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Made With Unity Creations to Be Showcased at New Frontier at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival  

2017, January 13 - 17:02

ASTEROIDS!, Life of Us, and Heroes to debut in Park City

Sea City

2017, January 12 - 17:29

TV21 Annual 1971 published a story about a Pilkington Glass Age Development Committee design study of a “Sea City” for a community living offshore. A model was created and cutaways and renderings of the model appeared in the press. Details can be found at http://www.aiai.ed.ac.uk/~bat/sea-city.html

OpenSimulator Project

A possible project to build a virtual reality recreation of the model in the OpenSimulator virtual world platform or as a Unity3D VR Experience is under consideration…

hop://login.osgrid.org/Sea City/128/128/30

Unity Probuilder – Creating 3D Content in the Unity Editor

2017, January 12 - 09:55

Unity ProBuilder is a Unity3D plug in that allows the creation and manipulation of 3D mesh content directly within the Unity Editor. There are basic (free) and Advanced (paid) versions. The advanced version allows for complete UV unwrapping, export of models to OBJ, etc.

Sine.space – Creating Avatar Attachments

2017, January 11 - 15:02

As a trial, and to provide space related outfits for the Space Station/ISS experience in Sine.space, I followed the instructions on the Sine.space wiki to create avatar clothing and attachments…

I used the freely available NASA 3D models for the Space Helmet and NASA Extravehicular Mobility Unit (EMU).

In a new Unity Scene with the EditorPack-….unitypackage installed, the Sine.space “2015 Male” asset is placed at 0,0,0. An empty object to act as a container for the attachment is placed also at 0,0,0. The attachment itself is then brought in and positioned appropriately relative to the avatar, and then put inside the container object. Two Unity components are added to the attachment container object: Clothing Item Settings and Virtual Good. Instructions to complete those are in the Sine.space wiki page. The container object is then dropped into the Unity assets window to create a prefab. This prefab is the item that then can be selected and uploaded to the Sine.space content servers.

NASA EMU and Space Helmet on avatar at Space Station Region in Sine.space

Gender Specific Variants

At the moment Sine.space requires attachments to be gender specific, so separate male and female variants of each attachment need to be created and uploaded. In the Clothing Item Settings change the mesh model from “2015 Male” to “2015 Female” and adjust the position of the item to fit the different body shape and size, then resave the prefab and upload that.

Creating a Complete Replacement Avatar – Static Mesh and Non-Animated

It is possible to completely replace the standard Sine.space avatar and add in a mesh (static or rigged) by providing a “Costume”…

https://wiki.sine.space/index.php?title=Full_Body_Replacement_Costumes

Create an empty game object and add components for the “Clothing Item Settings” and “Virtual Good” as before, but keep the actual mesh to make the replacement avatar separate. That needs to be a prefab and dropped onto the Extended Settings -> Custom Skeleton -> Root template slot. The empty component is then made a prefab and uploaded.


On the advice of Adam Frisby at Sine Wave, he provided a custom empty animation controller… and this needs to be added to the Clothing Item Settings, with the slots filled in as indicated in the diagram to the right…

Simpler NASA Astronaut EVA Avatar

The EMU mesh (and the Sintel mesh below) both proved to be quite complex meshes. A simpler NASA 3D model of an astronaut in an EVA suit was used instead. I used the freely available 3D Astronaut Nr 1 (Collada .dae format) by Max Grueter and Byr2008. Again set as a complete avatar replacement “Costume”.



RGU Diver

A Sine.space outfit was also created using the meshes from OpenSim made by Colin Hetherington for his RGU Diver suit for use in training simulations in virtual worlds for training oil and gas drilling rig workers (see this blog post). It is not intended for distribution beyond the demonstrations on the “Oil Rig” region on Sine.space.



Sintel Rigged Avatar

With the experience of trying a replacement static mesh model outfit/costume as indicated above for the NASA EMU, I tried the Blender.org CC-BY-NC Sintel avatar (see http://www.aiai.ed.ac.uk/~ai/unity/resources/sintel/)… which is a rigged mesh avatar. On the advice again of Adam Frisby at Sine Space, its important that the rigged model prefab has the “Root Motion” unticked. Its ticked in the original avatar model. Also, as its greyed out and non-editable in the original asset, drag the one in the Assets into the Scene/Hierarchy, modify it to untick the root motion tick box, then drag it back into the Project/Assets view. Then use the new one from the project view to fill the slot skeleton template slot.

