catchup edition 12
DESCRIPTION
SketchUcation Community NewsTRANSCRIPT
Cabinets, shadows and colours
dynamiC Cabinets04 Learn to use DCs to create infinte options. Adriana Granados’ guide to DC cabinetry.
Ge and shadows09 Top Tip from Randy Wilkins. How to use Google Earth imagery to get building heights.
material tiPs14 Apply colours in SketchUp. Aidan Chopra’s explains the in and outs of applying textures in Sketchup.
Gallery41 Are you featured? Our members submissions to the Gallery for July.
rayleCtron34 Overview. Mike Lucey takes a look at RayLectron.
hey mr dj44 Getting in a spin. Learn how to use TIG’s Free Rotate Plugin.
This month in CatchUp we take
a look at some cool plugins
from Tomot’s Cabinet Tools
and TIG’s Free Rotate. Plus
Adriana shows how to create
some very useful Dynamic
Components that make great
assets.
Mike Lucey spends some time
with RayLectron and Eric Lay
shows a great visual trick with
shadows and 3D Text..
We also have Randy Wilkins
showing you how to use GE
imagery to calculate building
heights and Aidan Chopra
has an indepth explanation of
SketchUp Material tool.
Enjoy!
....endless cabinets with two dCs!
Dynamic cabinets using 3 parametersby adriana granados
In a few months I’ll be publishing my new
book Designing Kitchens with Sketchup.
Some of the exercises will cover how to use
collections from the 3DWarehouse, plugins,
use pictures to present your ideas, create
dynamic components, use MatchPhoto,
create seamless constructions materials,
complete the necessary documents by
inserting notes and much more.
Today’s tutorial even though is not included
in my book will touch briefly some concepts
that I share there. We all know that we have
to keep a low counting faces, but when you
insert fifteen or more cabinets the size of the
model can be pretty considerably especially
if we are using raised door designs and other
features. So I will share some tips on how
to create a kitchen with a small file size and
at the same time can deliver the feel and
look to your client. I based this exercise on a
wall cabinet, but the same procedure can be
applied to a base cabinet.
Step 1: Create a box
The first step is to create a box of the dimension of the real world picture that you have. In this case,
I used 24 “x 12” x36”. Insert the handle as a component and nest it inside the box.
Step 2: Create a Dynamic Components
Creating a dynamic component is very simple if you keep the hierarchy order. All parameters you
wish to enter a value must be created in the first instance. The parameters that I wanted to change
are width, height and the position of the handle in the case of a right or left door. These are images
for each of configuration parameters. For Width and Height I established a list with the different
options. For the Door Hand I gave two values for each option – Right or Left.
Once the first level of parameters has been set you must define the second hierarchical level, in this
case the position of the handle in relation to the door. When you change the width of the cabinet,
the component should automatically adjust the width of the door and therefore the position of the
handle. But it also needs the ability to vary the hand according to the chosen option. Therefore in
the section of the cabinet knob I entered the position whether right or left and used the IF logical
parameter to establish each condition.
Once you finish entering the formulas the Component Options window will look similar to this:
Step 3: Apply Textures
I keep a file with all my door textures. In
this file each door has two or three image
versions depending the design. For example
for the first picture below I keep one image
with the complete door, a second one with
just the inside raised panel and a third one
with the wood grain. In this way I can control
what portion of the image I want to apply
to each surface. I usually create these new
versions by connecting SU with my picture
editor, saving as a new image and then
importing it as an image or texture.
At this point you could use this cabinet in combination with any picture of a door cabinet. If you
do not need to be precise perhaps because you are just sharing your ideas with your client, you
could use different textures to apply on the front face like this picture and a wood grain texture for
the rest of the cabinet. The same cabinet can be resized. To apply the textures to the box I use in
first instance the native Paint tools. Recently I have used Thrupaint plugin of Fredo tools to apply
the front door image to the front face. Using this plugin restrains me to enter to the edit mode and
makes the texture unique by choosing the face to face option. I can also change easily the rotation
and I tile it 1x1.
For the image below I sampled first the wood grain applying to the box and then I sampled the
door and applied it to the front face. The drawback is that the image will be stretched accordingly
with the cabinet size and the stiles will not have the exact dimensions they should have when you
choose different cabinet sizes.
