Rendering

Quality Components: Part 2- FormFonts

Part 1 of this series on quality components focused on generic, lightweight models provided by the SketchUp team. This post is about another great resource for quality SketchUp models: FormFonts. The model creators at FormFonts have been at it for almost 15 years. It’s a subscription service, but you can download up to 30 models […]

Skatter Extension: Part 2 - Realistic Trees and Rendering

In Part 1 of this series, I introduced Skatter, the amazing extension that allows you to mass-place objects onto surfaces. Specifically, with Skatter you can create detailed, vast forest plantings, lawns, and similar vegetation patterns. In this post, I’ll show a quick demo of using Skatter to generate a quick mass vegetation planting for a bridge […]

Community Center Rendering FINAL small

Before you ask, no – this is not an interview with this guy:   I met Ryan Seacrist when he attended one of my classes. During one of the tutorials, Ryan came up with a different approach to getting 3D modeling work completed faster. I was impressed and have kept in touch with him. Ryan has a […]

Prisma-AI: an (Artficially) Intelligent Photo Filter

Architectural renderings are a big part of my job. And NPR (non-photorealistic rendering) is awesome – making art from a computer model. The free Apple app Prisma-AI first caught my eye because it contains the letters “AI.” Artificial Intelligence combined with photo editing = cool. This could only mean great automation of images. And I’d say that’s the case […]

SketchUp Layers: Part 2 - Layer Case Studies

In Part 1 of this series, Bonnie showed the importance of using SketchUp‘s Layer0 for all loose geometry, and placing components and groups on other layers. In this post, I’ll demonstrate how layers can take you beyond basic organization. And in Part 3, I’ll combine scenes and layers for seamless control of object visibility. Layer Organization Case Studies The […]

sketchup graphics and styles Vineyard Styles Model

If you missed Part 1 of this series, I went over the basics of how to change your model’s style. This post goes a little deeper, showing a few dos and don’ts. Pro Style Tips It’s rather fun to open SketchUp‘s Styles window and try out everything you see, to play with different face colors, backgrounds, watermarks, background […]

SketchUp Styles: Part 1 - Customize Your Look

One of SketchUp’s best features is styles, giving you the ability to produce excellent graphic images and non-photorealistic (NPR) renderings. I almost always use SketchUp’s native graphic styles for client presentations, though I do have to produce “fancy” renderings from time to time (these days I’m into Lumion). For a basic presentation, just turn on […]

SketchUp Extensions: Five Reasons to Use Them

Extensions for SketchUp are amazing. I remember using my first SketchUp extensions when third-party add-ons were just introduced, way back in the SketchUp 4 days. SketchUp was still a start-up at the time (anyone remember @Last software?). And in those days, you had to install extensions via a cumbersome, somewhat geeky process requiring some coding […]

SketchUp Shortcuts Part 2: Model Display Shortcuts

In Part 1 of this series, Daniel showed how important it is to have SketchUp shortcuts set up. SketchUp provides a good number of default shortcuts, such as the L key for the Line tool, the Spacebar for the Select tool, etc. And Part 1 also showed how you can set up shortcuts for other tools that SketchUp […]