Monthly Archives: April 2011

My Unity3D Powerpoint Extravaganza

Unity3DPresentation2D

It’s no secret that I have been fairly impressed with Unity3D. I find it extremely liberating in comparison to Second Life’s (and any other MMO) pre-packaged notion of what online 3D environments should be. I had to give a talk yesterday, so I used that talk as an excuse to taking my knowledge of Unity3D to the next level. I decided to make my presentation in Unity3D, and have the audience be part of the presentation at some point — similar to what we see in SL/OpenSim, but with the experience on the Web browser and under my complete control. Go here to see the result. Let me explain what you see there.

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A Tour Through Unity3D for SL/OpenSim Aficionados

Unity3DScene

I was sick-ish last week, so I decided to use my idle cycles to finally learn Unity3D. I thought I’d share my impressions, given that (a) I’m not a 3D modeler, not even an amateur one, and (b) my only experience with 3D environments has been Second Life / OpenSim. I suspect there are lots of people like me. Being an OpenSim aficionada, and fairly ignorant of everything else (mainly for lack of time), I always felt like I was missing the big picture. Indeed, I was, and I’m glad my cold last week gave me the opportunity to explore a completely different point of this large design space. The picture above shows one of the environments I created. The bottom line, if you don’t care to read more, is this: the Unity3D ecosystem feels like Second Life for grown ups.

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Sculpt Terrains

sculptterrain_004

I do a fair amount of work with people in urban planning. Realism in those virtual environments is the starting point for the imagined plans they have in mind. The very first thing they want is the realistic terrain of the area. It has proven difficult to get the elevation data of specific areas, but we always end up finding it in some obscure place or other. Unfortunately, the terrain by itself doesn’t quite give the feel of the area as it exists today. Instead, it gives the feel of the area as it might have existed 10,000 years ago! — no signs of human civilization. Which, as nice as that may be, doesn’t quite do the job for urban planning. This weekend I was finally able to generate realistic terrains in OpenSim overlayed with a realistic image. Here is the story.

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