Second Life LoD Problems – Is Firestorm to Blame

Lots of Second Life™ people use the Firestorm Viewer. Creators are certainly part of that group. A  number of people think the Firestorm Viewer is to blame for LoD problems in Second Life. Can that be?

{ She leads in the cold of winter }

{ She leads in the cold of winter } by Trinetty Skytower, on Flickr

Personally I think this is a case of a fascist mind set running the standard victim line and wanting someone else to fix their problems. See what you think. 

The current idea is there is a problem with LoD in Second Life. I tend to agree. But, in my thinking it is mesh creators not knowing how to build optimized mesh for a virtual world and LoD is only a part of the problem.

Whatever is the case it is so much a problem for some a thread titled Dear Mesh Content Creators: Please stop making your content on Firestorm has started over on SLUniverse. You’ll see people with different idea about who is you blame. You can decide who you think is to blame.

First understand what they are talking about when they say LoD. LoD is an aspect of mesh meaning level of detail. The viewer uses LoD level 4 when you are close and can see small details. As you move away the viewer moves through the levels until you are so far way you can barely see the thing. At that point a small 2D picture of the item will look like the item. One could paste that on a 2 poly plane.

Why does the viewer do this? For better performance. The fewer polygons to be rendered the faster things render and the higher your frames per second (FPS). Also as you move away from things they get smaller. Soon some polygons are smaller than the pixels on your screen. There is no point in rendering those polygons. So, a lower poly model is used to avoid wasting CPU cycles.

Good designers literally make four models of everything they make. Level 4 is the most detailed, highest polygon count. Level 1 is the lowest with the least polygons. Often my LoD 1 is a cube or plain with a picture of the item.

What happens with LoD when a model is poorly designed is it renders slowly looking like a blob or collection glass shards. And it changes shape as you move toward and away from it. With sculpties this blob look was a common problem. Things started rendering as a blob that changed into some recognizable thing as it loaded finally and rendered.

The moving toward and away shape change is caused by the viewer changing which LoD model it is using. It decides based on a mathematical formula that considers the size of the object and distance it is from your camera.

Good LoD design avoids noticeable shape change. Many designers simply do not know how to work with LoD. With mesh this is becoming an acute problem and we are seeing more complaints.

Page links below…

24 thoughts on “Second Life LoD Problems – Is Firestorm to Blame

  1. A couple of things I want to add, just as food for thought:

    1. Uploading a mesh allows you to auto-generate lower LoD states. I think a lot of (inexperienced ?) creators jsut leave the task up to the viewer.

    2. For years we got notecards with mesh products, telling us to just amp our RenderVolumeLODFactor ourselves. Most NCs advise to set it to as high as FOUR. I could iamgine there are lots of users around still using that setting and therefore not seeing what others see.

    3. Several designers are working based off of full Perms items they purchased from others so these designers are not even responsible for LoD issues but still get blamed when you could only blame them for making a bad purchase themselves.

    I myself can plead guilty of all three at one time or other.

    • All good points. It is probably kindest to attribute use of the built-in LoD generator to inexperience.

  2. Still asking mysel why most SL viewers use the terrible 1.125 lod setting, it’s useless and bad. you always need to increase it to 2.0 to see things right.
    So don’t blame firestorm for wrong setting, the Ve the right one. but blame all the other viewer for a terrible wrong setting.

    Only designers that use lod 4.0 we need to blame. but 2.0 would be better to have that as default.

    • I explained. Viewers use the setting 1.125 for performance reasons. Firestorm uses 2.0 to reduce questions in the support group. IMO, they are balancing performance with a support issue.

      In all cases the problems originate will poorly made content. Whether 1.0, 1.125, or 2.0 is used well made content works.

    • LOD factor is an arbatrary setting. if most content looks wrong at 1.125, it’s clearly because most content was not made TO look good at 1.125. If a viewer pumps an LOD higher, than by reason most content will not look good at a setting lower than what it was designed for. If Firestorm raises that limit, than lower LOD settings will render less content good.

