“We’re pleased to announce First Look: Dazzle, a “refresh” for the Second Life viewer’s appearance which makes the UI (User Interface) more accessible and pleasing.” – Second Life Blog

Hailed by some as the new friendly user experience that Second Life desperately needs, Dazzle is a new brighter User Interface. It uses new buttons and symbols and has many ‘under the hood’ changes to ease customisation in the future. With a barrage of complaints however, is Dazzle all it’s cracked up to be?




Dazzle UI










Old UI






The original blog entry, posted by Torley Linden set out the following questions and relative answers:

"What if I don't like Dazzle?
This is understandable, particularly because Second Life's UI has basically been the same for several years. Change can be hard if you're accustomed to the way things currently look and have been with us for awhile…. we’ll pay attention to your constructive criticism and use it to refine Dazzle further

Will I be able to revert to the older UI?
When Dazzle is in the main viewer, then no, you won't be able to revert easily. On the surface many people like Dazzle however, with more and more posts, comments and worries being voiced at Benjamin Linden’s (Director of User Experience) office hour and on the JIRA, in answer to Torleys previous question – What if I don’t like Dazzle? Simply we don’t know the answer; no one appears to be listening to the very ‘real’ health issues it brings to the fore."

Dazzle was mentioned originally in February and has been in development since then. I spent a few hours researching the effects a bright user-interface can have on its user, ie you! I was quite shocked at the results I achieved in a matter of hours; a company like Linden Lab SHOULD have access to this information as freely as I do, especially considering there is a department qualified in User Experience.

“Whether characters are legible or not depends on contrast, that is, the difference in brightness between the text and the background.” - Ergonomics for Beginners: A Quick Reference Guide by Jan Dul.

“Dark colors maintain the focus on the images - bright colors can distract the eye and take the focus away from the images. Adjusting to the varying degree and the frequency of light changes can cause eye fatigue, headaches and mood swings. “ – Agfa Healthcare - The Benefits of Color and Style

“In short, to avoid dazzling and prevent eyestrain (your own or your users), try to keep all surfaces at the same brightness by matching the overall brightness or dimness of your screens to the office environment. If users typically use your software in brightly lit offices or if they type from bright source documents, use light or off-white backgrounds. If your software is used in dim or dark areas (air traffic control towers, for example), use dark backgrounds. If you can't find out what the background will be, you might want to include two backgrounds, one light and one dark, with your program.” – Fast Consulting

There is no template in place for the average Second Life user, many people are in-world at night, in a darker environment, with less or no natural lighting. However corporate companies and some residents play during the day time in areas of high natural lighting. As shown from research in this model ONE UI is not sufficient and two should be provided.

Another consideration you should bear in mind when looking at Dazzle is the blue on blue colour scheme. As stated in the Fast Consulting reference work “Your eyes cannot focus clearly on blue”.

"Since yellow and green wavelengths come into focus at the retina, they require the least accommodation from the eye (this is the reason for so many yellow and green monochrome monitors a few years ago). Red wavelengths, on the other hand, come into focus a little behind the retina and therefore seem to "pop out" of the background. Since blue wavelengths come into focus in front of the retina, blues seem to fade into the background." – Fast Consulting

There are far better colour combinations for the use of blue; “On the HSV Colour Wheel, the complement of blue is yellow; that is, a colour corresponding to an equal mixture of red and green light. On a colour wheel based on traditional colour theory (RYB), the complementary colour to blue is considered to be orange” – Wiki

Second Life will be made skinnable in the future, ie users can include their own colour combinations to suit themselves. A wonderful step forward but surely Skinability should happen before people have no option but to use Dazzle? According to the Viewer Roadmap the answer is no, Dazzle takes priority over everything else.

Linden Lab is placing great strain on their customers. With over 6 million user accounts the global cross-section MUST include people with colour blindness and migraine sufferers to name but a few.

“Some history behind this: over the years, we’ve heard a lot about how difficult SL can be to use, notably how scary the “old-style” UI looks. Cryptic icons, low contrast, and “things you click on that don’t do what you expect them to do” are all frustrating to newcomers, and at last — Dazzle’s here, because we want to make it easier for you.” – Second Life Blog

I am sure many agree with the sentiment above, however ‘scary’ and ‘frustrating’ are not in any medical journals I can source. Migraines, colour blindness and fatigue associated with bright User Interfaces are however.

Always striving to improve your Second Life experience, we at Rez, like to look into all areas of the virtual experience. From changes of Trademark usage, to WindLight content creation, we try our best to leave no stone unturned.

Today I will hopefully uncover a little gem being realised by more and more people i.e. the 3Dconnexion Space Navigator. In the past, to use the Space Navigator you had to tweak the hidden Joystick Flycam options under the ‘Advanced’ menu of the Second Life client. The Wiki page did offer some insight and a well documented user, Tenebrous Pau offers his settings for the device which he has been using for a year now. However 3Dconnexion, a Logitech company, have been working with Linden Lab to bring support for their popular Space Navigator product to Second Life. This support has been implemented in the 1.20 Release Candidate.

