Sketchup 7?

Boogster · 25 Jan 2008, 04:56

I have no idea what's going to be in SketchUp V7. My money would be on these features:

Features that are aimed at the populace and that make it easy for them to populate Google Earth

Annoyances and bug fixes fixed

Dumbing down hard to use features

Dare I suppose it.... lockable .skp files

Fat Faces perhaps

Todd

And don't forget the 3D Warehouse that is needed to be supported from other browsers, such as Firefox. It only supports IE.

CraigD · 25 Jan 2008, 05:06

@boogster said:

@unknownuser said:

I have no idea what's going to be in SketchUp V7. My money would be on these features:

Features that are aimed at the populace and that make it easy for them to populate Google Earth

Annoyances and bug fixes fixed

Dumbing down hard to use features

Dare I suppose it.... lockable .skp files

Fat Faces perhaps

Todd

And don't forget the 3D Warehouse that is needed to be supported from other browsers, such as Firefox. It only supports IE.

Noted. A workaround is that you can access the 3D Warehouse via Firefox (or Camino) and upload and download to your heart's content. We've added an Upload button to the 3D Warehouse...all you have to do is log in.

Hope that helps!

And all of the other feedback is great! Keep it coming! We're listening!

Cheers,

 - CraigD

alexander · 25 Jan 2008, 19:22

What i like to see in a new version is:
an easy way to get from a 3d the 2d vieuws in layout
Like iso / rightvieuw / topvieuw etc. and a easy way to do the measuring in the same.

crc · 26 Jan 2008, 00:31

Most things I think should be addressed have been mentioned here; ie, higher poly-count modeling, better curves, stronger "engine" underneath with fewer crashes.

A few tweaks I'd like to see that I've been trying to keep track of in my daily workflow:

edit:DOH!

-ability to view components/materials with the thumbnail and the name of the component beneath it. I know that if you hover over it, the name pops up, but this doesn't work that well, sometimes it hangs on one of the components displaying it's name even when I move to another component and sometimes it takes a long time to show the name. just doesn't work that well.
also, ability to sort alphabetically/numerically in this list.

-ability to drag and drop the scene tabs where I want them, and to double-click on a scene tab to rename it. I know about the scene dialog box, but why go to a dialog box what could be done right in the modeling window? also, you have to sit there clicking the up and down arrows to re-order the scenes. Sometimes I have quite a few scene in my models.

-I am a big fan of the Outliner and would like to see it enhanced. Not sure exactly what those enhancements would be but it is a great tool!!

-I'd also like to see the "Flip Along" command change with the axes of the component. As it is, it stays with the global axes.

don't see a need for a renderer, there are some great ones out there that work well with SKP!

These are just a few, I'm sure there are more.

cdubea · 26 Jan 2008, 01:03

I would like to see local help. I do a lot of work not attached to an internet connection and this makes help a non-entity.

chris

Tim Danaher · 26 Jan 2008, 18:10

Support for multi-threaded OpenGL:

Mac Gaming and Multithreaded OpenGL

Arstechnica and InsideMacGames write about some OpenGL optimizations which were privately announced at WWDC two weeks ago. According to the...

MacRumors (www.macrumors.com)

I'm hoping this would make the glacial animation export faster...

Support for 'baking' shadows into a material's texture. It would get rid of the reverse-flickering shadows problem. I started a thread about it here:

301 Moved Permanently

(www.sketchucation.com)

Fix the ¢¢∞∞¶•ª Mac Outliner. It blows chunks.

solo · 26 Jan 2008, 18:24

Did I mention tools for organic modeling?

NURBS!!!

All I ask is for nurbs and higher poly support for them.

remus · 26 Jan 2008, 18:27

hahaha, 'all i ask for is NURBS', you make it sound so easy solo not that i know anything about programing...

Tim Danaher · 26 Jan 2008, 18:41

Solo --

another thing about 'Fat Faces', is that a component would cut both faces of a wall automatically...

solo · 26 Jan 2008, 18:46

I have heard much talk about 'fat faces' but do not know what it's all about, do you have more info for me?

LO @ discussing fat faces and then seeing your avatar.

remus · 26 Jan 2008, 19:24

feel free to correct me anyone, but as far as i know, fat faces are basically solids, so not made up of lines and faces, as is the case for everythign else in SU.

