has been called as such since 2005-2006. Here is a map of the area made by our cartographer, Elisha Paklena: Update: the image can't be enlarged here in the forum, so I add here a list of regions that would be included in the areas marked on your map: East River (marked red) would include the regions of (west to east, north to south) Grizedale, Kirkstone, Brooks, Hardknott, Helvellyn, Muirhead, Munck, Macclaine, Whinlatter, Pippen. I would include McFee, Chong and Lane as well but that is debatable. Mowry Bay (marked green) is located in the region of Hepurn, north of the region of Mowry.

Hello! We are looking for the next affiliated member of the East River Community. The ERC is a nice community located on the continent of Sansara founded April 2008, though the community traces its roots back to 2006. One of our affiliated members has to sell his land due to RL contingencies, so there is about 18,000 sqm of land located in a very nice area for sale. The ERC is a federation of groups which share the same interests and we have an affiliation program to share resources, promotional channels and to better control the environment, thus preserving quality and beauty over a vast area. Affiliation to our community is NOT A REQUIREMENT to buy the land. You can freely buy it and do whatever you want with it. Please, check our blog for further information: http://bit.ly/hVjd4v

Thanks for your post, Gaia. Hopefully someone else will chime in, as I don't know much about this topic either. However, after yur post I got curious and did a search on the matter. Apparently it is possible to export an animation in BHV format from Blender 2.5, so it looks like Blender could be used as a tool for animations.

Nice post, Drongle. I wish expert SL users would make some tutorials focused on SL building on all this stuff, as there is so much to learn and, frankly some of it sounds a bit cryptic to me. Inworld classes would be great, too. Well, if anyone makes some tutorials please let me know so I can add a reference to MetaLibrary.

Don't underestimate things like this, Ian. A vast number of people in SL role play what they are not in RL. Being a police officer is not my cup of tea, but I see nothing strange about people playing a police officer. It's just a fantasy like many others. Also, there are several RL police officers in SL. Some of these groups even have educative purposes. Take the SL Coast Guard group, for instance: while not a police force, their organization is similar. They are a respected and helpful organization in SL, much appreciated by the sailing community and with a stellar reputation. In order to be promoted to higher ranks, their members must take classes. Some of their members are RL coasties and a few even joined the US Coast Guard as auxiliries. After all, the US Army tries to entice young people into joining the army with video games.

It's probably one of the several law enforcement role play groups. They are harmless in most cases. Should they harrass you in any way you can AR them.

Hello! I run MetaLibrary, a blog with links to tutorials, tips and tricks and anything useful to Second Life users (see link in my sig). Today I have found a tutorial on how to import and retarget mocap files (in bhv format) into Blender 2.5. The tutorial is rather interesting but I have no experience with animation and rigging, thus I have no idea if what it explains is of any use to Second Life content creators. Could any expert please have a look and let me know if the tutorial may be of use? This is the link: http://bit.ly/gyX3g6 Thank you!

Nice tree! Would you mind uploading your picture to the Second Life 3D Mesh group on Flickr? http://www.flickr.com/groups/secondlife3dmesh/ Thank you! :smileyhappy:

Very true, Polenth. I had the same experience. The area where our community is 3 years ago was a total mess, the usual chaos of unfinished buildings, ad farms, micro parcels, floating prims, ugly skyscrapers, dozens of skyboxes and a total eye sore in general.I started buying parcels after parcels with the intent of reclaiming the land to a state of decency. Three years later many says our community is one of the most pleasing areas on mainalnd.

Here some pictures of the East River Community... A foggy day in Helvellyn Town Helvellyn Civic Center: Hardknott Gate at sunrise: The Holly Golightly's Cafe: The opening of an exhibit at the Art'e Gallery in Helvellyn Town: Paola Tauber's take: While building a new house: The same house once finished: Muirhead Village at night: The ERMA (East River Municipal Airport): Map of the East River Community as of August 2010 (light green area):