Troubleshooting Avatar Appearance

TABLE OF CONTENTS

• My avatar looks like a particle cloud
• My avatar appears discolored or misshapen
• Additional helpful techniques

My avatar looks like a particle cloud

In the Second Life Viewer version you appear as a particle cloud while your avatar is loading. This may also happen when your avatar fails to completely load, which can be due to normal network behavior or if some information about you gets lost on the way from one place to another. Don't worry, you aren't stuck this way forever! Often, logging out and logging back in again will resolve the problem.

(You may sometimes hear people refer to an incompletely loaded avatar as "Ruth" or "being Ruthed" for historical reasons.)

If logging out and logging in again do not help, you can try some of the following steps:

• First, save your current outfit if you have not already done so. See Saving your avatar's appearance with outfits in the Knowledge Base for more information on how to do that.
• Set your avatar to one of the Second Life default Avatars from the Avatar > Complete Avatars menu.
  • Once the default avatar loads, begin to attach your preferred items (like mesh bodies, clothing attachments, custom body parts, etc) one at a time. 
  • You can use the Outfit you created as a starting point, but avoid attaching everything at once (via the 'Wear Outfit' command) -- adding content one at a time helps the avatar have time to load properly.

If the above method doesn't help, you can try adjusting your graphics settings so that your avatar is easier for your viewer to display correctly. To update your preferences:

1. Choose Me > Preferences > Graphics.
2. Move the Quality & Speed slider to the left (a lower/Faster setting).
3. Move the Draw distance slider to the left.
4. Click the Advanced Settings button.
5. Move the Detail slider under the Avatars section to Low.

My avatar appears discolored or misshapen

If your avatar appears in strange, unintended colors or shows spikes, bumps, or other unsightly protrusions coming out of its body, check your graphics card to make sure it is supported and that the drivers are up to date. Learn more about graphics cards on our Knowledge Base.

Additional helpful techniques

Try these from the top until one works:

• Quit and restart the Second Life Viewer (also called "relogging").
• Right-click yourself and choose Edit Outfit Parts (don't save anything). In the AVATAR window, click the Back (<) button, or close the window out.
• Rebake textures by following these steps:
  1. Choose Me > Preferences > Advanced.
  2. Select Show Advanced Menu and click OK.
  3. In the menu at the top of the viewer, select Advanced > Rebake Textures (Ctrl+Alt+R).
• Open your Inventory and enter a character (like a) in the Filter Inventory field. The number of items displayed in the top left of the INVENTORY window will increase as the servers fetch your inventory. Wait until the number stops increasing (this might take some time, depending on how much stuff you have), then relog.
• Re-wear your normal shape, skin, clothes, and attachments. This step is much easier if you are using a pre-existing saved outfit, but remember not to save anything before your avatar is restored!
• Clear the Second Life Viewer's cache.
• Use the avatar picker to access and wear a default avatar. Go to Avatar > Complete Avatars and choose from an extensive collection of vampires, humans, animals, robots and vehicles. You can then add your preferred custom content from this default 'clean slate' to restore your preferred look.

Don't see what you need here? Check out our expanded Knowledge Base article!