3D rendered walk throughs
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I believe in the near future we will be using game engines for real time walkthroughs.
Unfortunately no one really developed a fast workflow from Sketchup to game engine.
With the new Cry Engine 3 just being released, I really hope it will finally happen. -
i just tried Camstudio and there's no way to get the frame rate even near acceptably smooth at a descend resolution. at least on my machine. fraps on the other hand is smooth like butter
even at full screen resolution. But hey, its your presentation. 
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@kwistenbiebel said:
I believe in the near future we will be using game engines for real time walkthroughs.
Unfortunately no one really developed a fast workflow from Sketchup to game engine.
With the new Cry Engine 3 just being released, I really hope it will finally happen.have you tried playup: http://www.playuptools.com/ seemed pretty good to me but i didn't spend that much time.
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Although I am not sure if Esperient Creator could be considered a game engine, it supports native SU file import.
Interactive 3D content developed this way looks very good indeed.
But with a price of $500 or even $2400 for a high end package, it is probably out of the question.
Has anybody tried it yet? -
@numbthumb said:
Although I am not sure if Esperient Creator could be considered a game engine, it supports native SU file import.
Interactive 3D content developed this way looks very good indeed.
But with a price of $500 or even $2400 for a high end package, it is probably out of the question.
Has anybody tried it yet?I have tried it and it was quite easy to use. It didnt have a way of having the camera fly through a scene ( you only had a fixed camera height) and after I asked for it at the forum and was told it would be done soon. I waited for some six months before giving up on it.
Scripting Esperient was far beyond my capacity.DX Studio was better in that area but lacked much else. Like speed with scenes of more than one building.
Quality wise nothing beats Crysis but workflow isnt quick and since you can't use it commercially there isn't much you can do with it. Plus it hasent got a web exporter.
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I have tested a lot of realtime engines and they have their fair share of plus'es and minus'es.
My latest workflow would probably be:
Quick/cheaper/not so good looking path: SU+LightUp then to Unity3d.
High quality path would be SU then import to Max with the wonderful new skp importer.
Bake light possibly with the max plugin Flatiron that looks very good and is almost automatic. Then to Unity.
Unity seem to have a better more alive community and development roadmap than for example Esperient or DX studio.
It can import collada files and also has a system for trees and grass that looks quite good. (Not Crysis quality but still...)
It works on both mac and windows and you can present it through both a exe file or a webpage that detects the viewers hardware and adjust setting for best performance. This is starting to look like an ad which I didnt mean it to but take a look for your self: http://unity3d.com/gallery/live-demos/tropical-paradise
And here is an archviz made with unity: http://www.lazyant.nl/virtual3d/ -
Wasn't trying to answer my question, was just plugging camstudio....its not suitable for what I'm doing. Maybe I should explain better; I would love to be able to achieve something like this: http://www.anifex.com/experience_our_work/24/small
I know this is done with Maya but is it possible to get close with sketchup? I dont need it to be interactive though.
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Certainly - however the colour transitions would not be that "smooth" and gradual but once this colour then from the next frame (scene) another colour.
Ah yes, and of course the rendering engine of SU is far from that "photorealism" (well, even that move wasn't too photoreal either).
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So you basically need to fly around your design. I've done this quite a few times.
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Try buying smustard's "Camera path" ruby and then render the resulting animation with any render plug-in that supports scene animation, or... try to avoid curved paths, sticking instead to simple camera movements, like I did here with Twilight:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iNVqKh2k164 -
Export to an external render program with a Studio environment capable of creating fly-throughs, like Kerkythea, Vue or Artlantis. With a studio you'll get the smoothest camera path. I've used both Artlantis (old versions) and Kerkythea for this purpose. Pete Stoppel (solo) has used Vue with superb results.
Check the old Artlantis 4.5 in action:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tR3zw-G3PvM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uut3l2dJPns
And Kerkythea:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h3cwW2xkloA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MiS3l6otTQw
You can also do all material set-up in Twilight and then export to Kerkythea to create the smooth camera path and the animation. -
Do it in LightUp. With LightUp you don't need to place any cameras, just fly around while recording your movements. A couple of lazy examples by me:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4hdTdK__qaE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4hdTdK__qaE
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FlightPath
http://www.smustard.com/script/FlightPathBTW, i installed flash 10 and now youtube looks better in FF
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Thanks for the reply, Pixero.
I wasn´t even able to start it due to some side-by-side configuration error. -
Thank you all very much guys, There is now lots for me to consider, the effects you are getting, Ecuadorian, are just what I'm after. Pending IP issues I'll post the result here in a few weeks.
Thanks again
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hasnt someone mentioned a few months ago a plugin (or external program?) to export Sketchup Geometry to the HALF LIFE 2 game engine???
I guess that "playing" inside a house created with Sketchup would be the best walkthrough available, considering how smooth the HL2 engine is... of course, it doesnt make much sense to show you running around your client´s house holding a machine gun, but I guess you can change that with a mod
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but would be accurate depiction of the estate agent as a zombie.
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Wouldn't you (or anyone who wants to see the walkthrough) need to buy the game for it?
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Yeah, I guess you could do that. Although I wouldn´t mind a bit of good old fashion FPS with SU models as well.
BTW are you referring to SketchUp Source Tools?
http://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/SketchUp_to_Hammer_Export_plugin
http://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/SketchUp_to_SMD_Export_plugin -
i think Playup? http://www.playuptools.com/
and its the crysis engine "CryEngine2" if thats what your refering to. -
Hmm. If this is about HalfLife 2 ( as AcesHigh said ), than it has to be the Source engine ( correct me if I am wrong ), and SU Source Tools.
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@numbthumb said:
Hmm. If this is about HalfLife 2 ( as AcesHigh said ), than it has to be the Source engine ( correct me if I am wrong ), and SU Source Tools.
didn't know about that one. how is it?
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Oh, and yes, PlayUp tools does support Valve Source
More info can be found in this thread http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=654523 where the process of getting the geometry from SketchUp to VMF is discussed. As it is said there: (among other things)
"This is especially useful for my exploration of using the HL2 engine to give real-time walkthroughs (NOT recored flythroughs) of arcihtectural renderings."
Personally, I have run into problems with complex geometry, which was totally messed up in Hammer. Workarounds in Blender or 3ds Max were far beyond my capabilities, so eventually I gave up.
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