'Second Life' - art in virtual reality?

[Rick Clise]

Is anyone in this community doing anything art-related in 'Second Life' or in other virtual reality communities?

A friend of mine kinda lives in Second Life and he put-up a virtual version of one of my metal sculptures (done with my permission) and it's interesting that a lot of other people in SL are keen to add virtual art to their environment in SL.

I'm not a SL member but my friend's involvement in it, plus a recent grant category from the Australia Council (peak funding body in Australia for the arts) for exploring art in Second Life, has me a little interested in learning more about it.

I did a search but didn't find anything regarding Second Life in this community.

[dilida]

Rick,
I don't have a second life, but I work with a kid who does. He talks about the things he creates online, but really balks when I encourage him to put his hands on some REAL life material and try the same creativity. He doesn't think he can do the real life art. I think it will be interesting to see where this computor art is going with these kids.

As for this forum there have been discussions along these lines, not about SL specifically, but try searching computor art , I think a lot of the threads were in the New Technolgy section this past year.

lisa

[GlennT]

Second Life virtual reality communities are an invention of the Margons from the planet Dezoid. They intent to suck the life out of people through the computer and live off of the energies. The next phase of their plan is to use inverse 3-d modeling to scan and suck the physical forms of these hapless souls into the computer and replicate them on Dezoid to serve as slaves.

Or something like that!

[jOe~]

suck the physical forms of these hapless souls into the computer and replicate them on Dezoid to serve as slaves.

Now I know why Homer Simpson asked, "The internet? Is that thing still around?"

[CroftonGraphics]

If you want to do art in virtual reality,

look into game engines, I use 3d gamestudio,
there is also quest 3d, torque etc. These are all affordable and use the latest technologies to make proper shapes.

Second Life has no felxibility, you are not meant to import models from other formats either. The graphics are rubbish too.

Having said that, I agree with other posters, go and buy some clay, plaster etc, much more scope to do things. You could always scan or model up your real life sculptures in 3d worlds afterwards.

[Rick Clise]

Thanks all for the comments (and for the dire warning from GlennT - I was wondering if those Margons could be trusted or not...)

I'm already working in the 'real world' of sculpture but have an interest in the virtual side as well.

I have used AutoCAD and Inventor to design and model some of my metal sculptures but they aren't the optimal tools for what I want to do (for example, I don't need to work-out interference between different elements on a sculpture using Inventor etc), so thanks CroftonGraphics for the apps recommendations.

One thing I'd like to use computer tools for is to create virtual maquettes of pieces before committing the plasma torch and welder to real materials. Although I am actively working on them, my manual drawing skills currently let me down.

[CroftonGraphics]

Also, rather than CAD packagers,

try more creative animation packages such as 3ds max, softimage xsi,
maya.

Softimage is about the cheapest.

There are also very cheap and also free ones-

Blender is free and probably all you need for what you want.

Also zbrush is worth checking out for organic modelling too but thats not free.

Hope this helps....

[rhendriks]

You can use second life to promot your art.Setting up a (virtual)gallery
for example in one of the shopping centra.But it is expensive.

Rob
See My Foam Reliefs

[Andrew Werby]

I have a piece in D.A.A.P; a Digital Sculpture Park run by Derrick Woodham in the UK. It takes a high-bandwidth connection to navigate, but it's nice to be able to see more than one view of a piece; there's definite advantages in this for sculptors over showing work as regular photos. Here's a link: http://www.derrickwoodham.net/dwoodham/daap2.htm (check out Intersculpt 2005 for my piece; Intersculpt 2007 is worth seeing too...)

Andrew Werby
www.computersculpture.com
Digital Tools for 3-D Artists

[Rick Clise]

Hi Derrick, I'm running into a problem when I click on the hyperlinks on your website - is there specific software that needs to be installed to follow the links? Your site looks very interesting, and there's a lot of good info about a variety of graphics tools on the computersculpture.com website. Thanks for the post.

[Andrew Werby]

Thanks for the kind words about my site, Rick, but I don't think you can reach Derrick this way. You need to download and install the Activeworlds browser to make the DAAP site work: http://www.activeworlds.com:80/ . You don't need to pay, you can register as a "tourist" for free.

