David Daniel is an architect and the manager director of design at Starbucks. David learned about SketchUp from Kathmandu and after that he only uses SketchUp. Starbucks design studio is collaborating with SketchUp.

Designs

In Miami David had to review and approve many designs. In that year his team members executed over 1400 designs. So, it was really tough job for him. On that moment some of his team members brought him some black and white two-dimensional visuals. At that point David insisted that everyone had to use SketchUp for modelling and painting in textures and surfaces so that he could approve designs with more confidence.

After that the Miami studio designed more beautifully and hosted a design charrette every week. The team member’s co-author five or six core stores in a day, figured out the spatial design, palette and flavor in the SketchUp. After testing the workflow David got the Latin America studio by using SketchUp, New York and Dallas.

The team members of David carried out the site surveys and created the building shell in Revit. The whole team exported that model into SketchUp and carried out all the interior architecture designs in SketchUp. It also included colors, materials, furniture, futures and fitting. They created three-dimensional schematic design and after that they handed over to the Architects of Record.

Every store is the third place to the company and the customers. Parameters are different every time so each store has to be unique. Though they have some principles that are really very important. After finding the building if the space has any brick walls and some surfaces are distressed then they want to celebrate the envelope, and not covering up a bunch of staff. This shell also provides an envelope that is able to host to hero of the space: the coffee bar.

10 Waverly Place is a reserve bar. It is a special store with a coffee experience. We prepare and brew coffee in a way that is pretty good. We have a Black Eagle machine, a Siphon. This is which a Harry-Potter-like brew is. We are also able to offer our customers cold brews on tap. The building was an existing building with a white terrazzo floor.

This floor is happened to be in the same color range as the flagship store, The Roastery, in Seattle. So, they preserved and resurfaced that, and kept the existing brick walls and also commissioned some hand-drawn custom maps and artwork.

One functionality of SketchUp is style builder. The way it can tweak the default style for achieving a hand-drawn, warm, and finish, that helps the whole team to portray a range of design aesthetics across the stores.

The team used impressive selection of materials. They created that material from photos and scan of the standard catalog. The Miami studio creates a library with the standard materials and the whole team shares the library with other Starbucks studios. The materials outside of the standard palette are made per project.

Shortcuts

Shortcuts are very important for the workflow. David Daniel has favorite and most frequently used custom shortcuts like

• M = Materials
• C = Components
• L= Layers.

Some places like 10 Waverly Place, Brookfield Place, and Broadway & 9th reserve bars have just opened across Manhattan.

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This is very useful for 3D designers. It is not just for interior designers and architects. The method can also be applied to video game design, civil engineering, mechanical engineering, and more. For Example, The Move tool in SketchUp can also use as a Copy tool. Extrusion is also possible with Push & Pull when you use a modifier. Trimble wants to reduce the number of clicks you make, speed up 3D thinking, and make undoing as easy as possible.

Unit Translation for Live Components

SketchUp Labs continues to develop Live Components into an even more powerful tool. Additionally, Live Component parameter values will now display in the same unit format as your SketchUp model. As a result, it is much quicker to enter a measurement into a Live Component parameter than using the Tape Measure tool.

New Look Extension Menu

We should give some attention to the extensions menu. This menu heading will always be visible whether extensions are installed or not. You can also access developer tools from here. It’s not a requirement that developers put extensions on the Extension menu, but it is best practice.

Pre-lock Interfaces

Some SketchUp tools offer pre-locking of drawing planes and inference directions. Those features are now available for other tools in this release. Now, you can lock the inference direction for the Line, Tape Measure, and Move tools before clicking.

Modifier Toggles

The most defining change is the addition of toggle keyboard controls that allow you to turn tool modifiers on and off. In this way, fewer tools will require press-and-hold modifier interactions, resulting in better modeling results and, therefore, more efficient use.

If you examine the cursor or on-screen modeling behavior of the tool, you can identify which modifiers are available for a given tool in the Status Bar. It is easier to switch tool states before you complete an operation when more modifiers behave as toggles.

Sticky Modifier

The Multi-operation tool state is now persistent. The user will be able to make multiple copies of an object with Move or hide batches of edges more easily with Eraser across multiple view changes.

