Linden Lab recently announced that mesh imports may one day be possible in Second Life. But what IS a mesh import exactly? What are the benefits? How will this impact how content is created in Second Life? Reed Steamroller, Chief Creative Officer at Sandcastle Studios, joins us for a discussion of this potential new feature and you’re invited to join in on the discussion of pros/cons and what ifs.

Join us at the Metanomics Main Stage on Thursday September 17th at 12:00 p.m. PST/SLT as Dusan Writer welcomes Reed for a discussion of “Mesh Imports and Second Life”. You can also participate live via the Web. The event is held in mixed voice and text – if you attend in world, please make sure your ability to hear voice chat is enabled!

Related Links and Resources

Reed provided an overview of mesh imports at the Sandcastle blog:

“At this years Second Life Community Convention, Linden Lab Chief Product Officer Tom Hale, aka T. Linden, showed video of a polygon mesh object responding to a dynamic lighting system much more advanced then the current lighting and shadows that are available in several Beta viewers. With the new system, light is able to be reflected off of objects to their surroundings. Both are much sought after and desired features of advanced and experienced content creators, especially those who want to make use of existing polygon meshes made in Maya and other industry standard modeling tools….

You can think of an irregular mesh as a polygon mesh in which the polygons are NOT laid out in neat or predictable pattern. These meshes are dependent only on the wishes of their creator, and are not restrained by any prerequisites of form. Irregular meshes give the creator access to manipulate the polygons themselves, instead of being limited to manipulating groups of polygons aligned in regular meshes. What is important to know is that allowing user-created, irregular, polygon meshes on the grid will give builders a higher level of freedom in not only what they build, but just how they build it.”

A Video Demonstration:

A Highly Speculative Post on Linden Lab Purchasing 3D Content Warehouses:

“The Lab would be well positioned to deploy a ‘buy-em-up-and-roll-em-up’ strategy, creating either strategic partnerships or outright buying other 3D content marketplaces. With the infrastructure represented by XStreet, a new “developer portal” coming soon, and the community forums and service to the Second Life community, the Lab could become the 3D content marketplace not just for Second Life, but more generally.”