DISQUS

Wow, so awesome! Can't wait to see the film and especially the SL bits. Well done folks!

haha yes it was *torture* for some of us, seeing all those beautiful pics from you Torley, realising the product was so close to another 'First Look' but just out of our grasp. Thus the 'tease' comments. You did such a terrific job of maintaining a high level of interest and anticipation for this product.. and it's great to see you, and now so many other talented SL photographers, really pushing the artistic possibilities of this new 'First Look'.

My only fear now is that once this 'First Look' testing phase is complete, it will be taken away again! Or do you expect it will go straight into the regular viewer after testing? Please please pretty please!?

Well done Torley, you continue to inspire with your skill, enthusiasm, dedication, and your openness.

Well done Torley. I am becoming a fan of tutorials in general (and yours in particular!) I am so glad to be part of this time, and this kind of platform, which values so highly the sharing of information.

I like that you mention anti-aliasing.. this has made a huge improvement to my picture taking over the last few months. I look at so many beautiful SL pics in flickr, then click on 'larger size' and its all jaggie-full.. argh! and it's so easy to get rid of that!

Thanks and like many others, patiently waiting .. okay .. * d y i n g * for WindLight to become available :)

Happy birthday SLOz!

Keep up the good work Lowell, it's always a good & informative read in here.

Cheers,
Simondo

I checked out the Toxic Garden on the weekend and yeah it's very well set up! Not sure if it was just my machine, but I noticed a pretty large impact on FPS. Other than that, it's an amazing place to explore.

Thanks for the heads up Lowell, they do have some really interesting things in the works in that group of sims hey? One I found was 'Stratos Legend Rezzable' with lots of large 'skeletal dinosaur' statues, really nice constructions.

Cheers,
Simondo

Some of those pictures are just insanely beautiful. I wanted to write something on most of them but thought it would seem a bit much. It appears you've gone so far past mastering the form, it's almost scary.

I love to see someone push the boundaries so far that the limits are redefined. Well done.

wow I am not good with the html skillz :)
..but I think it still makes sense somehow.
Cheers

Torley yes it was still working last night for me (Monday morning SL time). I didn't bend or twist anything to make it work. I just hadn't 'uninstalled' the FirstLook build after the 1.17 update, and had been using the regular 1.17 viewer, and just tried starting up and logging in thru the 1.16 FirstLook viewer.. and voila it worked! It wasn't crashing for me like it was on the weekend, but then I only stayed in for an hour or so. (ps. the very kind artist at Mill Pond, Kristauf McDunnough, resent my painting & actually refunded me half the price for the trouble!)

I run on an Intel P4 with an nVidia 8600GTS card if that makes any difference? I was expecting messages like "you are using an old version, please update" or something like that, but no it just logs me in no problems. I'm at work now so can't check again for a few hours.

The pics are the first three (the "Farnsworth House" ones), taken on Sunday. hehe as I write this I'm realising I can't prove I took them on Sunday (not that you're asking me to!) but from what I've read I think that sim only opened late last week? Not quite sure tho.

Thanks Torley

ps. I meant to add that I posted some photos on flickr taken yesterday at the "Maximum Minimum" sim, using the WindLight viewer and Vint Falken's excellent "Pirate" settings. Great stuff Vint btw.

I was able to log in with the WindLight viewer yesterday. I hadn't even tried it since the 1.17 update as I just assumed it wouldn't work, but I noticed someone had posted an image on flickr saying they could still log in with the 1.16 FirstLook viewer.

Not sure if it causes any problems (I did buy a painting at "Mill Pond" and never received it, but I think that was an unrelated problem).

I was a bit distraught (!) at not being able to use WindLight any more so was very happy to see it working after a few days of using the regular viewer. Give it a try. It crashed several times which I don't normally experience, but again I think that may have been due to grid issues, not sure.

Cheers

Wow that Timberlake-v-West track is exceptional. /me is so very glad to have nice subwoofer for that one!!

I wouldn't normally admit to liking it :) but so much of Mr Timberlake's output is pretty remarkable. I guess I still have a soft spot for Michael Jackson .. oops let me re-phrase .. up-to-mid-1980s-non-weird Michael Jackson.. and I think Timberlake takes up the mantle once held by Jackson rather well.

