CTRL+S is like breathing. Than for snapshots of the project you have Save A Copy As...I have at least 10 copies a day.

I draw airplanes with details of parts. EVERYTHING is either a group, if used only once, but always a component if used at least once or twice in the drawing. There are NO "free" entities in a drawing. Then I organize the collection using LAYERS. I number each layer in a hierarchy, and assign whatever appropriate groups/comps to a layer. Where I have components that move (ie: landing gear up or landing gear down, I create a layer for each, and a copy of the comp assigned to each. You can orient/move/rotate any comp. and retain its entity integrity. Only if a secondary comp. has a minor entity change would I make it unique. But that dissolves the link back to the original. One other important detail. Every single entity in the drawing is on LEVEL 0, whether in free space, in a group or in a component. Only groups and components bounding boxes get assigned to a specific layer. It can be layer 0. That way, you can easily control visibility, create scenes and do other neat stuff.

@fleawig said: Thanks, that's very helpful. Perhaps if I do the whole intersection operation at a larger scale, then scale down the results at the end--that could work? I'll try it out. (As well as your other suggestions.) That's a good idea, but still the segments have to be greater [in number]. Importing a larger file MIGHT give you better curves, but the dome likely has to have more facets and scaling one up alone won't do that. It may be a good idea to do the trimming at a larger scale because SketchUp has difficulty creating very small faces. It's OK however to scale down larger faces once created.

To assign another layer to selected object[s] there are two dropdown lists of layers available to choose from - one in the 'Entity Info' dialog and the other one in the 'Layers' Toolbar.

Yes, TIG, that seemed to fix it. Thanks

OK.Merci.

a bit of junk, sorry can be deleted, can't recall why I started it.....sign of age?

Okay thanks for that, I will try it tomorrow

3dsky

@cassieflo said: Yes, that did it!! I cannot thank you enough!! I really appreciate you helping me through the steps:) Perfect! Happy to help.

Thanks Tig, sometimes I wonder why I get out of my pit. It had become deselected somehow and I just missed it. Doh moment of the week.

Extracting models is against the TOS for Google Earth. Extensions, like PlaceMaker, can extract 3D buildings from OSM but these are only good for mass models.

[image: FJr3_legos.jpg]

Try Virtual Machine, I've used it in the past (admittedly a few years ago) with a fair amount of success, but not for SketchUp though. However, the problem you're having, IIRC I was able to configure a VM with access to the GFX hardware of the host machine.

Ok so the author of that addon rick got back to me and updated the script and it works exactly how I need it. Thank you everyone for your help, if you need the pluggin make sure you visit smustard.com for a list of there wonderful extensions. Rick also wanted to convey his appreciation for honoring the EULA. Thanks again everyone.

A good alternative is MSPhysics. You can program camera and targets on paths at any speed or control them directly with sliders. The entire model to be driven through is set as to be ignored in order not to be subject to gravity and to fall down.... The animation can be saved and output as a SketchUp, Indigo, Twilight or Kerkythea movie. A scene animation is also possible.

You could try adding the co-ords to 'Geo-location. Dont how accurate it would be tho.

Sorry I couldn't just give you a key to press to make it all clean. Unfortunately there's no substitute for keeping your model clean as you go. Some people will claim it takes too much time to clean as you go but it's actually less time consuming to model cleanly than it is to repair the model later. Best wishes.