Virtual World Platforms – CPU and GPU Load Comparisons

2017, January 9 - 18:00

I have done some performance monitor and CPU/GPU load comparisons for established virtual worlds like Second Life (Linden Lab viewer 5.0.0) and OpenSim (Firestorm Viewer 5.0.0) and emerging virtual world platforms like High Fidelity and Sine Space.

Windows 10 Xeon E5-1650 v2 @3.50GMz (6 core, 12 processor), 32GB memory, SSD drives, Nvidia GTX 980 GPU, 1920×1200 screen. VR Mode off (no Oculus Home, Steam and Steam VR).

  • Baseline (Idle): CPU: 3% GPU Load: 0%
  • Linden Labs Viewer in Second Life (ultra graphics, 512m view distance) (5K object region): CPU: 13% GPU Load: 16%
  • Firestorm Viewer in OpenSim (ultra graphics, 512m view distance) (Mesh base region with 12K objects and 9K mesh colliders): CPU: 8% GPU Load: 11%
  • Sine Space (Unity3D based) (Mesh base region with 12K objects and 9K mesh colliders): CPU: 21% GPU Load: 40%
  • High Fidelity (Custom region with 5 large mesh objects and two NPCs): CPU: 12% GPU: 16%

Baseline (Idle): CPU: 3% GPU Load: 0%

Linden Lab Viewer in Second Life on “Vue” region (ultra graphics, 512m view distance) (5K object region): CPU: 13% GPU Load: 16%

Firestorm Viewer in OpenSim on OSGrid “Oil Rig” region (ultra graphics, 512m view distance) (Mesh base region with 12K objects and 9K mesh colliders): CPU: 8% GPU Load: 11%

Sine Space on “Oil Rig” region (Unity3D based) (Mesh base region with 12K objects and 9K mesh colliders): CPU: 21% GPU Load: 40%

High Fidelity (Custom region with 5 large mesh objects and two NPCs): CPU: 12% GPU: 16%

Sansar

2017, January 4 - 16:00

Linden Lab announced a number of community and social network feeds on 4th January 2017 as they prepare for the public opening of the platform sometime in 2017.

Second Life – Winter Wonderland 2016

2016, December 15 - 21:50

@InaraPey has provided an overview of the 2016 Winter Wonderland themed areas in Second Life…

https://modemworld.me/2016/12/15/the-all-new-new-portal-parks-open-in-second-life/


Fireworks

On the hour, every hour in Winter Wonderland…


“Automated” Ice Skating

The skating though does take some (keyboard) work! For a more “automated” experience with solo, couples and trick dancing try “CALAS GALADHON’S 2016 HOLIDAY SIM, EREBOR” and just sit back and watch the dance displays at…

http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/EREBOR/148/105/22




OpenSimulator Community Conference 2016

2016, December 10 - 10:00


The OpenSimulator Community Conference 2016 (#OSCC16) took place over the weekend of December 10th to 11th 2016 on the OpenSim-based OpenSim Community Conference grid (grid URI http://cc.opensimulator.org:8002 and WiFi front end http://cc.opensimulator.org:8005/wifi).

My report on the experience of attending OSCC13 is described in this blog post, in 2014 in this blog post and some activities in the 2015 event in this blog post.

The 2016 event kicked off with a panel involving the core developers of OpenSim… with approx. 86 participants in the session, peaking at 95 avatars…


OpenSim Code Commits 2016

Nebadon Izumi produced a visualisation of the code commits into OpenSim for the last year, as he has done for previous years of activity.

Overview of the OSCC Grid Regions


Virtual Robotics: Creating, Collaborating and Constructivist learning in a Virtual World

A session by Carina Girvan and John “Pathfinder” Lester described an EU funded project to teach using turtle graphics visualised as 3D shapes and colours in OpenSim using the SCRATCH visual programming environment.



