Issue with invisiprims

So I've tried using Opus Beck -and- Beatfox's scripts, but to no avail.

I bought some attachments from a well-known modeler to replace a body part. The invisiprim to cover said body part makes it invisible... And also everything in it's shape invisible straight through the avatar (clothes, skin, etc...). I tried swapping the scripts in and out, but no avail.

I'm kind of a noob so I'm pretty sure the solution is obvious. Halp!

Ah... seems I need to replace with an alpha mask.

....*growl*

I want my money back.

said scripts (and really it's the textures they use) will block out any avatar related layers (skin/clothes) as well as any prim object that A) has no alpha channel (only the part it covers, 32 bit textures) or B) is entirely blocked covered from view by a non transparent version of the same (Object Occlusion)

Especially since the invisiprim scripts are available for free in a lot of different locations.

Erm, I believe that might be backwards, Void (on prims, not the avatar and clothes). Invisi-prims at least used to hide anything WITH an alpha channel or non-zero alpha, and NOT hide anything that is fully opaque.

Void may simply be a victim of the llSetAlpha(0.0, ALL_SIDES); conundrum.

ALPHA 0.0 (in LSL) = "INVISIBLE" aka "100% Alpha"
ALPHA 1.0 (in LSL) = "FULL SOLID" aka "0% Alpha"

Remember, a 32 bit texture is actually a 24 bit texture (16.7 million colours), with an 8-bit (265 shades of grey) alpha channel added on. Texture without alpha = 24 bit. Texture with = 32bit.

Textures without alpha, but with prim alpha applied will be occluded. Textures with alpha (regardless of prim alpha) will be occluded. Prims sufficiently far-away/small enough will also be occluded. For some reason, Avatars are also occluded, yet they do not suffer alpha-sorting issues, suggesting that something else is in play.

As of 1.19 (I think) shiny is no longer occluded... UNLESS the invisiprim itself is shiny. This sometimes is not true, but most of the time is. Yes, you can make invisiprims shiny.. how weird is that? Invisiprims *WILL* cull GLOW at this time. I beleive also that invisiprims cull ALL particles, regardless of their texture bit-depth or alpha setting.

an invisiprim with any amount of prim-alpha applied (even 1%) will no longer act as an invisiprim. Which means you can actually "hide" invisiprims by setting them alpha. (I don't want to think of the ARC ramifications of doing so).

Handy tip for building with invisiprims. Either set your invisiprims low-shiny, OR.. work on a platform. Make a floor 10x10x1, out of wood. Make a second floor 10x10x1.05 . Tint the second floor prim a different colour. Now, simply apply a 1% alpha to that floor. Now, anyplace an invisiprim gets between your floor and your camera, it will show up a different colour from the rest of the floor. I personally like to make the thinner floor slightly bluish, so that the invisiprims take on a slight blue tint appearance. (I also tend to work with a larger - 32x32 platform).

not moi

although I've always thought it was stupid that they would use differing standards, %transparency in the edit window, and %opacity in the script call.

Well my issue is apparently something that has changed recently.

See, every avatar change I now have (cybernetics, Tinies) has this weird issue with the invisiprims messing up the landscape. Was this due to the inclusion of alphas or something else?

Furthermore, is there a way to fix them so they work again? I hate that I can see through my chest when my cyber-arms are crossed.

That's what invisiprims do. They hide anything alpha, and any avatar mesh. Trees and water are alpha.

And hate to burst your bubble (but LL already did it to me, so...) but alpha masking on avatars isn't going to be available until viewer 1.24 at least.

they've always hidden terrain at a distance, and water and av meshes irregardless. LL intends to break that functionality when they enable alpha on av mesh.

I don't make skins, or anything like that, but I've always wondered why someone couldn't just make a skin that was all alpha?

That's really the current default, underneath is one of those Ruthish skins, and it shows through in its full glory if you drop clear textures onto a skin and wear that. The layer we put skins on was sort of envisioned for tattoos and the like, the pieces are still called that in the appearance editor. With 1.24 we will be given an extra layer that can mask out portions of the mesh and do real transparency. It should be possible to trick out an avatar to do the transparency now so that 1.23 viewers can see it, but 1.22 and back wouldn't know what to do with it.

and presumably when we get that ability to mask the avatar skin (which will only be on/off, not gradient) they will be disabling the current tech that's used to eliminate the av skin (at least that's what we've been told), meaning a need for an entirely new skin for most av's that make use of this... the repercussions are... ugly.

O prefer to see all the new options that will be available as a better idea than continuing with a hack method that will look cheap and trashy compared to the proper fix anyway.

oh I'm not saying the alpha on skin isn't an improvement.... it is....

I'm saying what happens when thousands of customers with custom av's that use the old method are suddenly broken, in need of a modification of their skin to make the product they paid for work again, and retailers are unable, unwilling, or unavailable to eat the cost of the upgrade, and provide the modification?

or let me put it in perspective... how come so many people learned how to convert their records tapes and cds to digital formats, which by itself is not an abrogation of the law, but enables several... and then imagine the further repercussions in SL...

if you create an environment in which users must rely on certain tools to make use of their products, you might as well be training them in their use... and we all know familiarity breeds contempt.

It's just stuff going out of use, like beta VCR's and cassettes, or Leaded Petrol. Retailers will be smart and make replacement products quickly to get the first new sales.

I think that shoe makers might *love* to see invisiprims break, with so many no mod examples out there that can be sold all over again and mean old LL to blame for it all

exactly how many people went out and bought retail cd's to replace their old retail tapes? and how many figured out how to rip them to their HD... and Later burn them to their own CD's for a ton less... seeing how easy it was, how many then went on to be pirates?


oh god I didn't even think of that... or what an ungodly hack of EVERY SKIN IN EXISTENCE it's going to take to make those work right... if it's even possible since I'm not sure that's down to the skin layer, but rather the shoe layer...

if they disable the old (or the change disables it), I see LL regretting it.... alot.

From what I've seen from LL so far, the mask will be a new clothing layer, so the existing skins should be safe, it's more that a lot of new wearables would have to be created. The real bugaboo may come with mixing and matching attachments, but at least the maps should be easier to make since most of the the hard stuff like shading and seam matching won't matter much. I can envision these masks becoming a little cottage industry of their own.

It looks like there may be some in-between time for people to figure out how to work with this too; the possible invisiprim borkage is more about the shadow stuff than the avatar mesh and shadows still need a lot of work.

1Bit alpha mask. Linden trees use the same thing. OpenGL doesn't bother with trying to decide which face/object is in front since there's no chance for partial transparency. (^_^)y

slight simplification there.. in true it's a palette transparency which is handled as 'don't render me at all' (ie don't occlude anything) as opposed to alpha channel which is applied over the pixel which then requires averaging with the pixel behind it. and the manner that those are combined in uses short cuts that lead to the sorting issue.

If you are wanting exact figures, tell us exactly how many people didn't? For me I have found hooking a cassette recorder or turntable up to a computer to much bother, I just sold my LP's, threw my cassettes in the bin and replaced them with original CD's. Piracy actually used to happen using cassettte tapes too, believe it or not.

I'm not saying everyone will, only that reckless content breakage by LL is likely to encourage 'technical piracy'. and considering the particular swiss army knife that would make it work....

PS I copied my vinyl to cd, and then dvd long ago (a large portion of which you can't buy any more) and alot of the tapes (including a few 8 tracks =X )... in fact the reason the tapes were salvageable was because I'd dubbed the originals and used the dubs.

They're not breaking invisiprims, they're breaking the megaprim hack for hiding the whole avatar skin. And that's already broken in 1.23.