Gaia Clary is starting the AVA Mesh Project. The goal is stated as: We want to provide a Standard Mesh alternative for the SL Avatar that can be used as starter kit for any mesh project that creators can think of. We plan to make Avastar capable to handle this Standard Mesh as seamless as possible.

Read more about the project here: The AVA Mesh Project.

…… Put your dreams to sail

I’m not sure what this project would do for me. I get the idea of standardization is appealing. But, making fitted mesh for the classic avatar body is always going to be a pain because of the disparity from the classic avatar using morphs and our mesh having to use bone weights.

Then we change to the new Mesh Bodies; Slink, Maitreya, and etc. I see no way to get these brand makers to change to a standard body. But, to make clothes fit these bodies we need their mesh and its weighting. If we try to standardize for all those bodies we come up with a compromise. So, there will always be the possibility to have a better product if we use a model specifically for a specific body…

So, I’m going to wait and see what comes from the project.

With the new mesh bodies and body parts merchants are releasing more and more Development Kits. If you are an AvaStar user you have probably tried to use one or more of those kits with AvaStar. Some work, some don’t.

Medusa

Now Gaia Clary  of Machinimatrix, the source of AvaStar, is building a compatibility chart/list. If your Development Kit is compatible with AvaStar, jump over to Machimatrix and add it to the list. That is likely to help your sales of kits or kit related products.

Invitation for Development Kit Creators

Second Life may get a new design tool in the Blender addon: AvaStar. Watch the video to see what Gaia is thinking about making.

Part 2 of Journey to Fitted Mesh for Second Life is out. This video shows more of how to work with Fitted Mesh in AvaStar.

I am finding there is a wide variation in how well fitted mesh fits. Some brands work very well. Others only look good if you stand still. Others have noticed this too. I just saw someone on Fab Free comment that when trying demos you needed to walk around, sit down, and jump to test the demo fully. Good advice.

If you are thinking about fitted mesh, Gaia has one of better explanations of what it is here:

Gaia is working with the ideas of giving AvaStar away free and charging for the tutorials or charging more for AvaStar and giving the tutorials away for free. I have no idea what Gaia will decide. I wish Gaia a profitable business whatever is decided.

Gaia has a post out today (5/13 – Wednesday) announcing a new release of AvaStar 1.5.6. See: Avastar-1.5 is Out.

There is an update tool in AvaStar Blender. I was thinking it is in the release I have, 1.4.5. But, I don’t see it. Seems it only arrived with version 1.4.8. If you have 1.4.8 the last part of the video shows how to use it. Otherwise, you will have to download 1.5 and manually update AvaStar as I did.

There are a number of small fixes in this release. The list of them is in the announcement. But, the most interesting ones are discussed in the video.