Gaieus · 26 Jan 2008, 19:28

Well, as I read about an article of a 2006 basecamp (if I'm not mistaken), they have been planning this for a while. But in SU it wouldn't be achieved as real solids, as I read, but by assigning thickness to certain materials.

I don't know however at what stage this development is. Then it was still a discussion about the (future) release of SU6. Certainly not every new idea and wish can be incorporated into every new release.

Gjenio · 29 Jan 2008, 14:01

@solo said:

Did I mention tools for organic modeling?

NURBS!!!

All I ask is for nurbs and higher poly support for them.

Totally agree with SOLO.
In another tread I wrote the following:

Sketchup 7 whishlist:
1- Improving dwg export: something to recognize arcs and circles in your model and trasform them in true arcs or circles. And the possibility to export shadows as hatches (so...vector shadows)
2- Improving section tool with something that can manage edge thikness and hatches (more than SectionCutFace.rb)
3- Layout must be somthing like AutoCAD Layout sheet with possibility to insert dimensions and to edit your 2d drawing accurately
4- Ability to join together edges and trasform them in a continius path that can be modifyied and stretched like a Bezier.
5- In sandbox tools the smoove tool would have the same capabilityies of the sphere modelling tool in MODO (a 3d modelling sw)

Fletch · 18 Feb 2008, 22:13

Advanced Scene Organizer: Ideally a complete overhaul and extreme expansion of SU's scene dialog capabilies is in order, IMHO.

I'd really like to have, at very least, the ability to have rows of tabs at the top of my SU window, instead of just one row... just drag the existing tab row down, and it shifts up a second, third, fourth, however many rows you want of scene tabs, then you could select one or groups of tabs and drag-n-drop them to where you want them. I'd like to also select muliple scenes to rename them, yet keep a number before or after them... Entry1,2,3,4,5... Corridor1,2,3,4,5... etc. Multiple Scene editability (change all selected scene's camera FOV, change the animation settings for a selected scene or for all selected scenes.
I'm animating a building at the intersection of 3 highways and I have these long animation paths along each highway showing what the building views looks like... and SU's scene dialog only lets me see 7 at a time and forces the view of the scene names back to the top after changing a single scene name.

Alan Fraser · 19 Feb 2008, 06:32

I would be very surprised to see Fat Faces in V7...not unless they have managed to achieve a breakthrough in another direction. Talking to what was still @Last, before V6 came out, I was told that, jaw-droppingly impressive though David Vicknair's little baby was, development of the feature had hit a brick wall.

Basically, it was parametric materials...interior surface, exterior surface and wall thickness. Paint it onto a surface that is exactly what you got, including the accommodation of any voids for windows, doors etc. The material...including maintaining the thickness...would automatically adjust itself if you edited the wall in any way.

remus · 19 Feb 2008, 06:44

Jus tot add another wish to the list, id really like to be able to use straight jpegs as materials rather than having to mess around importign them into a model and them savig them. It would save a lot of time and make creating bumpmaps/clipmaps for renderign a lot faster.

Fletch · 19 Feb 2008, 17:09

remus, just check the correct radio button when you import the .jpg.
or, you can drag and drop the jpg right onto a piece of geometry in your model.

perhaps it's time to watch all the video tutorials again... you'll be surprised what you missed in there the first few times...

remus · 19 Feb 2008, 17:25

Fletch, ive just watched the tutorials relating to textures (did learn a few new things ) but what i was refering to was the ability to see and use materials from the materials browser.

Ive tohught aobut it a bit more and youd need some sort of system to scale the textures correctly, although this could just be a case of a prompt the first time you go to use the material.

bigstick · 20 Feb 2008, 21:37

@cyberdactyl said:

I would like to see more flexibility with scene making.

Buying out Indigo might be a lot cheaper. . .

Yeah right, we've all got massive powerful machines and a day to wait for a decent render

[Edit: I vote for 'proper' texture mapping, more speed, higher poly count support, fix the damn clipping bug, make the Mac version work as well as the PC version, parametric components, ability to make sections exportable (and renderable) with added cut faces and better modelling of complex curved surfaces. It would also be nice if LayOut was completely overhauled to look and feel like SU, as well as made to work even half decently]