Push & Pull Polishing

Since SketchUp was released, Stretch has existed in the Status Bar and Push & Pull cursor but was never referenced or treated as a modifier state. It is especially useful at the earliest stages of form development to stretch a face perpendicular to its drawing plane. Faces can only stretch if adjacent faces are convex to them.

Lay-Out Improvements

SketchUp introduces a faster way to set the size of a viewport in 2021.1. The Camera tab of the model panel lets you type in the size you want. Lay-Out’s ability to find SketchUp viewports was modestly improved in a January update. It’s ready to be updated if you haven’t done so yet.

Export & Classification of IFC4

It is common to exchange IFC files as part of large construction projects. IFC 4 classifications and export capabilities are now available in SketchUp, as are IFC 2×3 schemas and formats. The result is an extremely efficient collaborative process.

Improved Performance on big mesh Extension

Extensions, for example, create or manipulate large areas of geometry. The generation of a large mesh in SketchUp will certainly take longer. Although these operations might make a good reason to make another cup of coffee, SketchUp’s API is now generating large meshes with an order-of-magnitude improvement inefficiency. The improvement is especially noticeable once you reach meshes with more than 20,000 polygons.

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SketchUp’s interface is relatively uncomplicated for first-time users. Trying to understand the basics of 3D modeling software isn’t that complicated because there aren’t so many tools out there. SketchUp provides intuitive tools and enables users to navigate the program easily, so it’s simple to grasp the basics and create simple 3D printable models within the first few hours.

System Requirements of SketchUp 2021 for PC

1. Operating systems: Windows 10 or higher
2. A processor with a clock speed of 2 GHz or higher is recommended
3. It is recommended to have at least 8 GB of RAM
4. The graphics card must be a 3D class graphics card with 1 GB of memory or more and should support OpenGL 3.1 or higher.

Make Use of SketchUp2021 for free before Purchasing

There is currently only a web app version of SketchUp available for free. You can use SketchUp’s free trial version to find out whether it will work for your workflow and intended use. You can also familiarize yourself with the software’s interface and mechanics by making use of the various tools. Following that, you can either proceed with one of the other options or purchase the full version, but by then, you should have an idea of whether you want the full version. After your trial period is over, you can upgrade to the full version of SketchUp with a license. For the latest desktop version, personal users will have to pay $300 a year.

Key Reason for Choosing SketchUp 2021

Many millions of people use SketchUp to design 3D models. This has led to its popularity as the most popular 3D design tool in the world. Despite the fact that SketchUp is not available for free, you can download a free trial version and test it out. In the following paragraphs, you will find some key reasons why you should use SketchUp 2021.

New components of Sketch2021

SketchUp 2021 will introduce the components. Essentially, this new feature will open up an infinite number of possibilities for the future. SketchUp gives you the ability to create 3D models with ease and without sacrificing creativity. For those in a hurry to complete their model, it is an ideal place to find ready-made components. The SketchUp repository contains a variety of 3D models such as furniture, cars, plants, landscape architecture, houses, doors, people, windows, kitchens, stairs, stadiums, play areas, musicians, a temple, and a soccer stadium. It is our job to look at a 3D design and analyze which components are most usable, as well as which features are essential. You can download the models and add them to your SketchUp image.

3D Modeling

As you modify the controls and deselect them, the model viewing window updates in real-time. You can preview the final result in SketchUp before publishing it by adjusting the settings on these controls in dispatch. After the live component adjustments are complete, you can download the SKP file to your computer. It is possible to insert that SKP file into SketchUp 2021 to use those components.

Final Thoughts

The original owner of SketchUp was Google, but Trimble eventually acquired it. SketchUp is the most user-friendly free 3D modeling program you can find online. 3D drawing does not require the use of dozens of tools. All you need is a canvas and an idea. The 3D and 2D models you create with SketchUp are easy to edit. In addition to creating 3D objects, SketchUp can use to design structures and interiors for video games.

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SketchUp is useful right from the initial phases of the design to the completion of the project. We’ve compiled some of the best plugins will have a detailed discussion about them and their uses in 3d Modelling.

How to Install Sketchup Plugins

Once you’ve downloaded a .RBZ file from the innerwebs save it to where SketchUp can find it. By default, that location is your Sketchup/Tools folder. In older versions of SketchUp you’ll need to use your Sketchup/Plugins folder.

