Building on the island: revising things to provide room for one of my new planes and moorings for visitors
As a result of expanding my selection of SL aircraft with a Beechcraft C90 and C33, both from DSA (I’ve really got this SL flying bug rather bad!), I decided I wanted to have one or other of them rezzed and ready to go at my little home island; after all, what’s the point of having something like an aeroplane (or a boat – or two for that matter) if you’ve constantly got to pull it out of your purse / suitcase / handbag / attaché case (or however you think of your inventory) to use it, when you have the space to show it off?
Truth be told, I’ve actually had an on-and-off nagging issue with the design of my little island for a while now. As regular readers may know, part of the island has been laid out to provide a stand for my PBY-6A Catalina, with a south-facing ramp to provide access to the water for take-offs. The problem here has been that the ramp led into what is pretty much a main navigation channel, while at the same time made the southern end of the parcel pretty much unusable.
As the island looked before the changes
Given this, I’d been thinking of re-arranging things for a while, but until the arrival of my new toys, I didn’t really have the motivation to get on with it. However, that I had been thinking of things did give me a loose idea of what I wanted to do before I started pulling things apart and gluing them back together.
First off, the Catalina stand and ramp got rotated through 90-degrees. This required a certain amount of fiddling, as the parcel is fairly narrow, so I had to spend time cutting and rotating and generally faffing with a prim to get a ramp that fit within the parcel boundary, didn’t cut too deeply into the land and which wasn’t so ridiculously steep the Catalina wouldn’t be able to climb it without grounding the hull and getting stuck.
The revised east facing ramp for the Catalina and the widened water basin for mooring boats
Once done, this freed-up the southern end of the island so I could make better use of that end of the parcel. As a result, and without dragging this all out, I’ve been able to add moorings for one of the additional ‘planes (which will be the C33 Debonair by default) and a place where visitors can moor their boats without a lot of additional faffing around on my part and hanging things in the air to make space for them. The move gave also me the opportunity to widen the water basin between the north and south sides of the island, providing additional mooring space there, if needed.
An unexpected outcome of this work was a reduction in the overall LI of all the structural elements on the south end of the island; not by a lot, but enough to allow me to add to the garden while still keeping a very decent ceiling of “free” capacity on the land. At the moment I’m thinking of adding a screen of small trees to visibly separate house & gardens from my budding “airport”, to give the former a greater feeling of privacy on those days when flying and boating aren’t that important.
The home changes even provide enough room for the C90 King Air, if needed
So am I happy with the outcome? Overall, yes. At least until the next time the urge to glue prims together and play with mesh comes over me :).
Not too long ago, I wrote about my acquisition of the DSA Beechcraft King Air C90 GTX. At the time I reviewed it, I mentioned it was somewhat bigger than my “ideal” ‘plane. Well, if only I’d been a little more alert. Not that I’m in any way disappointed with the King Air, I hasten to add (other than the issue in getting it up ramps and out of the water when using the floats), but rather because DSA are, at the time of writing, currently running a special promotion on their Beechcraft C33 Debonair.
This is a variation on the famous Bonanza design, but with a more familiar vertical tail, rather than the latter’s V-tail. However, what matters here is the Debonair comes as a “combo” plane; like the King Air, it can switch between floats and conventional undercarriage with a single command, and is presented, fully-functional, under the promotional offer at the princely some of – L$200!
The Debonair in its default textures and, beyond it, my custom version (some may notice a certain similarity with King Air I recently purchased!)
Obviously, at that price, the Debonair is an absolute bargain (so much so that when I told a friend, they leapt onto the Marketplace and bought two – one for their main account and one for their primary alt account), and I had to pick one up. And what a bundle of joy!
