Using the Artiste

I’ve been busily working away on routines for the last several days.

Several months ago, I began using the Artiste products exclusively to dance, so that I could force myself to learn more about it.

I knew that I had only scratched the surface of what it can do, and it’s been a really fun ride learning more and more.

The last couple of routines I did with it, I heard “That’s amazing!” and “Wow!” and “Fantastic!”

So I am pretty happy with how things are going. 😛

My original goal was to learn/re-learn some basic palette abilities so that I could offer some one-off classes on them.  Since there are currently about 70-some abilities, I figured that would keep me busy.

And it has!

Some of the abilities are things that you can do with many other systems, like tipping an object (or person), or raise/lower (via mover or object-mover).

However, my latest breakthrough had nothing to do with the abilities of the palette itself, and everything to do with making my life easier. 😀

When I first learned to use the Artiste, I learned to create my mover route and trigger it to begin when I pressed play (like every other system out there).

There was an option to have the sequence start after pressing play (a delay), but that seemed tedious and a lot of extra work.  So I would trigger my palette to start moving when I pressed play, and to continue through its series of moves.

This meant figuring out not only my moves (from A to B, B to C, etc.), but also figuring out wait/sleep times (times that my mover would stay in the same position before moving to the next point).  Now, I’m good at math, but I don’t like it.  I did it simply because there was no other way.

No system that I owned (or am familiar with) allowed me to pause/stop my mover after pressing play (without also causing a bunch of other issues that usually involved more math). So, I planned my routes, did the math (yuck!), and went on.

Because I had taught a class on using  the Artiste palette as a mover, I figured I should experiment with some of the options.  One of those options is to trigger your mover/palette via the sequence.  Great, I was already doing that!

But you can also trigger your mover/palette to do only 1 move OR a range of moves, not just the entire route.

Mind blown.

This meant that I could tell the palette to do move 1. Then dance. Then, when I wanted to, tell the palette to do move 2. Or to do moves 2-4.  Then dance some more.  And since you can specify PER MOVE a specific animation that you want to play (not just one default walk, for example), I can, when triggering my moves, have the palette activate a walk I have specified for THAT move.

So I can skip walk on to the stage, dance, use a second walk to move, dance some more, and use a third walk for a subsequent move.  All with the same mover/palette!

And as with all things Artiste, there is always more than one way to do something. I can trigger my moves via my sequence if I wish.  Or I can trigger them via my chat commands.  Having so many options means that I can accomplish more in less time. And best of all?

Less math!!!! 😀

Artiste Producer Suite Class – K&M SOPA

On Sunday, March 13, at 12pm SLT (noon), I will be giving a short class on the products in the Artiste Producer Suite.

We have a theater set up with all the pieces installed so that you can come and play with them and see what they do.

The class is open to anyone who is interested, you do not need to own the Producer Suite in order to attend.

If you’re interested, IM me in-world for the class LM.

Hope to see you there!

Tutorial #11: Artiste Outfit-Change

The Artiste started out as a tool to facilitate the removal and subsequently the addition of items that could be worn as layers or attached items to an avatar during a live show. The procedure started out as a manual one. Then one morning I got an epihnany to schedule the changes. Why become manually involved at all? That was when I began to think that everything that could be scheduled should be scheduled .

And thus the term “Auto” was born.

We started with removal of all items from a particular body part like say the “skull” or “pelvis”. Then was born the need to remove a single layer or attachment when several are worn on the same body part. This required the use of RLV. I had not heard of RLV being used in a way other than as a method to faciliate BDSM play. It was just an idea I had that it could facilitate non-sexual applications. It had a history of association of ‘bad’ as well as a ‘fear’ that it could be used against a persons wishes.

There is a lot of depth to the process of stripping and outfit-change. I treat the 2 topics separately. In fact there is a manual on AutoStripping and one on Outfit-Change. And they both have their own enable/disable lights on the face of the HUD.

There are many advanced disciplines to the Artiste. Each one should be seen as something special and worthy of concerted effort and time to master in order to maximize its feature set; like spending a week on nothing else but just exploring the discipline in depth and becoming deeply familiar with it. The motivation for mastering them is that they are empowering and either expand your abilities to control your performance beyond normal means or to solve performance issues and challenges…or both.

Advanced disciplines include but are not limited to:  Outfit-Change (with SmartChange), Artiste Rezzer, Advanced Mover, Adorning, Grouping, Particles, AutoCam, Formations(DanceDiva) , MasterPiece, to name a few.