Andrew Werby
www.computersculpture.com

[Rick Clise]

Hi Andrew, 'oops' on my part. Thanks for the info about the Activeworlds browser - I'll try again. Cheers, Rick

[CroftonGraphics]

Hi I think I e mailed Rick this link,

Not sure if its any use to others but-

http://www.coniserver.net/ubbthreads...e/0#Post469119

This link has some great non expensive or free 3D graphics programmes.
If you do not work fully in 3d graphics, these programmes will be more than enough....

[Julianna]

Originally Posted by Rick Clise

Is anyone in this community doing anything art-related in 'Second Life' or in other virtual reality communities?

A friend of mine kinda lives in Second Life and he put-up a virtual version of one of my metal sculptures (done with my permission) and it's interesting that a lot of other people in SL are keen to add virtual art to their environment in SL.

I finally found some time to venture onto SL, and I must say I'm not overly impressed (by SL, not your work...where is your work? I'd like to take a look at it there!).

Aside from the fact that someone tried to..umm...perform acts on me while I was reading billboards, I'm dismayed by the fact that the possibilities of a purely virtual reality aren't being explored by most of the SL residents.

I visited a few galleries, and most of the work was either created in real life and ported into SL (which is fine, but I was more intrigued by the landscape than the art, to be honest) or it is art created for a virtual world, but still limiting itself to many of the concepts of real life.

The best work I could find (in my limited time there) was Sasun's Morphing Sculpture, which was an interactive piece of work which involved textures, motion and "particles" (add-ons?). The work, unlike the most of the other sculpture I was able to find on SL, could only exist virtually.

...And don't even get me started on the SL architecture I encountered!

[StevenW]

Originally Posted by Julianna

Aside from the fact that someone tried to..umm...perform acts on me while I was reading billboards, I'm dismayed by the fact that the possibilities of a purely virtual reality aren't being explored by most of the SL residents.)

I want to say something, but I'm at a complete loss, the imagery is just too overwhelming. :|

[CroftonGraphics]

Hi, Long post------------------------------------------------

I am not a programmer I am a designer/artist thing so excuse if below is not entirely spot on for any programmers out there-

With SL, the graphics engine is very basic with regards to the way it looks.

If you look at modern game engines, ie the latest game blockbusters.
These 'game engines' use shaders. If you want to see how real modern games are, type in 'Crysis' in amazon and look at screenshots.

These shaders add extra effects, for example they can simulate the bumps and how light reacts to these bumps in the form of normal maps, but at same time be put onto a fairly low detail 3d model mesh.

SL only has the low detail mesh facilities.

I would say anyone wanting to explore sculpture in 3d would be restricted by SL, firstly by the graphics and also by the modelling capabilities with the built in modeler. Ok, its kind of 'cool' that you can get people to stand round your art work etc and also use it to sell your work.

However, there are other ways.
Me for example, I am using an 'indie' game engine, currently just about to finish off a virtual part of a city.

Then over xmas, I will work on my abstract form ideas in 3d studio max, then import it to 3d gamestudio. I want to make real life sculptures but do some virtual ones as well that mirror the ones in real life.

The former is expensive, the latter is not so much.
See my link above to find cheap programmes.

I can then make myself walkaround the sculpture but the use of 'shaders' I can make the sculpture look more realistic then in SL.

This can then be 'built' and put into one file 'exe'. Then others can download it from my site to view.

There are other programmes that allow 3d on the web in web browsers, they usually require a plugin. However, some now use Java, and most pcs have Java installed.

So therefore, I would say if you truly want to make detail and have more options for effects/dynamics/lighting to display online virtual sculptures, I would not go with SL.

However, in my opinion SL could perhaps be useful for some sort of online shop.

Hope this might be of help......

[Julianna]

Thanks for the insights! I've spent a bit more time there and am slowly uncovering more art that can only exist virtually (mainly things which defy gravity and other physical restraints).

I have noticed a huge problem with my laptop, even though it's only a year or so old, not being able to handle the graphics rendering quickly or in much detail.

