Two of the things I can appreciate in life are coffee and art. When it comes to the former, I take pride in being both an appreciator and a creator; I very much believe in the “old” saying life is too short for bad coffee, and always enjoy a well-made cup and genuinely enjoy making my own from beans to cup (by way of automatic prosumer coffee maker or a Cafetiere / French Press or a Moka pot, depending on mood / company). When it comes to the latter, however, I’m strictly an appreciator because I can neither draw nor paint.
However, with LiThO Gallery I’ve found that I can enjoy both – and can combine my coverage of the arts in SL with my occasional series of cafés and coffee houses in Second Life whilst also making my way back to the Corsica South Coasters community, which I’ve also written about on numerous occasions (most notably in covering exhibitions at NovaOwl Galleries). Sub-titling itself the tiny art(ist) Café, LiThO offers a neat little play on words whilst also fulfilling its primary purpose: a place to relax and enjoy art.
LiThO – The Tiny Art(ist) Gallery
The play on words – as the notes from owners Lizzy Swordthain and Tom Willis available from the café’s terrace explain – first off takes the short-form of lithography, the planographic method of printing developed by author and actor Alois Senefelder, and most frequently used initially for musical scores and maps. In the second, it is a tease on their SL names. It occupies one of three parcels the couple have developed, the one alongside the café offering an open-air event space (although the café also has one of its own up on the roof and reached via stairs to one side of the building). The reaming parcel, to the rear of the café, is a private home, the two separated by the gully and bridge – the latter marking the limit of public spaces.
As a gallery space, the café hosts modest exhibitions in casual boutique style. Pieces from the invited artist are displayed the the two covered wings of the terrace and on the walls of the café’s rooms. At the time of my visit the gallery was playing host to an exhibition of Second Life landscapes by Michiel Bechir – an artist whose work is always worth seeing. It opened on September 3rd, 2023, so has a while to run for those wishing to visit without feeling rushed. The select of pieces – 15 in total are well-suited to the ambience of the café and offer engaging views of some of Second Life’s most popular public regions, past and present.
LiThO – The Tiny Art(ist) Gallery
Cosy and nicely presented, LiThO makes for an easy-going visit, and the trails and paths around it offer opportunities for exploration.
The following notes were taken from the Tuesday, September 12th Simulator User Group (SUG) meeting. They form a summary of the items discussed and is not intended to be a full transcript. A video of the entire meeting is embedded at the end of the article for those wishing to review the meeting in full – my thanks to Pantera for recording it.
Meeting Overview
The Simulator User Group (also referred to by its older name of Server User Group) exists to provide an opportunity for discussion about simulator technology, bugs, and feature ideas.
They are open to anyone with a concern / interest in the above topics, and form one of a series of regular / semi-regular User Group meetings conducted by Linden Lab.
Dates and times of all current meetings can be found on the Second Life Public Calendar, and descriptions of meetings are defined on the SL wiki.
Server Deployments
On Tuesday, September 12th, SLS Main channel was updated to simulator update 581292, previously on the majority of the RC channels.
On Wednesday, September 13th, the “Dog Days” update should be deployed across all RC channels. This update includes:
The unbinding of the Experience KVP database read / write functions from land (users will still require an Experience to access the KVP database).
A scripted ability to set CLICK_ACTION_IGNORE, allowing an object to be clicked-through to reach an object behind it – a flag supporting this is included in the Maintenance U RC viewer promoted to Release status in week #34.
PRIM_CLICK_ACTION is added to llSet/GetPrimParams so you can set the click action on prims in a linkset.
It was noted that as LL has “changed some of the tools that we use for simulator builds … the version number is now longer”.
Viewer Updates
No updates to the official SL viewers at the start of the week, leaving the current list as:
Release viewer, version 6.6.14.581101, promoted August 23.
Release channel cohorts:
Maintenance W RC viewer, version 6.6.15.581670, September 11.
glTF / PBR Materials viewer, version 7.0.0.581684, September 8.
Inventory Extensions RC viewer, version 6.6.15.581692, September 8.