After your file is in that folder, close and restart Sketchup.

When you reopen SketchUp your plugin will initialize. Depending on the plugin, using its functions may vary.

Edge Tools

ThomThom’s handy palette of edge-related tools saves you time in multiple ways, enabling quick simplification of imported DWG site plans, the ability to split a face into multiple planes, and – most significantly – highlighting of imperfections so you can clean up your model in a flash of seconds.

Simplify Contours Tool

This Plugin allows you to select the topographic lines (Contours) and simplify them as much as you want/need. If you’re original topographic lines were splines in AutoCAD this is definitely a must, for your model.

Purge All

Purges’ your model of unused Components, Layers, Tags, Materials and Styles: its dialog makes each type optional: there is also an optional closing Report showing numbers, or a Log file also listing the names of the purged items.

Clean Up

A superb plugin to remove unnecessary coplanar edges and clean up imported geometry. This SketchUp extension can also be used to:

Fix duplicate component definition names (when in model scope)

• Purge unused items
• Erase hidden geometry

Angular Dimension

Angular dimension helps you measure the right angle. his tool comes under the features of marking dimensions in SketchUp. Whenever you need to mark a distance and angle in your model, linear dimension and angular dimension prove to be very useful.

Section Cut Face

If you are looking for a plugin to create your section slices in SketchUp you are in the right place. This plugin will create a group of the section cut you select and fill it up automatically.

Sketchy FFD

It is an exclusive SketchUp extension that includes a control cage to an object facilitating the mesh to be operated through control points.

QuadFace Tools

It’s an organic Modelling extension that allows you to create organic shapes. What it does is smooth out geometry to make it look more organic. The reason this is important is that it works best with shapes that are made out of quads, or 4 sided pieces of geometry.

LSS Matrix

It is an extension of Sketchup, which allows advanced copying of groups and component instances.

Mirror

This extension helps to select objects by picking 1/2/3 points to define a point/line/plane: then choose to Keep/Delete the original objects.

Fredo6: Bezier Spline

This extension draws a variety of Polylines, Bezier, and Spline curves, all in 3D. Version 2.1a fixes issues related to icon size.

Weld

Weld allows you to join multiple connected edges, curves, and arcs.

Selection Toys

Selection Toys is a set of commands to manipulate selections. Filter out particular geometry based on edge, faces, groups, and components. An extensive suite of tools that allows you to customize your toolbar as you wish using the UI Settings using Tools > Selection Toys > UI Settings.

Curviloft

Curviloft is a script dedicated to Loft and Skinning, that is, the generation of surfaces from contours. Loft by Spline joins separate contours, open or closed, by smooth splines. Loft along Path joins contours, along a given rail curve. Skinning creates surfaces bounded by 4 or 3 contiguous contours.

Soap and Bubble

The free plugin gives modelers the ability to easily create a multi-faceted face inside of a closed group of three or more lines. It’s as simple as selecting the lines, starting up the plugin, telling it how many faces you want the new face to have, and then sit back to watch it work its magic. The plugin also lets to inflate or deflate the new face after it has been created.

FredoScale

FredoScale is a plugin for Sketchup, Programmed by Fredo6, for Interactively applying a number of geometric transformations, such as Scaling, Tapering, Stretching, Plane Shear, Twisting, Bending, and Rotation.

With FredoScale one can orientate the selection box around a set of objects and interactively apply a number of geometric transformations, such as Scaling, Tapering, Stretching, Plane Shear, Twisting, Bending, and Rotation. By extension, some transformations can be done without a selection box.

Random Push Pull

Randomly Push Pull faces to a min and max value

CLF Shape Bender

Create a shape to bend. It must be a group or a component. Then select a single horizontal (red axis) line to use as the base for bending. Then select the curve that the shape will bend to match. Wait for it to think, then it will show a grid and preview of where your object is going to transform to. Press the Up-Arrow key to toggle the orientation of the bend.

Access the plugin via Plugins > Chris Fullmer Tools > Shape Bender, or there is a Shape Bender toolbar.