You should add your own personal notes to yourself of important discoveries ore perferences of usage. You should also keep a folder of successful experiences including notecards, HUDs, Palettes, Rezzers, snapshots of inventory, or anything else that can help jog your memory as to how you were successful in the past. You want to be able to quickly repeat a discipline with confidence and without relearning or fear of remembering .

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One area of major concern with people is that of troubled outfit-changes during a live show. In fact I have heard from at least 2 people in the last week on major concerns on recent “fitting” issues  as well as expended effort to facilitate multiple outfit-changes in one routine. It seems good enough is no longer the case. People seem to want answers. Solutions.

We spent a LOT of time on the issue of the wearing and unwearing of outfits over the years. We even discovered certain SL issues years ago prior to LL acknowledging just recently what we had already surmised…that of items with a lot of links.

We had to address issues of: unrezzed, double-rezzed, or stuck (as in unremovable) costume-changes, especially during laggy conditions. We also addressed the issue of alphas.

There are many, many features at your disposal to control an outfit-change cycle. We provide for an automated way to micro-manage an outfit-change process and allow for up t0 5 of these micro-managed outfit-changes to occur  for a given HUD during a set.

WearUnwear 

We call an outfit-change WearUnwear, as a reminder of what is happening. We wear or add the new outfit prior to unwearing the the old outfit so as to minimize any embarrassment of unneeded skin-exposure. It also looks better aesthetically when performd in this order as opposed to unwearing prior to wearing. You can also perform a Wear and Unwear cycle separately. You can do them manually or scheduled via the AutoFX feature of the Artiste PerformanceHUD.

Simply add the items you want to wear in one RLV folder and the items you want to unwear in another RLV folder.

So WearUnwear are attached to events via AutoFX just like moves or fades or particles or any other special process.

There is also a Replace option for certain special situations (nocopy) but is not recommended if WearUnwear could be used…as it is not as controllable.

Anchoring

At this juncture you have the ability to Anchor certain body-parts so they are NOT removed.

Also Anchoring , avoids the unecessary step of removing the same layer or attachment if you are simply going to rewear it in the new outfit. This is performed automatically if you turn AutoAnchor to “on”. Example: The currently worn hair is the same as the new hair you are going wear. Why add an extra redundant step that could help clog the process?

You can anchor manually thru the menu for quick experimentation or via the main configuation notecard of the Artiste Performance HUD.

Also, by default, all HUD  areas on the screen are Anchored. So in order to replace a HUD you would have to un-anchor its screen area.  Usually you want to keep HUDS worn via an outfit change process which is why it is the default.

Exclusions

You can exclude certain bodyparts from being affected by removal or addtion. These are like Anchors only they are PERMANENT. Bra and panties for example insure that under NO conditions are these layers removed.

Retries

When attaching new items we found often that repeated attempts helped to vastly improve success. You can set the number of automatic attach-retries along with the amount of time to ‘wait’ in beween retries via the main configuration notecard. We even set the number of retries to 2 by default as insurance as we notice it is better to have it than not have it. We were able to improve 100% failure scenarios  down to about  20% failure rate by adding in auto-retries of high-link items (hair, jewelry).

SmartChange – troubled-Item wearing and unwearing

Over time we discovered that items with a lot of links as well as alphas and to a lesser degree, heavily scripted items, caused certain problems that were exacerbated as laggy conditions increased. These included: stuck items (unable to remove or detach), double-rezzed body-parts, failed rez layers, and alpha-related (also alpha-on-alpha) issues.

We created a process by which you have more granular control of WHEN certain body-parts were addressed during an outfit-change process to help unclog the process and space out activity.

UPDATE: SmartChange may well come in handy  when addressing the touchy issue of MESH, although not much has been done to explore how best to deal with MESH.

We made this process automated.

A WearUnwear process can be replaced by a SmartChange which does pre-processing prior to a normal WearUnwear cycle followed by post-processing that happens after the normal WearUnwear cycle.

You can have up to 5 SmartChange Sets.

You set them up on a special notecard.

You can execute them by number (1 thru 5) at the appropriate times in your routine.

AutoChange needs to be enabled as does AutoFX.

Each SmartChange Set will change an outfit with added special instructions to do pre and post processing targeting of body parts in certain folders with given delay times.

What you gain is the ability to PRE-WEAR, PRE-UNWEAR, POST-WEAR, and POST-UNWEAR specified trouble items so they are performed in a less clogged client-server communication. We give you 3 RLV folders to drop troubled items into.

They are named: Shoes, Hair, and Jewelry but you can put ANYTHING in them that you want as it does not check.

There are 3 folders that address the PRE WearUnwear cycle to the main WearUnwear cycle and 3 folders that address the POST WearUnwear cycle.

