Background Question

Rudbeckia · 22 May 2008, 16:13

I am working on a city brownstone roof garden, and would like to be able to place
the drawing in the actually city setting where it located, so the background
looks real. The rooftop is in Brooklyn with a view of Manhattan.
Is this possibe to do in SU??

remus · 22 May 2008, 16:21

Yep, thats definetly possible. It's in the styles window (window->styles), you then have to browse untill you get the option to use a watermark, then set the watermark image as your background. You might have to move your model around a bit to get it looking right.

Rudbeckia · 22 May 2008, 16:23

Can it be customized to be actually what you would see by putting in the location?

remus · 22 May 2008, 16:28

No, youll need a picture of the background you want.

I suppose it would be possible to export the model to google earth and then take a screen shot from there, although i dont know a lot aobut GE so it might be worth waiting for someoe more knowledgeable to expand on that one.

Rudbeckia · 22 May 2008, 16:33

I do have current pictures of the actual background, just not sure how to get them in to the drawing.

remus · 22 May 2008, 16:40

sorry, i obviously wasnt very clear in my first post: window->styles->edit->watermark then use the little plus button to add a watermark. This will put an image as the background for your model.

mateo soletic · 22 May 2008, 16:46

@unknownuser said:

I suppose it would be possible to export the model to google earth and then take a screen shot from there

Yes it is possible

Open Google earth find the location You want then..
Tools / Google earth/ Get current view
Place Your model on the imported photo
Tools/ Google earth/ Place model
Now You have Your model on the globe.

Mateo.

Rudbeckia · 22 May 2008, 16:50

Thanks so much for the help! I will play with doing it both ways.

dylan · 22 May 2008, 19:21

The other way if you have the background images is to export an image of your SU model with the view you require, then use Photoshop or similar software to create a photo montage, combining the two images.

Rudbeckia · 22 May 2008, 21:59

How do I "ensure google earth is runnning" thats the message I keep getting when I try to set the location? Does it have to be installed or turned on or something?

remus · 22 May 2008, 22:01

I imagine it does have to be installed and running for it to work.

Rudbeckia · 23 May 2008, 00:26

No need for the sarcasm Remus, I am on the newbie forum right? Isn't this where you are supposed to ask stupid questions? I just assumed it was part of SU,and not something extra I had to install.

Gaieus · 23 May 2008, 04:51

Maybe Remus was a bit sarcastic, Rudbeckia, but as he said above, he is not very familiar with the co-operation of SU and GE eitzher.

So the answer is: yes, you have to install GE and have it running while you want to take the snapshot. Have a look at this workflow where Google explains how to place a model to GE in details.

Once you placed the model, you can take a screenshot of the placed model with a suitable application and use that for your background image. I would try this way:

Take a snapshot of the GE terrain and do everything that is described under the above link to place your model in GE (so I'm not repeating whet is written there now)
BUT orbit your model as you would like to see in SU later while exporting to GE
add a scene to make sure your SU will "remember" the camera location
open your exported kmz file in GE
turn off the visibility of your exported model (in the "temporary placemarks" on the left)
take a screenshot
use this screenshot as a background image in the Styles > Watermark settins (as Remus suggested)
go back to your saved camera location (the scene you created)
find out if this process was successful (I have never tried - just made it up now )
Another solution could be to take a good photo of the scene you want to model in reality, use photomatch to start modeling and the scene in SU will keep the original background for you. See attached file (or rather "linked file" for it is too big for this forum) where in the first scene there are two walls of the ruins of a Turkish mosque I photomatched. It's in context with its background while if you navigate to the other scene (or orbit around to go on editing / modeling, the background disappeares. Yet you can make any changes to the model and go back to the original scene and the background will appear again. Note that you can use wider image also so it could cover more of your background than in this example.

Link to the file (Mosque of Pasha Ferhad from the 16th century, Pécs, Hungary)

p.s. Remus, please, make sure your posts are not misunderstandable!

remus · 23 May 2008, 06:10

Sorry if that sounded a bit sarcastic, it wasnt meant to. Just my nigh on illeterate mind trying to spew out words in an order that makes sense.

p.s. I try gai!

Rudbeckia · 23 May 2008, 14:06

Thank you a bunch Gaius!I am going to install it and give it a try!

Sorry Remus, I was about ready to destroy my drawing and had a deadline and was in a bad mood. No worries! Thanks for the help.

steve6 · 22 Aug 2008, 13:23

If you place your background images on various rectangles, won't the boundings lines show?

remus · 22 Aug 2008, 19:06

You could always just hide the edges by using the eraser and holding shift.

Alan Fraser · 23 Aug 2008, 18:43

You don't need to place background images on a rectangle. You can just import them as images, not textures. That way, they won't have any edges unless you explode them...so there's no need to hide them