Talk by Soror Nishi at LandExpo...

OK, so this is the chat log of my talk....slightly chaotic, but thats Slife...:))

[14:03] soror Nishi: Hi...:))
[14:03] Nadir Taov: hello :)
[14:03] Mellifera Szondi: hello!
[14:03] Betsy Linden: Hi Soror
[14:03] soror Nishi: I'm soror and I am the next "turn"...:))
[14:03] Kirstyn Meredith: hello :)
[14:03] Teresa Weatherwax: hello Sonor
[14:03] Betsy Linden: Nadir, mellifera
[14:03] soror Nishi: This talk will be carried out in text Chat only..
[14:03] Aiko Serrao: i believe you are the coloud
[14:03] Mellifera Szondi: oh..okies
[14:03] Aiko Serrao: clloud
[14:03] ReSoarces Andel: OK
[14:04] Joppa Linden: i hope i'm not sitting on someone
[14:04] soror Nishi: is everyone near enough to hear?
[14:04] Nadir Taov: sorry i can't see a thing here! ))
[14:04] Al Supercharge: anyone know "The Indigenous Flora of Second Life" with soror Nishi Wed, June 10, 2pm – 3pm is ?
[14:04] Joppa Linden: let us know when you start talking and we'll know if we can hear you.. hehe
[14:04] Teresa Weatherwax: Im sorry but I cant hear you Soror
[14:05] pao Homewood: i can't hear too
[14:05] soror Nishi: anyone at the back??
[14:05] Al Supercharge: Soror ur not setup for voice
[14:05] soror Nishi: are you getting this chat??
[14:05] soror Nishi: This talk will be carried out in text Chat only.
[14:05] Mellifera Szondi: I think you need to shout it
[14:05] ReSoarces Andel: YES
[14:06] Joppa Linden: aha.. in that case i don't need voice on :)
[14:06] Gambino Amsterdam: yes its cool
[14:06] Kirstyn Meredith: soror you might have to shout or use a mic since it's corners of 4 regions
[14:07] Vanillitavia Hellershanks: /ao off
[14:07] soror Nishi: OK
[14:07] soror Nishi: well, i'm going with this...:)) hopefully its OK
[14:07] Garrett Ceriano: ok
[14:08] soror Nishi: excuse my back...some og you...":))
[14:08] soror Nishi: I will not take the time to introduce myself and what I do, those of you who don't know me can find out easily afterwards..... basically I landscape :))
[14:08] soror Nishi: so.....
[14:09] soror Nishi: In the beginning the grid was created.
[14:09] soror Nishi: The decision was taken to separate the sky from the sea and the land rose out of the sea.
[14:09] soror Nishi: Sun and moon were created.
[14:09] soror Nishi: This was not the only possibility, but the way that was deemed to be the most useful.
[14:10] soror Nishi: This gave rise to a number of consequent decisions,and to the path of Mock Reality which, then as now, influences so many design choices of both LL and the individual players and creators in Second Life.
[14:10] soror Nishi: Ruth arose from the pixelated dust at the Virtual Dawn of Time, a flying being who walked like a duck but looked like a Human.
[14:10] Mellifera Szondi: omg...ruth!.
[14:10] Zaphod Theas: RIP RUTH grhs.
[14:11] soror Nishi: This sketch shows, in a limited manner, the evolution of Ruth and the almost obvious way she and her kind have developed. It is not an exhaustive or scholarly diagram, I have neither the information or the anthropological interest necessary, simply an illustration of growth.
[14:12] Zoya Writer: waiting for the sketch ...... ??
[14:12] Zoya Writer: tah duh .... :)
[14:12] Mellifera Szondi: ✯*¨¨*✯◑◑ GASP ◑◑✯*¨¨*✯
[14:12] soror Nishi: sorry
[14:13] soror Nishi: rezzing is a bit slow
[14:13] soror Nishi: :))
[14:13] soror Nishi: This, I would suggest, is a “Natural Development” of an idea. This is how things develop. A core idea/creation is accepted as the starting point and, through constant “customisation”, branches develop which are more or less successful.
