AOs and "popping

You know how quads and tinies and other "folded" avatars sometimes pop out of shape to the default stand now and then? Here's a comment from Ziggy Puff about what can be done to the animation overrider to make that stop.

login screen pictures

I'm wondering if the Lab is using a bot to take the pictures for the login screen... Waterproof scooters at sunset anyone?

Bye freebies! *cries*

Say bye to the freebies!

I'm trying to decide if I want to unlist them, merge them into a single package, or just keep the popular ones and list those at 10L. Most months I move over 100 sound prim packs on xstreet, and if I move a pair at that price it'll cover their fees. I can always dump the profits from it onto NCI or an SL education group.

There's also a monthly listing of 10L per item for each thing that costs at least a linden. I'm trying to decide if I want to pull some of my slower items, or offer a "trial pack" that includes a link to a webpage with pictures.

Moving the mainland shop...

Should be back to normal in the next day or so.

EDIT: Move's done!

viewing object permissions

Want to know how those perms will be set for the next owner? Torley pointed out a debug view of object permissions.

OH HAI!

I think I understand it now. Sometimes, people stay around SL but stop blogging. They're still running their shops, hanging out with friends, catching shows, building, maybe consulting.

At first it was the NDAs for me. I was building and learning new things, but I couldn't talk about the specifics. And the times when everything I was doing in SL was under NDA, well, what's there to say about the general news that isn't being spun about a dozen times on other blogs? And that awareness that whatever hot blogging issue has been discussed a dozen times before in the last couple years whispers "so why bother saying it all again?"

Then there's deadlines. No time to write something when you could put that time to getting a step closer to your immediate goals! Just a few more hours, right?

And I can't forget simple laziness. I've learned a lot about making and scripting content on opensim the last few months. Nothing that undoubtedly has been said by others, but enough of the related work is under NDA that I haven't felt like picking it apart to write about.

I've been enjoying the underwater sim project I embarked on with some friends too. Not a lot to write about, but it's a nice space to explore and do some spear fishing. We've got plans to do more with it, but like everything else it depends on time. ;) I've also got to get around to moving my main shop, rebuilding The Brass Needle, and building a couple dozen avatars that have been on my mind.

Hardware frustrations

I've been fighting with my machine's hardware, and getting my new system into working order. I got hardware that wasn't working out of the box from NewEgg.com, and getting them to fix things has taken weeks and a ridiculous number of "oh yes, we've taken care of it" phone calls. BOO HISS NEWEGG.COM! Insert long rant about incompetence and lies here. But now I've got most of my software running on Win7, and things are going well.

Snowglobe logo design contest

If you like designing logos, there's a contest with a cash prize for designing the logo for the Snowglobe version of the viewer.

animations

I spent the last several hours learning how twisted the animation bvh format is. *rubs head* Blender does have the ability to flip a pose, but there currently doesn't seem to be a way to import one in a way it can be used in SL. Blender can now import bvh files by default, and there's a method to take blender animations and export them, but the glue in between isn't there.

This takes other bvh files and tries to tune them to work in SL. It's worth reading how it works - there's a lot of details there about what SL expects from animations that I haven't seen talked about elsewhere.

HOWTO: Prim torture

The ultimate guide to prim torture.

Doings.

So the first pass at the sitting writeup is done, except for pics. I also did a first pass at a writeup about underwater sims for a contract, although I expect that one won't ever go outside their people.

I'm getting together with some friends and we're building an underwater area. We've got a space and a general theme, but still need to work out the details. I'm excited!

O.o

After several years in SL, I'm happy to report that I can still look at something and wonder. Side-splitting Zindra jokes left as an exercise for the reader. ;)

(definitely not PG)

It's the simple things

Having VWR-6226 fixed makes me so very happy!

Sitting revisited

I'm slowly working on a long writeup about sitting in SL. Didn't realize how complex a topic it is until I was explaining parts of it.

Doings.

Busy today.

I got several mer avatars done and boxed today, I'm happy with the AO, and I finished the hair I wanted to do. The scripting's done for the second set, but I still have to do the texture and prim work.

Did a lot of talking too. :)

Fantasy Faire June 15 - 21

I've signed up as a vendor in the Fantasy Faire 2009 being held by the RFL and FFC. Looks like there will be all kinds of awesome avatars there!

I've got several avatars and parts that I've made for myself or friends that I haven't boxed up. This gives me a deadline to make it happen. It'll be a busy two weeks!

Sketch pad

A SL sketch pad.

Musings

My 3rd rez day is next week. Not sure if I want to be social or find a quiet build and be mellow.

I've been making a lot of things, but I've taken almost none of them to where they're products. I'm not sure why. My contract work, I've been completing that without any reluctance. I've made things for me to wear, and I've made several freebies for friends.

The Brass Needle's in good shape.

I should rebuild the mainland shop, but I'm not sure what I want it to be next. I've done a lot of building spaces lately and I want it to be something I enjoy. The current shop's pretty old, I'm a lot more skilled now.

Might see if I can mix up a challenge with some other builders, maybe that'll encourage me to get something into product form.

