VWBP!

I have to admit, I got the times messed up for the events I really wanted to go to. But to say the least, I still learned a lot more than I thought I did. After I missed the EVE Online Tour,  decided to choose a different event. I went to the poster exhibit area, and found that I was particularly interested in what I saw. I know that in class, we learn that you can use virtual worlds as a medium for teaching. But hell, did they really get into it.  I had never been more thoroughly intrigued with the depth they took to show how connectivity benefits learning. One of the first poster areas I went to talked about Universities on the Hypergrid. The University of Cincinnati had bought land in Secondlife, where they built a complete replica of the UofC campus. The Center for Simulations & Virtual Environments Research (UCSIM, a group of students and professors from Cincinnati) provides support for the application of virtual environments.They use it to enhance teaching and learning, and to model complex processes and situations through the use of computer generated and enhanced environments. It creates educational and practical applications of virtual worlds, such as first responders to incidents such as policemen and firefighters. At first I never really thought about what exactly entails 'practical' uses for a 3D augmented world- but the more I thought about it, it also applies to training for astronauts and pilots alike. It's intriguing to see how 3D worlds, not just Secondlife, can have a more substantial effects on learning on students other majors, rather than ones just learning to make video games and 3D worlds.

SL Experience!

Any experience with Second Life that I've had on my Mac, I found to be awkward and frustrating. Pardon the grammar. I found that every time I try to upload an image or sound, or even try to teleport, my SL Viewer crashes. And as I'm sure you can understand, that is frustrating. But beyond that, (whenever I use a regular computer) I find my SL experience quite pleasant. Customizing my character is relaxing, but I also find it quite dull from time to time, and Find myself having much more fun building. Whenever I log on, I try to look around and see what people built, and how they went about actually creating it. I've tried making myself a list of all the things I would like to build, but my list is always changing because I find that a lot of the things I want to create requires scripting, which is a process that causes me some anxiety. Granted, we have the website which helps us out immensely, but I always feel somewhat guilty when I use it. It feels like I'm cheating, and that I should learn the scripting language the good old fashioned way. And that scares me. So recently, I've been having a difficult time making bigger and more complex objects, though I do intend on using the website at some point in my near future. After all, my goal for the end of this class is to gain enough skills to be able to make a giant recreation of the Airship from Final Fantasy VII. Or a unicorn. That would be neat, too.

3 Places! =D

Old New York

http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Acropolis/85/108/30
Ok! So Old New York sounded really neat to me, because I've always wanted to visit New York in real life. I found myself a little disappointed...It was very very small in comparison t the size I actually thought it would be. It also tried too hard to make New York seem like the dirtiest place on Earth. For instance, there was a barrel of toxic waste, more than enough dumpsters, and what I believe was a strip club, but because I thought it was a strip club I didn't go inside in case I was right. I kind of just went around, it was mostly stores and it was kind of boring. The only really big redeeming factor of Old New York was the bridge, and a really nice art display in one of the buildings.

The Magic Flute
http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Imparafacile/133/112/35
The magic flute was really interesting! I remember a day in class when our teacher told us there needed to be a balance between fiction and reality so that those in the world/video game could be able to grasp onto something-but this (what I believe French made world) pushed the envelope a little too far on the fantasy aspect in the only building they had in that world. The rest of the place was very normal, and very pretty. There was a nice beach, pretty land. But then you walk into the only building, and everything doesn't quite make sense. The floors change color as you walk through the halls-things that would be solid aren't and shouldn't be solid are-it was an amazing array of color and mystery! It was much like a funhouse of color and imagination. I loved it way more in comparison to the Old New York! The picture is of the buildings outside, because I didn't know where i the building to take the picture! There was a lot to take in!

  

 
Inspire Space Park
http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Shinda/74/187/1560
Inspire Space Park, I think, is my favorite. You're basically in a world that looks like space, and it's very gorgeous. It's the type of place to go if you want to chill or meet people, and the people who were there were very friendly. At one point I fell, but I walked along a space rock path to find that it lead to what looked like a star being created. It was beautifully made and I was astounded by it. There were a lot of interactive things, too. You could click different rocks and dance, or click a different rock and have gravity no longer apply to your avatar-all in all it was very pretty and a lot of fun! Especially for someone like me, who loves to look up at stars and loves space in general. I used to want to be an astronomer! There were also shooting stars, which also really caught my attention! I also took two pictures, just because I thought both were really gorgeous.

