Evolving Spaces

If you create tools and environments, especially for virtual worlds, I would recommend these two quick posts.

I have a great respect for anyone who can create an immersive environment. Doing so requires an empathic and critical understand of human senses and motivation. How do all the little pieces come together and create a scene that envelopes the viewer and makes them part of it?

I have a great respect for those designers that do this so completely as to ply the user into playing a part. I have been to theme parks and watched people's behavior change as they move from one environment to another. I have been to themed events (conventions, parties, etc) and watch how the space chosen draws the person to become a character. This is especially notable in those that don't RP.

In Second Life, a new viewer feature enables you to share windlight settings, which has a huge impact on creating a sense of place. Caer Firnas in perpetually shrouded in an early morning hush, changing to hazy and dim twilight in the forgotten little cemetery. Above, Port Morgan drifts at the cloudtops, feeling the first rays of morning warm the frosted metal hulls and chilled canvas. It was meant to feel like an old cemetery in morning: a place of quiet that has an unseen life of its own.


At least, that is what is seems to aspire to...