You could use your image editor to solve this issue but you will end with many different textures
deviating from an original size. If you want to solve this issue there’re many ways to do it so. I will
only mention one of those I use.
“...Create a KitChen with a small File siZe...”
As I said I have a separate file with my cabinet door textures. I import it as a component to my
model. Then I download the Dynamic Door by Eric. I set the stile and rail widths and choose the
Flat panel type as with this option I can control the application of my pictures. I use the SU native
Paint tools to apply the wood grain to my box. Then with Thrupaint from Fredo Tools I sample the
panel image and apply it to the component panel.
There are many times when you’re studying an arial photograph of an area and realize it would be
great to have some idea of how high a building ( or tree or other object ) is.
I figured out a way to do this using Google Sketchup that’s fast and pretty accurate, depending on
the quality of the photograph of the object.
First, you want to find the location in Google Earth, not Google Maps. The reason is that in Google
Earth, each photograph will have a date stamp in the bottom left corner. You need the exact date
the photo was taken.
estimatinG buildinG heiGhts usinG sKetChuP & GooGle earth
by randy wilKins
Then, with a new window in Sketchup open, click the “Add Location” button in the toolbar at the
top of the window. It’s a little icon that looks like a folded map. Or, you can go under ‘File’ to ‘Geo-
Location’ to the ‘Add More Imagery’ sub-menu.
Navigate to the same location on the map and you’ll see that it’s the same arial photo as in Google Earth.
Zoom in as close as possible and adjust the grab frame to include only what you need.
Click the ‘Grab’ button in the upper right to bring
it into Sketchup. Open the ‘Layers’ panel in the
‘Windows’ sub-menu. You’ll notice that there
are two new layers, Google Earth Snapshot and
Google Earth Terrain. For the most accuracy, be
sure the Google Earth Terrain layer is turned on by
checking the box.
Now, under the Window menu, you want to check Shadows to open the Shadows Setting dialogue
box. Enter the day and month of the Google Earth date stamp and click the box in the top left to turn
on the shadows. Be sure the ‘on ground’ box at the bottom is also checked.
Now, using the photo as a guide, draw the outline of one of the buildings and use the push/pull tool
to pull it up slightly. You will now see the shadow of the form in relation to the shadow cast in the
photo. (SketchUp shadow in red and GE shadow in orange)
Using the Time slider in the Shadow Settings box, slide it back and forth until the two shadow lines
meet. Then use the push/pull and move tool once again to pull the building up until the top of its
shadow matches the photograph shadow. Pull the other surrounding buildings up to meet their
shadows as well.
The accuracy of the final measured height will depend on a number of factors: the quality of the
photo, how close the model terrain is to that at the actual site, how accurately you have drawn the
position of the footprint of the object, and the shadow length ratio. You’ll get better results if the
shadow length is longer than the actual object height. Of course if the shadow is obscured or non-
existant, you’ll have to find the height by going there.
sKetChuP tiP: understandinG materials by aidan ChoPra
Everybody knows that faces in SketchUp can be painted with different materials. What lots of folks
don’t know is that you can apply materials to groups and components, too. The following illustration
shows the Entity Info dialog box, which is a great place to see which materials are applied to your
geometry.
The Entity Info dialog box (Window > Entity Info) shows thumbnails for the materials assigned to
selected entities. When you select a face, it shows thumbnails for the front and back sides of that
face [as in the previous image]. Groups and components have material thumbnails, too [which you
can see below].
When you paint a group or component red, only the faces inside it that are painted with the Default*
material turn red. Faces that have already been painted with another material don’t change at all.
The group [below] includes faces that are painted with different materials. Only the top face is
assigned the Default material.
Applying a material to the entire group only changes the color of faces that are painted the Default
material.
This trick also works with groups and components that are nested inside one another. When you
apply a material to a top level group or component, all the Default-colored faces that are inside
nested, Default-colored groups and components inherit that material automatically. The following
diagram is my best attempt at a visual explanation of this phenomenon.
Applying a material to a group or component that in turn contains sub-groups and component
instances can be a confusing experience. Just remember that the color you’re painting “trickles
down” to Default-colored faces contained within Default-colored groups and components. It’s easier
done than said.
*SketchUp automatically applies the Default material to faces you create from scratch. You can also
paint anything with the Default material at any time; just pick it in the Materials Browser (which looks
completely different on PCs and Macs.)