Multiple Offsets

As you start working with more advanced shapes in SketchUp, sometimes you need the ability to offset multiple faces at once, or the ability to offset edges multiple times with the same tool. This plugin allows you the ability to do both of these things.

Joint Push or Pull

Joint Push Pull is an extension from Fredo6 that contains a number of tools to expand the face extrusion functions in SketchUp. Practically, this means that you can now push pull multiple and curved surfaces within SketchUp. In addition, tools like Vector Push Pull allow you to extrude the footprint of a curved surface into a flat shape, and more!

Conclusion

The tools and plugins listed above are only the ones we believe are the most important or interesting to know for any user who wants to get started. One thing is for sure: For whatever project is there in hand there’s a SketchUp tool that can solve it in a highly efficient way.

The post Top Amazing SketchUp Plugins for dynamic 3D Modelling appeared first on SketchUpFamily.

Lighting Design

Lighting design plays a key role in creating the right mood and adjusting the ambiance of interior spaces. Interior designers have different lighting resources that help create functional spaces that can adjust to the specific needs of clients.

Residential interior designers utilize several types of lighting to create the correct amount of lighting in a room. It is important to understand the use of each type of lighting source available and which particular need it will satisfy in a successful home lighting plan.

General lighting is one of the first layers of lighting used in modern interior design and refers to the light used for the overall illumination of the space. These types of lighting sources provide basic lighting requirements to create an accessible space where users can move around easily in a safe way. Recessed ceiling lights or overhead ceiling fixtures can meet general lighting needs. General lighting can sometimes be the existing lighting or part of the new lighting design plan.

Different types of lighting fixtures

SketchUp has created countless lighting fixtures and decorative lamps to add a glamour quotient to the interiors. Some of them are discussed below:

Table Lamps

If we click on the table lamp section, we can see that there are 369 different designs of table lamps. Table lamps fall under the Mood Lighting category. Mood lighting is as important to the overall look of a room as general and ambient lighting and space would be bare without it. It makes a room pleasantly inviting by creating pools of light that counteract the shadows caused by general lighting. It’s also an important element of a room’s style as it tends to be equally concerned with style as it is with function.

Floor Lamp

If you click the floor lamp section you will get more than 40-floor lamp designs in SketchUp. Floor lamps occupy a special place in every designer’s heart – stylish lighting is the part decor and part utility, able to stand on its own and make a distinct impression even when they’re not in use.

Pendant Lamps

These designs are available in all colors, for all tastes and styles. Pendant lighting fixtures are great for large and small home interiors, they save space on a table or floor. Hanging lamps are a functional and beautiful decorative element in modern interior design, that can be a focal point of the dining room, Kitchen Island, or living room decorating. There are more than 345 pendant lamp designs in SketchUp.

Hanging lamps are the perfect solution for illuminating rooms with indirect light. With its unique, creative design, this golden pendant lamp creates an island of light with an individual character throughout the home.

Wall Lamps

Wall lamps, also known as sconces, are stylish accessories that can really make a space glow. There are many uses for a wall lamp, even though they might not mind right away.

Conclusion

If one is using SketchUp and would like to quickly take the design visualization to the next level in terms of graphic realism, Interior Designers and architects must try out the various designs of lamp models for SketchUp.

The post Revamping your interiors with Stunning Lamp Models appeared first on SketchUpFamily.

V-Ray is basically a 3D rendering program that works as a plugin for many 3D modeling applications. The program is developed and released by the Chaos Group from Bulgaria. This commercial plug-in for third-party graphics software is used for visualizing 3D models in realistic settings and is widely used across many industries such as media, entertainment, video, and game productions. However, in this case, the usage is mostly locked in various kinds of engineering industries – the construction industry taking the lead in V-Ray usage.

Features of V-Ray 5 for Rhino

V-Ray Vision

Perhaps the most exciting part of this new release, V-Ray Vision is a system where you can see the changes in the works as you arrange lights and shadows, daytime, etc. It is a really useful tool for anyone who uses Rhino or Grasshopper. This feature comes into play as you set up materials on surfaces as well. V-Ray Vision lets you have the following:

1. Exploring the model in real-time reality
2. Collaborating on decision making in the design
3. Exporting normal and panoramic pictures of a scene
4. Save real-time animations as you progress

For the above features, V-Ray Vision is best suited for speeding up your decision-making work as you design your model’s looks for presentation.

