Thread: KMs Sketch Up Tips

Hi Km

any tips on how to start a basic house plan (walls, roof, windows etc).

sure do. first off i would say if you are going for construction plans do it in somthing like Acad, if its just concept plans then SU is your program.

i will asume that you want to model the interior as well

first i would draw a plan in 2d (i normaly do this in acad and import it) and then push/pull the walls to the correct hight. i would then draw the opening (windows, doors) and push them through, ie for a window draw your rectangal and push it through to the other side if the inside face dosent delete just right click and delete

i would make the wall a group or components depending size this could be 1 or several groups.

next i would add doors and windows from the component libiary resize to fit if needed
roofs can be tricky but with infered referancing can be made easy and remember to hide the other groups i covered that in one of the tips.

once iv done that ill finsh with the furnishing wich would be components or picture of them

i would then add vegitation and maybe people

then off to photo render

if you have any probs with the model, i can take a look at it for you or just post were u are stuck. also if you cant find a component let me know i will have somthing to use

hope this helps. i had some videos ill try and dig them out

km

Originally Posted by kmthor

....then off to photo render



km

Hi km, what program do you use for rendering? I was getting good results with renderplus or iRender cant remeber what it was called, but it was only a trial version and only lets you have 1 install.

Can you recommend any good free ongoing programs?

sure can.

this is by far the best FREE photo render i have come across good tutorials and a very good helpful forums

http://www.kerkythea.net/joomla/index.php

you will need a exporter add-on for SU which you can down load from the site

enjoy

km

Cheers

heres a box done in SU rendered in maxwell

Originally Posted by kmthor

TIP # 6

selection

let say a cube again and you are on a face. click once and you will select that face, click ywo times and you select the face and the border lines, click three times and you will select the whole object

km

Excellent tip kmthor, that one thing has been my big issue with Ketch-up, now I know the solution as I like to group things so I can move them. Now I no longer have to hide all other objects just so I select all and group one object that I forgot to group.

A question: Imagine a rectangle, how do I create an elliptical shape and knock it out of the rectangle to give me something like the apron in the attached pic?

Hi,

Have a look at the sketchup file, guess this what you mean?

Kayu

G'day Kayu,

That's getting there. But how do I delete all areas other than that part that I want to push through on the rectangle. A circle over top of the shape below when pushed only seems to create that circle from 2D to 3D. or have I missed something?

Ahh, just worked it out.

sorry guys didnt see these messages. ill try and be more on to it.. all sorted now i hope

km

Originally Posted by Rattrap

1 thing i was having trouble doing was drawing a spheare. I ended up using a default spheare that i then had to resize by eye.

Sketchup is fantastic, I have only just started with it but very happy with the potential for helping me get my dimensions correct...my big issue at the moment is joining different components...I've done a table leg and stretcher and trying to get them joined via mortise and tenon...very new to this and figure I will work it out.

I found this for creating spheres...from the Sketchup Startup Tips (was clicking through them)....I just copied the text, you'll probably want to look at the demo on the startup tips.

Ever wondered how you might create a sphere in SketchUp? Try the Follow-Me tool. Draw a circle on the ground plane, copy that circle and rotate it 90 degrees. Select the edge of the lower circle. This will be your path for the Follow-Me tool. Select the Follow-Me tool, and click on the upper circle surface. This process is also useful for creating lathed or revolved forms.

I just found this for mortice/tenon

http://www.brightcove.tv/title.jsp?t...nnel=769316223

Can we sticky this thread?