There are several ways to show presentations in Second Life. The methods are outlined here.
In-world Images: Create images of slides which can be uploaded and used within Second Life directly.
Media URL: Use URLs for the content to be shown, whether it is an image, movie or any web page.
Webcast: Use a web accessible program or script to display content on a single dynamically updated webcast URL. Changing the content can be done by a presenter using a control web page, or tools in-world that make the changes. [ Demonstration PowerPoint Show: audience, presenter ] [ Demonstration Dynamically Set URL: audience, presenter ]
Screencast: Arrange for a computer screen (the whole desktop, a specific application window or a selected rectangular area) to be fed into a video streaming system. e,.g. using Telestream's "Wirecast" and their "Desktop Presenter" programs, and then use the resulting stream as a media URL in Second Life.
Notes
- Second Life only permits one "media texture" which can be a URL in any Quicktime compatible format using http:// or rtsp:// protocols for video/audio file or live or recorded streamed video/audio. [Opensim is more capable in ths respect]
- Objects in-world (such as a screen or presenter console) can be programmed to change the media URL in any area, so long as it has appropriate ownership and permisisons.
- Images can be uploaded at a cost of $L10 each time (File -> Upload Image). Bulk upload with a single command is possible (File -> Bulk Upload). The images can be used on posters, or on screens that allow next and previous sdelectiosn to be made.
- Resolution can be quite high, but file sizes and media stream bandwidth can then mean it is unacceptably slow to load for some users.
- Images in world are resized to a power of 2 on each side,a nd if not already a power of 2 will be rounded down to the nearest one. So a 1024x768 image will become 1024x512. Larger images take longer to load for all users, so try to use a size sufficient for the content rather than having all slides be very large. The images keep their aspect ratyio when put on a suitably sized screen or object. So use for exmaple a 4:3 ratio image resized to 512x512 as a good target.
- The Freeview script by CrystalShard Foo in Second Life is freely available as a basis for media presentors in Second Life. Later modifications by Raina Andel 04-16-09 can relay Youtube videos, etc. [ Available on XstreetSL ] [ Freeview Help ]
- PowerPoint slides can be saved into an image format via File -> Save As -> and select "Save as type" to be one of the image formats. E.g. PNG and JPG can be uploaded to Second Life.
- Consider use of Scribd (http://www.scribd.com) for uploading and sharing Powerpoint, PDF, etc. Formats Suppported: http://support.scribd.com/forums/35566/entries/25092
Converting Rich HTML Web Pages into Simple Image Files
- Web pages with richer content than can be displayed directly within Second Life as a media URL can be transformed to a simple image via a range of web services.
- E.g. the service at http://pici.picidae.net/ can produce PNGs from URLs. More details at http://www.picidae.net. Example URL for a direct translation as a demomstration is http://pici.picidae.net/browse.php?c=0&f=&u=http://www.aiai.ed.ac.uk
Handling YouTube Videos
Youtube videos are normally played badck in web pages usign Flash. This cannot (yet) be handled via the media URL and playback mechanism in Second Life which essentially are Quciktime Player compatible formats, and a simple web renderer (based on a Mozilla library). Hence, Youtube screens in Second Life usually use MP4 versions of the Youtube videos, some of which are stored at youtube, or some are converted and used from the conversion URL. E.g. using http://www.youtubemp4.com just use the Youtube video code as follows:
Handling Flickr Images
Flickr images and all Flickr images with a given tag or category are usually presented via a URL fetched from Flickr or an intermediate service and used as the Second Life media URL.
See for example: http://www.freeslscripts.gendersquare.org/communication/45-images/34-flickr-screen.html
A default image that may be suitable when not showing a specific image is: http://www.flickr.com/images/flickr_logo.gif (or http://www.flickr.com/images/flickr_logo_gamma.gif.v1.2 )
Screencasting via Telestream Wirecast and Desktop Presenter
Telestream's Desktop presenter is a small application which runs on a PC or Mac, and allows a full screen or selected window to be relayed to Wirecast (a commercially licenced product) for onwards streaming via its built in streaming mechanism, via your own streaming server, or via a range of commercial or freely available streaming services. When Ddesktop Presenter runs, it needs firewall port 7272 to be open for inward connections on the system whose screen will be relayed. The URL used within Wirecast for the relay is http://IP address of presenter computer:7272
- Desktop Presenter (freely available) and Wirecast (broadcasts are watermarked and H.264 codec only operates for 30 days) is available at: http://www.telestream.net (you have to create a username/password to get in to their downloads page).
- Also available at: http://www.telestream.net/update-check/wirecast/wirecast-update-main.htm
- Local copy of the freely available Desktop Presenter is available for PC (.exe) and Mac (.dmg) via http://openvce.net/resources/wirecast/