Maintenance V(ersatility) RC viewer, version 6.6.15.581557, August 30.
Project viewers:
Puppetry project viewer, version 6.6.12.579958, May 11.
Note: the alternate viewer page also lists “Win32+MacOS<10.13 – 6.6.12.579987” as an RC viewer. However, the Win 32 + pre-Mac OS 10.13 was promoted to release status on July 5th, and viewer version 6.6.12.579987 points to the Maintenance S viewer, promoted to release status on May 16th.
Potential for Improving Vehicle Control Options
Further to recent meetings, Leviathan Linden gave the following update.
Last week it was suggested (although I missed it, Signal later pointed it out to me) that instead of using a new specific library for detecting devices we should use SDL (Simple DirectMedia Layer) since it is already used by various 3rd party viewers for Linux support. So, I’ve gone ahead and starting walking that road, FYI. This will bring the official SL viewer closer in compliance to some 3rd party viewers and won’t add a new dependency.
This led to an interim agreement that the API could be analog_control, and a discussion on the control events it should recognise / support, how the data should be transmitted, etc. This conversation commenced during the last 20 minutes of the meeting and continued through until then end.
In Brief
Please refer to the video for:
A potential issue with llRezAtRoot generating unexpected results.
Rider Linden indicated he’d like to implement an extended rez function similar to BUG-233084 “Rez function with prim properties, primarily for projectiles”, “soon”.
a discussion on llkeyframedmotion. and whether or not an object using can reliably differentiate between “I stopped moving because I ran out of keyframes” and “I stopped moving because someone with edit perms selected me”, which broadened into a discussion on kfm objects.
† The header images included in these summaries are not intended to represent anything discussed at the meetings; they are simply here to avoid a repeated image of a rooftop of people every week. They are taken from my list of region visits, with a link to the post for those interested.
Tilheyra, September 2023 – click any image for full size
In May 2022, I visited Tilheyra, a Full region leveraging the private region land capacity bonus and designed by Teagan Lefevre as a means to showcase her TL Designs brand. It’s a place blogged about here – but that was spring 16 months ago; time has marched on, and those of us in the northern hemisphere are watching autumn stride towards us, and Second Life being what it is, Tilheyra has also marched forward.
I was recently made aware of this by Teagan herself, who invited me to re-visit the region and view its latest redressing. In particular, the estate has been extended with the additional of a Homestead region, which Teagan and her team have called Kuulua. It has been combined with Tilheyra to form a continuous landscape modelled after US swamplands.
Tilheyra, September 2023
Fall unfurls its colours in such splendour, we are but forced to take notice of it. Tilheyra, welcomes you to wade through the everglades, tour the swamps by foot or by boat, and taste the delicious flavours that autumn in the bayou brings.
– Tilheyra About Land
Given this description, and as one would expect, both of the regions present a low-lying landscape rich in trees and cut through with water as it forms natural channels and pools. Some of the latter are open, others increasingly choked by reeds and wetlands grasses, the greenery providing – if any were needed – perfect cover for local alligators as they prowl the shallows.
Tilheyra, September 2023
Sitting solidly towards the centre of this setting is a town. It is a place of indeterminate age; some of the buildings within it have the appearance of belonging to a grander setting whilst others – well, perhaps not so much; however all are showing signs of being past their prime. Roads, tracks and trails spread outward from the town, some of them crossing the water by means of bridges, all of variable designs and solidity – including one which started life as railway carriage! It a network of trails and paths which might be seen as a web spreading out through the swamplands, the town being the spider so often at the heart of a web; only rather than waiting for prey, the town awaits visitors to get caught in the unusual beauty of the landscape and itself.
During my May 2022 visit to Tilheyra I noted that while most of the region was open to the public, it also presented a number of rental properties. This is still the case with this latest iteration, with houseboats and cabins available for rent. All are clearly signed as private, so the risk of trespass should be minimised.
Tilheyra, September 2023
Those wanting to explore will find a lot to see, from places to eat to hangouts for passing the time – there’s even a corner memorial to pets that have passed on, tucked away in a corner. For the more adventurous, there’s a small dock on the shoreline of Kuulua, offering rowing boats and little Culprit speed boats for those who wish to explore the waterways.
