The Natural Land of Muir

Ok, with a name like this for a sim, there's only one way to do it justice! Let's make a forest of giant trees. Redwoods, cedars, sequoias, heck - all kinds. It was tried a few times before but height taxes always did them in.

Taxes are over now! May Muir become the beatiful, natural land I for one always dreamed of making...

Look there, Muir is a mature sim. Rather than making it just another strip club, how about a full-scale nudist resort and artists' colony? Keeping with the "natural" theme. Anyone caught wearing synthetic materials (or anything!) gets the boot!

Nahh, it ought to be a welcoming place to all critters and plant life. Of course, the Lindens may have some more secrets up their sleeves for the place, but I vote for more forest!

Get in touch with me (or Fleabite, go ahead, bug her). Our trees need a true home and we've got more textures and ideas if you'd like to build a tree too.

Ok, it's late and I'm really rambling, so I'll let Flea's words sum it up:

"nude wood elves!"

I'm all for this!

SL needs more forests, we have little ones, but we need BIG ones with all sorts of trees and some hot springs maybe and lil forest creatures!!

I was so happy to see some of the new sims with trees, and Philip Linden saying he needed to go to do what? To plant more trees!

Anything I can do to help with this project lemmie know, I can't really donate any land to it, but I could throw in some money and/or some script work. And I can always help plant trees and build.

Edit: YAY Nude Wood Elves! (The use of "wood" in there makes me nervous.)

In travelling around the new sims, I noticed that a Linden has left a small prim that was titled "Trees" or something like that.

I opened up the inventory, and inside were like 25+ different trees. I assume these are the "sway-in-the-wind", single-prim-type Linden trees. Unfortunately, it was No-Copy.

Lindens, can we get copies of these trees?

Making our own trees results in dull, static, prim-heavy trees.

Hank,

You can create Linden style trees. In the "create" pop up window (the one with all the primitive object shapes) are a couple buttons for trees and grasses. Clicking the tree button and then clicking on the ground places a randomly selected Linden Lab style tree that is affected by wind. You can repeat this to place down many trees and see all the different preset types, and then grab the ones you like into your inventory. You can then drag out copies of those trees any time you want to plant a specific type of tree. You can also use the edit tools to re-scale and rotate any tree you create.

I didn't see any new varieties of trees around, so I imagine that box was just an organized collection of the standard trees available to anyone through their edit window. It would be nice to have a box with a predictable collection rather than generating them completely at random. You could make your own.

In any case, after my raving post of late last night, I've had a few more thoughts:

Nothing would please me more than to see a large area be wild and forested, and full of "living" things be they plant or animal. Various areas around SL have achieved this on a small scale, but with the new limited-terraforming regime in the southern sims, I think the environment is perfect for a whole new level of it!

While Muir is an inspirational name that cries out for honoring the wilderness, actually there are a couple other sims more suited to such a thing - or more to the point they are UNsuitable for the sort of big-box development (pardon my language) so common of late. Seacliff, for instance, would look great with trees and waterfalls clinging to its slopes, but just AWFUL with a giant shopping mall or pyramid perched awkwardly on its spires.

Anyway, that's my daydream. Seeing these new sims, I'm feeling inspired to try and make them come true...

There's others - that new volcano is the first truly mountain-sized slope I've seen in SL. Does it have a name? Mt. Eggy bit the dust sometime last week - maybe this could be the home of the first SL ski resort! Jack's chairlift could climb the slopes, or maybe there could be a canyon-spanning gondola ride...

I guess what I'm saying is, think big! It's a big new land, it's time for some big new group projects.

Giant trees, waterfall lagoons. Snow covered ski slopes. Whaddya say?

When I finally get my big plot of land I pland to make a forest. I'm going to need trees and critters. . .I would like some help with the trees (hint, hint Ananda) and I want to do the critters myself.

Having a huge forest is kinda soothing and relaxing. . .

Make it a SL park with outdoor activities.

