Is this acceptable in professional software?
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Hi,
After a great deal of frustration I have come to the conclusion that trying to render animations in sketchup with shadows is a complete waste of time.
Due to the long-standing bug which causes a variety of "blips" to occur you either have to constantly re-render with slightly different views or edit out the offending frames.
Sometimes you can get away with this but most times you can't.
So, I have had to settle for producing animations without shadows.
My company pays for SketchUp, but if I as an individual had paid hundreds of pounds for software that had professional in its title and had been released for so long without this being fixed, I would be one very angry customer. I don't think any other serious software would have been allowed to get away with this serious lapse.
Yes, I love SketchUp, but can it ever be taken seriously when this sort of thing is allowed to continue.
Frustrated rant over. I feel a little bit better now.Regards
Mr S -
There is a fix for it called 'somedboy's reverse.' Although a company somewhere owns the ip to it, so we're stuck with either paying a lot more per copy of SU (to license the solution out) or just putting up with it. The @last team went with just putting up with it.
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Carmack's Reverse. John Carmack of id Software developed it years ago for Doom III, but Creative Labs got in early with a patent on a very similar solution and are being very proprietorial about it. I guess they are within their rights to defend their patent, but it's incredible that no one else has come up with an alternative solution to the problem in the last 9 years.
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@unknownuser said:
it's incredible that no one else has come up with an alternative solution to the problem in the last 9 years.
Exactly.
Google should either pay up or provide a solution itself.
Either that or drop the professional from SketchUp Pro.I simply can't believe that there isn't a solution to this.
Is this another example of where adopting DirectX could provide a solution?Regards
Mr S -
I don't agree at all. SketchUp is so much faster and more intuitive to use than anything else, that certainly for architecture - its core market. I'm not sure that anyone can argue that it isn't a professional tool. What did we have before it came along? Lightwave, Rhino, AutoCad, Microstation, Archicad, Blender, 3ds Max? Usability and intuitiveness of these things aren't close.
The difference between the free and Pro version is importers for other professional software, which is much more difficult to use and costs many time more. Simply importing geometry into SketchUp from these other programs because it is so much easier shows why it is a 'Pro' tool.
I have been using SketchUp since V2, and from V3 onwards, I haven't used anything else for 3d. I guess that's because I don't do much modelling of curved or organic forms though.
And regarding bugs, well the shadow thing is definitely irritating, but not a deal breaker. All software has bugs. My copy of VectorWorks 12.5 crashes almost daily. When I try to upgrade it to (hopefully) fix the problem, the upgrade aborts with the helpful message "Server says, Huh?" To make matters worse, the UK tech support guy didn't believe that any company would release software with such a stupid error message. That is supposed to be Professional software as well.
I agree with you about one thing though - Google should pay up or develop their own fix. Let's face it, it's not like Google are exactly strapped for cash is it?
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I made a personal plea with one of the Google programmers I met at basecamp to address this issue. I told him that the legions of Sketchup users would look up to him as a genius if he was able to achieve this.
On the mere mortal side of things would it be possible for a programmer to extract the code for carmack's reverse from version 4 and turn it into a ruby plug in? accessible from a secret hidden button of course wink wink nudge nudge know what I mean.
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The problem occurs when the camera travels through a shadow. If you can fly the camera around while avoiding the shadows, you will avoid the problem. There are few tricks to this...you can turn off layers that would cast a shadow on the camera, as soon as they're out of view. You can use section cuts to remove sections of the building that would cast a shadow. You can turn shadows off for certain scenes. You can create shadows by tracing the original shadow cast border, then select the texture, copy it, and darken the copied version...this makes a "permanent" shadow but it is a trick of the trade if you need shadows and want to "bake" them into your model.
As far as the problem itself, I can't talk about it, but I can tell you it's not as simple as you think. We're not happy about it either, but it is not in our control.
Hope those tricks help.
Cheers,
- CraigD -
Wink wink nudge nudge, know what I mean!
That rang a bell!
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@craigd said:
We're not happy about it either, but it is not in our control.
Reading between the lines: It will not be fixed in SU7
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Anyone with too much time on their hands and a yen to become fabulously wealthy, start here.
The only problem is that you not only have to solve the problem, you have to solve it in a way that doesn't infinge the existing patent. -
@kwistenbiebel said:
@craigd said:
We're not happy about it either, but it is not in our control.
Reading between the lines: It will not be fixed in SU7
My conclusion as well. I feel like throwing up...
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Certainly someone can generate a rubyscript that takes current shadow conditions for the current geometry and projects them on the surface as a texture. Then you can have shadows off and navigate around the model, export stills, and animations.
