Fuzzy bleedy weird shoulders

I have this: http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3254/2755438683_3fa5b26cd5.jpg

Which doesn't really bother me personally, but I've seen some utterly perfect edges in SL and so I assume there is some secret to smooth edges that I just haven't figured out. Anyone? Is it about where they are in terms of those lines on the UV thingy (technical term)? Are there just some places that have to be avoided?

Yes, there are some places you just learn to avoid. Usually, they are places where ther are joints on the human body (shoulder blades, crotch, etc.) but there are other areas on the avatar body (the female breasts, for example) where details can get stretched out either because of movement or because there is so much variation in shape from one avatar to the next, or simply because of the design of the UV map. The "bleed" you see can be very annoying. Design around it or learn to live with it.

Yeah, some times you just have to fiddle with adjustments to avoid bad spots. And some areas will smear and distort no matter what you do. In some cases, it may take moving an edge just one pixel one way or the other to make a major diference. In other cases, you end up having to make a rather strange and wavy edge on your texture to get a straight edge on the avatar body.

The worst-case example is trying to make bikini underpants. The crotch area, on the lower surface between the legs, has a one-pixel line that can safely be used without smearing the crotch over the thigh. Go one pixel to either side of that, and you get a mess. You don't get a clean crotch edge until you expand it out close to a set of boxers, from there.

Thanks for replies! I am willing to learn to live with bleed, though I will probably still continue hoping tha someday I find a magical way to avoid it.

Ruth 2.0, when and if they ever upgrade the poly count and UV mesh for avatars in Second Life. Until then, we'rs stuck with a coarse and crappy UV mapping on an outdated avatar model.

Is it really only one pixel wide, Ceera, or are you exaggerating for effect? I have been experimenting off and on for a long time and haven't beat the bleed problem in the crotch area yet, but I haven't gone as far as narrowing my textured area to a band one pixel wide. It's kinda hard to make a decent bikini that doesn't either bleed or show .... um .... more than you want exposed.

Actually it can matter by only one pixel to the right or left (or in width). I have even had bleed on one shape, and not the other (of same sex that is, I know the male and female shapes stretch polygons differently).

This doesn't make sense to me, maybe someone can explain that.

In my (oh-so-copious) spare time, I'm working with making texture shoes. In the heel area, single pixels make a huge difference - and in the one set I've made for sale so far, I include the settings I used in a notecard I include with the shoe.

My customers are welcome to play with the sliders and get the shoe shape how they want it: but such slider play can ruin the neat edge I made. So I tell them how to get it back.

In my experience with shoes, yes, single pixels and slider settings make the difference between a neat edge and a stretched and distorted mess.

I don't know of an 'easy' way to determine which pixel to use, either. I just use the beta grid, my local opensim, or an av viewer (usually the opensim, but whatever works for you is fine).

I paint my approximation, upload it, see how it looks. Correct it, upload it, see how it looks. Decide I need a guide, paint several pixel contrasting colours, upload it, see which colours are all stretched out. Delete the stretched out pixels, upload it, see how it looks.....


.... and once I have a good one, I copy the template layer of that good shoe to my 'shoes and boots starting point' file, so that next time I can start with a closer approximation.

Oh, I can certainly believe that, Seshat. Being a pixel off can create fuzz easily. What I was asking Ceera about, though, was her claim that the entire "safe" zone in the crotch area is only one pixel wide. I wouldn't be surprised to have that verified, but that was the first time I had heard anyone say it. I keep trying to make bikini bottoms that don't "bleed" down the leg, but haven't succeeded yet. If it's true that the safe area is only one pixel wide, then it's virtually impossible to make a non-bleed bikini that hides key anatomical features. That's what Gene's post seems to suggest too.

From several of the nice bikinis and bikini underwear that I have purchased that do NOT have the smearing in the crotch, and from my own attempts at making clothes textures for that area, I determined that there is an area between roughly the lower edge of the mons to the forward edge of the anus that is only one-pixel wide, where it is "safe" to put a line of color that won't smear or distort between the legs. Over the mons and over the anus you can fan out with fabric. But that 3-inch or so long area between the two can only be one pixel wide, or it smears. An anatomically correct skin will usually be descretely covered by a bikini bottom that follows those guidelines, because the skin artist has to fight the same smearing issues!

Thank you, Ceera. That's exactly the anatomical road map I've been looking for. I just never suspected that the road was so narrow. Wow. Talk about uncomfortable. ......

Yep. It's terribly badly UV mapped. String bikni, or boxers, and not much in between.

Yes, you'll see some other intermediate styles between those extremes, but virtually all of them smear or distort, and you just 'live with it'.