[14:13] soror Nishi: Now there are all sorts of things you could learn from thinking about this, but it would go beyond the scope of this talk to venture into, for example, the poor Architectural provision of the multi-species inhabited environment.
[14:14] soror Nishi: The diversity of species living in Second life, if history is to be understood, is likely to grow no matter how much the Establishment concentrates on Mock Human lifestyles and housing.
[14:14] soror Nishi: and the same I believe to be true with Flora
[14:14] soror Nishi: So, with these thoughts as a preamble...I would like to talk about Flora Virtua Exotica.
[14:15] soror Nishi: our native flora
[14:15] soror Nishi: When the Olympian programmers and designers had finished with Ruth...they turned their attention to the flora of SL. ...
[14:15] soror Nishi: well, maybe they had run out of time or energy or...interest, (?) maybe they were mostly city folk.
[14:16] Mellifera Szondi: lmao
[14:16] Ali Akami: hehe
[14:16] soror Nishi: They stuck 3 photos together at 120 degrees and called it a flower.
[14:16] soror Nishi: The first trees were simply 3 photos stuck on the top of a stick.
Then the stick got a flexible script....and thats how most of Second Life have remained to this day.
6 years development has passed the main (mass) Flora by.
[14:16] Zaphod Theas: ★ '||' ||''|| '||' ★
[14:16] Zaphod Theas: ★ .II..I II..II .II..I ★
[14:16] Zaphod Theas: :)
[14:17] Zoya Writer: wow
[14:17] Zoya Writer: :)
[14:17] Milolin Spore whispers: 6 years that's pretty long time
[14:17] soror Nishi: When I arrived in SL, just before sculpties were made available two years ago, I was lucky enough to meet the man who made this.
[14:18] soror Nishi: still rezzzing no doubt
[14:18] Joppa Linden: yup
[14:18] soror Nishi: His name was Kaltusaran Moonsoo.
[14:19] soror Nishi: ....and this changed the course of my Second Life, but that is personal biography, charted in my blog.
Flora became my main interest,
[14:19] Joppa Linden: oh wow.. here it comes
[14:19] Mellifera Szondi: =^.^= PurRRrrRzzzZZZ =^.^=
[14:19] Mellifera Szondi: ~Melli PurrZZzz with PleAsUre~
[14:19] soror Nishi: the problrem with replicating RL trees is obvious really
[14:20] soror Nishi: trees have 100,000 leaves
[14:20] soror Nishi: so abstaraction is the only way forward
[14:20] Ali Akami: and they all fall in my back yard
[14:20] soror Nishi: or photos on sticks..:))
[14:20] Joppa Linden: text
[14:20] soror Nishi: :)))
[14:20] Franchella Milena: is there voice or just text?
[14:21] soror Nishi: text
[14:21] soror Nishi: There aren’t that many people involved in the development of Flora in Second Life, compared , for example, to clothes makers.
[14:21] Franchella Milena: Thanks!
[14:21] soror Nishi: There are a few different directions that the development of Flora has taken over this past two years, and I would like to show you some, to give you a taste of what, I believe, will become more commonplace.
[14:21] Teresa Weatherwax: wow that is cool looking Soror
[14:22] soror Nishi: These are three methods of depicting a more "indigenous" flora for Virtual Worlds.
[14:22] soror Nishi: 1) The total abstraction of the tree or flower shape into a feeling of movement.
[14:23] soror Nishi: This piece is by White Lebed, one of our best “prim benders”. She has sought to capture the beauty of Natures ‘lines’ without resorting to copying exact shapes.
[14:24] soror Nishi: 2) The scripting of alpha-textured prims to allow movement to dominate.
[14:24] soror Nishi: This piece by Glyph Graves shows how unfolding and blossoming as action give us the feeling of nature, again, with no attempt to copy.
