The Google SketchUp Thread

[finescalerr]

The wheels now are more consistent with the rest of the rendering. Thank you. Nice job. -- Russ

[JohnP]

Ed, I used meshlab with my TurboCAD output for a 3-D print job. It worked well.

Please post detail shots of your bridge assembly. I want to see the 1:48 rivet resolution. Have you had this type of stuff printed before?

Thanks, John

[eTraxx]

John. Nope. Nothing with the 'detail' of the rivets. I'm curious to see whether it will print well enough. The biggest problem with the lower-resolution (but affordable) printers seems to be the layer depth. I just took a photo of a column for my coke oven .. trying .. to get a good look at the detail. This was printed in FUD by Shapeways .. so you can get an idea. The mortar lines are .008" wide



Here's a close-up of that pic .. best I could do

[JohnP]

For brick and stone a little texture and a small roughness on the edge of a course should be OK. A smooth surface with hemispherical shapes will be different. And that depends on how magnified any viewing will be. Spray filling and abrasive smoothing are probably out as rework options on riveted surfaces.

Anyway back to .skp. Thanks for the photos!
John

[Ray Dunakin]

I've been experimenting with Sketchup a little, trying to make an accurate drawing of a miner's cabin while learning to use the software. It's slow going. (But then I've never yet seen any software that was as quick and easy as using paper, T-square and a triangle.) Anyway... this software seems to have some odd quirks.

For instance, zooming. As far as I can tell, the only way to zoom in is select the zoom tool and "wave" it across the screen several times, then select the "pan" tool and try to drag the drawing around until you can see the area you wanted to zoom in on -- what a PITA! Why can't you just click on the area you want to zoom, and have that spot centered in the screen?? Is there actually some way to do this that I just haven't discovered yet?

[eTraxx]

Ray. I don't know whether you have a PC or Mac or .. even if that makes a diff (understand mouse is diff on a Mac)

But .. on a PC

(1) I have a mouse with a scroll wheel center of the mouse. That zooms in and out depending on the direction you move the scroll wheel. Holding the scroll down as a button allows orbiting. Hold the shift key down and press the scroll and you can pan.
(2) When the Zoom is selected .. magnification glass thingie .. double-click a point to center on screen (PC)

Me .. I never use the Mag icon .. just the scroll wheel and shift key

[EZnKY]

Anyone working in CAD and/or 3D visualization software needs a multi-button mouse with a scroll wheel!  Mac or PC.  It'll be the best money you invest in the adventure.

[W.P. Rayner]

Yes, a multi-function mouse or trackball (my personal favourite) is essential. In the more advanced CAD and imaging programs, the scroll wheel (if properly set up) will zoom the screen in or out relative to the position of the cursor. No other key stroke is required. Just position the cursor over the portion of the drawing you want to zoom in on and spin the scroll wheel until you reach the magnification or view you need.

Paul

[marc_reusser]

Thought this might be of interest to someone. I downloaded and installed a new (to me) rendering plug-in for SketchUp, called Maxwell Render. It works directly in SU.

http://www.maxwellrender.com/index.php/maxwell_for_google_sketchup

The attached image is a side-by-side comparison of the original SU image, and the Maxwell rendered image. Note that this render was done right out of the box, no testing, no reading the manual, no assigning materials,....only slight adjustment in the sharpness/output settings...then basically just click the button and let it do it's thing.

Its not Rhino, or 3D studio or such, but I think the results are decent, and can likely only be made better once I learn how to use it. The other nice thing is that there is a free downloadable version...or you can get  the full version for $95.

[mad gerald]

... Note that this render was done right out of the box, no testing, no reading the manual, no assigning materials,....only slight adjustment in the sharpness/output settings...then basically just click the button and let it do it's thing.

... not bad, man ... 
(still involved in the struggle with Inventor, due to a lack of time)

Cheers

[W.P. Rayner]

Yes, for the price, that's fairly decent. Keyshot will also work with Sketchup 7 and 8 files, though it is 10x the price.

Paul

[marc_reusser]

Heres another test run with the Maxwell program (free version), on an old project piece (simple stained plywood and marble reception desk for a small hair salon). This time I added some materials to the SU image to be rendered. After the render was done, the image was imported into photoshop, where the text, and a slight shadow halo at the upper corners was added using a PS plug-in.

[W.P. Rayner]

That's acceptable and fairly decent for a free render app. Does it provide any options concerning shadows, reflections, ambient occlusion, light colour and balance?

Paul

[marc_reusser]

I now bought the pay version, and that comes with access to a library of .mxm material files.  It appears the base mapping/image jpgs for these can be used as materials/surfaces in the SU drawing, and can then be adjusted insofar as surface quality and smoothness, texture, luminance, transparency, etc...etc, in the program. Each material and color can be individually adjusted for these qualities...you can also ajust the rendering paramaters, output quality, size, resolution etc.

So far I have really not done much but the very, very basics with it, just to see if I wanted to pay for it, so I cant say if it does all the things you are asking about. I need to read the manual, check the tips on the forum, etc.

I am quite happy with the results I have gotten to this point.....I don't plan to always use this  (as I dont think all things look better, or communicate an idea/concept better, when perfectly rendered), it's just another nice presentation tool/option to have. I wanted a rendering program because I thought it was the right presentation medium, to do some basic renderings for a current project, like the rough test attached below.

One thing that is important, is the more small detail and accuracy you add/create in the SU image...the more believable the rendering will look.


M

[W.P. Rayner]

Looks quite adequate for basic tests Marc, showing interplay of volumes, materials and textures in space in a manner that can be easily interpreted by the client. Maxwell has a huge library (user contributed) of materials at http://resources.maxwellrender.com/visual_catalog.php?t=#page=1. I've done a little work with Maxwell Render Suite and Maxwell Studio but so far, it hasn't met my needs and doesn't play well with Autodesk projects. As time allows I hope to work with it some more as I do like some of the options available in their primary product.

You are correct, perfection is in the details (as any scale modeller will attest), but perhaps more important to the rendering process is the lighting environment and therein lies the major challenge with any rendering program. It's very easy to get wrong, but quite difficult to get right.  

Paul