The Windows and Mac versions of the Materials Browser. On the former, the Default material is
included as a permanent thumbnail; on the latter, it’s the first material in the “Colors In Model” list.
As you can see, this technique is a godsend for building complicated
objects that need to change color easily. In the case of the George
Nelson Marshmallow Sofa (from FormFonts) in the images that
follow, the cushions are individual component instances nested
inside the main Sofa component. These are assigned the Default
material.
The individual cushions are instances of the same component. Each instance is assigned the Default
material.
The faces that make up the surface of each cushion are also painted with the Default material.
All of the metal and rubber frame pieces are also groups and components, but their faces are all
assigned specific materials.
When you use the Paint Bucket to paint a color—in this case orange—on the main Marshmallow Sofa
component, only the cushions take on that color. Everything not assigned the Default material stays exactly
the way it is.
Painting the sofa component orange causes all Default-painted faces to turn that color. Non-Default-
colored faces remain unchanged.
The Build1: Find a silhouette you prefer then change the color of it to something other than black.
2: Use the SketchUp 3D Text tool to place some words in your model.
shadow Funby eriC lay
3: Explode the word components and make each letter a separate group or component.
4: Set your shadow settings to the desired time of day and start placing the letters on your silhouette,
elongating or scaling your letters to fit the silhouette edge.
5: Continue placing, elongating and scaling letters.
6: Start adding basic pathways or roads and other features you wish for your scenes.
7: Finish placing your letters then add some other elements like basic vehicles.
8: Delete the reference image and you are done however you can take the detail level as far as you
like on the letters, even making them look like real buildings.
You can watch the final result here. Using scenes to
control the shadows you are able to reveal the surprise
at the very end.
PluGin review : Cabinet toolsby riCh o’brien
Everyone knows SketchUp is fast and fun when it comes to designing. But no matter which industry you use
it in that fun can sometimes be dulled by repetitive modeling. Sure, components help but not every situation
is suited to components.
If you are using SketchUp for cabinetry, kitchen design or interior design then you need tools that can quickly
and effectively block out new layouts and populate your scene accurately. Plugin author, Tomot, has a few
free tools that are already big time savers when it come to modeling shortcuts. Whether it is windows, doors
or stairs Tomot has a clever suite of tools that make life easy over on his ThingsVirtual blog.
Recently Tomot released a new commercial plugin for cabinetry that is called Cabinet Tools and I had some
time to sit and see what it could do.
Cabinet Tools comes in 2 flavours, metric or imperial, so you need to install the
version you which to use. Currently you cannot have both in place but this is not a
major drawback. Once installed in places an item in the plugins menu and a toolbar.
The toolbar itself consists of 4 icons which relate to the 4 types of basic cabineTs you can construct - Single
Door, Single Door or Drawer, Double Door and Corner Cabinet.
It is not until you activate the plugin that you come to realise the flexibility you have in terms of options. Each
cabinet can be customized via a dialogue box that concerns the width, height and depth of the cabinet along
with the kicker height. Depending on the type of cabinet you can also tweak either the door values or the
drawer values. As well as the hardware that is used to open/close the cabinets. Finally you can decide the
values for the counter type.
Every cabinet you create is placed on the world axis at 0,0,0. This means you must place it within your scene
but Tomot also has a version of Cabinet Tools called Component-Cabinet Tools. This version allows you to
create cabinets as components and place wherever you wish within a scene similar to loading a component
from your Component Library. So depending on your chosen workflow then there is a version to suit.
The cabinets themselves are nicely packaged with each element grouped to allow further tweaks if needed.
Below you can see the detail of assembly that each cabinet has. Each item is also a solid so using SketchUp
Solid Tools you can easily union parts together as needed.
By default base Cabinets are created so simply changing the depth and deleting the Kicker you can create
upper Cabinets. Cabinet Doors or Drawers are created with a distinct display color, which can easily be
edited later using the Materials pallette.
Overall, Cabinet Tools is a great addition to SketchUp especially if your workflow is cabinetry related. The
volume of options you are able to create are limitless. The creation process is quick and easy and at only $5
it is an absolute bargain. Highly recommended!
“volume of options you are able to create are limitless”
New to the rendering game lately is RayLectron
by SoftByte Labs Inc.