External Application Development for OpenSim Applications such as Large Scale Urban Simulation

OSCC16 talk by OpenSim core dev Christa Lopes of University of California at Irvine (@DivaCanto) on using virtual worlds for large scale urban simulation…


Winter in Second Life

2016, December 9 - 13:15

As usual there are some wonderful Christmas and winter regions in Second Life… one of the “Destination Guide” locations in Winter 2016 is the Erebor region by Calaas Galadhon.

http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/EREBOR/155/106/22

Sine.space Regions

2016, December 8 - 20:55

As described in an earlier blog post (Sine.space – OpenVCE Region) there is a route to take content created in OpenSimulator, save that as an OpenSim Archive (OAR) file, convert it to Collada mesh via the OAR Converter tool, and load that in as content to Unity3D to merge with the Sine Space “EditorPack” unitypackage. This content can then be uploaded to Sine.space servers and made available to others in the Sine.Space community either through each user’s free region (an allowance of one 128MB download region with up to 10 concurrent avatars)) or via paid subscriptions.

Some of the initial testing done on regions used OpenSim OAR content and other Unity3D experiences created using freely available mesh models.



The OpenVCE region is “live” in Sine.space and can be visited in any WegbGL compatible browser via http://go.sine.space/openvce or http://sine.space/locations/openvce

Other tests of Sine.space for Gerry Anderson’s Black Rock Laboratory (Supercar) and Space City (Fireball XL5) regions, RGU Oil Rig and NASA International Space Station (ISS) are in separate posts. These are not publicly accessible and are mounted on development servers for testing only.

Virtual University of Edinburgh (Vue) on Sine.space

The Virtual University of Edinburgh (Vue) has now taken out a subscription for three regions each with an allowance of 512MB download size and up to 30 avatars concurrently present. The regions will likely use the Second Life/OpenSim layout brought across via OAR Converter initially, and then develop Sine.space specific content for testing of collaborative facilities in virtual worlds. In the meantime, temporary content may be in place for testing.

Unity Technologies Hires Dr. Danny Lange as VP of AI and Machine Learning

2016, December 7 - 16:21

San Francisco, CA - December 7, 2016 - Unity announced that it has hired Dr. Danny Lange as VP of AI and Machine Learning. He joins from Uber, where he was head of machine learning.

At Uber, Lange led the efforts to build the world’s most versatile Machine Learning platform to support Uber’s hyper growth.  As head of machine learning, Lange will lead Unity’s efforts around AI (Artificial Intelligence) and Machine Learning.

NASA Eyes

2016, November 29 - 21:32

See the current or historic positions of spacecraft, planets and solar system bodies with @NASA_Eyes app for Windows and Mac. Download from http://eyes.nasa.gov. Checked out the view from Cassini during the flyby of Titan on 29th November 2016…





There are a number of special computer simulations of mission highlights.. e.g. the Mars Science Laboratory (Curiosity) landing sequence…

NASA Eyes has a “Simple Mode” which provides a thumbnail of spacecraft missions, planetary and other destinations, and recent news items…

Sine.space – Roller Coaster

2016, November 29 - 16:47

CindyBolero has ported her “Winter Festival Aero Pines Park” content into Sine.space including a roller coaster. A bit more work is needed to sync up the views that each user sees. Apparently, sync on avatar movement is the default, but it is necessary to mark other region content such as a moving vehicle or coaster train that needs to be synced between clients.

Sine.space – Castle Region

2016, November 24 - 15:42

Sine.space by Sine Wave Entertainment is a multi-user virtual world based on Unity3D. Another blog post gives details of the development process for a custom region using content created in OpenSim and brought across to Unity3D via the OAR Converter.