Caught under the reds, greens and golds of autumn and framed by a sky in which both the Sun and the Moon might be found, the Tilheyra wetlands avoids the clichés often found within swamp-themed regions (such as an over-abundance of alligators or a “haunted” cabin or two), and instead presents an engaging and very natural setting, available for those seeking a home, and a destination for explorers and photographers.
Logos representative only and should not be seen as an endorsement / preference / recommendation
Updates from the week through to Sunday, September 10th, 2023
This summary is generally published every Monday, and is a list of SL viewer / client releases (official and TPV) made during the previous week. When reading it, please note:
It is based on my Current Viewer Releases Page, a list of all Second Life viewers and clients that are in popular use (and of which I am aware), and which are recognised as adhering to the TPV Policy. This page includes comprehensive links to download pages, blog notes, release notes, etc., as well as links to any / all reviews of specific viewers / clients made within this blog.
By its nature, this summary presented here will always be in arrears, please refer to the Current Viewer Release Page for more up-to-date information.
Note that for purposes of length, TPV test viewers, preview / beta viewers / nightly builds are generally not recorded in these summaries.
Official LL Viewers
Release viewer, version 6.6.13.580918, formerly the Maintenance U(pdate) RC viewer, version 6.6.14.581101, promoted August 23.
Release channel cohorts:
The glTF / PBR Materials viewer, updated to version 7.0.0.581684 on September 8.
The Inventory Extensions RC viewer, updated to version 6.6.15.581692, September 8.
Project viewers:
No updates.
Note: The Alternative Viewers page appears to have suffered a hiccup, listing version 6.6.12.579987 as the “Win32+MacOS<10.13” RC viewer. However, the Win 32 + Pre-MAC OS 10.3 viewer was actually version 6.6.13.580794, promoted to release status on July 5; 6.6.12.579987 was the version number assigned to the Maintenance S RC viewer promoted to release status on May 16th.
The following notes were taken from my audio recording and chat log transcript of the Content Creation User Group (CCUG) meeting held on Thursday, September 7th, 2023.
The CCUG meeting is for discussion of work related to content creation in Second Life, including current and upcoming LL projects, and encompasses requests or comments from the community, together with viewer development work.
As a rule, these meetings are:
Held in-world and chaired by Vir Linden.
Conducted in a mix of voice and text.
Held at 13:00 SLT on their respective days.
Are subject to the schedule set within the SL Public Calendar, which includes the location for the meetings.
Open to all with an interest in content creation.
The notes herein are drawn from a mix of my own chat log and audio recording of the meeting, and are not intended to be a full transcript.
glTF Materials and Reflection Probes
Project Summary
To provide support for PBR materials using the core glTF 2.0 specification Section 3.9 and using mikkTSpace tangents, including the ability to have PBR Materials assets which can be applied to surfaces and also traded / sold.
The overall goal for glTF as a whole is to provide as much support for the glTF 2.0 specification as possible.
Up to four texture maps are supported for PBR Materials: the base colour (which includes the alpha); normal; metallic / roughness; and emissive, each with independent scaling.
In the near-term, glTF materials assets are materials scenes that don’t have any nodes / geometry, they only have the materials array, and there is only one material in that array.
As a part of this work, PBR Materials will see the introduction of reflection probes which can be used to generate reflections (via cubemaps) on in-world surfaces. These will be a mix of automatically-place and manually place probes (with the ability to move either).
List of tools and libraries supporting glTF: https://github.khronos.org/glTF-Project-Explorer/ – note that Substance Painter is also used as a guiding principal for how PBR materials should look in Second Life.
An update for the PBR viewer – version 7.0.0.581684 was issued following the meeting, on Friday, September 8th.
Work is continuing on the communications bloat issue. This will utilise a new message type – GenericStreamingMessage.
Bug fixing continues.
Ambient Lighting / Sky Brightness
Also noted in previous summaries, there are some issues around ambient lighting where the PBR viewer is concerned. In particular, it tends to render a lot of EEP settings darker than users are used to (in part because the ambient environment lighting in SL has tended to always be over-saturated and bright), and the PBR viewer effectively reverses this to render environments more realistically.