We found troubled items work best addressed in the PRE WearUnwear cycle  We found that alpha layers work best when addressed in the POST WearUnwear cycle.

You can also adjust the delay times up or down to allow these PRE and POST cycles to do their thing.

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ADVANCED

Tattoo Layers

You can address tattoo-layers separately and cause them to automatcially be removed and added in optimal order. They have been known to cause issues when not removed prior to everything else and not added back in after everything else.  We have automated this feature should you ‘turn it on’. It requires some minor preparation on your part regarding RLV folder loading.

ME folder

You can specify items that you ALWAYS wear to automatically be worn using the ME folder option. This way you dont have to always repeatedly add them to the WEAR folder. It requires some minor preparation on your part regarding RLV folder loading.

Invisibility Folder

You can cause your avatar to automatically go invisible as the result of an intentional effect by adding 1 or 2 special invisibility items in a special folder. It knows to perform this feature after an (optional) particle-effect emission. AutoInvis needs to be “on”. It requires some minor preparation on your part regarding RLV folder loading.

Rebake

Place a temporary body part that forces a rebake, like noob hair or skin into one Rebake  subfolder.  Place the real skin or hair you want to wear in a different Rebake subfolder. We found this process helped circumvent another type of outfit-change issuedwe came across. It is optional but recommended as a safety measure. It requires some minor preparation on your part regarding RLV folder loading.

Teleport

We have up to 5 entries that control teleporting out and back into a sim as we found this to sometimes be the only solution to extreme rez issues in super laggy sims.

It automates the procedure of masking the change, teleporting the avatar out to another sim, performing the outfit-change at a less-laggy sim and then returning them back to the same spot they lef.

This is where auto-particle effect-emission comes into play to help mask the outfit change procedure. You can specify where to teleport to, where to teleport back to (often a forced teleport landing spot) and then to the  2nd more specific onstage location to return you to the specific stage-spot where you left. All of this is  automatable as part of a SmartChange operation. This is extreme but is provided as an option. It requires some preparation on your part.

OuttifChange AnimationsDances

You can specify particular animations to  lead into an outfit-change and out of an outfit change, separate from other normal ways of  dancing via HUD animation-sequencing or Palette-based animation or Coupler animation. It requires some minor preparation on your part.

AutoEmission of Outfit-Change Masking via Particle-Effects

You can cause auto-generation of a few built-in particle effects to be generated during an outfit change. It requires some minor preparation on your part.

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Outfit-Change Cycles

The cycle of outfit-change process has been explored so in depth that we have itemized many  cycles that you can consider and control for advanced outfit-change situations.

The WearUnwear Cycle – tentative

1) Optionally BeginDance Into outfit-change
2) Optionally insures !Me1 folder contents are added
3) Optionally goes invisible if folder exists and AutoInvis is toggled
4) Optionally Rezzes a particle Effects Shield (if on)
5) Optionally Rezzes a rez object shield (if on)
6) Optionally Removes Tattoo Layers (if folder exists and removal is toggled on
7) Adds trouble items separately (Before phase — recommended)
8) Wears (adds) new outfit
9) Unwears (removes) old outfit
10) Wears new outfit
11) Optionally wears new outfit again x times
12) Optionally Adds trouble items separately (After phase)
13) Optionally Rebakes old then new body part
14) Optionally Removes Particle Effects (if exists)
15) Optionally Removes Shield (if exists)
16) Optionally Adds back in Tattoo layers if it applies
17) Optionally Animates EndDance if it applies
18) Optionally LAST THING Removes invisibility

Customizable Delays

SecondsAfterStartDance,5
SecondsAfterEndDance,3
SecondsAfterEffects,2
SecondsAfterMe1,4
SecondsAfterInvis,3
SecondsAfterRezObject,1
SecondsAfterUndress,5
SecondsBeforeRebake,1

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tutorial # 10: Dancing With The Artiste

We discovered (well I did late in the process) that the easiest thing to learn with the Artiste is ‘dancing’.  It is referred to as “sequencing” in the Artiste world. It is something most everyone who has performed before has done with other tools so it appears easiest to learn and transition into.

A question I get asked often is how many dances will it store? It cannot store 8,000 or anywhere near that amount nor is there intent in the foreseeable future to add mass storage-and-retrieval of SL animations  to its list of credits. It does not have a dance-recorder ability in the normal sense of the term. It does have its own approach to providing information about dances-played and associated times.

A couple of Artiste users have told me that they use other tools that do provide that standard dance-routine-building capability during the creative part of choreography and then migrate their dance choices to the Artiste for final sequencing, so I’ve been told. At least 2 dancers use the Artiste start to finish for building dance sequences and playing them.