      It’s very simple to me, at least.

  3. I certainly agree that proper LOD performance is primarily the responsibility of the creator. Users do, however need to know it exists! Simply complaining something does not “rez right” is not enough, especially after you have manually set LOD too low (or high).

    I keep a tribute item I got at Dust Bunny ( http://lovetodecoratesl.com/2015/05/25/dust-bunny-in-memory-of-scarlet-chandrayaan/ ) out as an example of Mesh Done Right. It is an amazing little bit of work.

  4. http://niranv-sl.blogspot.de/2015/06/unia-why-i-hate-it-already.html

    Talked about it here too.

    While i don’t think it is specifically Firestorm’s fault of setting the LoD higher, it is rather the Creators fault for being inexperienced and using a non standard Viewer for creating content and building it around that non standard Viewer’s features but sharing it as content for everyone, even those who might not see things properly. I do blame Firestorm for offering the community the ability to create mesh content in their Viewer and therefor allowing this mess. Open content, meant for everyone, no matter the Viewer should always either be created on a Viewer that is based on the defaults of LL or is the Linden Viewer itself, it should never be created in a Viewer that adds so many features like Firestorm that people cannot even be sure which features are from LL and which aren’t. I saw so many people confuse so many default features as Firestorm-only features. I also blame Firestorm users for recommending Firestorm in a manipulative way to everyone, where the Firestorm devs are again to blame because they decide to cater to everyone, trying to make it the best Viewer and attracting as much people as possible.

    This has to stop.

    I talked about this manipulative recommending here:
    http://niranv-sl.blogspot.de/2015/06/about-quitting-development-2.html

    • You really do object to freedom… It is not Firestorm’s duty or place to prevent people from making sub-optimal content by restricting what people can do with their viewer. Why do you want others to control what you can do?

      You say catering to everyone as if it is a bad thing… are you for ignoring minorities, like nubies?

      I disagree that that Firestorm using 2.0 in place of 1.125 is that significant a difference or a major contributor to designer ignorance.

      Have you ever considered how those few Firestorm users that are little fascist monsters trying to impose there ‘shoulds’ on people is only different from your ‘shoulds’ in the length they go to?

      Why does the Firestorm team have to quit catering to everyone? What if I am one of ones they quit catering to? Why do you want them to do that?

      • I want “others” to control what i can do to ensure that i don’t do shit. That is not the message behind it tho. It’s about the general fact that mesh should always be uploaded with the latest Linden Release for obvious reasons. If anything goes to shit, it’s at least not because Firestorm has extra features, changes or functions differently or uses different methods or versions of uploading/creating mesh content.

        Catering to everyone is a bad thing. I think i made it clear anough why, if not, heres the short version: You can’t make everyone happy, catering to everyone is a time waste, doing it to gain as many users as possible is bad in Second Life terms as you destroy the playing ground for other Viewers, you essentially take their existance reason away. There is no reason having different Viewers with different focuses if there’s one Viewer that has it all.

        Minorities are minorities and should be treated as such if the situation allows it. If those minorities were 2 guys, paying all the upkeep for everything in Second Life, then that’s a whole different ballgame, same with if those minorities are those actually wanting to make Second Life a better place free from any manipulative opinions they might have.

        I’m not saying that Firestorm defaulting to 2.0 is that big of a difference, i’m saying that recommending people to set LoD values which are out of reach for a default Viewer is bad, building projects based on those “unreachable” values and recommending to set these values to experience something as it’s meant to be is even worse. Firestorm ,weither it’s their support, their FAQ, help, or whatever else, started this by recommending these values, probably for the same reason they raised LoD to 2.0 by default.

