Sculptie "shimmy"

When I look at sculptie rocks or trees, I sometimes see them 'shift' ... by which I mean, subtly change shape. I see this even if my camera position is static and they're fully rezzed in a well-performing sim. Is this a bug that is or will be fixed in a candidate viewer, or is it some artifact that I can improve with settings?

I see this both with my 8800GT card and my integrated graphics laptop. Haven't tried a newer release candidate. It seems intermittent.

I don't see this with sculptie shoes or hair, perhaps it's related to size? Or perhaps I simply don't notice it on smaller sculpties.

I searched Jira, but really don't know enough about sculpties to tell whether or not this has been reported or fixed somewhere.

(p.s. now that I look at this post, it probably should have gone in RA. Sorry!)
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I'm guessing you're seeing one of two things:

1. It could be just LOD changes, which are perfectly normal. As your point of view gets further away from a sculpty, the mesh detail is lowered, polygons are removed. If the sculpty is not well made, the apparent shape change can be fairly dramatic.

Chances are that the makers of the shoes and hair you've looked at are more careful to make their sculpties more "LOD-proof" than those of the big rocks. Or it could be, as you guessed, that you just notice the effects more when the object is larger on your screen.


2. It could be that the sculpt maps are just taking a while to fully rez for you. You know how sometimes a texture can be blurry for several minutes before suddenly "snapping" into full clarity? Sculpt maps can do the same thing, especially if they've been made too large.

Again, it's possible that the makers of the shoes and hair are more careful in what they're doing than the makers of whatever rocks you're talking about. Sculpt maps are supposed to be just 64x64. But some people make them as large as 1024x1024. Bigger maps will take longer to load properly than smaller ones.


If neither of those is what's happening, then maybe you have indeed discovered a bug. It's not one I've ever seen, but that doesn't necessarily mean anything. There are certainly bugs out there that for completely inexplicable reasons, affect only some people, and not others.

Thanks for the answer, Chosen!

I doubt it's LOD, because there is this one waterfall near my house where I can stand right next to it and see it shimmy.

Is there a quick way that I check how large a sculpt map is? The rezzing issue sounds possible.

This waterfall is driving me crazy. Next time I'm inworld I'll study it from several distances, more carefully.
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your waterfall may change its shape via script that toggles trough shape-frames and try to display sculpt-map shapes that are not fully loaded.

You're drunk.

Lee, I think Ollj was saying that with a script, it is possible to create a sculpty that purposely changes shape. Since Nika doesn't seem to have made the waterfall himself, this seems to me that it could be the explanation.

No, I didn't make the waterfall, but a friend did. I don't believe it is scripted, because it was simply assembled from a sculptie rock and waterfall kit (also, the shapes appear to change randomly). But I can check for scripts next time I'm inworld.
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I mean, Nika is drunk. That's why she sees shimmering sculpties. Or maybe I'm drunk.

Or neither of us are drunk. wait ... let's go get a drink!
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Wait, I'll come with you.

what kind of boob makes them at 1024? have they no decency? no ethos??

I've seen this aswell, most notably on furniture, most obviously when I zoom in to check out the texture or some such...... see it quiet a lot.

think the resaon don't see it on small things, is it's only a small change, so it may well happen on the smaller things, they are just to small to see it on

Grrr! of course it's stopped happening now. The only shifting I'm seeing is the regular slight polygon rezzing/unrezzing when I cam around ... which, I think, rosie, is what you're seeing as well. Chosen descripes this in #1 of her post above.

SL is a place of endless mystery.
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