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Why your house looks like uncooked ramen

<Rant On>

Sculpts are useful things, mostly.   But they have their limits.

On buildings, they are increasingly annoying to me.

When you use a sculpt on the outside of a building, remember…unless it’s narrow cramped area, people are going to be able to see your building from a good ways off.   This impacts your mesh, or as I prefer to call it, the mangle.

The more sculpts and textures in an area, the longer the mangle lasts.   At a distance without enough attention to LOD, mangle can last forever.   And looks horrible.

So stop it, already!   A few sculpts is good.   If someone comes up to your building and cant find the door, or the windows, or even the walls, until they’ve stood around for ten or fifteen minutes, use more regular prims!

This rant brought to you by the “WTF IS THAT?” foundation.

<Rant Off>

 

 

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14 Comments

  1. Grendel Footman Grendel Footman August 23, 2010

    could never get the hang of sculpties myself anyway, they look good on small things, large ones though, yep, mangled

  2. Zaida Gearbox Zaida Gearbox August 23, 2010

    Okay, you come over an’ redo de front windows on de convent.

  3. Arconus Arkright Arconus Arkright August 23, 2010

    So many persnickety Babbagers ranting this week, and it’s only Monday. Perhaps I should postpone my plan to set up a full-volume loop of Britney Spears’ “Toxic” in Port Babbage.

    • Kimika Ying Kimika Ying August 24, 2010

      If Max Raabe is singing that instead of Miss Spears then don’t wait.  I’ll be down to the Port shortly.

  4. Sredni Eel Sredni Eel August 24, 2010

    Sculpties are fine on clothing, but on buildings they can be pretty confusing.  I can’t tell you how many times I’ve Teleported directly into a huge sphere that remained a sphere for quite some time before it resolved itself into a doorway.

    Also, if you’re going to use sculpties for artches and such, make them phantom so you can actually walk through them.  Bashing your nose on an invisible wall can be a bit off putting.

     

  5. Marian Dragovar Marian Dragovar August 24, 2010

    I prefer buildings with sculpts, I’ll put up with a quick bit of mangle for a pretty in-person experience. Though, I don’t know that I’ve experienced the same kind of visual mess — sculpts rez super quick, and my view distance is not maxed.

     

    /agree with Mr. Eel regarding making prims phantom if they’re doors, etc.

  6. Breezy Carver Breezy Carver August 24, 2010

    thinks of sculpted windows  and   shudders  !

    • Rip Wirefly Rip Wirefly August 25, 2010

      *thinks of more sculpted windows and adding shudders*

  7. Gabriell Anatra Gabriell Anatra August 24, 2010

    They usually rez fairly quickly for me too but sometimes I’ve tp’d into a sim that seemed to be made mostly of them and it was impossible to see let alone move.

    Better made ones will often rez faster than poorly done ones, or so I’ve heard.

    • Mr Tenk Mr Tenk August 25, 2010

      it  depends on your machine. my $600 windows laptop with the NVDIA 230 geforce video card… no problem. amazing even. stunning. i can even fly around with the draw all the way up.

      my imac that i’d rather not say how much it cost with the ATI Radeon HD 4850 upgrade, not so great. i am completely underwhelmed by the performance on this card. Sad.

      • Zaida Gearbox Zaida Gearbox August 25, 2010

        I’m pretty happy with what I’m getting from my Dell with just the standard video card it came with.  It beats the pants off of my old laptop, and I feel pretty sure SL isn’t going to eat it up like it does my laptops.

  8. Jimmy Branagh Jimmy Branagh August 24, 2010

    I avoid sculpts on buildings when possible but far prefer them to alpha-encrusted textures that bleed all over the place.

  9. Edward Pearse Edward Pearse August 25, 2010

    Sculpts are good for tricky bits or to help reduce primmage, but sculpt walls are really pushing it. I know I’ve been in the Academy sim for nearly half an hour before all the sculpts on Brunel Hall have rezzed. Admittedly that was a very slow day but still.

    And yes Jimmy I have to agree on alpha clash. Prim windows where possible, sculpt frames if you need them.

  10. Zaida Gearbox Zaida Gearbox August 25, 2010

    Ah haff both prim and sculpt windows on mah building, an’ personally I’m real proud of mah eye windows in de convent in Babbage Square.  Ah looked all over de place an’ haven’t seen anudder build wid windows laike dat anywhere in SL.

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