How To Stream Second Life to YouTube Gaming

Streaming Second Life™ to YouTube Gaming (YTG) is easy. This is a tutorial based on my first successful try. It is not complete or as detailed as it could be and I’ll probably come back to it and add more or write another tutorial. Now lets get into the basic what we need to do.

The only geekie part is you may need to know your upload speed. You can find your actual speed by using SpeedTest.net. Mine averages 6.6mbps. A safe value for me to use is 80% of 6.6 = 5.3mbps. But, I never HAD to know that to make my first stream.

Go to YouTube Gaming (YTG) and create a channel. (You can search on Second Life to see what channels are already there. To do that, click the GO LIVE link (button?) in the upper right of the page. It is an odd button, which is really a drop down. The first time you click it opens and gives you two choices, GO LIVE and UPLOAD Video. Click GO LIVE again.

YouTube Gaming - Upper Right of Home Screen

YouTube Gaming – Upper Right of Home Screen

From there walk your way through the  instructions. You’ll enter your name and possibly a phone number, if your new to YouTube (YT).  Whatever name you enter for the account will be displayed on the channel.

At the bottom of the page is a section labeled Encoder Setup. You need to copy the Channel URL and Key shown here and save it. You’ll possibly need that information later, depending on the encoder you pick.  Continue reading

Second Life: Photography Tools

On Flickr I came across an interesting image of a photographer’s viewer screen. I used the image in a previous article. But, in that article I didn’t say anything about the information Kerri Fegte included in the image description. You may not have seen the information, which I think is good enough it is a must read for any photographer shooting models.

Oh, Monday, you're such a Tool Meme 1.20.14

Oh, Monday, you’re such a Tool Meme 1.20.14 by Kerri Fegte, on Flickr

This is a wonderful collection of tools. Add some of these and the Black Dragon Viewer or Firestorm Viewer tools and your talent… you’ll be making pro quality snaps. You’ll have to find you own model with photogenic legs.

Evolution

Evolution by Kerri Fegte, on Flickr

Kerri’s image and posting were inspired by one of Strawberry Singh’s Monday Memes.

Second Life: MayaStar News – Week 15

A week or two back I covered MayaStar®, the addon for Maya® users developing Second Life™ content. I suppose many are aware of the similar product AvaStar for Blender. These are different products made by different people. They are not competitors as they serve different audiences.

Even if you are a Blender/AvaStar user there is still a bit of information here that may help you in  your design work. I’ve sot of added the work flow Cathy is building into MayaStar into my AvaStar work flow.

The video is 30 minutes long.  Continue reading

Second Life Profile Cards/Badges

My Community Badge March 2015

My Community Badge March 2015

Also know as: Second Life Community Badges

Four years ago to the day, 3/3/2011, I posted about how to make a Second Life Forum Community Badge. The badges are, of course, shown in the Second Life Forum. See the example image.

The alternative is to show just the avatar profile picture.

At the time there was a problem and four years later it is still here. We probably need to file a new JIRA. Whatever, the problem only appears of you select one of the default ‘profile cards’ to use.  There is no way to unselect using a card after that. You are doomed for life.  Continue reading

Second Life Wiki Lockdown 2014-52

I have a bit of time to write today. RL is still busy with work and holiday related stuff. I can confirm that Adobe’s latest release of Dreamweaver is way buggy when one tries to use their new fluid ‘LIVE’ design features. It appears Adobe is moving away from Dreamweaver and toward their new Adobe Edge.

SL Wiki

I’m not sure how many of my readers use the SL Wiki. I suspect even fewer add to its content. Those of us that do contribute to the wiki content have been blocked for some time. The SL Wiki is no longer user editable. Few Lindens can edit it.

Months ago some socially dysfunctional people started vandalizing the wiki. The Lindens locked it down to stop the vandalism. Continue reading

Second Life: DMCA Abuse – Fight Back

The Digital Millennium Copyright Act or DMCA is pretty well known and abused in Second Life™. In RL it is also commonly known and abused. The law should be over turned and I expect it would be if it ever made it to the Supreme Court. The law makes people prove their innocence, which is upside down in America and most free market economies. The the reason the law continues to stand is the it favors politicians, big business, and the wealthy. Individuals and small business can’t afford to fight at the Supreme Court level.

Image by: Michael Mandiberg @ Flickr

Image by: Michael Mandiberg @ Flickr

The WordPress organization is fighting the censorship that can be imposed by abuse of DMCA. They wrote about it here: Striking Back Against Censorship. Others are in the fight too. One of those is a company named Automattic. They gained fame when fighting  Janet Jackson’s take down demand. (ReferenceContinue reading

Education in Second Life

Virtual reality/worlds have extensive possibilities for education and training, we all know that, I think we do… But, I suspect most are like me and think little on the problems educators have using virtual worlds as their classroom.

SLeducate - University of Western Australia (UWA)

SLeducate – University of Western Australia (UWA)

If I think about it even a little I realize the first problem is just getting a student into the world and to the right location. The University of Western Australia (UWA) has an article up about those challenges. See: Eliminating a headache faced by all SL virtual educators!

Experience has taught us over the years that existing Learning Islands in Second Life™ don’t really get people new to Second Life to a level of usability needed to take a class. Often people are still figuring out how to use the viewer rather than focusing on the lesson.  Continue reading