WHAT ARE THEY?

Sculptured prims are often a single custom prim that can have a very unique shape and yet only be a single prim.  They are made by offline programs or very complex online programs that can deal with complex three dimensional mapped surfaces.  While that may seem too technical, what it really means is that complex shapes are possible.  And yes, if you can have one complex sculptured prim, you could also combine several of them and do an extremely complex design with few prims.

Why few prims?  More on this by clicking here.  But basically SL charges monthly fees based on the amount of land you use, but in a way, also on the number of prims (objects) you have on your land.  That is because land can only have so many prims because of the time and energy it takes the second life computers (servers) to draw them.  So you can get more out of your second life experience and yet spend less if you get into low prim, or even sculptured prim technology and products.

SEEING SCULPTURED PRIMS AT FURTHER DISTANCES

Sculptured prims are becoming more and more prevalent in Second Life, and yes, the software people are aware of it and trying to ensure you see the right shape at a better distance. Later versions of Second Life, such as 1-23 and later we are told do better with sculptured prims than earlier versions. However, if you are an expert, this next item can also be quite helpful. Enable "Advanced" in your pull down menus high on your screen if you have not already done so. Then under "Advanced", find "debug Settings". A window should open on the bottom of your screen. Type the following in the box (or highlight and copy and transfer it there):

RenderVolumeLODFactor

If you set this to a value of "4" or higher, that also may help viewing sculptured prims at a distance. Note that it might take a minute for the change to take effect and you may need to move your avatar to help it. Of course this works best for faster computers, and be careful, it may slow down older or slower computers. However, it worked great in our fast computer, and even did quite well on our very slow portable. The old value seems to be 1.125 if you need to return to the previous value and it slowed your computer too much. In general better vision usually means slower response so you might find that happening. But in our cases, even with our slow portable, this seemed a better SL experience.

Second Life Limitations and Problems