How the heck are armor suits made so good?

Okay guys. I am getting frustrated. I understand how to use the modeling tools within SL, but surely I am missing something. How the heck are people making such good seemless suits?
I have seen absolutely gorgeous AV suits. I have seen Brain from Inspector Gadget. I saw Godzilla. I have seen beutiful robot costumes and yesterday I saw a freaking Jellyfish. Mind you these where not just spheres and square stuck together but finely modeled works of art.
How are they doing this with the in game tools? I am having much difficulty even with the simplest designs.
For example. I simply wanted to create curved ears on my Bunny Rabit suit. I could not get a simple curve in the ears. I wanted horns on my armor helmet and I could not curve the cone prim.
Is it possible to manipluate the prims on a vertex level? If there is a way to manipulate them on a vertex level I would be good to go as I could make just about anything?
Also, is there some type of boolean tool in the SL utils?

Sorry for the long winded post guys.. I'm just a little frustrated.

Thanks

No, you can't manipulate any prim on the vertex level. At least not in any way outside the SL client.
I can tell you the way I've learned to create full prim AVs, which was to actually get ahold of a copy that you could examine the different parts and see what prims were used. That and experimenting with all the prims and becomming familiar with how far you can stretch/cut/hollow them to get different shapes.
Don't let yourself get too frustrated, it does take time to get the look you want. Other times it requires textures to make it pay off...but that's another hurdle right there. =)
Also, if you see something that blows you away, ask the creator and they might be more than willing to show you how they created what you're seeing.
Hope this helps.

heh.. yeah it's frustrating.. but most suits of armour and other avatars are made up using the basic building tools.

here are a few things that might help you:

for curved ears - try cutting a sphere in half (using cut begin & end), hollowing it, then using dimple to cut the bottom off

horns - made from a torus (tori?) - that's the donut one - change the radius delta setting, set the X and Y taper to 1.00, then add a few revolutions depending on how curly you want them

just spend some time playing with each of the prims, learning what the options will do to them - you can make some amazing shapes from a single prim

Be sure to check out the Ivory Tower Library of Prims in Noyo for some great hand-on tutorials on how to wrangle all the different prim types. It's been a big help to me with making special shapes.

Noyo (200, 175)

hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

Some people are just good. That's the reality of it. Whether they have a natural talent or many years of experience, some people just seem to be able to instantly build whatever comes to their head. I used to think I was pretty damn good, until I saw the work of people like Archanox Underthorn and Starax Statosky. They are gods. Worship them

I think part of what makes an armor suit look good is knowing when something looks too "bulky" when it's attached. I try not to let bits of my armors overlap too much.

It's also helpful to know how prims act when they're attached. I suggest just practicing using a cylinder. Attach it to a location and practice rotating and moving it. Pay attention to how it behaves.

And some if it is just being patient enough to put up with how much time it takes to get something looking good. I really cannot emphasize the patience aspect enough.

Good luck.

lo Marcos.

heh.

lo Ingrid.

lo Bob

Well, another thing that I've found really helpful for building is numbers! If you can't use the mouse to get a seam to line up just right, then use the position x, y, z properties in the edit box. Just make sure that the size of one of the prims and the size of the other don't add up to make an odd number, if they do you will not be able to have a truly seamless object, although .005 is very close. If done correctly you can see none of those annoying light pixels through the seam. Also, knowing and applying trigonometry and basic geometry can really be useful. If I start building and I know I'll be using curved shapes, I always keep a calculator handy and never stretch the prims using the mouse. An exact job is what it takes to get the perfect seamless appearance, and luckily, within SL those appearances are possible. The only limit is your knowledge of basic mathematics.

For a very simple example:

If you've got a prim that's 1x10x1 and you want to line it up at an exact right angle to another prim that's 10x1x1, simple math could really help you. Copy the number from the x direction of the first prim and paste it into the x box of the second prim. Its position should be half the length of the first prim + half the width of the 2nd, plus or minus the original position. Not so bad, eh? The thing to remember is that the prims report the position of the center of the object. Also, when editing size in this manner, remember that it will always act as though "stretch both sides" is active.

Of course, you can't use numeric editing on prims that are currently attached to you...

But if you have one of them nifty posing pedestals, you can line up the prim where you will want it to be (without attaching it), then edit it.

I just wish I could find one that made you completely motionless, no upper body sway.