[CroftonGraphics]

I think the scene takes a long time to build up because of internet connection times not your pc.

As for detail, probably its that second life isnt good with detail.

[CroftonGraphics]

Hi there,

Here are some screenshots from a 3d realtime game level I produced with 3ds max and imported it into a relatively cheap game engine called '3D Gamestudio', just wanted to post to show that you can make more detailed work for 'virtual reality' if you use engines other then Second Life.

Realism can be pushed even further than this, I use this sunset colours look and blocky work as its a style I like.

Thank goodness I got that work finished, I now want to do a project this year combining abstract forms from real life materials with a screen with abstract forms and somehow mirror or contrast the two, I cannot wait.

If anyone wants to ask about how do go about doing 3d realtime work, feel free to get in touch.

[Julianna]

Wow. Very impressive....thanks.

[Julianna]

Here's some more SecondLife stuff:
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/200...ects_into.html

It's basically exporting digital objects into the real world. I always thought real objects were the 3D ones, so I'm a bit confused by their use of "3D"...but anyway...

[CroftonGraphics]

They are getting the 3d meshes from second life using a kind of hack and
then taking the meshes to a piece of software called Pepakura Designer,
I have messed around with that software, as you can see you can make lots of nice 'toy' cardboard cutout models like those kits children used to get.

You dont need second life to do that, you just need a 3d model creation package that will be able to export to DXF format then into pepakura,
its then quite fiddly to layout the mesh parts.

Then you print it and use glue. That pepakura could be possibly used to create layouts scribe on thin metals etc and fold the metals into the shapes you made on pc and would create a more durable form.

I see they have made a donut, well seems a lot of hassle to make a donut when you could make one from clay in a few minutes.....I suppose as they say they want to show the irony of the value of second life objects...

[Julianna]

Originally Posted by CroftonGraphics

I see they have made a donut, well seems a lot of hassle to make a donut when you could make one from clay in a few minutes.....I suppose as they say they want to show the irony of the value of second life objects...

Yeah. It seems like too much work just to make a donut (especially one which isn't edible!).

[Rick Clise]

CroftonGraphics' virtual worlds are very inspiring! Amazing graphics! And obviously amazing ability with the different software programs he uses. Keep up the great work.

On of the podcasts that I regularly listen to covered the subject of people using computer animation software to create 3D versions of existing 2D artwork. Specifically, Associate Professor John Finigan from Purdue University has his class of computer animators create a 3D version of Edward Hopper's painting 'Nighthawks'; and in the same podcast the Chinese artist Miao Xiaochun talks about his work 'Last Judgement in Cyberspace' which is the artist's conversion of Michelangelo's fresco 'The Last Judgement' into a 3D computer animated world. 'Last Judgement in Cyberspace' was exhibited last year at Adelaide's Contemporary Art Centre of SA and CACSA's director Alan Cruickshank discusses the work and exhibition.

The podcast is on the (Australian) ABC Radio National website on 27 Jan 2008. Here's a link to it if anyone wants to listen.

http://mpegmedia.abc.net.au/rn/podca...s_20080127.mp3

The interview with Miao Xiaochun starts at 13:32 into the podcast, and the interview with John Finigan (apologies if I have mispelled his surname) starts at 32:44 in the podcast.

I thought the idea of using animation software to make a 3D version of a painting to be very cool, and it reminded me of a scene in the movie 'Blade Runner' where a slick machine was used to do a virtual 3D walkthough a photograph. How I wanted one of those machines...

Happy listening!

[CroftonGraphics]

HI there,

I managed to record some 'ingame' footage of my Cadiz project. Youtube really compressed it though so the textures are better in the application.



Also it looks dark, remember in the final version it fills up the whole screen so it wont look so dark.

Next when I have the time, I want to create more sculptural abstracted interactive work in realtime along with REAL work in the REAL world as a contrast!
These days using even a cheap 'indie' gameengine such as the one I use 3D Gamestudio it is possible if you want to make one obect or a few, ie an instalation, you can have even greater detail than this Cadiz project. You can also use special 'shaders' such as normal mapping that bake even more detail into your model by the use of textures that you can create in another application.