This is an aeroplane that, given it likely runs the same scripts as the King Air, actually handles somewhat better, with very smooth region crossings for the most part (other than SL occasionally causing the camera to jump from the default view to one set a good ways back from the ‘plane) – no that the King Air was particularly rough. More to the point, with the floats in use and their wheels deployed, the Debonair can climb the ramp of most slips a lot easier than the King Air. I’ve tried my home ramp – although that’s now becoming redundant – the Hollywood airport slip ramp and Honah Lee Surf, and with a little power and a tap of the brakes, the Debonair took all three, where the King Air would frequently bury itself in the ramp / the terrain behind the ramp.
The DSA aircraft HUD, as presented with the Bonanza / Debonair
Being a smaller aircraft than the King Air, the Debonair only sits four, and is a bit of squeeze, but makes for a cosy flight :). As with the King Air, undercarriage options (wheels or floats) can be selected at any time, making landing options very flexible (although you can obviously make a runway landing with the floats attached, thanks to them having their own wheels.
Re-texturing the plane is pretty easy, as one would expect from a DSA plane. Download the maps from the DSA website (they’re labelled “Debonair” on the site, but the ZIP file and textures are all labelled “Bonanza”; this isn’t because they are the wrong files – as noted above, the Debonair is a variant of the Bonanza, and so uses the same texture files. the textures are supplied in .PSD, JPG and (some at least) X2 formats. However, I did note that float textures are currently absent the set (I simply re-used my King Air float textures).
The Debonair is a delight to fly and the DSA scripting makes STOL flights a joy
You can use Local Textures in the viewer to carry out “test fits” of your own designs prior to uploading anything and incurring costs; just make sure you select the required face of the plane when doing so, obviously, and be aware that you’ll need to use the same texture a number of times to achieve a finished result (e.g. you’ll need to use the wing textures individually on the wings, flaps, ailerons, tail & rudder).
Those who read my article on the King Air will see that I went for a similar colour scheme with the Debonair, and the little ego touches! OK, so I now have THREE ‘planes with the same registration, but I think I’ll be OK with the CAA / FAA! 🙂
All told, the Debonair is a great little aeroplane, and one I’ve been having a great deal of fun with – and likely will continue to do so. Certainly, as while the promotional offer is running, it is a genuine bargain.
Comparing size: the C90 King Air (to the rear) and the C33 Debonair side-by-side, and me for a sense of scale
No, this isn’t a homage to Yul Brynner, although as the song goes, Second Life could well be a show with everything, even without him… The “King” I’m referring to is the DSA King Air C90 GTX, which has – after some considerable deliberation and bouncing around – become the latest aircraft I’ve added to my collection.
To be honest, it wasn’t actually the ‘plane I started out to get; I actually wanted something a fair bit smaller, given I already have the PBY 6A Catalina, and initially started looking at single-engined ‘planes. But for various reasons, I found myself drifting away from that choice and heading back into twin-engined territory, initially looking at Erick Gregan’s Cessna 421 (which came highly recommended, and looks to be a most excellent aeroplane).
DSA Beechcraft King Air C90 GTX: the factory default finish, with my customised version beyond
However, as I live “on the water”, so to speak, I was drawn to DSA’s Beechcraft C90 GTX and Baron G58, as both of these are “combo” aircraft: you can switch between standard undercarriage or floats with a single command. In the end, and again on recommendation, I opted for the C90, although I suspect I’d have been happy with the G58.
The C90 is actually a big aeroplane; particularly when up on its floats – the picture of me doing a naughty and sitting on the wing probably gives you an idea of the size, if you’ve never seen this ‘plane before. 100% mesh, it weights-in at 96 LI, which is quite hefty – but it is packing a lot – and a physics weight of 11.7, which is slightly less than that of my MD-900, and almost one-third that of my Kv23H. It is supplied copy / mod, and is suitable for repainting, if desired (and a range of optional paint kits are available in-world from Josh Noonan – and I can personally attest to the quality of his work.