How many dances can it hold? Well no-one has run into memory issues yet. Not to say it won’t happen in the future. Should that time come then I will address the issue.

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Number Of Sequences

The Artiste can hold up to 4 dance sequences at a time. A dance sequence is a list of line-entries on a notecard of animations followed by a separator bar followed by a time-to-play or duration.

Example:

DanceName1 | 24.1
DanceName2 | 19.8
DanceName3 | 28.7

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Number of Dancers

The Artiste Performance HUD can dance up to 9 dancers at a time. This can and has been extended to more dancers in a controlled fashion using Palette-based dancing. (example: couples dancing in the background)

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Read-Outs

The round circle in the star on the HUD menu when pressed will give out an elapsed time in an owner-only chat log, (when not used for solo-dance breakout dancing when DanceDiva is enabled)..

When DanceScriptTrace is on, then each dance name will print out with its elapsed time. This helps with timing dances.

Also, we now have (option) automatic ElapsedTime-to-Duration and Duration-to -Elapsed Time conversions upon HUD reset so you no longer need to do the math when converting from on to the other after making modifications to dance times.

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There are many ways to play animations:

1 – Immediate – Play-Sequenced and delayed. Immediately means at time zero upon pressing play.

2 – Play Sequence-Delayed means at least 1 second or more after pressing play triggered by the occurence of one or more events (up to 4, one for each of the 4 possible sequences. the PLAY_SEQ=? where ? is a number between 1 and 4 are used on the *autofx notecard to trigger the playing of a sequence tied to an event.

3 – Toggling the S-button on the face of the HUD, will cause the 1st sequence to start or stop playing.

4 – Pressing a button on the animation-menu page of the HUD that holds up to 11 dance-animations of which you can assign brief pseudonyms to.

5 – Palette-Based playing. You can sequence up to about 20 animations safely by putting them into a palette and associating each one with a move. The moves can then all be played in sequence or you can play any particular animation or you can play a specific-range of animations. If there is no movement associated with the animation as in the case of creating a ‘dummy move’, then you can play the moves in any order.

HUD sequences can also trigger all, one, or a range of moves which can themselves play animations. This is indicated by a command to play a Palette and it has its own duration just like a normal sequenced dance. It is triggered between dances in a sequence. This was inspired by MJ.

Advanced

Animations can now also be assigned to the turn-type move, pause-type move, as well as the move-type move. A Palette can trigger other Palettes to dance via Palette “actions” associated with real or “dummy” moves.

HUDs can chain to other HUDs causing their sequences to play either immediatley or upon waiting on operator action.

6 – Repeat

There is now a new Repeat command that allows all the moves and/or animations associated with them to ‘repeat’ until told to stop. This is handy for things like the running of background or atmosphere animations. Animals, birds, fish, people walking, etc. thruout a routine.

7 – Formations – (DanceDiva)

Dances can be played while changing custom-created formations by using the DanceDiva add-on that comes with the FULL A-250 GOLD package, has its own controller but is now built into the HUD and uses Follower-Relays.

NOTE: The FULL A-250 GOLD package includes 25 FREE Transfer/NoCopy Follower-Relays. These can be used to synchronize many things: Formation changes, stripping, outfit changes, Palette-2-Palette transfer

Includes 4-directional turns and break-away-and-return to formation dancing.

8 – Custom Grouping  – we often refer to this method of dancing by the slang term ofsimply “ABC”, don’t ask me how or why. You  actually can have up to 4 dance-groups called A,B ,C and D.

We have synchronous and asyncrhonous grouping using our Division method.

You can dynamically change group-sets at run-time.

Avatars or Palettes can be assigned to one or more groups.

9 – The Artiste Experience Option – Dance Leaders can offer the option to now provide for the ALLOWance of new Artiste Experience. This means dancers need no longer have to repeatedly accept dance invitations.

ALLOW once, and you are relieved as a ball-sitter. Dancers still need to be invited. They just are not saddled with having to accept an invite. This also helps mitigate failed dance-invites.

This is an option included in the Performance Dance HUD as well as the new Artiste Coupler.  There are some tolerable caveats but it HAS been tested successfully.

10 – The Auric Canon – (completed – testing)

11 – Couples Auto-Alignment and Compartmentalization (completed – testing)

12 – The Artiste MasterPiece – Animation Piecing – (completed – fixing a bug) – Allows for several animations (except the 1st) to start in the middle, played back-to-back.

13 – Segmentation – (in development)

14 – Auto-Dancing – (planned)

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I hope this lends some insight into how the Artiste is and can be used as a show-time dance tool.