This has been an area of work for some time, with none of the results particularly satisfactory, so there is going to be a further round of changes. with the aim of making existing EEP sky settings render more closely to how the author may have intended, rather than remaining overly dark.
In addition, the tone mapper in the PBR renderer is going to be adjusted to help reduce undue darkening of older EEP settings.
These changes will not impact EEP settings which are created specifically using the PBR settings and capabilities.
This work will mean there will likely be a couple more viewer passes as things are tested and adjusted.
Mirrors
Mirrors are a part of the glTF / PBR materials project, but something of a separate tranche of work.
The idea is provide the means to have via high resolution reflections (i.e. mirrors) within a scene.
Initially only one active mirror surface per scene will be active for any viewer.
The process will use the PBR reflection probes mechanism, combined with a automated “Hero Probe” mechanism which with generate high resolution (512×512) “reflections” for the mirror.
The system will operate on the basis of avatar / camera proximity to a mirror surface triggering the closest reflection probe to become a “Hero Probe” for that avatar / camera. This means that if there are multiple mirrors placed within an environment, only the one closest to a given avatar / camera will be active and display the “reflections” generated by the reflection probe.
Depending on testing and performance, the number of mirrors might be expanded to two – one for mirror surfaces and one for Linden Water to generate high resolution water reflections where appropriate.
Status
The promised initial build of a PBR viewer supporting mirrors should be made available in week #37. Caveats for this build include:
It is not functionally complete and will not render as fully as LL would like.
It is not intended for primary use will likely look like it is breaking things.
There are already some known crash issues for Mac OS X which will not be fixed when the viewer is initially made available, but will be fixed in due course.
The viewer will be made available via the CCUG Discord Channel, and an LSL script will be provided to allow for easy toggling through mirror options.
In Brief
Senra:
Requests continue to be made to surface the new web-bases avatar creation / customisation tool through the viewer – even it is is just hooking it to the internal browser and providing an easy and obvious means of accessing it. The major reason this is being requested is to to help new users who may have become “lost” or confused in trying to customise their avatar view the viewer – which is clearly a very different experience to the web capability – to get back to something they understand and can readily re-use.
It was pointed out that Senra has yet to be featured in the Choose Your Avatar option in the viewer.
It was also pointed out that unlike the older “starter avatars” Sentra does not inherently have any form of outfit structure, so if items are worn directly from the Library, anything worn will be copied to the item type folder (shoes to shoes, hair to hair, etc.), rather than being placed within any form of “outfit folder”, making it harder for new users to understand what is happening with their avatar + the items they are using from the Library may end up getting copied multiple times into various folders in their inventory – potentially leasing to more confusion / frustration down the line.
This lead to a lengthy discourse through the greater part of the meeting, further demonstrating the need for a New User Experience User Group (or similar) where those actually responsible for projects like Senra could actually engage with users, address questions, etc., rather than cherry-picking if / what they want to respond to via the forums.
The above spun-out into a broader discussion on the development of a Sansar-esque dressing room element in the local viewer of outfit / appearance changes (leaving an “untouched” version of the avatar within a region until the change / update is complete) and the complications of doing so (attachments require simulator rezzing, for example), and an general discussion on outfit changes, etc., without firm conclusions drawn.
The question was asked about SL supporting vertex animation textures (VAT). This is seen by the Lab as something that might be investigated further down the glTF implementation road, alongside the likes of blend shapes.
† The header images included in these summaries are not intended to represent anything discussed at the meetings; they are simply here to avoid a repeated image of a gathering of people every week. They are taken from my list of region visits, with a link to the post for those interested.
Elvion, September 2023 – click any image for full size
It’s been a good few months since my last visit to Elvion, so when Cube Republic sent me a link to an image showing the region’s current iteration, I realised it was high time I dropped in again.