I used the Unity3D Sine Space Base prepared as noted in the blog post and installed the OpenSim OAR Converter translated Epic Castle content…

The upload size was 285.19MB and the produced downloads for the various platforms were reported as:

Successful Platforms: win32 (184mb), webgl (127mb), android (194mb), ios (193mb)



Unity and Xiaomi Partner to Grow Global App Economy

2016, November 21 - 23:43

Developers will be able to access MIUI app store, licensing support and new revenue streams in China

 

Sine.space – RGU Oil Rig Region

2016, November 18 - 18:00

Sine.space by Sine Wave Entertainment is a multi-user virtual world based on Unity3D. Another blog post gives details of the development process for a custom region using content created in OpenSim and brought across to Unity3D via the OAR Converter.

I used the Unity3D Sine Space Base prepared as noted in the blog post and installed the OpenSim OAR Converter translated RGU Oil Rig content…

The upload size was 110.12MB and the produced downloads for the various platforms were reported as:

Successful Platforms: webgl (46mb), win32 (125mb), android (124mb), ios (120mb)


Sine.space – ISS Region

2016, November 18 - 18:00

Sine.space by Sine Wave Entertainment is a multi-user virtual world based on Unity3D. Another blog post gives details of the development process for a custom region using content created in OpenSim and brought across to Unity3D via the OAR Converter.

I used the Unity3D Sine Space Base prepared as noted in the blog post and installed the OpenSim OAR Converter translated International Space Station (ISS) VR Experience content including detailed 3D models of the ISS, Soyuz, etc.

The upload size was 123.49 MB and the produced downloads for the various platforms were reported as:

Successful Platforms: win32 (148mb), webgl (82mb), android (129mb), ios (205mb)

Atmospheric effects, general fog, etc., were turned off in the “Post Zone Settings”, but “Bloom Settings” was left on and set to a high value of 2.0 at the suggestion of another Sine Space developer. The ambient lighting set under Unity3D menu Window -> Lighting was left on “Gradient” but turned well down to 0.4 with the sky colour set to an Earth-like blue. This meant that most light comes from the directional light which is set in the direction of the sun, with dark crisp shadows lit a little by earthlight. The image below is after this change…

Update: 5-Jan-2017… the “Space Station” region is now available on the live server via
http://sine.space/locations/space-station

Sine.space – Gerry Anderson Regions

2016, November 18 - 18:00

Sine.space by Sine Wave Entertainment is a multi-user virtual world based on Unity3D. Another blog post gives details of the development process for a custom region using content created in OpenSim and brought across to Unity3D via the OAR Converter.

I used the Unity3D Sine Space Base prepared as noted in the blog post and installed the OpenSim OAR Converter translated “Black Rock” region including detailed 3D models of Gerry Anderson’s Supercar and Black Rock Laboratory.

The upload size was 38.78MB and the produced downloads for the various platforms were reported as:

Successful Platforms: webgl (33mb), win32 (75mb), android (70mb), ios (76mb)



Space City/Fireball XL5 Region on Sine.space

I used the Unity3D Sine Space Base prepared as above and installed the Gerry Anderson Fireball XL5 Space City content converted from OpenSim via OAR Converter…

The upload size was 51.59MB and the produced downloads for the various platforms were reported as:

Successful Platforms: webgl (38mb), win32 (81mb), android (83mb), ios (86mb)





Unity Opens Global Authorized Training and Certification Partner Program

2016, November 17 - 17:18
Training providers can now apply for authorization to deliver Unity Certification Exams and training on behalf of Unity Technologies

 

Sine.space – OpenVCE Region

2016, November 15 - 18:00

Sine.space by Sine Wave Entertainment is a multi-user virtual world based on Unity3D. A previous blog post showed early experiments while the system was in test mode in 2015.

The platform is now available to all, and users can add one free “region” using an addon Unity3D “unitypackage” merged with custom content.

The OpenVCE region is “live” in Sine Space and can be visited in any WegbGL compatible browser via http://go.sine.space/openvce or http://sine.space/locations/openvce

Other tests of Sine.space for Gerry Anderson’s Black Rock Laboratory (Supercar) and Space City (Fireball XL5) regions, RGU Oil Rig and NASA International Space Station (ISS) are in separate posts. These are not publicly accessible and are mounted on development servers for testing only.

Sine.space Resources

Sine.space Clients

Sine.space regions can be accessed via a WebGL capable browser such as Mozilla Firefox or Google Chrome, or via an installable desktop application (download via link at http://sine.space).