My Avatar Benchmark AND My linked object!!

All right. Since I missed last class, I just thought I would combine both assignments in one. My linked object is a little Staples Easy button, and when you click on it, it says "That was easy!" in chat. I thought it would be cute. I made it a little bit bigger in this picture so you could see it better. What I originally wanted to do was to have the easy button say 'That was Easy!' out loud using a sound file, but I had problems uploading various objects through my laptop, including my texture for my t-shirt and the texture for the button. Like I said earlier, the button in this picture is bigger than how it actually is, but it is pretty small, and you attach it to your hand. You just click on it at anyplace or anytime and 'that was easy' will show up in chat. The picture on my shirt is supposed to be two rubber ducks in a bath tub. I made it in windows Paint. Because I am amazing. It wrapped all the way around the shirt so you can't see it clearly, but you can see the left side of one ducks face.

Neat Buttons

So, one of the things a lot of us are still perfecting is how to get the exact look we want our avatars to have. Or not, and in which case, never mind. Personally, I think it's much cooler if someone makes their own avatar's clothes, rather than just purchasing it. I know I'm being hypocritical because I bought mine, but I do hope to get better at making clothes that I will be confident enough the make my own some day.

Here's what I know about the wonderful Appearance mode:
~If you want to use a custom clothing texture, select build, then upload, then image. And of course, it costs money to add it to My Inventory, because let's face it, how else can they get money from you. Sorry, that's just me being bitter about my fraction of a penny being lost.

~Right click on your avatar and click My Appearance

~Afterwards, click the picture of a little gear at the bottom of the appearance window.  Then select new clothes.

~From there you can choose whatever you want: shoes, shirts, skirt, whatever. With whatever item you choose, you have multiple sliders on which to adjust you characters clothing.

~ Then click the Texture box to select a clothing texture from My Inventory, or drag the texture from My Inventory onto Texture.  This is pretty vital. Without it, your clothes will look bland and kind of awful. You CAN make textures with photoshop, but lets face it, I'm lazy and too poor for photoshop, so I (and potentially you!) just buy textures from the Shop icon at the top of the SL viewer.

~The last step is to obviously save. It would be a damn shame to have all that effort put to waste because of something dumb like that (but lets face it, we've all had our moments).

Now, I realize that there's a way to create clothing outside of the My Appearance, but I haven't quite figured it out and am far too lazy to tinker with it quite yet. Perhaps in the future I'll go more in depth. Because after all, your avatar is supposed to be a representation of who you are, blah blah blah artsy Columbia stuff. Either way, you should probably take time creating a neat looking avatar, because it's the first thing you'll learn to make in this class, and that in itself is pretty rewarding.

This is my snapshot!

Virtual Worlds First Assignment

So, I definitely had a very interesting time on Second Life so far. Since I missed the first class do to horrible oral surgery, I had to learn how to make an avatar myself. Since my brother has a past with programing, and was familiar with Second Life, I asked him if he could help me learn the basic building tools and help me make my avatar. He scoffed at me and told me that I could just figure it out if I tried. The avatar was particularly difficult, because I refused to look up how to do it with online tutorials, because I wanted to figure it out on my own. After the second day, my screen name finally had an avatar under it rather than a sentient-looking blue cloud. Which is in a way still pretty cool, I guess. When I saw the building tools, they reminded me of tools I use in photoshop and in illustrator, along with a program my brother used to use to make his own video games. I didn't want to play around too much, for fear of doing something HORRIBLY wrong that I couldn't fix. But I feel pretty confident about everything, and I'm really excited! The only negative thing I have to say is that working with a Mac in a programming class is probably going to suck, and I'm really upset that  forgot my mouse at home. To say the least, I've had an interesting time in Second Life so far, along with awkward encounters with random people in the Columbia I Am world...particularly awkward because I left my chat on and no one tried to talk to me. Either way, I hope that this class is as exciting as my first few times using Second Life. I always love learning to create.