Google is Listening!
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@olishea said:
being able to paint seamless textures onto organic shapes
Does the Ruby API allow to set a color value to a pixel of a texture? Or to reload a texture image very fast? Would it be theoretically possible with Ruby + ImageMagick or would we need to wait for the SketchUp team?
Another thing that I would like (maybe easier as painting) is deforming UV coordinates on multiple/curved surfaces with a smooth tool. This would allow to project your texture with a simple spherical projection and if you don't like the result, you just drag and deform the texture until it fits.
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@aerilius said:
Does the Ruby API allow to set a color value to a pixel of a texture? Or to reload a texture image very fast? Would it be theoretically possible with Ruby + ImageMagick or would we need to wait for the SketchUp team?
No - no read or write to image data.
Reloading texture via the API is no faster than what you do in the UI.
@aerilius said:
Another thing that I would like (maybe easier as painting) is deforming UV coordinates on multiple/curved surfaces with a smooth tool. This would allow to project your texture with a simple spherical projection and if you don't like the result, you just drag and deform the texture until it fits.
I'm not fully able to envision what you describe. This "Smooth" tool?
Are you talking about a spherical mapping tool? (Where you stretch and squash the sphere?) -
Is there an app that already has such a feature? I'm curious of how it'd work.
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Sorry, I meant something similar to smooth selection in vertex tools, that you can use to move/rotate/deform the texture coordinates.
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@thomthom said:
Is there an app that already has such a feature? I'm curious of how it'd work.
Don't say that they have this, but I'd would first look on zbrush or sculptris.
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I see how it works for brushes for 3d modelling - but I'm not able to see how it'd be used for UV co-ordinates. Can you illustrate it some way?
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@thomthom said:
I see how it works for brushes for 3d modelling - but I'm not able to see how it'd be used for UV co-ordinates. Can you illustrate it some way?
Maybe like how Photoshop has "liquify" where you distort a grid that distorts the coordinates?
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Sorry, that I don't know how to explain it technically, or its feasibility. I think I thought already about it and can imagine how it works on a triangle mesh with 3 texture coordinates, but there is always the forth coordinate.
Maybe it's "innovative"
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I'm experimenting with some UV mapping tools - so I'm curious of any idea. Would it like Pixero suggested?
In what usage scenario would you use it? -
@jbacus said:
Pixero: Please be civil if you want useful interaction with the SketchUp team.
Our development team believes that a 64-bit version of SketchUp will provide little to no actual benefit to you for the majority of modeling/rendering operations. In fact, a 64-bit version of SketchUp is likely to run slower in many operations. So my question is both an accurate and relevant one. What class of operations do you hope will be improved by a move to 64-bit processing?
If what you really want is the ability to export images at higher resolutions, please ask for that. We don't really have to shift to 64-bit processing to improve image export resolution.
If what you really want is the ability to interact with larger/more complex models at interactive frame rates, please ask for that. 64-bit processing doesn't have any relevance to this problem, but we do make performance improvements in this area with every release.
john
.Hi John!
If my post was uncivil I apologise, but likewise I found that quote from you an insult to me and other loyal SU users that have repeatedly asked for improvments to the core of SU. Something v8 didnt deliver. IMHO.
I'll try to be more polite in the future.First, I would like to thank you for replying to us in this forum.
I know it's not Googles policy to talk about unannounced features and such but I strongly believe that better interaction between users and Google would greatly benefit all.
In other software forums I visit many developers take active part in discussions and answer questions without revealing secrets.
I see this forum as the "true" SketchUp community home and would very much like to see you people around more asking questions to us, answering questions or just discussing features, solutions and workflows.To me, as a professional user, SketchUp is showing its age.
It still is a great modeling tool but more and more often I reach SU's limits and would like to be able to use it for things that I believe it was meant to do. Being a easy to use tool for architectual design and presentation.
To me that means it should deliver the tools and workflow to still be easy to use by todays standards.
The users are more and more relying on third party plugins (which are great) and several workarounds to get SU to do what we need.For example.
The shadow bug. The workaround is either to export the animation to images and edit out the "buggy" frames in a video editing app.