[14:24] luce Laval is Online
[14:25] soror Nishi: 3) The use of particles to denote the multiple nature of the flower, or tree.
[14:25] soror Nishi: Many builders use particles and forgo the attempt to imitate , but give the impression of movement and multiplicity, growth and blossoming, like this piece by Jopsy Pendragon.
[14:26] soror Nishi: and...there are, of course all sorts of combinations of these techiques.
[14:26] soror Nishi: hopefully those are rezzing Ok for you
[14:26] Ali Akami: yup
[14:26] Pell Juran: yes and they are fantastic
[14:26] Aiko Serrao: it's awesome soror
[14:26] Nadir Taov: spectacular
[14:27] soror Nishi: yes...three talented builders
[14:27] soror Nishi: Now, a lot of things will change when flexible sculpties and shadows finally arrive.
[14:28] soror Nishi: Firstly, flowers made with flexible sculpted prims will be the most ‘realistic’ flora to ever hit Second Life. They will be flowers that cast shadows and sway gently in the breeze.
[14:28] Ali Akami: any time frame on that?
[14:28] soror Nishi: we hope
[14:28] soror Nishi: hmmm....on their way i believe
[14:28] sensory Hax: le ombre saranno sia per i prims che per gli av?
[14:28] sensory's translator: the shadows will be both for prims that for av?
[14:29] soror Nishi: shadows can be seen already with Kirstens viewer and flexible sculpties are under development
[14:29] soror Nishi: The photo flowers and photos-on-sticks trees will not cast shadows, alphas textures won’t in general.... this will not be seen as a problem initially..... but the fact that they don’t measure up to the new standard set by flowers will soon change peoples view-point.
[14:30] soror Nishi: The diagrams I showed at the beginning of this talk referring to the multiple developments of types of beings is relevant also to the Flora of Virtual Worlds.
[14:30] soror Nishi: We can quite safely predict that flora will develop in similar patterns to the avatar and RL evolutionary models, that is to say that different "branches" of flora will evolve and specialise.
[14:30] soror Nishi: Compared to avatar development little effort is being put into developing flora so changes will take longer to become mainstream. Relatively few prims, grid-wide, are used on Flora.
[14:31] soror Nishi: But, as a means of enhancing an environment and contributing to “presence”, Flora is totally unmatched in efficacy.
[14:31] Ali Akami: mmhmmm
[14:31] soror Nishi: I recommend you think of this when planning your next development or build.
[14:32] sensory Hax: come si può visualizzare ombre soror
[14:32] sensory's translator: as you can see shadows soror
[14:32] sensory Hax: ??
[14:32] sensory's translator: ?
[14:32] soror Nishi: that is the bulk of what I wanted to say, I have also a few thought s on Natural Selection
[14:33] soror Nishi: sensory...IM me...
[14:33] sensory Hax: ((sorry))
[14:33] sensory's translator: ((sorry))
[14:33] Flimsey Freenote is Offline
[14:33] soror Nishi: In SL the spread of a species is very dependent on its prim count
[14:34] soror Nishi: Low prim flowers and, especially mushrooms spread fast
[14:34] soror Nishi: mushrooms are spreading very quickly thro the grid..... this is mainly because they are normally one prim, and present a stong impact in a landscape.
[14:35] soror Nishi: However, longevity may well be determined by totally other factors. I would think that some pieces of Flora will be looked after and guarded for many years, even in the face of "newer" plants. It will be interesting to see.
[14:35] soror Nishi: Maybe a museum would be a good idea?
[14:35] Ali Akami: yes!
[14:35] Muruku Mureaux: And a bonfire
[14:35] Aiko Serrao: like fanstany world ?
[14:35] soror Nishi: Thank you for listening to me.
[14:35] Ali Akami: hehe
[14:35] soror Nishi: :)))
[14:36] Milolin Spore: Questions session?
[14:36] Garrett Ceriano: arboritium
[14:36] soror Nishi: I would be happy to answer questions now, or by IM if that suits you better.