An avatar can be moved using the usual WASD or arrow keys, and F(ly) mode can be toggled with “F” and then the E and C keys move the avatar up and down (Page Up and Page Down as alternatives may be added soon).

It may be worth noting that Alt+U toggles the interface elements on and off in the viewers, if you want a clear image for snapshots.

Sine.space Creator (Live) and Curator (Preview and Test) Servers

Previews and testing is done in http://curator.sine.space and live regions are served via http://creator.sine.space. There is a limit of 128MB on the download size of a region on the live server for the free account. Larger region downloads are available via paid subscriptions on the sine.space platform. The region size is reported when a region is uploaded from Unity3D to the review “curator” server so you can see if it will be within the size allowed for free or paid accounts..

Trial using the OpenVCE Region

A test of adding a region into sine.space was done using the OpenSimulator OpenVCE region converted via OARConv tool to Collada meshes suitable for import to Unity3D (see this blog post for details of that conversion).

Register a sine.space user as a space developer “creator” (http://sine.space/creator/) to get access to the relevant SDK and Unity3D package required.

Create a region API key via that account – via the API keys link at https://curator.sine.space/

You need to create a Unity3D application incorporating the sine.space Editor unitypackage available via a link accessible only to registered and logged in creators at https://sine.space/creator/resources/ (EditorPack-08p1.unitypackage as at 15-Nov-2016). Instructions for the process involved can be found in these two YouTube videos.

Create a new Unity3D base application using the following process, which you can save and reuse for any specific sine.space region creation. The process is as follows:

  1. Load in the sine.space Editor unitypackage (EditorPack-08p1.unitypackage as at 15-Nov-2016) using Assets -> Import Package -> Custom Package. This adds an extra menu item to the Unity3D editor menus – “Space”.
  2. Use Space -> “Install Editor Pack Settings” and then Scene -> “Scene Settings”. This will add a “Scene Export Settings” item to your Unity3D project. Click on that and set fields appropriately. The content type will be “Region”. Give it a name. You can “reserve” a URL for the region for when it goes “live”.
  3. Make sure you have some sort of ground plane which has collisions set so avatars do not fall through the floor. This can be removed when your region content is added if that incorporates its own ground terrain or floor.
  4. Add the sine.space provided “PlayerChar” (a blue male avatar) to allow local testing of the region in the Unity3D editor.
  5. Add a sine.space “Landmark” to act as the spawn point when avatars enter the region in sine.space. In the project hierarchy use Create -> Create Other -> Landmark. Then select that object and tick it as ‘Spawnpoint’ and select its Type as ‘Landing Zone’. Place it so that its baseline is a metre or so above the ground level. So when avatars spawn their feet are definitely above the ground plane and fall gently onto it.
  6. Remove the Main Camera as that will interfere with the “PlayerChar” avatar or live avatars when the region is used in sine.space.
  7. [OPTIONAL] In the Unity3D editor Window -> Lighting settings swap the Ambient Source from Skybox to Gradient, and raise Ambient Intensity from 1.0 to 1.75 to prevent over harsh shadows and lighting. If you want WYSIWYG between Unity3D editor and sine.space creator make sure Linear lighting is on via Edit -> Project Settings -> Player, under “Color Settings” there is an entry for Color Space – make sure it’s set to also Linear, not Gamma.
  8. Save this setup as a Unity3D scene and save the Unity3D project as a base for future region creation.

Now you can add your own region content into the project, testing it with the incorporated temporary “PlayerChar” to walk around it.

Lighting was a bit harsh when the OpenVCE region was first tested as the region content. Adam Frisby at Sine Wave Entertainment suggested to use Unity3D editor Window -> Lighting settings to swap the Ambient Source from Skybox to Gradient, and raise Ambient Intensity from 1.0 to 1.75. He also found a specific issue with a shader on the “Tweet Bubble” object, which was subsequently removed in the Unity3D project.

If you want WYSIWYG between Unity3D editor and sine.space creator make sure to switch to Linear lighting too via Edit -> Project Settings -> Player, under “Color Settings” there is an entry for Color Space – make sure it’s set to Linear, not Gamma.