Raylectron was designed to be user friendly with
no complicated settings, but powerful enough to
turn your SketchUp drawings into photo-realistic
images.
Currently SketchUp users are spoilt for choice
when it comes to rendering solutions but
RayLectron is competitively priced at $99.95.
Whilst the rendering market for SketchUp is
cluttered RayLectron does have some standout
features for someone considering adopting to
another application.
“user friendly with no
complicated settings”
rayleCtron overviewby miKe luCey
Some of the key unique features of Raylectron are as follows...
• Raylectron does not need any editing by other graphic software, such as Photoshop, to produce photorealistic
renders.
• It has the ability to Start/Stop the render to let you fine-tune your lights/materials and camera position, without the
need of SketchUp.
• Should you need to stop the render, Raylectron provide a Resume option. You can save the render to file and re-
load it later to continue rendering, even on another PC.
• Save your configuration. No need to re-export from SketchUp once you have exported it once already. Very fast to
load. Saving the settings include any modifications made to materials and lights and camera.
• Once you have exported your model to Raylectron, it lets you view your model as if viewed inside SketchUp.
You can Rotate, Pan, Resize, Zoom and even modify your materials and lights outside Sketchup (right from the
Raylectron viewer) no need to re-export your model.
• The rendering process free Sketchup so you can continue working on your model. It’s all done inside Raylectron.
• Supports HDR maps and can save the rendered image as an HDR, JPG, PNG and many other formats including
Photoshop (PSD).
The Material editor is simple, yet powerful. It contains, Glossiness, Shininess IOR, Transparency,
Reflection, Refraction IOR (Diamond, Glass, Plastic, Plexiglas, Water etc.), Bump mapping,
Environment maps, Background image and Normal maps.
The Light editor contains, On, Off, Light Beam kind: (Smooth spread, Spot effect, Laser beam),
Power, Coverage (degree) / emitting angle, Emitting color, and transparency to have an invisible
light source but yet illuminates your scene.
Rendering can be done in many different ways to achieve the result you are looking for. Such as...
• Ray tracing
• Path tracing
• Photon tracing
“save your render to file and
resume on another PC”
There are five type of light sources...
• Artificial lights
• Sun
• Sky (daylight)
• From environment maps
• Ambient occlusion for both, interior and exterior.
Two notable features in RayLectron are the X-Ray mode and 3D output. With the X-Ray mode
there is no need to remove walls to render the interior of a model, and there is no need to position
your camera inside in the corners using wide field of view. Simply position your camera outside and
use the X-Ray vision. And with ‘Render in Stereo Vision’ (also called stereopsis or 3-D imaging).
This will produce an outstanding 3D effect that is so real it feels like you can touch your model.
If you really need to crank out images in a tight timeframe then network rendering is well catered for
here. You have an unlimited number of nodes and it is very easy to setup. The communication from
server/slave is near nothing, freeing your network for other use.
Once your image is rendered they can be modified directly in Raylectron using tone mapping and
many other settings such as brightness, contrast etc. These settings can be used even while the
render is running.
Finally RayLectron also supports HDR maps and can save the rendered image as an HDR, JPG,
PNG and many other formats including Photoshop (PSD). Which means you can still further refine
your images in post production.
Overall, RayLectron is a robust and easy to use application that is well integrated with SketchUp.
It offers a lot of features and at ~$100 it is hard to ignore. It is free to download and try with images
overlayed with a faint watermark.
You can find out more about RayLectron visiting their website.
C o m m u n i t yshowCase
the latest gallery submissions on sketchucation.com
each month we want to show what our members are achieving using sketchup. if something takes your fancy just click the image to be brought to that topic.
oFFiCe buildinGRedot
CaterPillar John Higgins
PoliCe PreCinCt Jason Christiansen
mid CenturyDave Richards
louis e. brownAllan Casas
mountain suiteFrederic Yves Moro
amaZon theatreElisei Jurubiță.
oPen box houseDavid Hier
audi a5Tuanhm.
old KitChenJason Christiansen
water millJohn Higgins
CathedralOrgelf
books.sketchUcation.comlearn with the experts at your pace
NEW BOOKS ADDED!
Rotating objects in SketchUp is
pretty painless. If it is a group or
component SketchUp’s Move Tool allows
you to rotate about the bounding box
centre very quickly.
But you may not want to rotate about the
object centre, then what?