[14:36] soror Nishi: yes
[14:36] soror Nishi: ask away
[14:36] soror Nishi: :))
[14:36] Milolin Spore: If I want to turn off the tree or plants, those prims won't be part of it, right?
[14:36] Ali Akami: soror i have been using the new ,ultifacetted scuplties a lot - do you have any comments or tricks in using them?
[14:37] soror Nishi: milolin...I dont quite understand
[14:37] Kirstyn Meredith: No milolin, that's only Linden plants
[14:37] link: BB I luv ya
[14:38] soror Nishi: ali....building techniques may be a bit specuialised for right now
[14:38] Pell Juran: do particle based flowers put much of a load on the sim or the client?
[14:38] Ali Akami nods
[14:38] Garrett Ceriano: there should be some sort of way for linden labs to make it possible for content creators to make their plants be able to toggle on and off just like linden plants
[14:38] soror Nishi: well...I dont believe so
[14:38] soror Nishi: I have many on my sim and they dont appear to lag much
[14:38] Garrett Ceriano: because if these types of plants begin to spread, as lovely as they are, they will cuase much more lag
[14:39] Pell Juran: thanks
[14:39] Roadkill Parx: This isn't so much of a question as it is a comment - as far as I know Kirsten has stopped supporting/working on her shadow client. The newest SL RC Viewer has experiemental shadows that I think is the most stable of all the shadow viewers.
[14:39] Milolin Spore: Advanced > Rending > turn off those features.
[14:39] soror Nishi: well..I'm sure there are experts here who can answer that better than me
[14:39] soror Nishi: are particles very laggy???
[14:39] Muruku Mureaux: Particles lag only the client
[14:40] soror Nishi: i simply adjust that in my Edit
[14:40] Milolin Spore: Particles does laggy on my side.
[14:40] Roadkill Parx: All depends on how good your graphics card is - you can boost your particle count waaaaay up if you want to.
[14:40] Milolin Spore: Yea
[14:40] sensory Hax nods
[14:40] sensory's translator: / me Nods
[14:40] Nadir Taov: Do you have any suggestions or thoughts about Terrain? I think a lot of the grid is covered with library textures ... is this important factor when selecting the right flora?
[14:40] Garrett Ceriano: well, I have a pretty good graphics card and all is well
[14:40] Muruku Mureaux: But flexi prims are very laggy ... flexi sculpts .... Arrgghhh.
[14:40] soror Nishi: i do have thoughts about terrain
[14:40] soror Nishi: I do not own a whole sim
[14:41] Garrett Ceriano: but one has to think of others that might not be as well equipped, like potential customers etc, you dont want them to crash as they tp in lol
[14:41] soror Nishi: so I am stuck with very poor grass and sand
[14:41] Nadir Taov nods
[14:41] Milolin Spore: Soror, what's address of your sim, can I check it out?
[14:41] Roadkill Parx: Another thing I dont see used much are Oblong Sculpties with plants. You can create a massive amount of leaves, or an entire set of branches in one sculpt - instead of using the regular 32x32 sculpt map, try a 16x64.
[14:41] Garrett Ceriano: look at picks, might be in there
[14:41] soror Nishi: I use large stones and rocks to hide a lot of poor grass
[14:42] soror Nishi: all my places are in my Picks...sorors beach
[14:42] soror Nishi: it would be very nice to have a possible selection of terrain textures
[14:43] soror Nishi: currently you have to own a sim to have that privaledge
[14:43] soror Nishi: :))
[14:43] soror Nishi: I find large ponds help
[14:43] soror Nishi: :))
[14:43] Joppa Linden: (definitely check out her place(s).. a lot there is what i thought SL could blossom into.. such as flora that's indignehous to SL)
[14:43] soror Nishi: :)) thx
[14:43] Joppa Linden: surely :)
[14:44] Ali Akami: there is a new gadgets out that will custom make a sculptie to match any terrain and then you can texture it - it works really well
[14:44] soror Nishi: ahh...that sounds great Ali
[14:44] soror Nishi: very useful
[14:44] Muruku Mureaux: Yes - terrain texture distortion on gradients is terrible.