Upload to sine.space Servers

You might want to make a fresh Unity3D scene into which these changes can be made, prior to upload, so your base project and content remains intact for continued revision and testing in the Unity3D editor afterwards.

  1. Remove the PlayerChar character from the Unity3D project inventory before uploading the region to sine.space servers. Note that just unticking the box which shows the PlayerChar in the project is not enough as hidden objects are still included in the final result. This is because components can activate hidden objects via scripts, etc.
  2. Add into the project hierarchy a new empty game object and name it something like “Space Post Zone”. Open it in the Inspector and add a component called “Post Zone”. This gives many options for settings that will be applied to your region and how it is rendered. In here, for example, you can turn off depth of field blur with a tickbox. These are only applied on sine space servers not locally in Unity3D editor player, and may cause errors there.
  3. Check the “Scene Export Settings” settings to ensure the content type is “Region” to check the region name, URI and other details are correct, etc. Most defaults for the various settings should work for testing purposes. You can add in the custom icons, etc if you wish, or test without these.
  4. Login via the Unity3D editor Space -> Upload Settings” to allow for the upload to take place. This will fill in your API key which you should have previously created via https://curator.sine.space/.
  5. Scroll down to the bottom of the “Scene Export Settings” in the Inspector and you will see the button for “Automatic Submission”. Hit this to begin the region packing and upload process.

The OpenVCE region, unoptimised and with all the OpenSimulator region content intact was reporting a 226.24MB size.

After the processing feedback messages provided by content@sine.space are provided, the final message indicates the size of the download required for the supported delivery platforms. These are the sizes that will be needed for the live delivery sine.space platform. So the LARGEST of the sizes reported is the figure to use when calculating if you can fit in a free region (limit 128MB). For OpenVCE this was…

Successful Platforms: webgl (92mb), win32 (172mb), android (171mb), ios (169mb)

In the “Scene Export Settings” settings, this can be optimised, especially for texture quality. WebGL has a smaller download size as its textures are less detailed. The “Standalone” size is larger by default as it uses higher quality settings. Try adjusting these to change the download file size that will be required. E.g. I changed the max texture size to 512 from 2048 for the standalone. make sure you hit the “Apply Compression Settings” button under Tools in the “Scene Export Settings”.

You can also remove objects from the project. You must really delete them from the Unity3D project hierarchy since just unticking the box which shows the object in the project is not enough as hidden objects are still included in the final result. This is because components can activate hidden objects via scripts, etc.

A suggestion might be to create a new Unity3D scene from the full project and only delete the PlayerChar and unwanted items in that scene.

After this the upload file size was 213.68MB and the download file settings were lowered to:

Successful Platforms: webgl (78mb), win32 (127mb), android (64mb), ios (62mb)

Reducing Texture Size in the Downloaded Region

Advice from Sine.space developers to reduce texture size in region downloads was to set was to use the “Scene Export Settings” “Texture Compression” section. Allow Crunch and set the Crunch Level to 50 (100 is lossless, 0 is maximum compression).

Working on Multiple Development Computers

To be able to upload to the same region name and URL reservation name, you can copy the Unity3D project folder to another and make changes there. This will also work across development machines. This has the effect of copying the scene file with the scene settings component in it then it will resume automagically and allow the same region name reservation. Otherwise in a new Unity3D project folder, you need to use the ‘Resume ID’ in the Scene Export Settings, and fill in the Resume ID from either Space -> Items & Settings, or http://curator.sine.space/

Entering the OpenVCE Region on sine.space

Water

Look in Standard Assets -> Environment -> Water -> Prefabs… and add WaterProDaytime set at 0,0,0 and scaled to 300,1,300 (to extend beyond a 256mx256m OpenSim region). Then also add WaterProNightime set at 0,0,0, rotated to flip it upside down to act as a surface water layer when viewed from underneath 180,0,0 and also scaled 300,1,300.

For each type of water make the Water Mode be “Simple” rather than the default “Refractive” or the other “Reflective” option, as that will look better in the various Sine.space viewers.

Scripts, Seats and Furniture

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