OK, so maybe a post on doors doesn’t belong in a series on dynamic windows, but the concept is the same.
Part 1 and Part 2 of this series showed two different types of generic dynamic windows, great for showing how basic windows look in a space. But my room also needs a generic door.
The search term I’m using this time is swinging door author:sketchup is:dynamic. Only three results turn up, but they work. I’m bringing in the first one – a generic exterior door.
Unlike with SketchUp’s generic windows, this door doesn’t align to a face, too bad. (It’s a rather old model.) But rotating an imported component is very easy. The Move tools is already active, and it can be used to rotate a component. Move the cursor to the top of the door and click one of the red “plus” signs to rotate.
Once the door is in place, it can be scaled to fit. And again, it’s a bit different than the windows. Instead of scaling in just four directions, this door can be scaled every which way. Not a huge problem, just more room for error.
If you want to maintain the door’s thickness, be sure to use drag handles in the center of the face you’re moving. The door jamb and knob remain constant after scaling.
Check the options – the only thing you can change is the width of the jamb.
But as the Component Options window states, you can use the Interact tool to open and close it. Choose Tools / Interact to activate the Interact tool. When this tool finds something to interact with, the pointing finger gets a little sunburst icon.
Clicking the door once opens it inward.
Clicking again closes the door, then once again opens the door the other way.
And what if your swing is on the wrong side? You can use Scale to turn the door inside out, or use a Flip Along option. This is an option on an object’s right-click menu; the trick is choosing the correct axis to flip along. (I always get it wrong the first time, but there’s always Undo.)
Incidentally, the Interact tool also works on SketchUp’s generic dynamic windows too.