Lat “Yummy” Lovenkraft

 

 

 

 

 

 

2016 K&M School of Performing Arts Classes

I am very excited to announce the course listings for the K&M School of Performing Arts for 2016!!

I have spent the last month working on curriculum, changing some things, adding some things – all based on feedback and reflection from previous classes.

I have updated the K&M Course Listings to reflect the changes in the courses.  The basic topics/concepts covered in each course are listed.  You can now choose from courses in Choreography, Movers, Set Building, Costuming, and Advanced Choreography.

In addition, I am adding courses for learning the Artiste.  Currently registration is only open for the Intro to Artiste course.  If you have or plan to take advantage of Yummy’s discount offer for a HUD/palette combo, then this is the course for you!

Courses will be held on Sundays at 12pm SLT at the Kat & Mouse Theater.  There will be ‘homework’ for in-world skill assessments, as well as online assessments (assessments are not required).  For students who choose to complete all assessments, the school will keep a posted list of dancers/students who have successfully completed courses and demonstrated mastery of various skills.

I have listed the dates/times for both the Intro to Artiste and Movers courses.  The courses that will be taught following those will depend on interest.

I look forward to classes and hope to see you there!

Tutorial #9: Artiste Grouping

I have personally detected 6 major features for choreographers that dictate visually, movement and space centered around solo and group dancers that can be augmented by tool-featuers:

1. Dance Sequencing –  controls local dancer motion (dance-to-dance)
2. Formation Creation  and Transitioning – controls (non in-place associations)
3. Single-Dancer-Movement – controls global horizontal and vertical stage-space use of a single user
4. Grouping – controls local groupings (in-place associations)
5. Couples Pairing – control pairing and synching of 2 dancers
6. Segmentation

How these are chosen and combined seem to define the characteristics of choreography and level of sophistication. This, again, is just my own personal observation.

This tutorial discuses how the Artiste has chosed to address one of the elements. Grouping.

Grouping evolved in the Artiste from how I detected RL grouping…to how people have chosen to implement it in SL. From binary-grouping in real life to custom-multiple-grouping in SL.

Artiste Grouping

There are a maximum of 4 CORE groups in the Artiste.
Group A
Group B
Group C
Group D

NOTE: As soon as you provide more “types of something” than what you think anyone would need, someone comes along with a need for more. Aura wanted more groups for an idea she has but fortunately envisioned a solution of using Palettes to proxy new Groups.

Palettes can hold their own dance routines  up to about 20 dances. They can be triggered from autofx or from inside one of the 4 dance-sequences.

 So by naming Palettes with the same name, multiple Palettes can be triggered to dance their own “sequence of dances” disguised in moves that may or may not move anywhere. Triggering from inside a core sequence gives tighter sync control

An advanced method is a Palette triggering one or more other Palettes.

Meanwhile….back at the ranch…

Each group is assigned a dance sequence. 
Group A = Sequence1
Group B = Sequence2
Group C = Sequence3
Group D = Sequence4

Pretty basic.

Dancers are assigned to one group at a time

A particular assignment of groups to dancers is called a “set” or “division”; A division is simply a  series of Groups that will be assigned to dancers depending on the Grouping-Method.

An advanced feature of Grouping is that the set or division can be dynamically changed at showtime midway thru a performance.

So dancers could be assigned thusly (2 couples or boys vs girls)

Division/Set 1 (couples)
Archie  = A
Anne = A
Bob = B
Brenda = B

Division/Set 2 (gender)
Archie  = A
Anne = B
Bob = A
Brenda = B

There are currently a maximum of 9 dancers per HUD so you could assign groups in a division as an example:

From 2 dancers: AC
To 9 dancers:  ABABCABAB
Or in between:  CBABC

NOTE: For completeness  I want to address the issue of Artiste dancing large groups. Because we have employed HUD-2-HUD, a Master HUD can control, say, 11 Slave-HUDs. Each Slave-HUD could dance 9 dancers for a total of 9×11=99 dancers + the Master’s 9 dancers for a total of 108 dancers at a time. The most avatars I have seen on a sim is about 103 at one time.

A second method would be to embed the dance sequence into a Palette and rez 100 Palettes. This avoids the tedium of issuing and accepting invites.

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Meanwhile….back at the ranch…again…

There are 3 ways to assign groupings to avatars:

For simple small groups of 2 or 3 Invit-Order might be the preferred way:

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1 – Invite Order – this always assigns the HUD wearer to the 1st group. So for ecample if our Division is BAC then the HUD wearer would be assgined to Group B (sequence#2) and the 2nd person to accept an invite would be assigned to Group A (sequence#1), etc.

