How to make objects?

Second Life Info > Second Life by Role > Creators >
How do I build objects?

This page presents a short "crash course" on building in Second Life.

Getting Started:
Right-click the ground and choose Create to open the tools window. You can also press Ctrl+4.

You can only create objects on land that permits the creation of objects. Land that prohibits object creation is marked No-Build. You can identify no-build land by an icon that appears at the top of your screen when standing on no-build land.

In the tools window, choose the type of basic shape (primitive) you wish to create, then click the location inworld where you wish to build it. The shape appears (typically with a resounding "whoosh" sound).

Editing Prims:

Moving: When the arrow icon is selected, you can click and drag the red/green/blue axes on the object to move it around. Clicking on the red (X), green (Y), and blue (Z) arrows lets you drag the object only along those axes.

Resizing: Hold down Ctrl+Shift to bring up the sizing box. Click and drag one of the white corner boxes to scale the entire object proportionally. (The object's opposite corner will move in the opposite direction if the editor window's Stretch Both Sides option is checked; it will remain in place if the option is unchecked.) Click and drag the red/green/blue box to resize a prim's length/width/height without changing the other dimensions.

Rotating: Hold down Ctrl to bring up the rotation sphere. Click and drag anywhere within the sphere to rotate the object freely along all three axes. Click and drag a specific ring (red/green/blue) to only rotate the object around that axis.

Entering Specific Values: Click on the editor's More button, then select the Object tab. You can enter in specific XYZ coordinates to move, resize, or rotate the object. Changes to these values are always based on the center of the object (the point where the red/green/blue axes meet).

Advanced Edits: The Object tab offers several additional options for editing based on the basic prim shape. Here are some common examples:

* Cut (begin/end): Takes out a slice of the object along its Z axis. You can specify where the cut starts and finishes.
* Hollow: Puts a hollow center in the object starting from the center of the shape and expanding out. You can specify what percentage of the radius is hollow.
* Twist (begin/end): Puts twists into the object, warping its shape as well as texture alignment.
* Taper: Reduces the size of the top or bottom sides (x or y axes, negative or positive) of the prim.
* Top Shear: Shifts (shears/skews) the top surface of the object away from the bottom. You can shift the X and Y axes separately.
* Dimple (begin/end): Cuts a hole in a sphere from ring of latitude (you specify the percentage) to the top or bottom of the Zaxis. The dimple cuts straight to the origin of the object (leaving a cone-shaped hole).


Linking: This makes the linked object act as one coherent piece (though the object count is maintained). With no object selected in the editor, hold down Shift and click on each prim you wish to link together, one at a time. Make the most important prim (root) the last one you select (such as the seat of a vehicle). Then, go to the Tools menu and select Link, or just press Ctrl+L. You can select Tools->Unlink or press Ctrl+Shift+L to break the object apart. There are limits to how large a creation you can link together: No single object may have more than 256 prims, and no physics-enabled object may have more than 31 prims.

Content creation

* n00b Be Gone series - By Natural Selection Studios.
o Camera Tutorial - "how to interact with objects, different forms of camera controls, and a few ‘unknown’ tricks"
o Building Tutorial - "basic building inside Second Life - as well as continuing camera controls learned in the first episode"

* Building in Second Life series - By Ian Monstre.
o Building a Clock - How to make a timepiece that really works, in 7 parts.
o Open/Close Door - "how to create a door that opens and closes when touched"
o Create a Fluttering flag - Flag vidtuts are a great way to show flexiprims in action.

* Building and scripting series - By Seeter Sullivan.
o How to build a chair
o How to create an interactive sign
o How to embed texture onto an object
o How to embed a notecard onto an object
o How to link an object to a webpage
o How to create links within a notecard
o How to create a dropbox
o How to create a teleport link

* How to animate your creations - How to animate your creations with linked prim animation using Puppeteer by Todd Borst.

* How to build a bridge - By Noire Mirabeau — a relatively vintage example of an SL vidtut.

Thank you very much SuezanneC for those informative links. I've just recently joined the sl community and want to get into building, but those still frame tutorials on help island just really don't cut it for me.

I don't even know how to teleport to different worlds. How do you do that? I always stay in the home. I want to goto Ivory Tower.