I'd be lining up if someone created a bungee script to leap off some of those giant cliffs! Booiiinng.

I think it would be wonderful to see organization of the more 'natural' sims. It all depends on how the Lindens go about distributing these masses of new land.

Very cool - I'd hang-glide on over to that event!

Wow... I never really thought about how much I'd really love to see an SL national forest of a few sims... That'd be awesome!

Wow, I love the sight of enthusiasm!

Ingame there are quite a few more folks looking to preserve and enhance the natural beauty of the new southern sims. I've been running around and chatting about it quite a bit - so much so that I haven't even got my textures organized, heh.

What's developing is a loose confederation of tree and parkmakers, nothing too organized but there is the potential here to make some truly spectacular places.

Maybe a get-together is in order - a sort of Treemakers' Symposium or a maybe a building competition. I really like the idea of some recreational features too - adding onto the roads and waterways, which are great and will only get more interesting as things go along.

More to come in the weeks ahead.

As the ex-owner of a chunk of SL nature reserve I'd like to own and dedicate some land to this cause.

I'm not a regular here at all, and can go months without logging on (that's how I lost my old reserve) and am currently trying to find some decent land to put a waterfall, rocks, trees and animals.

Gutted I lost my waterfall in Minna, now I just need a replacement ... any tips on where/how to get land for this?

http://www.popuptoaster.com/images/SL_old_home_01.jpg

and

http://www.popuptoaster.com/images/SL_old_home_02.jpg


C'est la vie and so ist das leben

We've still had no response from the Lindens on the topic of large chunks of land in the new southern sims, so my advice would be that if you see your dream parcel among the ones currently on auction you should bid on it -- with the understanding that a nature-themed sim or half-sim might happen in the future, and you could decide then whether or not to join in.

Glad to hear there are other folks out there interested in this idea; stop by Clementina and say hi the next time you're in game.

Cheers,

Kelwyn

This idea sounds great - I too have been looking for some southern SIM land to populate with trees and such, and would love a location where I can build a rope bridge (or attempt to, anyway!).

I'll keep tabs on this idea...

Charlton

You read my dirty mind! BUMP

Dang, my new waterfall in Cowell is open to all but I regret only having the cash to bid on PG land now

I have 1024sqm willing to go towards some forested sim space. Would there be a script policy to allow for free roaming critters (birds etc) to some degree? I would like to try my hand at some critter AI and a large forested sim for a couple of critters to play in would be awesome. Maybe get it under group control to get that 10% bonus, and allow scripts to run on it all... like I said I have 1024sqm for such a venture (its not that much, but its my entire alotment and all I can afford).

I'd be interested in participating in a project like this.

To further the cause and get communication going, we've now got a group!

The Wood Elf Alliance:

"Dedicated to creating and preserving natural landscapes in SL, working in cooperation with others who have the same goal, and providing habitat to all manner of wild things such as trees, flowers, critters, and the elusive Nude Wood Elf.

By joining you declare your intent to make natural areas on most of any land you get in the southern sims."

I've started with a small group of folks who intend to colonize the south together, and also invited everyone who expressed interest in this thread. The other main contact for this group will be Kelwyn Gallant - get in touch with either of us if you'd like to find out more or make some planning suggestions.

Also, stop by next week at the headlands on the south side of Rodeo Bay, (Rodeo 245, 10 or thereabouts). I'll be starting the first giant tree there, and also making a group cache. It'll be a collection of group shared info, textures and such - a communications point for everyone since it's always hard to keep everyone in touch. Feel free to add anything you'd like to share with the group. Just be sure to change the update date on the cache so people know when something's been added. Look for the big stone yinyang symbol on top of the cliff.

I am getting more and more confident that there will be a place soon where the gentle nude wood elf can play freely and safely in its natural habitat!

I have joined on in the Wood Elves, even though I am a giant

I am not a great builder, but any land I happen to acquire in the south will be tree filled and a rustic build, in state or national park vein. I hope enough of us join together to keep the area natural.