Testing the AvaStar Model vs LL Avatar Model

About 5 years ago I was testing the various models available for use in Blender and comparing them to the SL default avatar. Now Gaia of AvaStar has done that for you. Check it out.

I think it is really nice to have this information. But, there isn’t much use for it. Mesh clothes built based on the default avatar are simply never going to fit well. The sliders will always change the classic avatar and mesh clothes at different rates.

The classic avatar use morphing. Mesh clothes use rigging. Those two things respond differently.

However, the AvaStar model will get you as close to a match as is possible.

5 thoughts on “Testing the AvaStar Model vs LL Avatar Model

  1. The reason for making this video was to demonstrate that the Avastar-2 meshes are reference meshes for Secondlife. We need this exact replication so that we can ensure that animations made for the system character will fit precisely when used in Secondlife.

    It is also true that custom meshes will never match the system character for all slider ranges. But we have some useful options… I am already working on the follow up videos which will be published soon 🙂

    A bit of nitpicking

    – The official terms – as defined in the avatar_skeleton.xml – are “Basic” and “Extended” . The terms “Classic” and “Bento” slipped in at a time when there was no official term available for this.

    – The term “rigging” is very popular. But i believe it should be “skeletal animation” to be more precise. See here: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Rigging_(computer_graphics)&redirect=no

    However i admit that we use “rigging” also in the Avastar user interface. So…

    End of nitpicking 🙂

    cheers,
    Gaia

    • Thank you for nitpicking. 🙂 I appreciate ‘preciseness’.

      I may not always be precise in my writing. I often use the terms I think most of my readers are most familiar with. I get my sense of that from answering questions in the SL Answers Forum. So, if I don’t use the precise terms you mention, it isn’t from a lack of gratitude for your pointing to the more precise terms.

      • nono, all is well 🙂

        It happens often that the more precise term is just not accepted by the users. I had one situation when i started with Blender where they consistently used the term “UV Tex” to describe something very similar (but not identical) to what other tools name “UV Map”. After a long discussion it was finally renamed to match the “user standards”. That was my very fist Blender project btw 🙂

        Anyways, just continue naming it “Rig” “Classic” and “Bento”. Those terms are at least much shoreter and more easy to remember. And I suspect those names are rather sticky and won’t go away any time soon 🙂

  2. I salut Gaia work in doing avastar and support including video presentation like this one.

    For the sake of making this comment lets call FITTED the adjustable mesh body and lets call RIGGED the rigid original skeleton ( rigid for Breast and Butt ) .

    Now come bento . The bento skeleton present officialy by SL for blender ( http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Project_Bento_Testing) is RIGGED ( rigid ). Iit cannot be adjusted as a fitted skeleton can. ( rigid for Breast and Butt ) .

    This has an interesting effect. in two ways. Having a rigid body allow adjusting the FITTED mesh clothing to the rigid avatar by way of adjusting the cloth breast and butt while the rigid avatar will stay as is.

    In addition the SL BENTO mesh body can be textured using skin and clothing texture since it has same UVMAP as system avatar.

    The problem of shape vs clothing adjustment was formally solved in system avatar by adjusting the cloth attachment to fit the avatar . The introduction of fitted mesh avatar which is only a layer on top of the system avatar uses the sliders to modify the skeleton which prevent adjusting fitted body and fitted cloth separately.

    To me rigid shape is not so disadvantageous since avatar shape is not changed as often as clothing .

    GiMiSa

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