DSA Beechcraft King Air C90 GTX – a closer look at my paint scheme
Indeed, the very first thing I did on getting mine, other than going for a short familiarisation flight, is repaint it. As I liked elements of the default colour scheme, I decided to stick with this as a base, and then work-in my traditional red and white. The model supports the use of local textures, which means you can play to your heart’s content creating and trying colours, and a full set of textures in JPG, PaintShop Pro and Photoshop formats can be downloaded from the DSA website.
To apply textures when working on things, simply blank a copy of the ‘plane then select the required face, then select and apply the texture from you heard drive via the viewer’s Local Texture option in the texture option of the Build floater. Note that The fuselage and the wing textures are used several times, and you’ll have to make sure they are applied to all the faces using them. For example, the fuselage texture needs to be applied to the fuselage (best to select the face by clicking on the tail), the rudder, and the nose wheel doors. When you’re happy, upload your textures to inventory & apply, or use the painting note card in the ‘plane.
DSA Beechcraft King Air C90 GTX – this is a big turboprop
I went for a very personalised look, as the photos here show, complete with my usual G-NARA registration and a bit of ego-pandering with a stylised “I” on the tail and on the winglets. I also added a touch of shine to the fuselage and wing textures, to give them more of a polished finish.
Flying-wise, this is a ‘plane aimed towards the more “realistic” end of the market (my one disappointment with the Catalina is that the flight system is rudimentary). DSA aircraft aren’t perhaps as advanced in this area as some other makes, but they are still pretty comprehensive. A detailed HUD is supplied, and commands can be given in chat as well. One thing that is missing for those who enjoy procedure, is a need to carry-out pre-start checks (battery, magnetos, etc.); “lstart” and “rstart” will kick the respective engines into life once seated in the pilot’s seat, although the Engines button on the HUD will run through a more complete (and automated) pre-start check and engine start-up. This will also enable navigation, strobe and beacon lights for you, as well as close the boarding door.
… with a comfortable interior
The C90 handles really well in the air, and can be shared between pilot and co-pilot (the HUD is copy / transfer, so you can share it with friends) – make sure you both activate the co-pilot option on the HUD. Range is limited by fuel, and the plane comes equipped with a full fulling station (43 prims, which I presume works with any DSA ‘plane), or a convenient jerry can should you need to set down somewhere to refuel. Another nice touch is the inclusion of an instrument landing system (ILS), although I confess I’ve yet to actually try this, and documentation is supplied on the DSA website, rather than with the aircraft.
A slight irritant I have found is that this plane doesn’t handle water ramps at all well; with the wheels for the undercarriage deployed, it seems to require a decent run-up to a ramp at full throttle. Even then, getting ashore is far from guaranteed, and should you do so, there is the inevitable desperate throttling back before you go careering too far across an apron. Ironically, the C90 cannot make the relatively shallow ramp I have at home at all.
Also, the HUD also seems sensitive to region crossings; In the 4.5 hours I’ve been flying the plane, I’ve had buttons vanish from the HUD when clicked just after a region crossing, only to reappear on their own a short while later or at the next crossing. This is a niggle, but not a major problem.
DSA Beechcraft King Air C90 GTX – guess where? 😉
At L$5500 (at the time of writing), this isn’t a cheap light plane to have – but you do get the floats / wheel combo, and the mod options are all good, paint-wise. Overall, I’ve found the C90 more than pleasing to fly – the ramp issue following water lands notwithstanding; and particularly like the fact you can swap between floats and “standard” undercarriage mid-flight. OK, so not terribly real, but adds a certain flexibility when flying :). While this may not be the ‘plane I set out to get, I certainly have no regrets over buying it, and I’ll likely be swapping back and forth between the C90 and my Catalina quite regularly.
So 2014 draws to a close. I’ve already given a detailed review of the year as I saw it and reported on it through these pages; but before the year closes, I wanted to offer something a little more personal.
This year has been incredible for me. In terms of raw figures (for whatever they’re worth), I’ve published 950+ posts, passed through 3,000 published in total, seen the blog pass through one million page views and, at least according to WordPress, these pages (intentionally or otherwise) have been viewed from 194 countries (hello, Iran and North Korea. Oh wait, you’re not listening 🙂 ).
