Rendering with sketchup

guibot · 28 May 2009, 12:26

Hello all, my first post here

I am giving first steps with sketchup, I already went into basic modeling and going fine until now.

I would like to know a few things about rendering scenes:

how to get better renders?
how to add lights? and how to deal with shadows to have a more realistic effect?

sorry about this basic questions, but I would love to know more about this subjects.

Gaieus · 28 May 2009, 15:31

Hi Guilherme and welcome!

SU is basically a modelling tool (as you noticed) and has limited capabilities in rendering. It doesn't do "photorealistic" rendering, doesn't have lights (other than the only Sun) and shadows can only be "tweaked" to be darker or lighter a bit...

There are a lot of external rendering engines and plugins (some of which work pretty much like "inside" SU) which can help to achieve more realistic results. Depending if you are inclined to invest a couple of bucks, beside the free ones (like Kerkythea), you have a good selection between about $150 up to about $ 1000.

Have a look at the sticky post in the Gallery forum: "Render applications home pages" to have n idea.

(I'm sure some members will chime in and suggest this or that renderer... )

SFX Group · 29 May 2009, 13:09

Ive been using Podium (its free up to 500x500 res), seems ok to output what you want....

It has some clever features like "bump" maps and lighthing (which i havnt got to work fully yet).

Many Thanks

d12dozr · 14 Jun 2009, 23:44

I've used IDX Renditioner free version and it is easy to get good results with.

barrington · 15 Jun 2009, 02:54

The Podium plug-in is not expensive and well worth buying. It is improving all the time and the results are excellent. It also gives registered uses some excellent light fitting as well as other goodies.

Al Hart · 15 Jun 2009, 04:06

Render Plus just released a new low cost, integrated renderer for SketchUp - nXtRender - so if you are interested in a very good, low cost renderer for SketchUp take a look:

(www.renderplus.com)

kwistenbiebel · 15 Jun 2009, 05:12

Talking about marketing... sigh.

I think the best way to decide on a render engine is to go to the gallery section here on SCF, see what images you like ,what render engine is used to make them and decide based on that.

Asking it in a thread will give you biased or commercial answers by developers, pushing their product.

bahri · 20 Jul 2009, 09:44

but if u want a free render engine try kerkythea,, it a good render