Missing item - Amelia In Red Outfit (undershirt)

Got an IM from a customer about an item of clothing in one of the sets I sell giving her an error. Turns out I've been hit with an inventory bug.

All instances of it in my inventory and items have the same failure. When worn, they fail to show up on the avatar and show a blue box with "Failed to find clothing named Amelia Lace Undershirt - Red in database." I've got a ticket in for it, but /shrug

If you've got the outfit and are experiencing the same failure, IM me and I'll send you a replacement.

EDIT March 12: Sadly, LL has been unable to find it. So as a general heads up, the inventory DB is still eating items now and then. Keep the things you use to make items around. ;)

Surreal Shakespearean experience

Here. I'm wondering if it is a demo piece - size it up and add a music stream reading verses aloud and it'd be a wowser.

Another way to be invisible

Turns out you can hide the basic avatar by wearing a huge megaprim (the 65K one) as an attachment. This is being used as an alternative to invisiprims that doesn't interfere with the display of alpha textures (or linden trees or water.)

The wise script it to die if it finds itself unattached. ;)

A couple Lindens have said they consider this to be a bug and to not count on it to work in the future. 1

Keep in mind being completely invisible is a serious no-no. It's treated as stalking usually.

Sigh.

If you're an XStreet merchant, it's time to update your magic box again.

Visiting Linden Memorial Park

I went and checked out the new Linden Memorial Park. (LL blog entries 1 2 ) It's a cluster of twelve sims. The place reminded me of national parks. Trails, woods, clear areas, rivers and waterfalls, bridges, a lake, a couple formal gardens, even some picnic tables. I noticed several of the large rocks have sit poses set in them. There's also a place with floating candles you can use on the beach to the northwest.



Lots of people were there. I ended up walking part of the path there with some friends and had a nice chat with Governor Linden.

Doings.

Got my New Babbage shop land updated. I was dancing between selling the land or getting someone to share the rent with me, and two friends turned out to be interested in sharing it. Now it's got a new land picture, a pair of new shops, and a modified description.

I lowered the prices on some of my earlier avatar sets, and they're generating more money than before. Maybe the people at Grendel's are on to something.

Even more map play.

Well, I'm still fussing trying to get color matches for the map voids. It's not the fastest project. :/ Having to wait about two days for each bit of feedback is sooooo sloooooow....

0,75,100 is close for the teal SLurl map. 5,5,65 isn't too bad for the internal map, but it doesn't hide particularly well. I'm beginning to wonder if there's something in the map snapshot code that prevents a prim's results from exactly matching the internal map's dark blue.

More map play

Hiding a sim from the map with a megaprim works.

The inworld map and the SLurl map aren't being updated together yet. The SLurl map seems to be on a faster update cycle.

The two maps use different colors to signify areas without a sim, so I'm finding the appropriate colors to use on the prim to make the sim "invisible" on one map or the other.

Moving land around.

Sold off my old workshop land, and a pair of smaller parcels. One I no longer need, the other has since become entirely surrounded by a neighbor (who bought it) who's been trying to repair some of the land cutter damage. I'm trying to decide if I want to pick up more land in the sim with my main shop. It'd give me more prims for the shop and for building if I'm in the mood.

Playing with the map

When your building out a new sim, sometimes you want to keep it a secret until opening day. But you can't hide from the map! Or can you?

I've taken a 256x256M megaprim, textured it with the "nothing here" color from the SLurl maps, and covered a sim with it at 375M. (400M seems to be the cutoff height for the map.) From this, I should know in less than two days if it "works". SLurls would still work, and I expect the pointer on the map would still show the sim's name. But you won't be able to see the build from the map.

I've never done any skywriting before in SL. From what I read, it seems the map averages the texture (and color) on a prim's face into a single blob, so you have to use individual prims to "write" things.

Making things

Lots of doings lately. I made my first mermaid avatar from scratch and learned a lot about making fins. And for Armada, I made my first real game. I'll put up something more about both soon, I still have to take pictures.

Virtual seasons

New Babbage's winter is over. So away go the piles of snow, and time to decide what will go in the flower boxes for spring.

Facing the sun

It's the little things that drive you mad.

llGetSunDirection() returns a normalized vector.

XStreet doings

You can now send things from XStreetSL to any SL avatar over a day old.

Which reminds me to put up some new things there. If you like brightly colored fairy skins, take a look!

I also put my valentine's camo pants freebie up for the next week. If you missed them last year here's your chance!

Double your pleasure, double your fun!

The email from the Lab about how they may have accidentally double-charged weekly fees for some groups? They sent it to me twice.

LL buys XStreetSL and OnRez

The rumor about XStreetSL and OnRez being bought by LL is true. OnRez is being closed, so transfer any outstanding balances by Feb 11.

Been a rough week for the grid.

Dear Grid,

Please, get well soon.

Thinking of you,

-Storm

Water. It isn't always wet.

Been building underwater a lot lately. Sometimes the water gets in the way.

Ctrl-Alt-Shift-7 makes the client not render the surface of the water.
Ctrl-Alt-F6 makes the client not render the underwater effect.

Or, if you've got access to the sim estate controls, you can always change the water height to zero.