[14:44] Ali Akami: it is
[14:44] Garrett Ceriano: someone mentioned the RC viewer having supporting shadows? where do i turn them on?
[14:44] Roadkill Parx: Ah yes, I used that in my own sim to make a corner "swampy"
[14:44] Ali Akami: solves all the ground problems
[14:45] Ali Akami: i used it for a beach with SAND
[14:45] Nadir Taov: neat, thanks for that tip Ali
[14:45] Ali Akami: most welcome
[14:45] Roadkill Parx: You can also see that used in the Malady Bog sim, the entire sim is covered with sculpties that "hug" terrain. The texture is a very faint glow overlay of sawgrass that looks great in all times of the day.
[14:45] Muruku Mureaux: Who makes the gadget?
[14:45] soror Nishi: ahhh...thx...thats great
[14:45] Ali Akami: hmmmm i don't rember right now
[14:46] Roadkill Parx: I wish I knew, I had to do some voodoo sculpt tricks and practically choke my brain with math to get it to finally work - I don't think I could do it again myself.
[14:46] Ali Akami: i'll look it up
[14:46] soror Nishi: landscaping doesnt get the attention it deserves....I dont think theres a catagory in the Linden prizes for landscape
[14:46] soror Nishi: it is something that could be better promoted
[14:47] Milolin Spore: It should be, promote eco movement.
[14:47] Roadkill Parx: A friend of mine also owns the sim Hambone Slash - its a massive desert and he used those same sculpt tricks to "hug" the terrain and bake shadows onto the sand.
[14:47] Garrett Ceriano: I think when i entered SL it was one of my main interests, I have not created anything yet but I am hoping to, I am a landscape architecture major in rl :P
[14:47] Ali Akami: https://uncensored.xstreetsl.com/modules.php?name=Marketplace&file=item&ItemID=1328306
[14:48] Joppa Linden: sounds like a good Jira Feature Suggestion..
[14:48] soror Nishi: excellent
[14:48] Roadkill Parx: thats the one!
[14:48] soror Nishi: well...I have started a small group if anyone wants to join...its called "A Freak of Nature`"
[14:48] Roadkill Parx: Never knew there was a tool for it, but that tool can do great things. It's like custom texturing your land. You can practically paint the ground
[14:48] Garrett Ceriano: well, I think it should be more recognized, landscape is like 30 percent of the user experience
[14:48] Ali Akami: Garret i have lots of land if you want some practice my black thumb has followed me here to SL
[14:49] Garrett Ceriano: lol
[14:50] Garrett Ceriano: I would like to join soror
[14:50] soror Nishi: ok..well...Like I said...thank you for listening to me...I hope you all have fun in your SL gardens.
[14:50] Nadir Taov: thanks soror!
[14:50] soror Nishi: pleas do, garret
[14:50] Ali Akami: thanks!
[14:51] Joppa Linden: thank you so much, soror!!
[14:51] sensory Hax: thanks very much
[14:51] sensory's translator: thanks very much
[14:51] Roadkill Parx: Thanks for bringing some light to the environment - it's often totally neglected how important it is in SL.
[14:51] soror Nishi: I'm off for a coffee...:)))
[14:51] Roadkill Parx: (*still waiting to be able to set the default windlight setting for his estate*)
[14:51] soror Nishi: but will be happy to talk more in IM iof anyone wants to
[14:51] Joppa Linden: take care
[14:51] soror Nishi: byeee
[14:51] Milolin Spore: Thanks, Soror. It's inspiring presentation.
[14:51] soror Nishi: :))
[14:51] Aiko Serrao: thanks soror
[14:51] Joppa Linden: i'm off to other adventures
[14:52] Roadkill Parx: Thank you soror!