How to spin a barn

tspco

Here is what I need to do, I have a large barn I modeled.
I want to make a video of the barn spinning, (actually rotating slowly).
I tried a couple of things, the old "takscene shotsts from several locations" trick. Well that didn't work so well. Then I tried Chris's camera recorder, better but not great. On a whim I put a SketchyPhysics motor on the center of the roof, and connected it to the barn all by itself, when I ran the simulation, the results were not too bad(after I set the max acceleration to 0.125, then slowed it down to 25%).
There is got to be a better way to make a video of a barn, any ideas? plugin wise?

Dave R

Do you really need to spin the barn or orbit the camera around it? There's a big difference.

Rich O Brien

Doesn't the 'Ruby Example' that are enabled under Preferences have an Animation that does this?

I'd check but I deleted the folder

Dave R

I'd forgotten about that one because I never use it. Under Camera>Animations there's Spin View if you've ticked Ruby Script Examples under Extensions in Preferences.

tspco

Orbit the camera around it, but the subject got youre attention didn't it?[flash=640,480:3f7cm05z]http://www.youtube.com/v/0NX1EF9eGrE[/flash:3f7cm05z]

tspco

Other than the fact the downward spiral comes into play, the spin view works. But I need a flat spin about the z axis, to do what I want.

Dave R

You might look at Camera OrbitOnTarget. It seems to me that there's another plugin that will allow you to establish camera locations about a center point but I can't remember what it is called and didn't find it in a quick scan of the list. You might look through the list of plugins yourself and see if you can find anything that might work for you.

Rich O Brien

With some thinking outside the box this will work

http://forums.sketchucation.com/viewtopic.php?t=36430

driven

This ones handy, http://forums.sketchucation.com/viewtopic.php?p=45473#p45473 john

tspco

I tried teh creat360 plugin, probably not ready for SU8, I had 10 scenes as soon as I started SU, 10 scenes of an empty drawing.
So I loaded a model, after deleting those scenes, right clicked, looked in the plugins menu, the tools menu, even the draw menu, no plugin, access point/menu found. I tried again same results. So I de activated it for now. Perhaps someone is still here that knows how it works.

sdmitch

Here is a simple plugin that will spin the current view. Input consist of angle and delay between screen updates.

def spin_vue
  inp = inputbox(["Angle;","Delay;"],[1,0.1],"Spin the View")
  if inp
    angle=inp[0].to_f;delay=inp[1].to_f
    mod = Sketchup.active_model
    vue = mod.active_view
    tar = vue.guess_target
    cam = vue.camera
    eye = cam.eye
    tr=Geom;;Transformation.rotation(tar,Z_AXIS,angle.degrees)
    for i in 1..(360/angle).to_i
      eye.transform! tr
      cam.set eye,tar,Z_AXIS
      vue.refresh
      sleep(delay)#control speed of rotation
    end
  end
end
UI.menu("Plugins").add_item("Spin View") { spin_vue }

david_h

would flightpath work? Just make the path a circle around the barn. I've rarely used this so I can't speak for it, but it seems to me to a be a possibility.

tspco

I tried flightpath in the past, if the camera would be pointing other than in the direction of the "flight", then maybe, otherwise no.

SD I wish I knew what to do with the code you posted. I am going to guess that all I need to do with it is paste it in a notepad ++ files and save it as rotate.rb. But I have a doubt that is that is needed.

sdmitch

Yes, just copy and save. If there is only one object in the model, it doesn't matter if you spin the view or the ojbect. If spinning the object is required then you can use this method.

def spin_object
  inp = inputbox(["Angle;","Delay;"],[1,0.1],"Spin Object")
  if inp
    angle=inp[0].to_f;delay=inp[1].to_f
    mod = Sketchup.active_model
    ent = mod.entities
    sel = mod.selection
    corg=[]
    sel.each{|e| corg<<e if e.class==Sketchup;;Group || \
    (e.class==Sketchup;;ComponentInstance and not e.definition.behavior.always_face_camera? and not e.definition.behavior.shadows_face_sun?)}
    sel.clear
    for i in 1..(360/angle).to_i
      corg.each{|e|
      tr=Geom;;Transformation.rotation(e.bounds.center,Z_AXIS,angle.degrees)
      e.transform! tr
      }
      Sketchup.active_model.active_view.refresh
      sleep(delay)
    end
  end
end

The objects to be spun must be groups or components. You can select more than one.

tspco

SD, the first version works ok, thanks.
The spin object (2nd version)does not show up in the plugin menu.
I compared the two and I added the last line from the first one to the second like this

UI.menu("Plugins").add_item("Spin View") { spin_vue }

UI.menu("Plugins").add_item("Spin Object") { spin_obj }

That didn't help...help

sdmitch

@tspco said:

SD, the first version works ok, thanks.
The spin object (2nd version)does not show up in the plugin menu.
I compared the two and I added the last line from the first one to the second like this

UI.menu("Plugins").add_item("Spin View") { spin_vue }

UI.menu("Plugins").add_item("Spin Object") { spin_obj }

That didn't help...help

Oops. Sorry about that. The text in the "curly" brackets should be

{ spin_object }

It is always the name of the method to be called whin the menu item is selected.

Jim

There is a spin view animation included with SketchUp - you need to enable Ruby Script Examples in the Extensions dialog. The option appears in the Camera menu.

Oh, sorry Dave - didn't see your response.

tspco

Jim been there done that, I just don't care for the downward movement while spinning.