        The difference between them and me is that they have no particular reason to have any “shoulds”, my primary goal is to make Second Life a better overall experience, it might not be better in everyone’s opinion but then again this is not my goal, my goal is a better Second Life overall, unassociated to people’s (especially Firestorm users) opinions. You are implying that i’m a fascist here.

        Why they should stop catering to everyone? Look above. Other than that, if you are one of those they should quit catering to, then you would be simply out of luck. I don’t necessarily want them to ditch people and say “fuck you because we don’t care”, i want them to stop trying to cater to everyone and ruining Second Life for others on a low level base with that. It’s like going around and catering your beancouch to everyone, having either a million versions of it or scripting it heavily to have several versions and textures for several Viewers and/or several PC specs, possibly breaking stuff for one or another and/or trying to get a compromise, crippling your product for everyone.

        • Sort of a paragraph by paragraph response.

          Who is it you think is capable of or responsible for controlling you? And who do you want controlling you? Why don’t you want to be free to behave as you wish?

          So do you think because someone can’t accomplish something like cater to all, they shouldn’t try?

          So, if one viewer has everything, there is no need for any other viewer? What if someone wants lite version of a viewer?

          Isn’t treating minorities as minorities what MLK was preaching against? Isn’t that the basis of racism and prejudice?

          ‘Free from manipulative opinions…’ Are you manipulated by other peoples opinions? If not, do you think others are and isn’t that a bit arrogant? Aren’t opinions what gives us the liberal goal of diversity? Are you against diversity?

          ‘…recommending people to set LoD values which are out of reach for a default Viewer is bad…’ What viewer cannot set LOD to 4 or more? The majority of viewers used with SL (high 90%) can be set to 4 or more… I don’t see where this makes any sense.

          I am implying your comments reflect fascist choices and opinions. When say they have no “should” I assume you mean the FS peeps. They have plenty of goals and ideas about what a viewer should be and how it should be built.

          Your last paragraph is self contradictory. Saying they should not say F-you and say stop catering to you and just ignore you… that is pretty much we don’t care and F-you… Did you think that through?

  5. “Good designers literally make four models of everything they make. Level 4 is the most detailed, highest polygon count. Level 1 is the lowest with the least polygons. Often my LoD 1 is a cube or plain with a picture of the item.”

    Do you know any tutorial explaining how the technic you’re talking about ?

  6. As a consumer in SL, we have no way of knowing which mesh items have been built properly using LOD. The only we we find out is after we purchase the item, rez it inworld, and see it degrade as we take a few steps away. Perhaps builders need to come up with some type of demo system like the clothing designers so we can see a good facsimilie of what we would be purchasing.

    • To a significant degree, you are right. There are systems for rendering a demo model of almost everything in SL. The problem is getting builders to use them. There are enough using them I don’t have to buy most of things I want without a demo.

      I have sent a note card to the builder and asked them about LI and ARC. Or to tell me where a version of an item is located that I can look at. Often they have a test unit in the preview grid if not on the main grid.

      I believe if enough of us are asking they will include the info in their promo materials, just save their having to answer all the questions.

      • Responsibility goes for cusotomers too, indeed.

        While not related to LoD, people very very often ask me if it would be possible to see my items inworld. My answer to all of them is the same: “Yes, in my store. Wich is clearly marked in my Picks, complete with info and TELEPORT button”.

        Usually, the answer to that is:

        “Oh.”

  7. I know i am capable of being responsible of controlling my own stuff, but that is because i can tell good and bad content apart, because i’m actually interested in stuff like that, i can see Second Life’s potential and i can see (and feel) the mistakes being done that will eternally limit Second Life to what it is. It might be to our best…

    Trying someonething you can’t accomplish is something entirely different to something you shouldn’t try to accomplish in the first place, which brings me to the point with Firestorm being an can-do-everything-Viewer is bad again.

