Builkding Suggestion - Object Resolution

I've been meaning to ask about this for a while now,

A buiding feature you could add, that would be very beneficial to SL, would be Object resolution.

You already have this in effect, to a certain extent, when I move far enough away from a cylindar prim it will become octagonal, then hexagonal the further the distance.

There's also an option in the preferences menu to lower the resolution of all objects.

My suggestion is this, why not add object resolution to the actual edit window, so you can create an object that looks lower in resolution to everyone, no matter their setting?

In effect this would give us extra prim shames, such as 1 prim hexagons, octagons, less than perfect spheres (kinda liek a D&D dice) - the list goes on.

Secondly, this would help lag...

Imagine one of the famous, lag enducing, client crashing, sim crawling hairpeices which consist of 100+ curly tauri. That hair will look just as good on low resolution, and the lag and fps releif is very VERY noticable.

I'd really like to see this feature added to the building menu, in the simple form of a drop down menu per prim.

Anyone else who agrees or has comments on this, please feel free to post.

This would also make it possible for a builder to create objects that look reasonable from a distance when the lod starts distorting them. I support and or endorse this feature and or suggestion

I support this because i have an older video card. I have to drop my object detail down to zero if i want to be able to even think about moving when there is primtastic hair in range.

that would rock as long as they can't make it higher resolution than it can normally be now. just to be able to make hexagons would be shweet.

Hexagons are just two cubes with 50% top size, Zuzi.
Actually, if you want a general method, for n > 3, you can build an n-sided polygon just by adding a triangle. Two triangles can make any shape of square, rectangle, trapezoid, parallelogram or losenge. You merely have to split it along a diagonal. Add a 3rd triangle and you can make a pentagon, a 4th triangle and you can have a hexagon.
Since in SL no one forces you to use triangles, for even numbers of sides you should be able to use cubes and top size to add two triangles at once. Just grab the figure you want to make, and try to draw diagonals that unite vertices n and n+3 without crossing each other.
Darn, I sound like my algebra professor. I hope I'm getting through to ya here.
I have suggested per-prim LOD in the past but nobody listens to me.

yeah but it would be nice to be able to do them with one prim and not have the top texture all screwed up. good tips about building shapes there Professor Eggy

Hexagons would be easy 1-prim objects with this feature suggestion I made a little while ago:

/13/85/32435/1.html

Never heard anything from LL - but I left it on their whiteboard when I was there a few days ago...

Here's hoping!

Take care,

--Noel "HB" Wade
(Tread Whiplash)

That's what that meant? lol

So much text when you could have just said, "n-sided prisms, please"
Yeah, I want that too. In fact I think the whole primitive system looks a little ad-hoc.
If I were to reimplement the prim system I would go with a RISC approach of sorts.
There are three essential transformations: translation, rotation, and scaling
You can generate any of the current primitive shapes, and much much more, simply by having the ability to draw an n-sided polygon and applying basic transformations.
n-sided prisms are the result of applying translation on a polygon.
n = 3 is the "Prism" prim, n = 4 is the "Box" prim,.
For n = MAX (subject to LOD though), you get a cylinder.
n-sided pyramids are translation + scaling.
For n = MAX you get a cone.
For n = 3, through eccentric rotation you get the "Ring" prim.
For n = 4, the "Tube" prim.
For n = MAX, the "Torus" prim.
Add scaling, and you have the tapering feature. Add translations and you have the spiraling feature.
For concentric rotation, you get... polygonal sphere approximations, for lack of a better term, with n = MAX as the real sphere.
Something like that anyway.

Eggy -

I'm not asking for "N-sided prisms". I'm asking for what I would term "n-Sided Lofted Polygons".

"Lofting" is a drafting / rendering term that means taking a flat 2d-shape and "stretching" it into the 3rd dimension - usually vertically. You could call the "Box" prim a "lofted square".

An "N-Sided Prism" with 12 sides is like 12-sided Dice, isn't it? That is more complex than I need or want LL to try to implement (it would "break" some of their current transformation / modification params in the Edit window).

What I was looking for, were objects that have a flat top and bottom face, with varying numbers of vertical sides. A "box" prim would have 4 "sides", with a square top & bottom face. A "hexagonal" prim would have a hex-shaped top and bottom face, with 6 vertical "sides". It should be simple to implement with the current system (meaning we have a better chance of it happening), and would open up a lot of new possibilities.

Eventually, I'd love full vertex-editing & CSG... Then "n-sided prisms" or any other shape would be But I don't see that happening ANY time soon.

Take care,

--Noel "HB" Wade
(Tread Whiplash)

What you are describing is exactly what the term "n-sided prism" means. A 12-sided die is a 12-sided regular polydedron (or platonic solid), or a dodecahedron. A 12-prism actually has 14 faces - the 12 sides plus the 2 ends, thus it is a 14 polydedron.

If you want the skinny on all this geometry stuff, check out Steve Wolfram's MathWorld - http://mathworld.wolfram.com/Prism.html

Eggy and Olmy are correct about the definition of prisms (as opposed to polyhedra). And I also would like to see this feature (being able to define prism prims). Between this one and rounded corners, we would radically improve the existing prim system. Then all we would need is partial arcs (being able to make a 10' prim that is 1/4 circle, e.g.) and I'd be pretty happy with the whole prim system. Sure, meshes would be nice, larger prims would be nice, but this would be a really good start.

Quite a few of the existing prims are just variations on each other, e.g. half-cylinder. I assume regular cylinder and half-cylinder were there first, then cuts were added as a feature, but it's kind of silly to have them both in there now. Better to replace them with new prims that actually offer more variety.

neko

send me 10L$ and an in-game IM and i'll send you a (full perms) 20 meter circular prim.

A single prim? Or one of these scripted prim group thingies? (Sorry for the non-technical term, it's late where I am, and I'm running out of brain juice.)

neko

I endorse this product and/or service.

(yes it uses a script to torture the prim but after it is tortured it doesn't need the script anymore; but it is 1 prim. It's only 10L$, it costs less then rating )

That's cool, and I certainly can't complain about the price. I may need a bunch for the Sun Realm Online project, though, and it would be more convenient to be able to do it myself. Would you be interested in selling the script? If not, can you sell me a 20m dome as well as a cylinder? (Wow, my humble cave could be twice as big!) I'd happily direct future inquiries back to you. I'm not in the business of selling prims.

neko