Sansar creators got a look at two impressive experiences during the most recent community meeting.
Lead Environmental Artist Mario Wagner discussed his work on the Sansar experience Zen Garden, a surreal but relaxing spot surrounded by floating islands and flying spacecraft.
Wagner shared his experiences creating the Zen Garden while fielding questions about best practices in 3D experience design. According to Mario, one of the most important things within that scene was to make sure that objects are grouped or separated with occlusion culling in mind. The Sansar engine occludes objects that are covered or not drawn within frame, which enables the creator to use more detailed geometry in areas that can be concealed. The texture work on rocks was a combination of Zbrush sculpting and baking and material generation in Substance Painter 2. All rock walls in the garden section rely only on one square module that gets rotated and stamped repeatedly. Using fewer shaders reduces draw calls which is important in VR for high FPS.
While some creation features showcased in Zen Garden are not yet accessible to the creator community, they'll eventually be rolled out to everyone. During this meeting, one creator asked when/if animation importing from Maya will be supported. While we don't have a specific timeline yet, expect this in an upcoming release.
The community also got a sneak peek at Lost Treasures of Coral Canyon by rudresha. This elaborate underwater experience features several hidden areas, as explorers wander through the dark crevices of a disabled submarine nested on the seafloor.
In addition to this week’s Sansar field trip adventures, the community had a chance to discuss other Sansar developments including the next release (planned for early July). Among the new features planned for the next release are audio occlusion and obstruction and full-body inverse kinematics (IK).
The community also asked about the availability of some other Sansar features including vehicle scripts, instancing, an indicator for “who is speaking,” the ability for an editor to “white box” out a level, and support for more textures (such as transparent glass). No specific timeline was offered for these features, but the requests were noted for future development consideration by the Sansar team.
During the meeting, Lead Community Manager Jennifer reminded attendees that as of the most recent release, voice chat is already muted by default in desktop mode. (Avatars in VR mode continue to have voice enabled by default.) We also acknowledged that Sansar users will need to re-enter their password after each new update, even if it's previously been saved using the “remember password” option. Another known issue is access to documentation for those new users who haven’t yet downloaded the client and completed registration. However, documentation will be open to the public without a requirement to complete registration in the near future.
The meeting also included a reminder that the Sansar Creator Challenge is about to end! Don’t miss your chance at a $500 Amazon Gift Card, which will be awarded to one talented creator. This challenge encourages entrants to develop a new creators' hangout space within Sansar, where our community can interact and hang out. To qualify for consideration, remember to publish your Experience in the Atlas before the June 12 deadline.
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