But more particularly, the year has offered me the opportunity to visit over 100 regions and blog on them (some more than once), and to experience 136 art exhibitions, installations and performances that I’ve actually manage to document (57 sponsored by the LEA and 79 non-LEA events) – my apologies to those I missed / didn’t manage to get written-up.
Where art is concerned, I’ve been particularly privileged to be asked to join the UWA jury for Transcending Borders – thank you, Jayjay and FreeWee, and to have also witnessed Paradise Lost: he Story of Adam and Eve’s Original Sin, which I still believe to be an outstanding masterpiece of performance art in a virtual world, and the jewel in the crown of my enjoyment of a fabulous year for art in SL. I’ve also met many more talented people in SL.
Walt Ireton was one of several artists I was fortunate enough to meet in-world and become friends with during 2014. His real-life photography exhibited in SL in shows such as H2O is amazing – blog post
I’ve also tried to improve my photographic technique and also started to get my head around image editing with GIMP (PhotoShop still has me hiding under the desk). I’ve even managed to get into “proper” machinima, something I’ve wanted to do for a long time, and have received a lot of support and advice in my efforts – thank you to everyone concerned.
2014 saw my interest in, and enjoyment of, flying and sailing increase
I really don’t want to go on at great length here; suffice it to say, the year has had its moments at times, but for the most part has been a huge amount of fun, discovery and learning. It has also been immensely rewarding simply because I see so many people returning to these pages again and again, reading, offering “likes” and feedback, providing suggestions and pointing out things of interest or providing hints and support.
So what I really want to say is, thank you to all of you for all your support through the year; and thank you for all the Tweets, re-tweets, Plurks, re-plurks, location suggestions via social media or via e-mail, comments via e-mail and in-world IMs. It may sound trite, but the reality is, without your support and feedback, this blog would simply be a collection of dry electronic pages, and I’d be without any stars to steer by.
It’s once again that annual time of reflection. The winter is with us, the old year is slowing dying, the new year awaits, and it is time to look back across the highs and lows of the virtual year as seen through the pages of this blog.
This year has been even busier for me than previous years, so I hope you’ll forgive that as I look back over the year as I’ve managed to report it through this blog, I’ve broken it down into three parts, this being the second, and you can catch-up with part one or part two if you so wish. Not everything that happened through the year may be here; there are some aspects of SL in which I’m not active, and so may have missed some headlines. Nevertheless, I hope this review sparks a few memories and provides some interesting holiday reading. As with the first part, rather than just offer a month-by month account, I’ve tried to group things together by topic to hopefully give more of a narrative flow.
The Lab
The Lab is relatively quiet in September. The Skill Gaming Policy takes effect from September 1st without too much fanfare, and at the end of the month the Lab issue a statement that it will be enforced as from November 1st, 2014. When that date is reached, CapEx is forced to suspend operations, due to their Skill Gaming application not having been approved by the Lab, a situation still unresolved at the end of the year.
September does bring with it the very sad news of Joe Miller’s passing; while I wasn’t acquainted with him, having known him only by reputation, I offer a short piece on Mr. Miller and his contributions to the platform.
Towards the end of September, I finally notice that the Lab’s corporate leadership page has been updated, while in October, In October, Ebbe Altberg joins Saffia and Rik for a Designing Worlds special show to talk LL, SL and the “next generation” platform. For those who prefer to read I offer a transcript.
In the interview, Ebbe drops a hint that the product review which saw Creatorverse, dio and Versu vanish from the Lab’s portfolio in February hadn’t entirely finished. At the time I suspected that Desura might be parting company with the Lab, but as it turned out, it was Patterns, the Lab’s sandbox game, that took the bullet, with the Lab willing to hear from parties interested in carrying it forward. However, November does see the Lab shed itself of Desura as well.
The Lab’s updated viewer splash / log-in screen reaches RC status. Landon Linden returns to the official SL blog to provide a fascinating insight into how Lab’s Ops team responds to issues within their services, the communications tools they use – and why the tools are so effective. As I comment at the time, it’s a remarkable piece, well worth reading.
Also in September, the Lab provides a small piece of news on the CDN project, alongside the launch of the new Benchmark viewer and the viewer log-in screen updates. The CDN deployment to the main grid commences in October, initially using the special purpose Snack channel. which is drawn from regions usually on the Main (SLS) channel. The CDN provider is Highwinds.
By October 29th, CDN support is grid wide, and the HTTP pipelining viewer is formally released. As a result of both of these projects, the majority of people are seeing benefits in terms of texture and mesh fetching and (in the case of the pipeline viewer, inventory fetching. However, some across the grid continue to report issues arising from the updates which require further investigation, prompting to the Lab to seek direct feedback. At the start of November, the Lab publish data showing how the CDN has been good for them as well. Later in the month they report on progress being made to deal with the issues affected users are experiencing.
The CDN deployment dramatically decreases the load places on the Lab’s simulator host servers (image: Linden Lab)
Monty Linden provides a further update on his HTTP work, which also touches on the CDN while focusing on his pipelining work, and the improvements that has allowed him to make to inventory fetching as well. In November he is interviewed on the Drax Files Radio Hour, and offers further insight into the work.
October brings word that new viewer-managed Marketplace (VMM) functionality is coming to the viewer. Due to be deployed in 2015, the VMM is aimed towards finally eliminating the need for Magic Boxes and to replace the Merchant Outbox , while providing a means for merchants to sell their goods direct from their inventory (no Marketplace uploads) and to carry out some aspects of Marketplace listing management from within the viewer. In November, I provide an overview of beta testing and the project viewer. Keeping on the Marketplace theme, DX Exchange open their Marketplace to users in November, and I have a bit of a play.
After finally receiving their Oculus DK2 headsets, the Lab is able to release an updated version of their Oculus Rift project viewer. A notice about the POODLE vulnerability is also forthcoming, with an updated viewer coming hard on its heels.
Given October marks Halloween, the Lab launches a further demonstration of the upcoming Experience Keys / Tools in the middle of the month, featuring a haunted house. October also sees the dreaded required tax information issue rear its head again.
In November, users get the chance to meet Lab staff in-world at the Mole’s new home region, while nigh-on a week of daily restarts prompts a blog post on what the problem was. The new benchmark viewer reaches release status on November 10th, but results in some users no longer being about to log-in to SL using the official viewer. A fix appears at the start of December, and quick roles to the de facto release status.
Coming in 2012: a new means to control how the viewer renders other avatars which place a high rendering load on your computer
Work also starts on a new means by which users can control the degree of rendering impact other avatars can have on their viewer’s performance.
Just as they were generating problems at the start of the year, AMD driver issues continue to cause woes at the end of the year, although Yoho Waco offers assistance to affected users. An oopsie with inventory leave some people upset in December, and the Lab offers a partial explanation, and a December 29th GSP update to the effect they believed matters to be fully resolved. On a brighter not, the Experience Keys / Tools viewer reaches RC status.
OnLive and Firestorm announce the availability of Firestorm on the SL Go client for PC and Mac, and hold a special Q&A on the release.
December sees a disturbing twist in misuse of the DMCA process, as Belleza are hit by a take-down notice which later turns out to be not only entirely false, but apparently completely fraudulent in origin. Drax investigates the DMCA process, and I ponder the DMCA issue in general.
As Christmas arrives, the Lab looks ahead to 2015 with a special competition, while a couple of promotional videos (which are rather good) appear on You Tube, one on content creation and the other on getting started with SL. I’m a tiny bit critical of the latter, but actually may have jumped the gun – I’m informed by Xiola Linden that the videos are intended as a part of an e-mail campaign, which will offer the context for the Welcome video I felt was missing.
