Component Modification

[Sawduster]

This may be a real DUH tip for many, but . . .

I detailed furniture modeling I often find myself having to make modifications to component parts after they are installed into the piece. Even with layering and the ability to disappear stuff to get to other stuff, it is often a tight squeeze. What works best for me is to do a move/copy of the component and drag it out into the open spaces, open the copy to edit, make the mod which is duplicated on the piece in place, then delete the copy.

[Masta Squidge]

You know, this isnt a bad hint for any new users, I spent about 2 months doing it in place before I realized that any change you make to any copy of a component changes all of them.

[3eighty]

Jerry> Thanks for the tip..I just visited your web site and enjoyed it very much..Is there a chance that you could post a good picture of that Hackberry wood so we could use it as a material in Sketchup..

Thanks

Richard

[Sawduster]

Richard,
I'll see what I can find.

[TIG]

@sawduster said:

This may be a real DUH tip for many, but . . .

I detailed furniture modeling I often find myself having to make modifications to component parts after they are installed into the piece. Even with layering and the ability to disappear stuff to get to other stuff, it is often a tight squeeze. What works best for me is to do a move/copy of the component and drag it out into the open spaces, open the copy to edit, make the mod which is duplicated on the piece in place, then delete the copy.

There is a built in function to do this less painfully...
Start to edit the component and then select
Menu > View > Component Edit > Hide Rest of Model [toggles on/off]
This will make only that component's parts visible during the edit. When you exit to end editing the component everything else reappears automatically. I have a shortcut key Ctrl+Alt+H that toggles this on/off...

[Sawduster]

TIG,
Thanks for that. Another weapon added to my arsenal.

Richard,
I've looked around my pics and such and I can't find any of pictures of spalted hackberry in large enough pieces to make a decent material that won't get all blurry.

[3eighty]

Thank you for looking Jerry...

[Dave R]

Once in awhile I find Jerry's method a better option that hiding the rest of the model. If I want to add details that would generate those tiny, non-filling faces, I'll copy the component and move that instance away from the rest of the model. I scale that instance up by a factor of 10 or 100 or something. Then I do the editing on the large version. The original instances of the component get the same treatment and even those tiny faces fill. When I'm finished with the editing, I delete the enlarged instance of the component. This is faster than scaling it back down andgetting it accurately placed.