I've mentioned before in scripting that i was working on a way to easily animate a mesh in Unity (what's Unity3D?), and... it is done! How this works?

• You make your mesh just like normal, building, setting UV texturing, Even boning and animating.
• You then make a copy of the base neutral mesh and reshape it so what you need. (normal face into a smiling face)
• You then use the blender script to make a color Diff map in the vertex color data of the mesh, and then using baking to render that into a UV texture.
• Do this for each new shape.

Then, you...

Nice tip from Chris at ReactionGrid about some 3D collaboration tools that seem to be heading in a good direction. IL Immersive Collaboration by Jeff Lowe is a small set of tools (now) that help people make the most of being in a virtual space to do project stuff. 

Chris poses the same question I always wonder: "When people come to me talking about work in 3D, I can almost guarantee I'll hear the word "PowerPoint" in the first paragraph. What is it about this particular tool and why do they want it in 3D?" Powerpoint is so 1990's -- at least use photoshop! But clearly people struggle to express their ideas (err.. when they actually have some worth sharing). Getting to good ideas is much more exciting, albeit harder work.

Still from "Avatar" which promises to rock our 3D worlds Sam Worthing plays Sully who plays one of these tall elf-like warriors

 What is an avatar anyway? Kinda like the Matrix on purpose? Trailer for the upcoming "Avatar" film from James Cameron promise "a heroic battle to save civilization." Looks a little counter-culture to me, but wtf do I know. Doesn't seem like you can hit "appearance" so easily in this virtual world as imagined by "Titantic" director James Cameron. Also he made "the Abyss" which had some cool enough aliens and deep water scenes.

Sophie Yates at Profile Magazine Today has written a review on King Tut Virtual, spicing it up with a neat machinima. Miss Yates says this is the first time she saw this level of visual imagery quality with objects in this virtual world. Yeey! More friendly words: "I really saw the 3D effect there and the interaction for the viewer that was provided was very well done."

"There are quit a few good exhibits going on now but this ones the best 3D, interactive one that really demonstrates how in the future virtual worlds like SL can be applied to so many other subjects either it be history, in the medical field or in the classroom."

Read more by Sophie Yates and watch the machinima at Profile Magazine Today.

Okay, Universal data exchange seems to still elude us all. Moving virtual items into formats we want should be simple, but are evilly difficult.

For example, if I want to export my avatar from SL and use it in Blender 3D (or another 3d program of your choice), there is no 'export avatar' option. Nothing to get a UV textured mesh out of SL and into anything else. I can't take my build and export it so I can add lighting and see it in soft diffuse shadows.

While I understand that it's in the best interest of the person running a virtual world to keep people in that world, I am still disappointed at these limits, and want to move past them.

My question is, does anyone else know of ways to get SL content into 3^rd party engines?
(Ways easier than loading special drivers that allow the rough ripping of whatever I'm looking at using GL scanning?)

Anything would be a godsend...