Ok, this all sounds very exciting but I hear you ask; what is a Space Navigator and how will it make my Second Life experience better? The Space Navigator is a 6-axis input device. It allows the user to pan, tilt, zoom and rotate efficiently from one single input with far superior accuracy than that of a standard mouse. With the new Release Candidate, users can control their avatar with the navigator; you can walk up a hill, tilting the device to seamlessly enter into flight, pushing down again to smoothly get two feet back on the ground. Intended for left hand usage you can also guide your avatar with your left hand while typing with your right or using your mouse to interact with the UI.

That’s just avatar control, with the Space Navigator you can do much more. Now found under the ‘View’ menu you can activate the Joystick Flycam option and with the default Space Navigator settings you can control your camera with the device as well. Never before has the movements of Second Life been so seamless. Also, of course, a very nifty tool for the Machinima creators out there with fluid soft movements all controlled from the one device making it easier for absolute novice movie directors out there to have a go.

I was lucky enough to see the Space Navigator in action under the old Joystick Flycam settings and agreed it was a lovely device, however when 3Dconnexion announced actual support for Second Life, I decided that I REALLY needed yet another input device. Having ordered from amazon.co.uk I waited excitedly as my package arrived. Similar to a child at Christmas, I tore the box open, installed the drivers, downloaded the Release Candidate and away we go.

The first thing that struck me was the build quality, this is a very weighted object (in fact could be considered lethal in the wrong hands). From amazon.co.uk the device retails at £37.65 ($52.25 amazon.com) which as an extremely reasonable price for such a piece of kit, how many of us have paid upwards of £40 for a mouse?

I installed the driver CD onto my iMac and launched Second Life. Using the Release Candidate I had no further settings to input or install, I hit login and waited for my world to arrive. To begin with the Space Navigator takes a very short time to get used too. Having the ability to walk and fly so easily and seamlessly is, for me, an amazing achievement, but one you need to learn to control. Trin did have her fair share of bumping off things to begin with! Having used the device for a short time now and gone on the short learning curve I really cannot see ANY reason why everyone using Second Life shouldn’t have one of these. It makes you feel more connected with your camera or avatar.

Out of the box the Space Navigator works well, it should be remembered however you can use your preferences to alter some settings to suit yourself. One strong piece of advice is to turn off build mode before you attempt to build with the navigator; otherwise you might end in a disastrous mess (this can be done by un-ticking ‘build’ in the ‘Joystick Setup’ window of the ‘Input & Camera’ preferences tab, see below). There are also two buttons on the side of the Space Navigator which allow, with a bit of tweaking, the ability to jump and enable Flycam mode.Obviously, being newly supported it is not without fault, there are a few subjects on the JIRA (most of which are small niggling flaws with the software rather than big intrusive issues), which will be fixed and implemented to help future Second Life viewers. There is also a “3Dconnexion Space Cadets” group in-world for users to gather, share information and help one another.

Of course it should also be noted that this little gadget isn’t just for use in Second Life, it also works in such applications as Adobe Photoshop, Autodesk AutoCAD, Autodesk Maya and Google Earth to name but a few.

Read up on the device, admire its beauty, bask in the splendour of an evolved integration with Second Life and most importantly go buy one, now.


Resources:

Beast Linden Demo Movie
JIRA
Space Navigator

Nearly a year ago now, our favorite watermelon-loving Linden, Torley, announced to us the plans for a very shiny addition to the Second Life Client. This would be codenamed ‘WindLight’ and would contain new atmospheric rendering capabilities.


Linden Lab acquired Windward Mark Interactive LLC. The company already developing the WindLight product for use in three dimensional environments for example flight simulators and gaming.

WindLight entered into a long Second Life First Look & Release Candidate process and in April of this year reached the masses when it became the main viewer.

WindLight brings us amazing skies along with some other new additions; for instance Avatar Imposters and Glow. Glow is a whole new lighting effect for objects which will soon be scriptable. Avatar Imposters on the other hand help reduce lag by only drawing avatars beyond a set distance in 2D rather than 3D.

What is WindLight?

“With WindLight, Out-The-Window rendering means exactly that. Unparalleled visual fidelity and atmospheric representation are now within the realm of realtime simulation.” - Windward Mark

WindLight allows users to define the look of the sky and the water to suit their need at any given time - "The trick is to build a unified lighting model where whatever you put it on, whether it's a watermelon or an F-16, it looks good" Windward Mark president Asi Lang - Boston


WindLight has dramatically changed the way we all view Second Life, from photographers, machinima creators, stylists to every day explorers no more will our sky and water be flat and rather unappealing.

I have personally been using the WindLight First Look client for a long time, but as WindLight spreads its wings on our grid I contacted Andromega Volare a wonderful Second Life photographer, and Halden Beaumont a Machinima creator, who both embraced the new dimensions that WindLight has to offer, and asked them a few questions.


Beyond Magic from haldenbeaumont on Vimeo.