Art and Events
September kicks-off with the remarkable Stand Up 2 Cancer in-world music event, co-ordinated by Still Braveheart, featuring 23 music venues and 150 performers. It going on to raise a staggering L$1.5 million in just four days. The same weekend sees Making Strides Against Breast Cancer 2014 opens, building towards the MSABC walk in October. Later in the month, the Michael J Fox Foundation has two special events hosted in SL by Team Fox SL and Creations for Parkinsons.
October sees Virtual Ability host their annual IDRAC conference, with a well-rounded list of speakers. Later in the month, BURN2 2014 opens its gates. While in December, I sneak a peek at the Xmas Expo and Breedables Fair.
In the art world, the UWA announces a beautiful printed book about The Freedom Project is now available, and as I have a copy myself, I can say it is simply beautiful. 2014’s Project Sci-Fi also launches. In October, JayJay Zifanwee (Jay Jay Jegathesan), one of the driving forces behind the UWA’s work in SL, participates in the university’s 3-Minute Thesis competition, providing a moving insight into the power of virtual worlds.
Transcending Borders draws to a close in December, with the announces of the 3D Art and Machinima winners, including Tutsy Navrathna’s brilliant first place machinima winner, Metahpore, and Sharni Azalee’s Never Say Never – Love Transcends Borders,
Paradise Lost, the production which has truly pushed the boundaries of performing arts in SL, approaches the end of its season of performances. The LEA plays host to a superb retrospective on Bryn Oh’s art, which starts in September. Put together by the artist herself, it provides a deeper insight into her work and thought processes, which I find intriguing.
Never Say Never – Love Trasncends Borders, by Sharni Azalee, the Transcending Borders 3D Art Challenge Grand Prize winner
And, of course, December brings us the ever wonderful Calas Galadhon Christmas region, one of many winter and Christmas themed regions for residents to enjoy over the festive season.
Other Worlds
In September, Registrations open for the OpenSimulator Community Conference, which takes place in November. High Fidelity offer people a peek into their Alpha testing, and looking at the work of AI Austin, CrtlAltDavid and others. In November they also bring news on their new documentation resource. Speaking at Gigaom the same month, Philip Rosedale voices the view that we still don’t get virtual worlds. Back at the office, it seems that a virtual game of rock, paper, scissors is all the rage. In December, a short series of introductory videos is released.
Stonehenge in Blue Mars during the 2014 summer solstice. One of a number of simulations still available on the platform
November sees me jump back into Blue Mars (yes, it’s still there!) to see what has been going on since its passing to Ball State University.
VR and AR
October sees Magic Leap apparently burst onto the scene, with the announcement that Google and several other big names have poured $542 million into the company, and this on top of around $50 million of investment earlier in the year. No-one is quite sure what the company is up to, and whether it is purely AR or perhaps a mix of AR and VR, but the promo videos are impressive.
In November, it is announced that the Magic Leap technology will be at the heart of a new immersive film bring written by Professor Brian Cox, and which will premiere in the UK in 2015. Then in December, Neal Stephenson reveals he has joined Magic Leap.
Also in October, and having been relatively quiet for a while, the other AR system that had been making news, and which offers a VR capability as a well, castAR, moves to Silicon Valley from Seattle, as their initial developer kits start shipping.
November sees Brendan Iribe again repeat that the consumer version of Oculus Rift is still “many months” away from launch. During the interview, held at the Web Summit event in Dublin, Ireland, Iribe drops hints that Oculus may be looking at a more packaged VR solution, referencing as he does gesture devices, camera systems and haptic devices. Then December brings word that Oculus is buying Nimble Sense.
However, while Oculus may be still sitting over the horizon in terms of a consumer model, VR enthusiast with an up-to-date version of the Galaxy Note 4 had an early Christmas offer, with the opportunity to order the Gear VR.
Inara Pey: Living in a Modemworld 