I’m seeing Second Life adverts in my Google Adsense stream again, I haven’t noticed these for a while but it looks as if Linden Lab are utilising adsense again in another marketing campaign, which is good to see. However this post is about the forthcoming release of Blender 2.64 and new features that have Second Life in mind.
Gaia Clary, who has been working hard with others to ensure Collada support in Blender is improved and maintained, brings us news on the official forum of new features in Blender 2.64. Collada is the format we use to import Mesh objects to Second Life, Blender were talking of dropping support for Collada as it was a buggy format, but Gaia and others have risen to the challenge of helping to improve it.
Blender 2.64 isn’t officially released yet, but the new improvements include:
- Geometry data is now again named similar to the Object names (Object names are preserved).
- The order of export for objects can now be sorted (avoid LOD matching problems).
- Apply modifiers is non destructive. You no longer have to apply the modifiers before exporting. This works also with Mirror Modifiers and Shape keys.
- You can now export a rig with stripped control bones as long as the deform bones define a complete SL Skeleton.
- The reimport of exported collada files to Blender is still not fully fixed. But for static meshes it now works reasonable well (not so important for Second Life users though).
Gaia goes into further detail in a blog post on the subject, including a photo of an export option for Second Life, which will load some presets that you’ll generally want when you export your Mesh to Collada for use in Second Life.
The development build of Blender can be found at GraphicAll.org, Gaia advises that you should look for a build of version r47979 or newer.
If you do go to Gaia’s blog post you’ll see a screenshot of the new options, with the Second Life checkbox option. Now, let’s consider this for a moment, Second Life is now getting some promotion in the Blender community, Blender users will see the option to export for Second Life and some of them may then be tempted to see what they can come and do with their models in Second Life.
This is where we go back to an old bugbear of mine, the lack of strategic alliances or cross promotion. I’ve often wondered why Adobe aren’t advertising on the Second Life forums, after all Photoshop is a popular tool for Second Life creators. Then there’s Autodesk Maya which can be used to make Mesh.
Blender and Gimp are open source tools that can be used for Second Life content creation, how about some adverts for them in the forum in exchange for links to Second Life from their sites, or Linden Lab talk to the guys at Blender Cookie about linking to some of their training materials, some of their content is free to use and some require a subscription fee. Linden Lab could even enquire if they could sell training subscriptions on behalf of Blender Cookie and bundle it with a new premium plus membership package for Second Life, which would be aimed at content creators.
I feel that a trick is being missed here, Second Life is a platform that can be used to display wares, there are companies that make tools for the creation of those wares, it would be beneficial to all involved parties to talk to each other at the very least.
Hey, I am glad I could reach this post, Ciaran… 🙂
You raise some very good points. I hope that the “Lindens that be” read this post.
I really wish I could trace what the issue is with people not being able to get here.
Excellent news re Blender 2.64 and its further optimization for SL content creators. Never enough kudos could be sent in Gaia’s direction as developer, promoter and most importantly teacher and disseminator.
You raise some excellent points about the need for cross pollenating and promoting content creation IN SL with the tools makers and promoters outside of SL.
Mesh is the first chance in a while for SL to present itself as a serious platform for game development and if nothing else to showcase the skills necessary for successful low poly modelling. Many of us learn from and subscribe to sites such as Blender Cookie, yet the focus is always either on renders as the finished product using high poly models, or extremely stripped low poly models viewed from very restrictive game angles. Let’s get some how to know how on models meant for a dynamically streamed 3D environment.
COME ON SL! you started it!. Get back to the original program of being a place AND a platform for creation.
What a great little bunch of comments. The problem is, we have not reached a threshold of enough people with such interests. I struggle to find answers for using Blender in SL, and when I get stuck, there is no place to get help. So anything the companies can do is sorely needed.
Thx