This is a quick and dirty method when you have 2 or 3 dancers in your group and say maybe only 2 groups, you the leader as group A and everyone else group B.  You can change the  Division assignment of the default assignment dynamcially by sending a Division command via *autofx

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2 – Troupe – this hard-assigns groups to avatars by their name/key. So if Mary is assgined Group D then she will perform sequence#4 until there is a GroupSetChange issued during mid-show. Mary can have more than one Group assigned but only ever one at a time.

Example:   Mary,(uuid),DBDA

Here we set an elaborate scheme to allow for 4 DivisionGroupChange alterations during our routine. Mary is assigned to Group D at the start then when DivisionGroupChange is 2, she will dance Group B. DivisionGroupChange 3 she would dance Group D again, and DivisionGroupChange 4 would be Group A. DivisionGroupChange is the command sent via *autofx to change the division assignments dynamically.

The good things about this method are:
1) Independent of invite-order
2) Does NOT require Palettes
3) If Palettes ARE used for other needs, Group assignments are unaffected. This allows for Sit-2-Sit Palette transfers without worry of dance-groups being affected.

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3 – Palette – this method is probably what you are used to. Group assignments based upon your relative position in the ‘line-up’. Each Palette has a letter in its name, A thru H. Divisions are assigned to those letters respectively. Assuming Palettes are laid out left to right A thru H.

So if you had 5 dancers and a Custom Group Division of say  CBABC, then Palette A would be assigned to Group C. Palette B would be assigned to Group B. Palette C would be assigned to Group A, etc.

ABCDE = Palettes
CBABC = Division

Here is a link to a video Aura: Easy As ABC – The Penguinettes
She uses CBABC as the Division and you can plainly see the 3 groups working independently mid-way thru the video.

And here is a write-up from Aura herself on the making of the video:
As Easy as ABC

did that demonstrates the Division CBABC. I forget which method, Troupe or Palette, that was used in this video but i recall we tested both in rehearsal satisfactorily.   UPDATE: She used the Troupe method.

You can change Palette-Division assignments dynamically for the Palette method as well by using the DivisionPaletteChange *autofx command.

 

There is another special command that simplifies group-swapping.

Advanced

ABOrder can flip the assignment of dance-sequences.

ABOrder = AB  (Default) means GroupA dances to Sequence1 and GroupB dances to Sequence2. But if you send an ABOrder dynamically in prior to the next dance change and its value is ABOrder= BA….then GroupA will dance sequence2 and GroupB will dance sequence1.

Same thing can ge done for Groups C & D.   ABOrder = CD and ABOrder = CD.  Of course you could accomplish the same by changing the division accordingly using the dynamic division commands learned above.

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Also new is a notification that an invite failed, even if the invitee accepted. It happens. While it won’t tell you who failed, you will know that you need to re-invite someone.

You can use the Rollcall to see who the HUD has successfully accepted and figure out who needs to be reinvited. There are also 2 other methods as double safety-checks as to which avatars the dancer-scripts believe the groups are assigned to. Rarely will you need this but they can be helpful diagnostics when an invitation fails.

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I hope you are now more comfortable knowing Artiste has a Grouping solution and are a bit more familiar with how it is implemented.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yes, Virginia, you can use the Artiste for that

A month or so ago, I decided to focus on learning/re-learning the Artiste HUD and associated products.

I’d used the Artiste before, both in its incarnation as the SILVER and as the GOLD.  I did a Christmas routine last year with the GOLD (which I’m hoping to revamp and share before the end of this year).

However, after that routine, I wasn’t dancing as much and so the Artiste was left to languish in my inventory.

This year, I began doing routines that were a hybrid – using the Artiste HUD and a different mover.  But I wanted to get to know this system a lot better – learn all the ins/outs, especially since I will be teaching classes on it in 2016.

So I set out to use the Artiste HUD and palette system exclusively for several routines.  I’m proud of how they turned out.

It took a bit of re-learning things I’d used before, as well as learning some new things, as Yummy is always adding new and fancy features.

I managed to find time this weekend to have my husband film one of the routines I created.

If you can’t see the embedded video, click the link here to watch it.

I wanted to see if I could accomplish all the same things with the Artiste that I could using various other products.

In this routine, I wanted to be able to chat commands, in order to fade the sets in/out.

I was going to be adding/removing items, including a costume change, as well as various particle effects.

I would be moving around the stage, so I needed a mover.

I was able to do everything I needed with just the Artiste HUD and the palette.

The HUD handled my dance sequence, my chat commands for fades and particle effects, as well as all of my costuming adds/removes.  If I had done emotes for this routine, it would have handled those as well.

The palette was used as a mover for this routine.