The result is not great since it makes the camera do a small time jump that doesnt look very professional.
Or rendering with a third party renderer. Still this gives us problems because of SU not beeing 64 bit the renderer cannot be either.
And renderers need all the memory they can get. I have never said or thought that 64bit would make SU a lot faster.
For me the main concern with it beeing 32bit is memory limitations.Exporting larger images. The workaround would be a script that lets you export the image in parts and you'll have to stitch them together in Photoshop.
(As a side note, I would for now be happy if I could export an anti aliased image that was in the range of 6500px wide.)
I could go on. The point is these are workarounds for problems that dont need to be there.As I said, SU is a great modelling tool and I believe you should rely on the community to enhance it by giving them even more access to SketchUp api. Who knows, Thomthom might even come up with a solution for better UV tools.
I've been a strong voice for improving the other aspect of SketchUp, - presentations.
I know you'll say thats what Layout's for but to many that doesnt suite the workflow.
Also, presentations can be more than a printed page.It could be a live walkthrough with a client.
If there was enhancements to materials (reflective surfaces) and lights (indoor lighting, coloured light, soft shadows) that would mean a lot. These things are quite possible in any game engine even on hardware that common people have.It could also be an animation. SketchUps animation is rudimentary compared to any competing software.
I have pushed and still am pushing the limits in this area and I believe I have some knowledge in the subject.
Since SU only do linear interpolation between scenes, making any kind of accellerating or decellerating movement is very hard.
I've developed a technique (another workaround) to make it possible but its unintuitive and slow.
http://forums.sketchucation.com/viewtopic.php?f=323&t=20173&p=167919&#p167962
Also the current way with scenes isnt really fit with rendering animations with third party apps.
I know others ask for the possibility to animate objects also.I don't think the things added in v8 are bad. But not as needed as other more important things.
And for a user that don't use GE or Layout, what are the reasons I should tell my boss to upgrade x number of licenses to v8?I also think it would be fair of you to release a free bug fix for the exploding toolbar problem also for v7.
Jan Sandström (Pixero)
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Sure picked a well qualified area to adjust the UV mapping...
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jbacus i still would like to know what you think of my post
http://forums.sketchucation.com/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=30586&start=60#p268908 -
Other apps integrate SU workflow step by step ...
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thom thom: painting directly onto the model with a seamless texture.....(in the normal direction)....here you could blend different textures. ie. you could have a base texture and then add rust stains/dirt blah blah blah......dunno if this is possible but it would be SWEET! yeah like zbrush, but not as crazy.
with regrads to unwrap.....it would be nice if there was a console within sketchup (like curviloft) that displayed your unwrapped model into one plane.
here you could paint and blend textures from your materials with a brush (within the console).....hit enter.....the textures are updated (by creating one large texture that wraps around the whole model)
this would be beneficial for texturing concave forms where projection is uselss. UV tools only work (accurately) within spehercial or cylindrical-like shapes. by the way they are great
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@khai said:
I get it. you prefer Collada even tho it is a poorly supported format at this time.
No, I'm questioning your assumption that it is poorly supported. I think it is pretty well supported now, and see evidence supporting that position.
john
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@jbacus said:
@khai said:
I get it. you prefer Collada even tho it is a poorly supported format at this time.
No, I'm questioning your assumption that it is poorly supported. I think it is pretty well supported now, and see evidence supporting that position.
john
.sorry I've actually given up. it's not worth the time arguing with someone who wont' see the problem when I can be getting on with things that are productive. take that as you will but that's how it is.
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@unknownuser said:
jbacus i still would like to know what you think of my post
http://forums.sketchucation.com/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=30586&start=60#p268908I think it is great that you're digging into the real applicability of 64-bit computing for 3D modeling apps, and that you now recognize that 'performance' is the issue that you care about, not our adoption of some particular technology that you think will make a difference.
I want you all to understand that the dev team understands clearly how important general performance is in SketchUp. We work on it with every single release, though sometimes in ways that aren't entirely obvious from the outside. SU7.1 included an entirely new rendering pipeline that was in development for almost two years. In SU8, we reworked the way that raster image data is handled internally. We'll work on something else in the next release.