I usually cringe when I hear mashups but thanks for pointing to that track, very very cool.

Cheers

Looks like a terrific addition to the platform. Not 100% sure but I got the feeling from the notes that it'll be the viewer doing the work, so I wouldn't expect much impact on bandwidth(?). It may require a hotted-up graphics card tho to reach its full glory!!
/me starts saving now for a nice upgrade :)
The funny thing about lag is so many things contribute to what we call 'lag'. For instance I was getting a lot of 'stuttering' graphics recently and dropped my SL disk cache back to the recommended 200Mb and straight away that stuttering (which I decided to call 'lag') just disappeared.
ps. Lowell is the PC viewer really available yet? (Torley mentions it will be a 'First Look' release but I couldn't find it in the Download section).
Cheers

Wow this looks just stunning. Can't wait to try it out! This + sculpties are going to go a *long* way towards making the in-world experience so beautiful and fresh, comparable in look I reckon to the flashy "Home" video from Sony a few months back. Beautiful work & well done to all concerned.
Cheers Torley!

Dear Torley,

Re: Project Open Letter

Ignoring the risks of sounding fan-boyish, I'd just like to re-state something from a few months ago..

You folks have done, and are doing, a great job.
*Thank you* from one grateful resident.

Simondo Nebestanka

It was a cool little story. Blair has one of the best looking male av's I've seen thus far.. /me is turning green with envy! I will have to look out for an audio feed of his dj work.. as the director points out in the extra bits on the SBS site, that club is very crowded.
Thanks for highlighting this one Lowell!
Cheers

I think it's 7.30pm..

What a brilliant video.. blew my mind!
G-r-e-a-t choice of music btw.
Thanks for posting this link Lowell.. I try to follow Lordfly's blog but missed this item.
Cheers!

Dear Torley.. I was about to say "omg I can't believe after all my wanderings, I haven't seen this function before" argh.. but are you pointing out a new feature? It *definitely* gets my vote for a feature to hang on to!
ps. I do like your addition at the top of the statue!
Cheers

It's a wonderful build.. a good choice of streaming music really adds to the atmosphere as well. Marino Nuvolari has also built a beautiful little church directly out the front of the mosque, and there is an office nearby which seems to have info on a lot of religious places to visit.
Great to see such talented people using their creativity in this manner!
Cheers

Actually now that I think about it.. perhaps an April Fools' joke?

Haha I'm glad you've pointed this out.. I thought I was seeing things! I read a couple of these tonight:

"Are you there yet?"

"Sending things to Earth..."

"Someone is standing behind you."

I am pretty sure they must be new..

I know where you are coming from Sean, but I think the story was more about the reality of what most people are doing in their 'second lives' than about the virtuous ideals of the platform. The report did touch on those positive aspects though.

I wish the reality of this 'virtuality' was a little different.. I wander around countless artistic spaces that push the boundaries of what is possible in SL, and am amazed that I'm amongst a very small number of people exploring those creations. Then I TP to a dance club, and the places are packed.

It doesn't mean that's *all* that people are doing in SL, but I don't think the Four Corners report was pushing that angle. Unbalanced? Try for a second to imagine the same story in the hands of say "60 Minutes". Ugh. And in fact *don't* try and imagine the story as covered by "ACA" or "Today Tonight", or your head may just explode..

Peace

I think the show was excellent - very well balanced. It showed some of the 'virtual sex' side of SL but didn't overly focus on it.

It's a shame we Queenslanders don't have daylight savings - I didn't want to go to ABC Island until after the show (which would have been 10.30pm NSW/Vic). Everything seemed over by then. Also it took me a while to figure out I had to be a Group member of 'ABC Friends' before I could get on to the island.. would have been nice to have mentioned that on the ABC/SL site I think!

Good summary Lowell.
Cheers

> This means that for the very first time, people can
> view in-world events without needing to be there
> themselves”, says Wisniewski.

Electric Sheep have been running DTV for quite some time now, streaming in-world "events" to their web page. I guess Gary is talking about it being a first for organised, advertised "Events", which is quite cool.

The multi-camera coverage is a great way to do it!

Did anyone catch the show? Did it work okay?

Cheers

Good questions, good info here.
Nice work.