The work of region holders Bo Zano (BoZanoNL) and his SL/RL partner, Una Zano (UnaMayLi), Elvion has tended to shift between Homestead and Full regions, but whichever it has occupied, it has never failed to offer settings of intrinsic natural beauty rich in detail and thoroughly photogenic.
Most often the builds are focus on very pastoral settings, rich in flora and fauna, and sometimes with a lean towards fantasy environments. Some iterations, however, have at times touch on more rural environments – such as with the design the couple presented back towards the start of 2023 (see: Elvion’s coastal retreat in Second Life). With the September iteration, Bo and Una take the region in another direction, offering a setting reflecting the ecological threat of climate change / global warming and the effect it is set to have on the likes of coastal cities and towns.
Elvion, September 2023
With rising global temperatures cities become less habitable. Nature is taking back and people are migrating to the country. Except some, who find peace and see the beauty.
– Elvion About Land
However, this shouldn’t be taken to mean this current iteration of Elvion is in any way a treatise on the threat of climate change and rising sea levels. Rather it is a visual ode to the fact that nature has a way of taking care of her own and redressing the balance when it comes to humanity’s claims on the land, even after those claims may have resulted in the land being ravaged beyond hope.
Elvion, September 2023The core of the build suggests the outskirts of a city or town, probably coastal in nature, and where an elevated freeway once provided rapid access to the heart of the conurbation without a lot of tedious mucking about navigating the gridwork of edge-of-town streets or dealing with locals, the broad lanes of the road instead being raised away from all that to run alongside the rail tracks which once carried goods trains on their backs.
However, the traffic carrying days of both rail and road have long passed; the freeway is in almost total collapse, the rail lines similarly broken and incapable of carrying. Even the buildings rising above or visible from the elevated roadway have clearly been long deserted, with some showing signs of being close to joining some of their brethren in collapse. At ground level, streets have largely vanished, becoming overgrown with weeds and grasses or lost under pools and channels where water has naturally taken command.
Elvion, September 2023
Exactly what has happened here is open to interpretation. Did the sea levels rise sufficiently to start drowning the town, resulting in its abandonment? Did it suffer the battering force of one or more hurricanes or typhoons so severe, abandonment rather than recovery was seen to be the only sensible option? was it broken by the force of a tsunami which originated across the seas but spent its fury here? The story is yours to decide.
What does appear to be clear is that whatever happened, it occurred long enough ago for Nature engage in the long, slow process of reclamation, and is now a good way along that path. The hardtop of roads and parking lots is being taken over by weeds and grass; vines hang from the sides of shops and the barriers guarding the edge of elevated road sections; a children’s play area is now little more than a rusted hulk, its tone matching the majority of the remaining vehicles scattered throughout – some of which are sprinkled across the freeway as if they were, for whatever reason, deserted in a rush by owners and passengers alike.
Elvion, September 2023
Elsewhere the presence of water along some of the depressions caused by former roads is such that little island have had time to be established and freshwater ponds form, offering homes for a range of waterfowl and wildlife. Even the wrecks of vehicles have become so accepted that they are now little more than perches from which heron can watch for signs of passing fish in the waters around them. Bear and beaver are equally at home here now, as are deer, whilst geese find the setting more than acceptable as a stop-over during their long migration flights.
Also scattered throughout the setting are signs that not everyone has fled this place; to the south, for example, someone has created a little homestead for themselves. A wind turbine provides lighting for the simple shack, chickens and goats are being reared, horses looked after (including one that will rez rideable copies of itself, and a canoe is kept in good order, presumably for fishing trips.
Elvion, September 2023
This is not the only sign of human habitation. Elsewhere, someone has built a raft while boardwalks and decks and scattered around on and over the waters, and at least one tree appears to have been felled to create a makeshift bridge over a water channel. But whether this is all the work of those living at the homestead, or whether it speaks to a little community of people holding-out among the ruins is for you to decide. And given there are these signs of habitation, so too can be found places to sit and pass the time, and appreciate the beauty of the setting.
As always with Elvion, there is a tremendous amount to see and appreciate with this build; far more than either my wittering here or meagre images herein can convey. As such, and as always, a visit is highly recommended.
Inara Pey: Living in a Modemworld 