    You don’t seem to understand what i was talking about, i was saying, there SHOULD be more diverse Viewers, that’s their sole purpose, different focus, different features, different goals, different Viewers. I’m absolutely against a Viewer that can cover most OR all areas in one like Firestorm seems to be trying. Firestorm wants everything because the users want everything in Firestorm, ultimately destroying the need of other Viewers. I have always tried to be an asshole to Firestorm (apart from the personal hate and all the mentioned reasons in my blog + many more) and do stuff as experimental and original as possible to go a path Firestorm would never dare to go, so they won’t implement my features.

    Theres a big difference between treading someone as minority in a racist way and treading someone simply as someone who has to accept that your stuff shouldn’t be made for these \minorities\, for example because they are outdated. People have to move on. Also, to be honest, if you go by that, racism is everywhere, every money making company does it, cater to the majority of people, the thing here is that the \majority\ here is actually a minority (rich people) but they are effectively a majority since they generate the income for the company. The actual user is a minority and can’t do anything about it because the product is simply not made for them. LL does this too but they do it at the wrong time for the wrong people. Bad decisions everywhere.

    It makes perfect sense. Building a SIM setup for LoD 4.0 is bad if the official Viewer can’t even set it to 4.0 without editing debugs that is. Public experience setups should be able to be experienced by EVERYONE without doing any kinds of hacks. Going into debugs is like opening the console and entering cheat codes to be able to play a game normal. It’s BAD. Also as far as i can remember the official Viewers have around 30-35% of the entire SL userbase. In NONE of the official Viewers you can set LoD to 4.0 without going into the Debugs.

    IF and only IF Firestorm was the official Linden Viewer, i would say that’s ok and true. Since they are a TPV and not the official, i’ll say, their thinking is wrong. They can think about how a Viewer should be, that’s fine and all but Firestorm is slowly developing into a massive cancer being shoved down everyone’s throat. Hey there’s a TPV its called Firestorm, its the only you will ever need! Firestorm! Firestorm here, Firestorm there. You need help? Download Firestorm, it will solve all your problems! If not, Firestorm Support! ~ What about Catznip? Exodus (ok that one is a bit old, but this is about the principe)? What about Lite Viewers? Black Dragon? Cool Viewer? ~ What? Never heard of them, doesn’t matter anyway Firestorm has everything!
    _____________
    Grrrr. I see Firestorm wherever i go. Firestorm being mentioned first and foremost in Guides like that Second Life game is a prime example for this. WHAT ABOUT THE OTHER VIEWERS?! AND THE OFFICIAL ONE? No one cares.

    And again you are misreading what i’m trying to say. I’m saying they should not go out and LITERALLY say \fuck you guys\, instead they should do it \professionally\, properly, tell people why time doesn’t stop and why everyone has to move on. Tell people that they can’t handhold them forever, they have to let go at some point.

    • NiranV saying you can tell good and bad doesn’t really answer why you want someone to tell you or make you do things. Also, isn’t your idea of good and bad, beneficial or detrimental simply your opinion based on how you see things and your biases and prejudices? How is it you know what is best for SL and everyone?

      Also, how is it you know what should or should not be tried in SL development? Is that not just another set of opinions?

      If building a can-do-everything viewer is so bad, why does it sell so well?

      Your 3rd paragraph seems confusing. First you want diversity in viewers, but then you don’t want to disallow a do-all version as one of the diverse types. Aren’t you disagreeing with your own thinking?

      You seem to think a do-all viewer discourages the development or use of niche and specialized viewers. If I have that right, do you have any evidence to support that thinking? My experience is all these variations co-exist pretty well.

      Your admission to hating a group of developers is not surprising to me. Thinking they fear to go in a development direction you chose seems odd. What is it you think they fear?

      Racism is engineered into our societies by social psychologists. The premier book on the subject was written on the 50’s (mind Rape) and is used by those running the Cloward-Pevin strategy. Your idea that minorities can be outdated mixes apples and oranges. Hardware can be outdated, not a group of people. Do you really think people can be outdated and thus should be discriminated against? Do you really think we should not build for a group of people? Is classing people by their hardware socially acceptable to you?