How has WindLight changed your experience of Second Life?

Andromega Volare : WL is a very important add-on for me, especially for landscapes the mood can be gorgeous and impressive. Not only the light settings I don´t want to miss in SL, the clouds and the water-reflections are a must-have too!
Halden Beaumont: WindLight has brought about an enhanced level of reality to the Second Life experience. Login using the WindLight viewer and the technology afforded makes the user feel closer to everything, as it approximates to the real world and it expands the options you have to create a precise atmosphere for a specific scenario. Since its WindLight’s first release, I only use that viewer. Once you experience it, you will not want to log in using a previous viewer.

How has WindLight changed your content creations within Second Life?

Andromega Volare : With WL you have endless possibilities of setting weather and lights, I spend hours with snap-shooting the same motive in different variations. Usually I do this in high resolution, so I have to clean my hard drive from time to time cause it is messed up with gorgeous WindLight shots.
Halden Beaumont: I often need to review details, especially those connected with lighting and the environmental settings of a location. I produce many videos, where the main goal is to convey the potential of Second Life. Many times, the audience consists of persons who are skeptical of the Second Life platform; they perceive it as a "game", unable to conceive it as a powerful tool for communication and dialog.
Once I began using WindLight, the videos I produce provide a much brighter and appellative representation of Second Life. Using WindLight as a tool in my Machinima productions, allows me to convey the feeling of Second Life, demonstrating that Second Life is more than a "place". It's difficult to make persons who have not actually gone "in world", understand what Second Life is, to have them feel the essence of it. "WindLight allows the viewer to feel the "wind" upon their skin, with their eyes". Once a friend told me about WindLight that is something that cannot be fully described, merely felt, I guess she is completely right about that.

How do you feel WindLight will change the average user's Second Life experience?

Andromega Volare : Most of the users will love WindLight, if they use the sliders of the environment editor. Some will hate WindLight, because they can´t use their face lights anymore or their skin is too bright and looses texture.
Halden Beaumont: The emotions felt by users in Second Life are quite real. WindLight expands these for the viewer. Second Life is evidence that "believing is seeing". If you have technology which can expand that evidence, the experience will be richer, affecting every sense. The experience becomes far more realistic and in many cases, much deeper.

Do you have any complaints about WindLight rendering as it is now a main viewer?

Andromega Volare : I don´t really have complaints, but there is something what perhaps could be added in later versions of WL. First thing: no more prim clouds, I really hate them; a key to hide them would be fantastic. I wish there would be a button to switch off all the face lights of the avatars on my screen. The amplitude of the waves could be greater, and thunderstorms with flashes of lightening would be cool.
Halden Beaumont: I had a huge one, but they finally corrected in this latest release :) It was a bug with joystick flycam, where the local lights start pulsing and the shooting scenes become most of the time obsolete. But they finally corrected.

WindLight is a spectacular addition to the whole Second Life experience so without much further ado, get in world and start tinkering with your sky settings, you will not be disappointed.

Sources:
Windward Mark
Boston
Andromega Volare
Halden Beaumont

Pictures Copyright Andromega Volare. Movie Copyright Halden Beaumont. Special thanks to both gentlemen for their time and allowed use of their creations.

For any resident of Second Life, the official Second Life blog at http://www.secondlife.com/ is a must read site (almost as much as this one). It is there that you can find out the latest happenings at Linden Labs, the holders of our virtual destiny, the rulers of our metaverse, and sometimes, the cause of our annoyances (transactions unreliable two days in a row, at precisely the same time after a new simulator roll out, you say? Oh joy!). The big story this past two weeks was that Linden Labs, in a stance of defiance against a perceived threat to their corporate image, set out new rules about what you can and cannot do with the words "Second Life" "Linden" "SL" and "InSL".

The full rules can be found here and here, but generally boil down to stating that from now on, companies and websites, inworld or in rl, must not use Second Life or Linden as their company name or website address, as this could confuse people into thinking they are affiliated with LL. They are, however, allowed to use "SL" or "InSL", as LL have given "Special permission" for you to use these trademarks they own, AS LONG AS you "use "SL" or "inSL" (but not both) in combination with your own word mark... or in combination with a name that uses at least two generic nouns".

So, what's so bad about that, you may ask? Well, consider that some of the biggest and most celebrated websites supporting, enriching and adding to your SL experience have now technically found themselves operating in direct opposition to LL's wishes, despite having done nothing other than to work hard, and as far as they knew, with the blessing of LL. From the most popular SL shopping site, SLExchange, to the most popular social networking site, SLProfiles, to Second Life news sites such as SL-Newspaper or the Second Life Herald, many people are crying out, not knowing what they did wrong, and why the feeling from our inworld masters went from welcoming with open arms, to a decidedly cold shoulder, so quickly. To get a better perspective into exactly what the situation is for these companies, I popped some questions to JamesT Juno, CEO of http://www.sl-newspaper.com/ and Yo Brewster, the man behind http://www.slprofiles.com/: