IMPOSSIBLE yet simple shape!!!

I am missing a sort of 'bending' feature when working prims. It seems impossible to make fx an oval plate with upturned ends. I have tried practically every possible combination of primshape and 'effect' without any luck.

Does anyone have an idea how to make that shape? I also tried linking several shapes but that doesnt seem to cut it. The curves can never match perfectlyand the result is not satisfying at all.

Its a fairly simple shape, but apparently impossible to produce in SL. Has anyone ever seen a primshape like that in SL? see attachment.

Closest I can think of is hollowing a sphere, then taper it (or is it cut). But that would give u sharp ends. Like a cut out melon piece that someone ate

See /8/07/84383/1.html .. others have tried & failed before.

I think your best bet would be to use part of a sphere and a specially made texture. Have the texture be some sort of opaque shape on a transparent background, so that when put onto the sphere you don't see the true edge of the prim, as the texture is transparent. Instead you see the edge defined by the edge of the opaque part of the texture.

I managed to get a passable Pringle shape out of this trick, pasted onto part of a torus. This picture looks like part of a sphere instead though.

Seifert's suggestion is probably the best way to go, but if you'd rather sculpt it instead of texture it, you might be able to do it with two spheres and a torus, or maybe just three spheres. Otherwise, you could definitely do it with a whole bunch of tapered cylinders, but you'd need a lot of them to make it look smooth.

okay, thanks so far! Seems like a complicated procedure...i think ill give Seiferts 'texture'-trick a try. But it is not part of a sphere. Maybe the attached picture is not quite adequate.....when looking at it from a 90 degree angle (horisontal), the lower side is flat. Not a pringle chip-shape, but more like a snowboard without the middle-section (tails joined). Am I making any sense at all?

Sounds like maybe base it on a cylinder rather than a sphere then?

I'm not really understanding your description. Can you post some orthographic views of the shape (front, side, & top views)?

I just re-read you reply. Am I getting this right? The basic idea is to shape a prim as close as I can get, then make it transparent and cover with a special designed texture (Ph.shop: a shaped layer + transparent background) that gives an illusion of the wanted shape, while the actual prim underneath is oversized, and more rough-edget. But the actual prim-shape wont show. Is that it?

Can I see the shape you once made like that?

...a ½cut, hollowed cylinder is the closest i get!

attached

I sent you a version similar to what I think you're after.

Well, you could sorta cheat with a texture and half a cylinder...

- Jolan

I'm not sure if it could result in the exact shape you want, but have you tried torturing a torus?

The ShapeGen guy also has a bezier curve tool. I've never tried it.

My idea is that you might make this shape you want out of many timy prims, perfectly aligned with one another.

are we still talking about second life?

I should check out these forums more often; apparently we get some interesting questions to answer. Now, I think I've done enough building to be used to how it goes here...

Sure, the surface is simple. However, when you add in a round cutout shape, you turn it into something often beyond the normal reach of SL's prims. Prim cutout shape tends to be pretty straight and boxy in nature. Fortunately, that's all you really need in order to take full advantage of transparent textures. Just cut out your choice of rectangular curved surface, then add in an image of a 512 pixel diameter circle, and use the Texture options to map the image onto the section you cut out. This should look far better than Jolan Nolan's image, especially when you include feathering on the edges.

Maybe in some contexts this isn't enough for what you need, but you haven't really specified that. If you were trying to make, say, potato chips, it would be just perfect. Only if it were the surface of a large round object, like one that people walk on, would you have to worry about the invisible corners.

Here's the best solution I was able to come up with, using only prims and no texture manipulation. I don't have access to SL right now, but when I do, I'll fix up a visible example.

Fully hollow out a cylinder and path-cut it to less than half, that leaves you with a shape like the one you want, but with sharp corners. Then take two flattened cylinders, path-cut to 1/2, rotate them and fit them to the ends of the base shape. This will leave the end pieces rounded but but not curved, and if you apply a texture, the difference should be negligible.

It's not an ideal solution, but again, best I could come up with.