      I can understand describing a group of people by the hardware they use. But, doing so seems to confuse people’s thinking when they try to discuss ideology and deal with prejudices.

      I agree there are bad decisions everywhere. But, if there are bad decisions everywhere and you think LL is making them, is it not also fair for others to say you too are making bad decisions? And who is right?

      Do you see good and bad as absolutes? Or as relative and subject to individual preferences and opinions?

      How is Firestorm being shoved down everyone’s throat? How do they force anyone to use Firestorm?

      Where have you seen anyone from the Firestorm Team say the FS Viewer will solve all your problems?

      I doubt I am misunderstanding what you’re saying. You are pretty clear on what you’re saying but I see you as very confused on why you say it.

      You don’t like that you see Firestorm is mentioned everywhere. But, you ignore that most of those tutorials about FS come from volunteers and non-FS people that just use the viewer. Most of the mentions come from people using FS not the Dev or Support Teams. Inara and I both give FS coverage because lots of people are interested in it and I think Inara is a frequent user. I am interested in it and I am an infrequent user preferring it for mostly for photos and RLV. I am playing with Black Draon for both of those.

      When has a FS Team member told anyone to F-off? What is it you are talking about in that last paragraph?

  8. Yea, meh i forgot that part. I noticed its absence when i read it again. (whoops).

    I don’t want someone to necessarily tell me to do things unless you are referring to \tell me HOW to do certain things\, like for example, if i create an object, lets say a necklace, this necklace has lots of different textures whereas, all of them 512×512 or worse 1024×1024. Now someone with skills and knowledge comes around the corner and tells me \hey, this is absolute shit, you can’t just put lots of 1024×1024 textures onto such a small object, instead you could design your model to reuse the same part of the texture multiple times for most of the necklace and a big part for the accessory on the chain, that way you only use one texture and if you do it right you could even go with a 512×512 texture because the object isn’t all that big. The thing is, if you keep adding so much big textures to your product you will fill the very limited texture memory in Second Life very quickly, making other things or even your textures go all blurry because the Viewer trashes textures it thinks are not important and loads the new ones instead, causing an endless texture trash loop.\ With that i would say \Oh, yes that makes sense, you’re right i should probably optimize this thing before selling it\ and then start working on optimizing it, instead of selling it as a texture trash causer. That is how i define good content, content that is adequately made, has a good quality, doesn’t unnecessarily kill your performance and doesn’t cause any such issues like alpha sorting, texture trashing, script lags, chat spamming etc.

    Because as of today (which is basically already too late) we can tell (from the past experience, fails and good changes) what users want and what they don’t want, what would be really beneficial for Second Life and what would be low-level to-do stuff for later.

    \If it’s bad why does it sell so well\ is an invalid argument i wont accept as it is. Call of Duty is bad too because its one of the reasons games are so dumbed down and full of DLC’s today, because it sells good, so it must be good according to your thinking. Yes it might be a good game to some extend (at least it was) but its good sales are telling the company that selling the same shit every year with DLC works, so they will continue doing that and with it reducing games to this Call of Duty level. Means, just because roughly 2/3 of SL uses Firestorm doesn’t mean it’s good. I think it is bad.

    No. An all-do Viewer is diversity in itself, it lessens and ultimately destroy the reason for using other Viewers. I’m all for diverse Viewers as in every Viewer does something else (apart from some basic functionality) but in Firestorm EVERYTHING is \basic functionality\, almost every main aspect of other Viewers is used in Firestorm too. They want to make a Viewer for photographers/machinima (my part and previously also a part of Exodus), for stability and usability (Catznip, Alchemy), for V1 lovers (Singularity, Cool Viewer) and so on.