Light Gen Tool

This nifty little tool generates many thumbnails based on possible outcomes of applying various environment lighting scenarios. This lets you see at a glance how the final render might look like in case you apply a plethora of pre-chosen lighting choices. You can then choose any one of them and the lighting preset gets applied to the model. This works just like those quick photo editing apps on a phone. Exciting!

Light Mix

Mix up the flavors! Once you are done with the render, you can afterward mix and match and play with the various lighting effects like brightness and color of any light source, interactively in real-time, without rendering again.

Layered V-Ray Materials

Great news for material enthusiasts! Now the materials in V-Ray 5 come with two layers on them – the sheen and the coat. Sheen works with creating fine fabric realities like silk, satin, and velvet surfaces.

The coat layers make reflective rich surfaces like varnished wood. Combining them, you have the almost unlimited possibility of new materials – make it just so!

Material Library Update

The already vast material library of V-Ray just got even bigger. New high-resolution 4k UHD textures, hundreds of deploy-ready materials, and much of them layered as stated above! Browse, test, and use any of the textures and materials easily through the user-friendly V-Ray library interface.

Direct Post-processing

For those who want that bit of extra shine, V-Ray 5 for Rhino now includes an extra new Frame Buffer, for all you delicious post-processing needs. Color corrections, render element combination, and other preset applications all can be done now without needing an external post-processing application.

Improved Sun & Sky

Now you can create beautiful sunrises and sunsets in V-Ray 5 for Rhino! The new sun and sky models work great in rendering photorealistic sky effects, including when the sun is below the horizon. Furthermore, you can now decide the sun’s orientation from V-Ray directly, to get that perfect render.

UVWrandomizer

Doesn’t it just ruin the best renders when you spot that irritating repeated texture? Thanks to the new UVWrandomizer tool, you will never spot the same texture twice in close proximity. Plus, it also increases the Stochastic Tiling value.

Better Contours

There is a new global contour setting that gives you precise control over lines in your render. You can use it to make your model look softer, or harden them to make it look more like a sketch.

Other Improvements

1. Better dirt
2. Better weathering
3. More efficient engine core
4. Faster loading
5. Faster exporting
6. More robust app architecture
7. New API documentation

How to get V-Ray 5 for Rhino

V-Ray 5 for Rhino is available for trial too! You can try this amazing rendering plugin for 30 days for the full potential before you choose to buy it. If you’ve already bought V-Ray after September 2020, you can get a free upgrade too!

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The importance of furniture is felt by everyone. One of the things that complete one’s house is furniture. These live load elements become a necessity and rather the most crucial part of designing an interior space. The evolution of furniture from their basic utility to them being a luxury symbol and their beautiful designs are taking a leap in today’s world. Furniture brings about changes in the space and its functionality. The range, variety of designs and type of furniture are making every dead and dull area a lively experience.

To incorporate the furniture, say here a sofa in the 3d model, start the base on the ground, by drawing the rectangular components of the Sofa in 3 pieces. Create an arc on the corner of the component, use a standard arc to create a perfect arc, now in the middle sections grab the points and do the arc.

Creating Structure of the Sofa

Double click on both the ends to make it a component and save the diagram, just rotate 90 degrees and select an average looking sofa, make the bottom section 9.5 inches. Now the next way is to triple click to separate the component, make the cushions and arms separately to add details to your work. Draw a reference line and draw a rectangle, just extend the base to 5’ and 28” to model the back of the sofa. Double click and make it a component by saving it at the back of the couch.

Creating the Arm of the Sofa

Click and make the arm by pulling 4 inches and pull it through and make a new component and save it by naming “The Arm”.

Rotate Keys

When you move you get the rotate keys, scale the components and lengthen the sofa.

The next step is to offset the arc of the sofa by double click and right clicking it, then save the file and name it as back of the middle in front portion and make it a component and save the component by naming it “Bottom of the middle”.

Now the initial pieces of the sofa are crafted, and it it’s time to take the basic decision, about how much we want the arm hold, back of the chair and other pieces separately or as one piece.