Using the Artiste does require you to do some thinking and planning up front.  I spent probably an hour or so planning out my costume changes and other add/remove items so that the changes would be as seamless as possible.

For those of you who have wondered what you can do with the Artiste system, I hope the video demonstrates what is possible.

And this isn’t even a very complicated routine!  One HUD, one palette, and a rezzer, and you too can make your imagination come to life. 😀

Sinners Burlesque Christmas Show

Last week I was fortunate enough to attend the Sinners Burlesque Christmas Show.

When I heard that Yummy was going to be onstage, I knew I couldn’t miss it.  And I’m glad I didn’t, because it was a great show!

The opening number was an adorable one, with the dancer in a snowglobe and penguins circling her.

So cute. 🙂

The next number was a group routine (I’ve lost my notes, so I don’t know the song, but it was very cute.)

The venue itself was decorated to the nines, including sleighs for the audience to sit in while they enjoyed the show.

And then, the number I’d been waiting for. 😀

Yummy was in a group number and it was spectacular!

Aura did a fabulous job with the choreography and I loved the costumes.

You can’t see him in the photo, but there was also an adorable polar bear who made a surprise appearance. 😛

The next routine was a solo number – a lovely ballet set in front of a Nativity scene.

After the ballerina, Aura took to the stage once again in a very jazzy, burlesque number, which I unfortunately did not get a picture of.

(I was too busy snooping around to see how she was working her magic.)

The final act of the show left everyone in the audience grinning.

Dancing (in reverse drag) to ‘Walkin’ ‘Round in Women’s Underwear’ (one of the vastly under-rated Christmas classics), it was an adorable number and a great end to the show.

If you haven’t been to a Sinners show, be sure to check them out.  Join the group to stay updated on their latest news.

Learning and Unlearning

As many of you know, earlier this year I opened the Kat & Mouse School of Performing Arts.

I’ve had an amazing time working with dancers who are eager to learn and grow in their craft and I can’t wait to do it again in 2016!

I am in the process of revamping some of my curriculum and adding new courses.  With the announcement of Yummy’s sale on pieces of the Artiste Suite, I will be adding classes on using the Artiste.

To that end, for the last month, I have concentrated on creating routines with the Artiste HUD and palette.  Yummy has added so many new features and functions that it was almost like starting over. 😀

It’s very easy to get up and dancing with the HUD, though some of the other features take a little longer to learn.

What I have discovered, both with the GOLD (current) version of the HUD, and the SILVER version (which I bought several years ago), is that because I have used other tools for so long, I have come to expect tools to behave in certain ways. Which means that, in learning to use the Artiste, I have sometimes had to ‘unlearn’ what I know.

Every dancer has preferred tools.  Though it seems like there is always some new ‘shiny’ becoming available, there are those who prefer to stay with what they know.  Why? Because ‘unlearning’ is uncomfortable for most people.

Is there anything wrong with using older tools?  No, of course not.  However, newer tools tend to take advantage of newer tech developments, which often means you can do more with less.

When I first started dancing, I used a HUD and had to manually click each dance.  Then I discovered that I could sequence my dances using note cards with the HUDDLES.  Then the Barre came along with its ability to do grouping.  Then SpotOn developed their mover, and followed it with various other products.

I admit, I am a bit of a tool junkie, and I’ve tried just about every dance tool in SL.  I, too, have my favorites.  Using my favorite tools, I can create a routine in a couple of hours.  However, doing so rarely pushes me outside of my comfort zone.

I want something that will help me to push myself to learn more and do more.  The Artiste has done that for me.  In fact, I look forward to working with it, because I know I have only scratched the surface of what I can do with it.

This pic is from a routine I created last year when I first got the GOLD version of the Artiste.  Looking back, I made this routine much harder than it could have been, because I was still ‘unlearning’ what I knew.

That said, it was my first true ‘all-Artiste’ routine and I am still proud of it. 😀

As a solo artist, the Artiste lets me do things I never thought were possible.  That is something to keep in mind, for those of who may be on the fence about purchasing yet another dance tool.

Every tool was designed for a purpose.  Every tool has its pros and cons.  If you are looking for a tool that will let you run huge group dances, the Artiste is not that tool.  If you are looking for a tool that will let you run everything manually, the Artiste is not that tool.

However, if you are looking for a tool that will let you shine as a solo performer, or a small group performer, the Artiste might just be the tool you’ve been looking for!

Tutorial #8: The Artiste Turn

Definition
A turn, using the Artiste mover system, is its own entity. A turn describes the direction that an object or seated avatar will be facing. It has no bearing on the direction of movement of the ob ject or seated-avarar. Movement is always from one marker to the next in a straight line.