    I don’t have any writings or something for this so you’ll have to take my word on this when i say i’ve seen enough people telling me that they \can’t use\ or \won’t use\ my Viewer not even for it’s intended purpose (machinima/photography) because it is missing an oh-so important feature from Firestorm. Those people are what i consider total idiots but they do prove that an all-do-Viewer does change the readiness to try out other Viewers (Viewers that are made for these specific purposes) and that is something i really hate, although it is also each invidual’s fault if they insist on a feature like their life depends on it. Most people have their opinion and they will stay with that (just like i do) until they realize that their opinion is unnecessarily limiting themselves and possibly others (if they tell people to use certain Viewers, Firestorm users telling other users to use Firestorm to get help because everything else is shit anyway for example). I don’t think all Viewers co-exist all that \good\ together, it seems more like a \against\ each other. \With each other\ would be something like the snowstorm project where everyone helps each other, this is clearly not the case here and sometimes i feel like i’m the only one who dares standing up and telling everyone else about it. It’s almost like a secret war, hidden from public eyes, everyone hates someone and is somehow directly or indirectly trying to stab that someone, which again is not necessarily a bad thing if that someone wouldn’t be mostly just one Viewer pretty much always being set out as the \target\.

    I think they fear losing users, or making them complain.

    Building for a group of people is a bit generalized here but yes, in certain situations i think you should not build something for certain people. Not if my actual targeted group has to take hits for it. If i designed my objects for the latest tech and low-mid range people would complain that they cannot see the materials for example, i’ll carefully tell them to talk to my hand, i wouldn’t want my targeted user group to take compromises of any sort. \but Firestorm has no real targeted group\ is probably what you’ll think about that. That’s the issue, Firestorm has no real focus other than \be everything\, that is not a focus that is a foundation and as such the LL Viewer should be the one that is \everything\, not necessarily literally as in it should be able to do all the things but it should have the basic functionality everyone with a more focused approach builds upon.

    Telling good and bad apart is something humanity tries to do for so long, there is basically no good or bad, yet we try to force things into a predefined case. We try to judge according to what we know and it appears to me that we often try to do good things, ending up doing bad things with a good reason behind it. Would you kill someone who’s pointing a gun at you and if so, isn’t killing someone a bad thing? Yes it is but you did it for a good reason. Still you did something bad, you should have let him kill you, that way you wouldn’t have done harm to anyone but then again who’s telling us if that isn’t actually bad since you were ego and just thought about yourself, totally forgetting that there’s a family who might be sad to hear that you are now dead. All this philosophical paradox nonsense… lets just stay at saying \this is good, this is bad\ and on that matter i think they are often doing bad things with/for a good intention. I wouldn’t be writing here and saying all this if i had a bad intention.

    I did not say Firestorm devs are doing so. I never did say that hence why i took a different example. Users are doing so which is only indirectly Firestorms fault.

    Guides for a game should not be mainly for a third party Viewer, it should be for the official Viewer. Simple as that, there are no excuses to this. I’m not talking about people reporting about it, that is totally out of questionm, i’m purely talking about people shoving FS down other people’s throats like it’s the only Viewer for Second Life.

    You are again not understanding what i said. I’m NOT saying they said fuck off, i’m saying they SHOULD say fuck off sometimes.

    • You seemed to have conflated someone telling you how to do something and someone telling you what can do. So, like me you prefer freedom. But you do seem to go for placing more controls on what people can build in SL. Isn’t that contradictory?

      You don’t really answer the question on what should and should not be tried being just your opinion. Thinking history tells us what to try and not try doesn’t work. Would telling the Wright brothers not to try to fly because all previous attempts had dramatic failures been a smart thing?

      Isn’t what we learn from history more about how to do things than what things to do? Like jumping off a cliff verses trying a runway…

      That more people adopt/buy FS is a very clear indicator of what people prefer. To try and stick with classifying a do-all viewer is bad requires rather esoteric thinking. I can see the validity in that line of thinking. It seems like rationalization.

