Graphics Programs Reference
In-Depth Information
take multiple snapshots, which can be saved to
a hard drive or “uploaded” into Inventory using
the “Upload Texture” option on the File menu at
a cost of L$10, or less than 5 cents per uploaded
image. Indeed, any bmp, jpg, png, or tiff image can
be uploaded, and then used as “textures” on the
surface of any object (including clothing, build-
ings, plants, animals, furniture) or displayed easily
on a wall either by using the image as a texture
on a flat object or via a simple, free, easy to use
image viewer such as the Freeview or SLGuide
Player. Multiple images can be played in a loop
or one by one in a slide show. One very power-
ful approach is to export PowerPoint or Keynote
slides as jpgs and then upload them into SL to be
used in a slide show.
Audio and video are also powerfully available
in Second Life. Given appropriate permissions,
an audio or video stream can be played in Second
Life by adding the URL to the Media tab in the
“About Land” option of the World menu. Any
Quicktime-compatible video on a web server
can be shown in SL, again using the Freeview or
SLGuide Player, simply by putting the URL of the
video into the menu of the player. (Be sure to en-
able streaming audio or video in the Preferences).
While any Quicktime video file can be played in
SL, videos with “Fast Start” checked when they
are created will download more quickly. (These
are known as “progressive download” files.)
However, unless the files are streamed (and not
simply hosted on a web server), each person view-
ing the movie will see it start at a different time,
depending on when they click the “play” button
and their own bandwidth. So, if you wish to have
a group of people view a video simultaneously,
you will have to use a streaming server. This is a
nice way to share the experience of viewing an
educational video, especially text chat allows for
ongoing discussion of a video without interfering
with the sound.
You can also create a video (called a “ma-
chinima”) of anything you see in SL. This offers
many opportunities for creating SL tutorials and
tours, but also, by including role-playing, script-
ing, sets, costumes, and the other techniques
of moviemaking, SL offers the possibility of
creating videos about anything at all, without
many of the costs of real-world filmmaking or
traditional animation techniques. As they say on
SL's official machinima page, “Movies made in
Second Life use the world's building, scripting,
and avatar customization tools, working in real-
time collaboration with people around the globe.
You can use Second Life as your own virtual back
lot, soundstage, choreography studio, costume and
prop repository, and special effects house” (http://
secondlife.com/showcase/machinima.php). The
general machinima site http://machinima.com
offers tutorials on making machinima as well as ac-
cess to more than 100,000 Second Life machinima.
You can also see more than 150,000 videos on
http://youtube.com using the tag “Second Life”.
There are several good options for creating
the machinima. There are free tools, including
Taksi, and http://WeGame.com for the PC and
Capture Me for the Mac. FRAPS and Camtasia
are two other easy-to-use programs available at
a low cost. Some people have recently experi-
mented with using Jing (http://www.jingproject.
com/). Many Mac users use iShowU with Stomp,
http://www.shinywhitebox.com for capturing
screen video and compressing it for sharing. In
addition to screen capture software, you'll also
need a video editing program such as iMovie or
Windows Movie Maker, or higher-end products
such as Apple's Final Cut Pro or Adobe Premier
to create the final video.
Another medium for communicating in Second
Life is not immediately obvious to newcomers,
and that is “body” language. Avatars have default
animations that they perform when speaking in
text chat, listening to another avatar (the avatars
automatically turn their head to the latest speaker!),
walking, running, jumping, sitting, and flying.
There are also many built in “gestures,” which
combine animations with sounds, including point-
ing at something, pointing at oneself, yee-hawing,
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