Not most direct solution, but would seem easy to author. Of course Once you change your geometry or sun conditions you have to re extract the textures. This is how I thought some of the integrated lighting within SketchUp applications would work, but doesn't seem like they work this way.
Since I've been using Kerkythea, I started using it for most of my animations.
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They've always been clear that it is not as simple as we think, and that they can not talk about it and that it will not get fixed.
Yet somehow I'm always a little confused why other companies are able to pay to use it. Perhaps its part of ongoing secret Google vs Creative Labs lawsuits or something. That's always been my best guess.
Chris
EDIT: What if lightup included a standard SketchUp shadow mode so it could bake on the SU shadows. Like a mode that didn't do photoreal shadows, just a plain ol' boring SU shadow mode. I guess animated shadow studies would not be possible, but it would do thee trick for walkthroughs that didn't need the time of day to change int he video.
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@craigd said:
but I can tell you it's not as simple as you think. We're not happy about it either, but it is not in our control.
I'll admit that obviously I don't know remotely as much about it as you do, but I suspect I have heard more lame excuses. From my (admittedly ignorant) standpoint it is quite easy. Google pays whoever the money to licence the relevant algorithm, or some of the mega-brains at the Googleplex develop an alternative or a slight modification/improvement which doesn't violate the patent.
Later this year you are scheduled to release SketchUp version 7, and Google is one of the richest and most influential companies in the whole world. You have a different set of rules - or at least you ought to. I thought this was supposed to be one of the benefits of Google buying out @Last.
Looking at some of the brilliant plugins here (UV mapping, freeform deformation, Subdivide & smooth) it makes me think that much better versions of these ought to be integrated into the next release. No offence to the guys who coded these - they are brilliant, but you develop the application, you really ought to be able to do it better. There is also the persistent problem with SketchUp's bility to handle large complex models well. To be honest it looks to me like you Google guys spend too much time on your slides, Segways and table football to do enough work. Yes, I know I shouldn't believe everything I read in the newspapers, but I would be delighted if you prove me wrong.
I am a massive SketchUp fan, but if I'm totally honest it looks to me like Google is getting corporately fat & lazy. I think it's fair to say that all users are expecting some really big advances for V7.
So no pressure then.
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Personally, I don't need Sketchup to create native eyecandy output (I use render engines for that).
But I DO want to be able to check what shadows and light look like at a certain time and date.
For interior scenes, currently the shadows are wrong, making it difficult to predict where direct sun will hit in my renderings.Any shadow representation in sketchup will do for me, as long as it is correct.
Support correct shadows, I don't care if it's an ugly solution.And I agree with Bigsticks point of view.
I am not loving the way Google treats Sketchups development either...
(I am sure Craig isn't the one to blame though) -
I still don't see how any of this can be pinned on Google having bought SketchUp. I get tired of hearing complaints about how Google ruined this or that. Well the shadows were broken while @Last still owned SU. So maybe you should blame them if you really want to blame someone. I was quite pleased with the SU team when we all met at the Googleplex and I really felt like they were working hard and were still quite excited about SketchUp. I really want to see some cool stuff in 7, but why all the Google hate folks? I'm failing to see exactly what precise problems can be pinned on to Google.
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It's not Google hate.
We just would like to see some elementary things fixed.
The shadows are an important SU feature. -
The idea that Google should just pay up & licence the algorithm sounds good but it assumes the algorithm is available to licence. I'd heard that Creative (the mp3 player manufacturer) who control the patent apparently have no interest in licencing it. I don't know why but that is what I heard.
Seems to me the 'baked' shadow idea is the way to go. It might also offer the potential of 'sketchy' shadows or some form of 'soft' shadow. I personally wouldn't care if it wasn't 'real-time' -- I'd be happy to wait anytime I needed it to 'bake'. I imagine the existing shadow engine could remain too as an option for when you want real-time.
Regards, Ross
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I agree with Ross and the comments of others here regarding having "Correct" interior shadows. I admire Craig for being straight up with us here in this public forum. It's obvious that the people who develop SketchUP and the people who use it agree that fixing the problem is a worthy cause. I just hope that someday it gets fixed. It's not going to stop me from using SU but having it fixed would eliminate a few headaches that occur on occasions while using the software.
Shadow Baking could also speed up animation considerably.
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I have to agree with kwistenbiebel that correct shadows are an essential and that possibly there are far better options now available for walk throughs. I have to strongly suggest there are a number of things that also need attention opoly count issues being my biggest gripe for now!
I reckon for now all users keeping fingers crossed for improvements to V7 is the way to go! I'll even let my thinning hair get matted for months to add to my ten fingers and toes!!
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