I am certainly not the first to post on this topic - search Feature Suggestions for "animated particle textures" and you will find at least 2 other threads but both from quite some time ago and I think it is high time to bring some renewed attention to this. It is an issue that should be of great interest to both builders and buyers and basically to anyone who would like to see Second Life stay competitive with other online worlds in terms of visual appeal. Our particle system, as marvelous as it is, is beginning to show it's age and is in need of a few updates. One of the most dramatic things that could be done is to allow animated textures to be used in addition to the currently used still textures. Animated textures are, of course, already in use for normal prim texturing and have been for quite some time but adding them to the particle system would allow special effects that are simply not possible now. Here is Jopsy Pendragon's* take from the JIRA page (pasted with his permission):
Clouds/mist could roll,
flames could dance,
sparkles twinkle,
critter particles could flap their wings,
sparks could fire out more erratically (using an off center texture with ROTATE mode)
water droplets deform
smoke could fizzle out
bubbles could pop
emoticon particles could be animated
endless hours of creative fun =)
I couldn't have said it better. In a nutshell, this one simple update (more are needed for sure!) would boost Second Life's particle system from "functional" to truly beautiful. The amount of increased client-side lag is debatable but some coders/programmers FAR more experienced than I have suggested to me that it should be minimal - certainly compared with some other planned updates (e.g. flexible sculpts.) I've put together and posted a brief video on YouTube demonstrating how this would look with contrasting examples of a few effects using both still and animated particle textures. Here's the link (please share it freely!!):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QMi8iEXizSg
Convinced? PLEASE add your voice to those who have already voted for this! Below is the link to the Second Life JIRA page associated with this topic. For any of you not familiar with Second Life JIRA voting it is quite simple. You will need to log in with your SL avatar name and password and then you will see where to vote in the upper left area of the page. Here's the link to paste into your browser:
http://jira.secondlife.com/browse/VWR-8276
I've made a small billboard - utilizing an "eye-catching" animated prim texture - which will give a notecard on touch as well as provide an inworld link to the video. If any of you can spare 3 prims and would be interested in displaying it on your parcel, please IM Klyks Klees and I will send you a copy. Many thanks for taking the time to read this and let's all look forward to an even more spectacular Second Life in the future!
*For those of you who are not familiar with Jopsy Pendragon please check out the Particle Laboratory in Teal. This guy has given tirelessly of his time and expertise to help anyone who cares to learn become a better particle scriptor. A true SL icon!