OK, we have the Rotate Tool but that can
be a bit of head scratcher when you want
to rotate about an odd point. Sure, you use
the click drag method to inference funky
angles quite easily but it is not exactly fast.
Luckily TIG has answered the call with his
Free Rotate plugin. Once installed you
even get Plugins Menu entry and a nifty
toolbar icon.
PLUGIN TIP: FREE ROTATEby Rich O’Brien
As I said using Free Rotate is pretty easy. Just
select what you want to rotate and activate the
plugin. You will be first asked to pick your ‘Pivot
Point’ which is the point at which you will rotate
around.
Then you will be asked to pick your ‘Axis Point’.
You can use SketchUp’s inferencing to good
effect here.
Once your pivot and axis point are chosen you
will immediately be shown your object within a
‘Gizmo’.
The magenta point on the surface defines your
chosen Axis Point you picked earlier and the
black point at the centre is your Pivot Point. So
now simply move your point around to get any
rotation you need. You can also change to ‘Axial
Rotation’ by hitting the TAB key.
You can grab Free Rotate in the Plugins forum.
the dataworld® is used to automatically generate precisely referenced illustrations of the processes embedded in a piece-based construction model. originally written in autolisp for autoCad, the program has been used for both forensic and real-time analysis of construction documents and preconstruction planning. this includes the review of the assembly sequences, jobsite changes, and the movement of personnel and equipment on the jobsite.
the intent is to dynamically generate a collection of screenshots and video animations as a graphical database that can then be used to illustrate process assumptions, simulate methods, and anticipate safety concerns. these images facilitate an imme-diate graphical response to change orders, reports, bulletins, and other field documents. when these illustrations are necessary as legal documents, the piece-based model can be certified as accurate by licensed architects or engineers after a complete review of the design and construction documents.
Scenes are automatically generated using fixed camera positions
Single Scene variables include zoom, field of view, time of day, and object deconstructions for animations
One or more data-WORLDs® are configured and imported as a XRefs in a separate Component file for each construction model
Camera and target for screenshots and videos are from fixed positions
24 - 128 positions and 18 variables are programmable for each fixed camera
Certified piece-based construction model
The construction model is geographic oriented to accurately simulate date and time
Scene Navigation for Complex Modelsthis simplified example uses the piece based construction model built in steps 1-10. however, when model complexity increases with thousands of pieces and multiple layers, the computational time to navigate between scenes makes the use of the final model impractical on the jobsite.
Fixed camera positions simplify navigation by standardizing the points of view of the observer. screenshots are generated as scenes using the outliner and layers Preferences. up to 18 variables can be indexed according to each of these fixed cam-era positions using proprietary plugins. these variables include field of view, zoom, time, motion, sequence, line phases, and piece-based deconstructions.
scene images and videos along with their corresponding variables for each camera position are thereby generated, labeled, and filed as a navigable graphical database. this makes it possible to index, sort, and access illustrations for different phases of the construction process in order to quickly support construction with graphic communications.
Setting up a dataWORLD® - Step 11
Camera Target
Piece-Based Model
Fixed Cameras
Scene can be annotated for slide shows using referenced data points
scene navigation speeds point to
point movement in a complex con-struction model
Scene to Scene transi-tions are interactively displayed on a secure website
Related Scenes make it possible to Click-navi-gate and control model display
Movement from Scene to Scene can also be navi-gated using directional arrows on the dashboard of a case file
Movement from Scene to Scene makes it possible to drive-by, fly-over, sequence assemblies, and capture motion as video anima-tions
Scene indices provide immediate access to each image and its cor-responding variables for print, fax, and email
The piece-based model is deconstructible and reconstructible
Clicking on any camera position displays a Scene that includes controls for incremental zooms, alterna-tive assemblies, and related documents
http://youtu.be/j8BRN-0q7bY
Fly Over
Simple Demonstration
Scene Data Sets
Drive By
Sequence Animation
Motion Capture
Behind the scenes we have being working hard to revamp SketchUcation. Soon we will need YOU to help us. Keep an eye on your inbox in the coming weeks as we will send out beta invites to get things moving.
We have lots of cool new features but want YOU to help shape the final result.
For ANY further information you can contact us at the email address below.
SketchUcation roundup
As always, you can send your feedback to [email protected]
taking shape