Add Minute details to the Sofa

The next important procedure is to explode the sofa in per piece, so that the minute detailing can be done. Add on the cushions on the sofa by putting 4.75 inches, make it as a whole component by saving as side cushion1.

Add Cushions

Repeat the steps by adding the cushions on the sofa make it as a whole component by saving as side cushion2. Explode the arc and, triple click it on one component, grab the surface by clicking Control + C. Push Pull to the cushion height and save it as component Cushion Middle.

Customise the default tool bar, the best function in Sketchup is one customise the design of the furniture’s. Now add in the cushions, make a 4-inch cushion and pull it up press it 2 inches into the back of the crowd. Triple click and make it a component and save it as side back cushion 1. Next step is to Push/Pull and extend the cushion triple click and make the component side back cushion 2. It’s time to soften the edges of the cushions.

FredoCorner

It performs the rounding of the edges and corners of 3D shapes along a 2D profile, in 4 modes: Round, Bevel, Subdivision Mesh and Chop Corner. FredoCorner also includes a Repair tool to undo any generated shape rounding.

Go to the tool pallets and then go to FredoCorner. The use of this is to take the geometry and helps in rounding the corner. Fredo corner acts as a follow me tool. Now take the second cushion and soften every single edge by using FredoCorner.

Adding Texture to the Sofa

SketchUp has a unique specification, if you want to add on texture to your furniture you can do that by selecting the texture button.

Creating Legs for the Sofa

Draw the legs of the sofa 3X3 inch square and add on the geometry, make it component and save it as a foot. Copy it on four sides of the couch, and then add four more legs on the arc of the sofa. Copy the foot and add on the extension of the sofa, so now the sofa has got its legs. Basically, sofas with legs allow people the advantage to stoop down less, making the act of sitting less strenuous, especially for individuals with leg, hip, or back injuries, or for the elderly.

Adding Materials on the Sofa

In SketchUp we can Revamp the furniture by changing the colour of the fabric texture of the cushions and also one can add cup holder to the arm of the sofa.

SketchUp’s work area is a window into a three-dimensional world where one can build just about anything. It can be as big as the Empire State building or as small as an iPod. By using SketchUp just design the house inside and out, and build all the furniture for each room.

The post Designing a Sofa in 3D Model appeared first on SketchUpFamily.

SketchUp is well-loved by a lot of people, but it is also hated by a large number of people. Ah, the price of success! But the fact is, SketchUp has always been supplying what many of the frontline 3D models are only now catching up to. For example, Revit, Bently, and Autodesk are all doing stuff with BIM that SketchUp has already been doing with some plugin support.

Most of those “other software” users will tell you at least one of the following reasons why they chose not to use SketchUp. Well, here is the answers you can throwback now.

SketchUp is not capable of modeling complex objects

Dead wrong! The Walt Disney Concert Hall is one of the most complex structures by shape – and it was successfully represented by a SketchUp model later, exact down to the last millimeter. The 3D render of it (using some of the SketchUp extensions) looks livelier than the real thing.

SketchUp can not only design intricately detailed complex 3D objects, but it can also render them in lifelike photoreal scenes. We have seen every complex thing designed in SketchUp – from modern residential and commercial buildings to Parks, Museums, Bridges, even whole city blocks – to small, complicated artful objects like jewelry or even organic stuff. With some good plugin support, what you can design in SketchUp is limited by only your imagination.

SketchUp is not BIM

No, it is not. Neither is AutoCAD. Just like most 3D modeling software must find another software’s support for Building Information Modeling (BIM), SketchUp must use extension support as well. And we dare say it does that quite well, sometimes better than even Revit or stuff like that. In fact, most BIM programs come with limitations, but with SketchUp, you can add a limitless amount of analysis and data/document export extensions.

The development of SketchUp is not going well anymore

This is a downright lie or ignorance. The development of SketchUp and other related Trimble products, and even that of most of the third-party extensions, are going very well and smoothly. Its power increases exponentially with every version, which pops up regularly with a substantial number of new features and ability amplification. And with hardware support, you can outperform some of the big players in 3D modeling games in terms of performance and capability. When you consider how cheap SketchUp is, having to deliver all that, you must take your hat off to the developers.

