The course is structured around, and partly delivered through, the Second Life multi-user virtual environment (MUVE). This is not because we have any special commitment to using Second Life, but rather because Second Life has for some years become the most popular and most widely used platform. Alternative platforms will be viewed and evaluated in the course of the semester.
The intensive 10-week teaching schedule is partitioned into ‘blocks’, as below. It is unlikely that we’ll have the time to cover all the topics and try all the software listed; hyperlinks are therefore provided to encourage you to explore further.
Block 1: Background and basic skills
- Introduction to desktop VR; a review of applications and application areas for desktop VR. Introduction to MUVEs in general and to Second Life in particular; an introduction to OpenSimulator as an open source alternative to Second Life. Case studies might include: St George’s University paramedic training simulations, Heritage Key and Western Front 1917. Basic knowledge and skills (walking and flying, changing appearance, objects, the inventory, rezzing, etc) required for using Second Life and OpenSim.
- Basic building in Second Life and OpenSim. Primitive objects (‘prims’), prim size, and why you should be concerned about ‘prim counts’; the box, prism, cylinder, tube, torus, ring and sphere. Gene Replacement’s notorious ‘megaprims‘ (you can get them from, for example, here or here). Controlling perspective with alt-zoom and ctrl-alt-zoom. What the coloured arrows mean: the ‘object (move, rotate, and stretch) handles’; moving, rotating, resizing, and copying objects. Editing object parameters in the Object tab; using the grid; snap to grid with the triangles for accurate alignment. Linking and unlinking objects. Applying textures. In-world building tools (for example, Prim.Docker, ShapeGen, Cadroe Lathe, Virtual Builder Studio Pack, etc)
- Advanced building. The Edit window and its tabs; linear and radial extrusion; hollowing shapes, path cuts, linking and unlinking groups of objects, the ‘root’ prim, editing linked parts. The other prims in the build dialog. Creating and editing textures using GIMP. Extending the SL resident experience: HUDs, animations, gadgets, interfacing SL with the 2D web, etc
- Basic scripting in Second Life; introduction to Linden Scripting Language.
Block 2: Modeling and terraforming with external editors
- 3D modeling. Modeling sculpted prims (’sculpties’) for Second Life using Wings 3D, Blender (with prim.blender), PloppSL, SculptyPaint, Art of Illusion, and Rokuro/Tokoroten; an extensive annotated list of other 3D modeling packages is published in the Sculpted Prims: 3d Software Guide on the Second Life wiki. MakeHuman for avatar creation and QAvimator for animation in Second Life.
- Panoramic (photographic) desktop VR (using Hugin); Second Life panoramas (Panogames, etc); holodecks in Second Life
- 3D GIS and terrain visualisation (using Terragen); RAW files and height maps; terraforming with Terragen and Bailiwick; using the whole region terrain editor Backhoe; other terraforming tools including Freeworld3D, Height Map Editor, L3DT, etc)
Block 3: Understanding and designing the user experience
- Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) / inhabited 3D worlds (review of worlds other than Second Life, including There, Kaneva, and ActiveWorlds)
- HCI and human factors; the ’social life of avatars’; running a business in Second Life.
- Other world-building technologies: OpenCroquet/OpenCobalt, Wonderland, Forterra, Web 3D (using X3D), etc; 3D data visualisation. Frontiers: from the 3D desktop to the 3D Internet.
More extensive documentation of each topic may be found in the sidebar links. The module guide may be downloaded from here:
