X y and Z - why are they messed up?

Coming from Soft and Maya background it seems "silly" and counter intuitive to do it the other way. Now I remember why I hate 3DSM.

I guess once you've trained your 3-dimensional brain a certain way, it sticks.

3DS actually has several coordinate systems to choose from, including screen coordinates in which X is always horizontal to the screen, Y is always vertical, and Z is depth back from the screen. That's the coordinate model that Maya's and SI's conventions are based on. No offense intended to those fine applications, it's just that the "window" paradigm doesn't make much sense when your POV is inside the 3D space and arbitrary. It's a bit of an anachronism.

this is my first x, y, z experience..... it seems fine to me.

And you can change Soft and Maya as well, but why would one, unless it was because of using imported models? As far as I know we can't change the SL tool. Can we?

Ultimately they are all in "windows" and to me, when modeling in SL, being tied to the "arbitrary" perspective gets pretty wonky and I always have to work around it by moving around the camera over and over. It drives me crazy. I have always been resistent to learning how best to model with SL, so there are probably tricks or settings, I could learn to compensate. I can't stand having to adjust things everytime I move around or everytime I just click edit and having the camera jump up.

The power of Soft and Maya is incredible. For instance "Happy Feet" done with Soft, I don't think the word "anachronism," fits. I think best of the best fits much better. But to each his/her own.

Nope, we can't change the SL coordinate system. I suspect you'll just get used to moving between the two systems and it won't bother you after a while.

If there are 3 axes all at right angles they will always have the same relationship to each other, won't they? And in a 3d environment you can roll the camera around to make any of them vertical, horizontal or front to back, can't you?

Very interesting. My own background is in CAD and Blender...I had no idea that people were having this issue.

The coordinate system in SL has always made perfect sense to me. I work in civil engineering, and in real world topography, X / Y is always the location in the horizontal plane plane and Z is the vertical elevation.

My resistence to SL tools had lessened with time mainly because using Softimage with SL is very limited at this time and I don't own Maya personally and Softimage is my holy grail. I am hopeful that eventually there will be ways to use Soft with SL.

A few weeks ago someone on the sculptie group exclaimed in IM in the middle of the night. I might as well copy and paste a edited-names version in case it wasn't documented anywhere:

R2D2: "Finally I figured out a way to use Softimage with sculpties!!!!"

[R2D2: take a vector state shader, and set it to intersection point!.. that gives you the 3 colors for the space axis.. then vector to color node.. into constant.. done.
R2D2: just bring your object in the right position in space.. it need to be between 0 and 1 in all axis.. pretty smal.. but you can multiply the shader by 0.1 so you can make it between 0 and 10

[2:32] Rebecca Proudhon: Great..I will have to try that, I gave up

[2:34] R2D2: just bring your object in the right position in space.. it need to be between 0 and 1 in all axis.. pretty smal.. but you can multiply the shader by 0.1 so you can make it between 0 and 10

[2:34] Rebecca Proudhon: I am copying this to a doc..thanks

[2:35] R2D2: np.. im just so happy i dont have to suffer with 3dsmax anymore..

[2:35] Rebecca Proudhon: fantastic

[2:38] Rebecca Proudhon: Maybe that needs to be written up somewhere

[2:39] GD: http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Sculpted_Prims

[2:39] GD: add it there

Shortly after that I had to send my good computer back to Alienware, for its monthly replacement parts(ugh )....and just got it back...so I haven't tried deciphering this yet. Even being able to do sculpties in Softimage would be wonderful, so I hope this little middle of the night revelation works.

I found the article at http://rpgstats.com/wiki/index.php?title=Axis, though lslwiki.net has a shorter version. For some reason, you've omitted the attributions, which would make it clear that the two fragments I quoted above come from two authors who are disagreeing on the point.

But the whole example just shows how wikis can be wrong. The term "Cartesian Coordinates" just refers to using rectangular coordinates, instead of, for example, polar coordinates. There's nothing intrinisic about the orientation of the axes in Cartesian Coordinates.

And this isn't algebra. Sure, graphs are used to help visualize some concepts in algebra. They're also used that way in calculus. But this is analytic geometry. There are a number of areas of mathematics that complement each other this way.

I cleaned up the article when I copied it to the forum because it had so many links it was tough to read through all the URLs, but yes that url is where i got it. I had posted the orginal URL but while cleaning it up deleted that too...not for any reason, but it had so many links it looked messy.

It looks like it is three authors and they all make good points not necessarily contradicting each other. I think it is both Algebra and Geometry and the "right handed" orientation is also called "standard" You are right, the Cartesian system is not inherently right handed one. The left-handed non-standard, orientation is also still cartesian.

in most 3d apps and games you're a solo operator. z is a depth into the screen. SL is a multi player use system wherein it makes more sence to return to z=elevation. thence the co-ordinates(and vectors) are the same for everyone(and thing)

Dispensing with algebra and Wiki, when you buy a plot of land, what navigational info do you have?

You have the name of the sim and the latitude and longitude (X and Y coordinates) of the map. Altitude doesn't come into it. You have the entire range in SL, unlike RL! You can dig an oil well, or hover a skybox. Your plot X,Y remains the same.

Jezebela mentioned topography, maps. That's where you start navigating in a world. Z comes later.

It would I suppose be an idea to have an option to change orientation to your own preferences. After all, we don't actually talk to each other in coordinates, but it conjurs up a picture in my mind of Columbus one side of a table looking at a map and Drake the other, arguing which is Y and which is Z

I'm dyslexic when it comes to coordinate systems. I can visual just fine, but sometimes I get YZ mixed up. If things pop up at a 90, just swap some things around until it's good. Trial-n-error is something that I've become accustom to.

It gets really fun when trying to import/export OBJ files. I'm going from Software A to Software B. Do I rotate or not? I can never remember.

And it gets even more fun when you have fight between flipping and rotating 180. Rotate it. Nope, now gotta flip it. Damn it, rotate it again.

It's a wonder I ever get anything done properly. Then again, some of my recent sculpties are actually flipped and I decided not to fix. No one will notice.

Yippie.

I put the sexy in dsylexia.

Isn't it spooky that if you take sexy out of dyslexia, you get laid?

But then .. it *is* Halloween

Isn't it spooky that if you take sexy out of dyslexia, you get laid?

But then .. it *is* Halloween