SketchUp cannot do what they need

True, alone SketchUp is not much. It does do an excellent job of 3D modeling and documentation that you can fairly rely upon to make small projects, but that is it. However, SketchUp’s main strength lies in its versatility and extensibility via plugins or extensions. Many of them are actually free and do a fantastic job beyond many frontline 3D modeling software’s capabilities.

With the right choice of extensions, you can turn your copy of SketchUp into an architect’s workhorse, a lean mean BIM-ing machine, a game developer’s object production studio, a sculptor’s visual playground, making it suitable for anything from heavy construction to jewelry making. SketchUp’s capabilities can go through the roof if you play your cards right, with a truly little extra cost – and they say SketchUp cannot deliver? Preposterous.

Besides, there are a lot of hidden tools and shortcuts packed inside the modern versions of SketchUp. Many people miss them at the first glance – that is their problem.

Graphics in SketchUp is outdated and outperformed

Admittedly, SketchUp does have a distinct, cartoonish nature of rendering stuff. Many professional SketchUp users will notice this; many a day they have seen some building render somewhere and blurt out, “SketchUp job, ya?” It seems, Trimble intentionally keeps it that way. Probably. It breeds familiarity and is classy in its own way.

Again, rendering in SketchUp can be augmented with plugins, provided your system can handle it. Go out on the web and you will find many breathtakingly beautiful renderings done via SketchUp. You will find furs and windswept grasses, views through and reflected on the glass, and animals and humans too, rendered in photorealistic awesomeness.

To be frank, if SketchUp is really so bad according to “them,” why are 30 million people using it? People are not stupid. So far in the 3D modeling business, SketchUp delivers the most versatile, flexible, cost-effective solution ever – and we have a feeling that it would remain so forever.

The post Debunking 5 Common Myths About SketchUp appeared first on SketchUpFamily.

The SketchPlus extension for SketchUp adds over 30 easy-to-use tools, such as selection filtering, selection memory, mirroring, and aligning, which are common to other modeling applications. It designs for seamless integration into any existing workflow. These tools build to work together intuitively, making them as easy to use as SketchUp. Before you know it, you’ll wonder how you ever used SketchUp without them.

Why do you use SketchPlus?

SketchUp’s enormous following should come as no surprise since it’s one of the most popular digital design tools. It is a constant task for developers to develop plug-ins that improve the software’s basic functionality. There are many smaller developers as well as big companies who contribute to the plug-in community.

As you can see, SketchPlus has much more to offer than you might expect. You can, for instance, create curved lines and edit them with some plug-ins. You can also build 3D models quickly and easily with some programs.

You can turn SketchUp into a professional design tool when you use the right plug-ins, such as SketchPlus for SketchUp.

You can find the extension library by heading over there. Almost everything that you might need is available in these plug-ins. You can choose from more than 500. Also, you must check each SketchPlus offers review from the community to help you decide if it is right for you and what you’re looking for.

Features of SketchPlus

1. Filtering by selection
2. Select Lasso
3. Choosing Polygon Lassos
4. Choosing a Face Deeply
5. Painter Selection
6. All instances should be selected
7. The Previous & Next selection buttons (Selection Memory)
8. This is the component finder
9. Recursive Explode+ (Explode+)
10. Changing Axes +
11. Reflection+
12. A smart array of sensors
13. An array of Path Components & Copy components along the Path
14. Replacing Component+
15. Spin the wheel randomly
16. Scale of randomness
17. Choosing a random position
18. Objects are dropped on the below-surface when you drop+ (Drop+)
19. Return to origin
20. Wedges
21. Make it align
22. Moving to Z
23. The ground is flattened
24. Tool for Spheres
25. Tool for conical shaped objects
26. Tool Torus
27. You can make faces with Faces+
28. Entities with recursive properties, groups, or components should be removed
29. Tags such as recursive entities, components, faces, and edges should be untagged
30. Faces painted in deep colors.

Advantages of SketchUp

1. You’ll save time and money with these tools and features.
2. You do not need to manage as many plug-ins.
3. Consistent and intuitive user interface. The interface is very similar to SketchUp.
4. This Plug-in provides first-class support and maintenance.
5. SketchUp Pro v10 and later is compatible.
6. When updating to a new SketchUp version or SketchPlus version, there is less effort to do so.
7. Comparatively, fewer training sessions are required. In SketchUp’s Instructor panel, you will find tutorials.
8. The latest documentation.
9. Bugs and plug-in conflicts are less likely to occur. SketchPlus tools don’t conflict with each other.
10. Search and download plug-ins take less time.