      I still find your thinking on diversity contradictory.

      Quoting you, “I think they fear losing users, or making them complain.” I think they have figured out what works for the majority and use that information to make a more popular and useful viewer. If they fear complaints, they are in the wrong endeavor. I suspect that get more complaints than any other viewer development team. I doubt that is a fear of theirs.

      Building for groups of people… That tends to go with socially engineered thinking. I think we are too generalized on this point to sort it out.

      You think the Firestorm people have no targeted demographic. I think their target is way obvious. The advanced and power users.

      Good and bad has been a philosophical debate forever. About the only thing decided is that use of the terms is general an indication of judgmental thinking and more about personal preference than realistic absolutes. Baal worshipers thought sacrificing a new born in a fire was a good thing.

      I don’t see where your perceptions of good and bad work any better. While you say philosophy is paradoxical and often nonsense, it is the philosophies of free market, people, and speech that has lifted millions out of poverty. Philosophies have consequences. Think ISIS. Without a clear philosophy and principals we are left with the confusion of situational ethics.

      Your thinking that guides should be for the main viewer seems arbitrary. Why would we not make guides that work for the largest number of people? Where is the sense in your thinking people donating guides should be making them for ¼ of the users and ignoring ¾’s of users?

      Quoting you, “You are again not understanding what i said. I’m NOT saying they said fuck off, i’m saying they SHOULD say fuck off sometimes.” Going back and rereading, you wrote, “I’m saying they should not go out and LITERALLY say \fuck you guys\, instead they should do it \professionally\, properly, tell people why time doesn’t stop and why everyone has to move on.” To say they should not do something implies they are doing that thing. Thus my question when did they do that? If you weren’t clear and I misunderstood then your correct is reasonable.

      Out of sequence:
      Considering the sentence, ‘An all-do Viewer is diversity in itself, it lessens and ultimately destroy the reason for using other Viewers.’ I have yet to see you explain why you believe that. The evidence is it doesn’t.

      Isn’t saying all viewers need to do things differently and no viewer should roll all those things in to one, eliminating a part of the diversity?

      If someone tells you they don’t use Black Dragon because it lacks a specific feature, you think they are an idiot? Isn’t that arrogant thinking? Why are you not considerate of what they want/need?

      Why do think presence of a do-all viewer is eliminating a willingness to try other viewers? Doesn’t the fact that people tell you they looked at Black Dragon and learned it doesn’t have a feature they use and thus aren’t using it show they have the willingness to try other viewers? If there was no willingness, why would they look at Black Dragon?

      This has been interesting, long and I need the time for other things. So, I’ll give you the last words.

  9. As the creator of the SLU thread, I’d like to clarify:

    I am accusing Firestorm of changing default Second Life behavoir. (Which they factually have, that leaves into question if you think it’s a problem, of course.)

    The reason I say this is a problem, is, if you run Second Life on maximum graphics, it is not the same as running Firestorm on maximum graphics. The reason is they have changed what the maxmum LOD is for turning the “Object Detail” slider al lthe way up.

    For most mesh creators, it only matters what your content looks like on max graphics. In the case of Firestorm though, that’s a much higher preset than what it is on Second Life. This leads to any problems your Mesh may have being entirely unseen while using Firestorm. So naturally, a Firestorm user will make meshes that LOD poorly on everything except Firestorm, whereas if they were using a standard viewer or other TPV, they might spot some bad LOD and be encouraged to make their meshes LOD a tad better.

    I’ve gone though many objects LOD’ing very badly in SL, and it can only be fixed by pumping up debug object detail higher than it should be – higher than 2.0. THAT IS BAD! For one thing, you’ll lag yourself, for another thing, you won’t be seen right by anyone who hasn’t done the same thing! Who wants to walk around as an avatar that only YOU can see correctly?

  10. Pingback: Second Life: Firestorm a Designer’s Problem? | Nalates' Things & Stuff

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