And while we certainly have a responsibility to increase performance in SketchUp at every opportunity, you must also do your part by managing the complexity of your model to fit within the 'polygon budget' of your particular system.
In game-theoretic terms, SketchUp's modeling performance is a classic "arms race". Every time we make SketchUp faster, you start making bigger models. Then we have to make SketchUp faster again, and then you start making even bigger models. There is no logical conclusion to this game where performance is infinite and you can make an infinitely large model. Eventually performance will plateau, and you'll have to learn how to work with the system as it stands.
john
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When I started with SU modelling, a large model was ~20-30K faces, then it grew steady to be 200K-300K, Now I have a couple of models of 1-2M faces - because my hardware and SU is better.
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@khai said:
but no one's using Collada!
everyone's using OBJ.put it this way. OBJ is better...because ppl are using it. Collada maybe technically better on paper.. but if no one's using it.. it's not better.
right now, to use a Collada model I have to take the DAE into Softimage Mod Tools, save out as a FBX then take the FBX into Wings3D where I can then take it to OBJ...which everything else reads without problems.
take a look. do your own research and you'll see the problem. many apps are writing DAE.. but only a few - SU is one - that reads it...
it's comical!
I'm sorry Khai, but I really have to contradict you here. Yes, you are right, no one apart from Google are (seems to be) using COLLADA, but that doesn't mean that COLLADA is not better, it just means that everyone who are using OBJ (including developers) are ignorant! I have exactly the same problem as you. I need FBX for export to Unity, and hacking a COLLADA file just isn't doing it for me (I used to have to use Autodesk's bloody awful converter- which never works properly
). I have found the Sket2FBX application which works extremely well- but needs the entire Mono framework installed to get it working! No exactly elegant. With FBX, I can export models with faces containing image data and much more, OBJ, I cannot, and often get thousands of triangles that I then have to post process. Again why have this when COLLADA could do all this hassle free?I take my hat off to Google for pushing this along, it's really up to us users to now request COLLADA in the other tools that we use. Why Unity doesn't, I haven't the foggiest (and yes, it's preposterous that it seems like it is up to users to demand these little import/export updates). I really don't like OBJ, but people use it, because they are used to the file format, and don't want change or progression (well that's my reasoning anyway). A bit like the ongoing DWG/DXF's saga, really.
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@jbacus said:
@unknownuser said:
jbacus i still would like to know what you think of my post
http://forums.sketchucation.com/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=30586&start=60#p268908I think it is great that you're digging into the real applicability of 64-bit computing for 3D modeling apps, and that you now recognize that 'performance' is the issue that you care about, not our adoption of some particular technology that you think will make a difference.
I want you all to understand that the dev team understands clearly how important general performance is in SketchUp. We work on it with every single release, though sometimes in ways that aren't entirely obvious from the outside. SU7.1 included an entirely new rendering pipeline that was in development for almost two years. In SU8, we reworked the way that raster image data is handled internally. We'll work on something else in the next release.
And while we certainly have a responsibility to increase performance in SketchUp at every opportunity, you must also do your part by managing the complexity of your model to fit within the 'polygon budget' of your particular system.
In game-theoretic terms, SketchUp's modeling performance is a classic "arms race". Every time we make SketchUp faster, you start making bigger models. Then we have to make SketchUp faster again, and then you start making even bigger models. There is no logical conclusion to this game where performance is infinite and you can make an infinitely large model. Eventually performance will plateau, and you'll have to learn how to work with the system as it stands.
john
.John, your post is a good example of why SU users are feeling unheard or misunderstood. It isabout "general performance" but it's also morethan that. It's also about a very specificmemory limit within 32 bit applications.
Your comment about "polygon budget," shifting the onus on the user is actually kind of insulting. It shouldn't be the case that one can't import one high poly tree into a model (much less a number of them and cars as well) because the poly budget is so low. SU is simply way under the bar in this arena in terms of it's fellow modeling software.
It is an arms race, as you say but at this point, in terms of poly budget (among other things like UV tools), we're still asking for handguns but we keep receiving shipments of frozen corn.
-Brodie
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