Turns are a continuous uinteruppted motion. You do not need to create a turn using several discrete partial turns.

A move takes up its very own line-entry on a notecard to describ it.
A turn ALSO takes up its very own line-entry on a notecard to describe it.

Defining Characteristics
Turns essentially have 2 defining characterictics:

1. Number of degrees to rotate
2. Direction (Clockwise or Counterclockwise

Those are inherent.

Additional Artiste-Added Characteristics:
  1. Duration – the longer the duration, the slower the turn.
  2. Animation for Turn (optional) – SL has turn-animations
that work well
  3. Pause-After-Turn – (optional) this is
number of seconds to rest after a turn just like Duration
  4. Animation for Pause-After-Turns – (optional)

Turn Elimination
Using the marker system (Method #2) the Artiste assumes you want to do a turn after every move. You can instruct it not to turn (as in… do 2 moves in a row) by simply setting the duration of the turn to zero.

Turn Creation
The easiest way to create a turn is to simply
1) Edit a marker and rotate it physically, eyeballing it. Something you are          probably already used to.
 2) You can type in a number of degrees in the Edit-Object tab

You can also click on the marker to bring up a menu and then choose:1) 3)   3) TurnLeft (counter-clockwise) or
4) TurnRight (clockwise)  or
5) Type in a specific number of degrees .

Or

6) Press AutoRotate – and every marker will immediately rotate in the direction of the next marker. A timesaver for the majority of cases. You can of course tweak any of the turn-info after the AutoRotate

Pre-Move and Post-Move
An important distinction is that with Artiste turns, they happen AFTER the move. You might be used to turns happening BEFORE the move.

Our logic is that if you walk down the street, you want to look forward while you are walking and only turn the corner when you get to the actual corner. Not better or worse…just different.

Turn-While-Moving

I also included a special type of turn for visual variety…at your discretion. It is a turn-while-moving, feature. The turn will be gradual over the duration of the move so that the turn is complete when the move ends.

It is an all-or-nothing switch for a given Palette(mover). All turns will behave that way or none will behave that way. In this case you would not have an explicit turn. The turn is embedded and implied.

Adjusting
You can use the marker-menu to adust turn-related information or you can edit the notecard directly that contains the move/turn information.

Relative vs Absolute
FYI: Turns or rotations are “relative” to where the markers prior rotation and are not absolute degrees.

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NOTE: The Controller does NOT serve as an anitial marker and plays no part in defining the route, unlike some other systems you might be familiar with so as not to be confused.

Scale
A reminder that you have control over the size of markers generated by the Controller using the Scale line-entry

Saving Moves and Turns Back Into the Palette

There are 2 ways to save your designed route, unlike the single standard method of Copy and Paste chat-output.

1) DumpMoves –  Pressing the DumpMoves button on the Controller will translate the markers movement and rotations into local owner-only chat so you can then copy and paste it into a notecard in the Palette. This is the standard way. You changes will be permanent after you save the notecard and will surive a Palette Reset. Simply Reset your Palette and then test it tracing your route with the press of one button.

2) UpdatePalett  – We have added as 2nd time-saver method of saving your moves and turns into the Palette. Press the UpdatePalett button and the moves and turns are sent directly tot he Palette. Same results as copying and pasting but without taxing your manual labor.

The only caveat is that your changes are temporary and last as long as the Palette is NOT Reset, else your changes revert back to what was hard-coded for moves prior, if any were at all. This speeds up testing quickly by saving time, allowing you to make several quick minor tweaks and testing them without extra labor and also reduces possible copy/paste errors.

Level of Effort

How Fast and Easy Can You Actually Create a New Route?

1) Press RezMarkers – Choose number of markers to rez
2) Press UpdatePalett
3) Done!

Test your route pressing one button on Palette.

OR

A more practical approach would be:

1) Press RezMarkers  – Choose number of markers to rez
or
1) Press AddMarker – reposition and rerotate each marker
2) Press AutoRotate
3) Adjust specific Durations of  the moves
4) Press UpdatePalett or press DumpMoves & Copy/Paste, save & reset
3) Done!

Test your route pressing one button on Palette.

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I think this is enough to wet your appetite and familiarize yourself enough with the Movement system so that you are not as intimidated by its ‘newness’ or ‘different-ness’.

There are 8 ways to learn or re-learn what has been presented in these tutorials as well as with new material not covered.

Ways to Learn
  1) This Ongoing Tutorial
2) Kat’s Classes – Tailored for new users & users from other systems
3) The Manuals – in-depth coverage
4) Demo Videos & Live Show Videos
5) Friendly User Group
6) BlogSite
7) WebSite
8) One-On-One assistance from me.