Saturday, December 10, 2016

Are Rigged/Fitmesh Items Impossible to Mod?

 No. There's plenty of ways you can mod rigged/fitmesh items. Stop making them no-mod.


 Ok, so there's this trend going around where content creators are making their rigged mesh items no-mod, explaining that since you can't resize or reposition rigged mesh, there's no point to it being mod. We're going to put this misinformation to bed and explain why content creators should not be releasing rigged/fitmesh content as no-mod.

First: Resizing and repositioning are not all there is to modding. They're not even half of what there is to modding. Here's a list of ways you can mod rigged mesh.

  • Adding scripts
  • Removing scripts
  • Retexturing 
  • Tinting the colour
  • Adding custom materials
  • Adding custom alpha masks
  • Changing the objects alpha textures from "blended" to "masked"
  • Making parts fullbright
  • Removing fullbright
  • Linking the object to others so you use fewer attachment points
  • Unlinking parts to use individually
  • Renaming

 This isn't even a complete list. As you can see, resizing and repositioning barely scratch the surface of what it means for an object to be moddable in Second Life. Every single piece of rigged mesh clothing, every single rigged mesh hairpiece and bodypart I own is modded in some way or another.

 Here are some specific examples of how I've personally modded rigged/fitmesh items:
  • Replaced multiple 1024x1024 textures on a hair piece with custom 256x256 textures.
  • Changed the alpha textures on hair from "blended" to "masked" to solve a variety of rendering issues.
  • Scripted fitmesh shirts to change my shape, physics and add/detach nipples when worn/removed. 
  • Added custom materials to mesh body.
  • Fixed issues with a mesh head caused by the applier leaving alpha skin texture as "blended" by switching it to "masked" manually.
  • Linked multiple rigged/fitmesh items together to be worn as a single attachment.
  • Removed the unused clothing layers from my mesh body to greatly reduce my draw weight.
So whenever you hear someone claim "rigged/fitmesh cannot be modified anyway" you set them straight and tell them that's just not true.

 Another explanation I've heard for making rigged mesh no-modify is to protect it from content thieves. The problem with that explanation is that making something no-mod offers no protection whatsoever from content theft. None. It's not even an inconvenience. The tools they use to steal content don't care what permissions the content has.

 So there you have it. There is no reason to sell rigged/fitmesh content no-mod. None. It provides no benefit to the creator, and it only has downsides for the customer. If you are a content creator who sells no-mod hair, bodies, clothing, I just want you to ask yourself, "Why am I selling these items no mod? Is there a reason, or is it just habit? Am I just doing it because everyone else seems to?"

 If you're a customer, I want to encourage you to support those content creators who do release moddable rigged/fitmesh content and I want you to encourage more content creators to do the same.