Final Thoughts

When there are so many different digital design software programs available, it can be challenging to start. It is crucial to becoming familiar with each tool and method. SketchPlus plug-in for SketchUp is only one software still stands out as a great choice for beginners, however. Many architects begin their careers by learning 3D modeling with SketchUp.

The post What Sketch-Plus for SketchUp Does & What Its Advantages Are appeared first on SketchUpFamily.

Workflow

Most 3D terrain data from OS or similar sources are available in flat colorless detail-less blocks only, and satellite imagery is way too low-res to possess any effect. At least, people who you’ll access publicly. These options are great for quickly mapping out the urban or rural environments around your model, but drastically limit options and capabilities when preparing client presentation renders.

This is where drones could also be very useful. you’ll get into really speedy context-building without having to sacrifice photorealism. the thought is predicated upon taking many photos of the world with a drone with a high-res camera, then using those photos to match and render the 3D context in SketchUp.

Incidentally, drones are already utilized in construction in a similar manner. They fly them around the site, especially just in case of huge or tall projects, to ascertain the progress and to examine difficult-to-reach spots. Now we will, and will, use an identical idea in SketchUp 3D context modeling.

Of course, to use this tactic in architecture design and visualization, you would like some help. A testing team of Lumion used a contemporary drone and drone-to-3D capture software and designed a workflow that might be easy for many architects. Not only that, it’ll be time-saving too – all the capture and fitting work for a standard-sized project (let’s say, 300 by 300 meters) is often finished during a day.

The team used a drone device named DJI Mavic Air. it’s but a kilogram in weight and may speedily fly for 20 minutes (or, 10 kilometers) on a full charge. While doing that, it can stream 4k videos and 12k photos! It cost them only $800, so, seeing the return, it’s cost-efficient also. Combined with a typical 10-inch tablet (with enough storage), this drone is often an excellent modern surveyor.

But taking random pictures darting around the site isn’t only clueless, it’s also inefficient. you would like to plan carefully about where the drone should pause, look in what direction, and take the image. Pre-planning that much, and flying the drone thereupon quite precision isn’t normal for us standard architects, yeah? Yes, the testing team thought that after only one try, they opted for Drone Harmony.

What is Drone Harmony?

It is an app utilized in the tablet mentioned above, and what it does it’s fantastic. you’ll define the world of interest on the local map, and therefore the app automatically calculates the flight path of the drone. Not only that, while it flies the drone on the precise path, it continuously captures images of the world. Each picture will have a 60% overlap with the previous, so you’re bound to get full coverage. Also, you’re getting to need that overlap to create the complete 3D map.

But what about the angle? It’s simple, just repeat the run with the camera tilted in different directions till you’ve got pictures of each solid object therein area from every conceivable direction. meaning five runs with 5 different angles. Each of those runs for a 300x300m area would take around ten minutes. Adding charging time, which will be finished in under half each day.

Now that you simply got all the visual information about your area, you would like to align and join the pictures to create one giant picture – and make a 3D model out of it, and add textures. You can, of course, do that by hand, with hour after hour of back-breaking work – but why bother once you have RealityCapture? This handy tool takes all of your area photos, joins them up to form a full photo of the world, and makes an in-depth 3D model out of it painted with textures to boot!

Granted, after importing the photographs and getting it configured for the project, the RealityCapture software would take a couple of hours on a moderately decent machine – but the result’s oh so worth it!

Now all you’ve got to try to do the next day is to import the model into SketchUp, prune and comb out unimportant details nobody will see (to make the model lighter and simpler), and send it to a renderer like Lumion. For those with longer, plow ahead and decorate the place with trees, people, and cars – hell, put the Batmobile within the middle of it for all we care – then catch on rendering.

Wrapping

There you go, all done! For video presentations, you’ll add scenes within the SketchUp model and obtain it animated also. LiveSync will are available very handy for that!

The post Using Drones to Create Beautiful 3D Context Models appeared first on SketchUpFamily.