you guys are telling me that plugins cant influence STYLES nor tell Sketchup to export a 2D image?
well... in that case, the plugin should divide and paint the layers, and the user installs himself a STYLE that avoids the Sketchup Shading (Gouraud Shading?) so the faces are seen in Sketchup EXACTLY with the color they were painted (independent of depth, sun position, etc). And the user himself sets the model to parallel projection, seen from the top, and exports it to a 2d image.
@remus said:
Someone who knows about ruby correct me if im wrong, but i think it's very hard to manipulate images using ruby.
you do not need to manipulate images.
the modelling is done by the user. What the plugin does is divide the model in MANY HEIGHT LAYERS (like using zorro)... probably about 256 layers (usual numbers of colors in a bumpmap?), and to each layer, set a different shade of grey... white on the topmost layer, black on the lowest layer.
Then the plugin sets the model to be seen from the top on a parallel projection camera, and renders it as a 2D image with black background. One important thing would be to avoid the shading that Sketchup uses on models (that is, if you paint something WHITE, it should be seen as PURE WHITE from all angles... probably just some application of SKETCHUP STYLES?)
@solo said:
I may be missing something here but if you already have the model in order to get the original image why would you need to render a 2d image to apply to the 3d mesh?, unless you are trying to fake the engine using images instead of geometry in order to keep the poly's low.
exactly.
for example... imagine you want to create an old building. The building has tiles that are carved with intrincate shapes and you cant find those on the internet.
You do a 3d model of the carved bricks/tiles. Pasting those all over the building would make the model REALLY heavy. Even today games have poly limits and will use bumpmaps for things like detailed engines, crevices among the metal plates of the hull, etc.
You could for example get a bitmap of a ship hull plate on the internet, set it over a square on Sketchup and model the square to fit that bitmap (the crevices among the plates, etc). And then use that geometry to create a bumpmap. (since obviously no game will have models so detailed as to show with GEOMETRY the plates divisions)
Maybe its not such a good idea for people who good with textures. But I have some difficulty creating good bumpmaps in the right locations in the right shapes and such.
I was thinking if it would be possible to create a bumpmap FROM a Sketchup model. Basically, the idea came from another plugin posted here, which painted in different shades the model to create a kind of height map from a tin sandbox.
Lets say I want to create an engine texture to post on the side of a spaceship.
With this plugin idea you would MODEL the engine and texture it the way you want. Then you would render a 2d image from it, seen from above (in parallel projection?). Ok, you have the image of the engine, that you now can apply to the spaceship surface and render it. QUITE FLAT uh?
You would need to apply bumpmaps to avoid that flat look. But how to create a bump map that follows the subtle shapes of the engine? The round pipes, etc?
Well, thats where my idea comes in hand. If ITS USEFULL or POSSIBLE, I will leave it open to discussion.
Take that same engine model. CUT it in many different layers (number set by user? Higher number, more detail?) from bottom to up.
To each layer, from bottom to up, the plugin assigns a different material color, in GRAYSCALE. Dark grey for the bottom layers, white to upper layers. Then the plugin automatically renders a 2D image, seen from the top. There you have it! A grayscale bumpmap image that perfectly fits the engine!
@chris fullmer said:
Once you select the vertex, you want to move it?
well... at first, that would already be great. Obviously, the tool could be updated in the future (like the soft selection talked above). But selecting vertex(es) and moving them would already be great for lots of stuff. Maybe even using a tool like Jim´s mover, to move the vertexes carefully around.
@unknownuser said:
Is that all? Would you like to be able to select more than one vertex?
yup
You know... its possible to edit vertexes on sandbox, but on normal objects, you cant. Well, you can if you have no entity selected, click on the MOVE tool and hover it over an object. But once you move a vertex in ONE direction, you cant move it again in other directions. That obviously sucks.
Isnt there a plugin to move one or more vertexes in any direction as much as you want?
I remember I used a few years ago Rhino3D with Flamingo. Flamingo sucked, its true. But it had a very nice and EASY TO USE procedural texture creation process.
Ive tried some free standalone texture creator tools, like MapZone, TextureCreator, etc... they are DAMN COMPLEX. I cant create anything at all!!
is it better than GIMP?
so far, GIMP is the most famous free substitute for Photoshop.
Thank you both, although I think in this particular case the solution of "mass uniqueing" (selecting various component instances and making them unique) was more appropriate to what I was doing.
one way or the other, it was really helpful what you guys told me, and I am sure I will use it in the future.
Daiku already solved my problem. If I select all the component instances I want to change, and click "make unique", all of the selected will change to a new, single, new component.
@daiku said:
I think I understand what you are asking for. If you select multiple instances, and then choose "make unique", all of the selected instances will now share a new component definition. CB.
Thanks! It was too obvious for needing a plugin for that... but then, there are some obvious things that needed to be implemented via plugins...
you saved my day pal (literally, since I would spend hours doing it manually!)
@thomthom said:
Or, you could leave the faces which represent glass to have default material and apply the different transparent glass material to the groups/components containing the windows.
sorry, but what would be the difference? It still would change the material of all the component instances.
lets say I have one thousand glass panels, all of them instances of the same component. I want to change 100 of those to a new material.
How to do that? Changing any instance to a new material will change them all (all the 1000, not just 100).
I could make those 100 unique and manually change the texture, but that would take forever.
I posted this question in the ruby forum. I may have made myself clearer there.
http://www.sketchucation.com/forums/scf/viewtopic.php?f=180&t=18011
Is that possible in native Sketchup? Is there a plugin for that?
Basically, I have lots of component instances. I want to change textures in a few hundred of those. Obviously, since they are components, if I change one, I change all. And if I make them unique, and change the texture one by one, I will spend a century doing it.
Thus, what would be needed would be to select the component instances I want and "rename" them as a new component. Thus, they will effectively be a new component and will remain in the same place, in their same group and then I can select just ONE of them and all of them will have the texture changed at the same time without affecting the other component instances (which now are not the same component anymore)
Sorry about the english. I cant make myself clear in these explanations.
ps: if you are wondering what I want it for, its creating glass panels for skyscrapers
http://www.sketchucation.com/forums/scf/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=18009
Hi... I am creating a skyscraper. I have created these individual panels of glass. I made a panel as a component, and positioned several of them, by hand (is there any other method?) around the curved face of the building.
But I want to create some "diversity" on the façade. Thus, besides the light blue glass, I want a dark blue glass to be used on some floors. There lies the problem.
I cant change the texture on any individual panel of glass, since as a component, it will change the texture of all of them. But I want only ONE floor to have different glass color.
I could make the panel unique (or explode and then create a new component), but I would have to delete all other glass panels on that floor and replace them with the new glass panel... and believe me, its a pain in the ass, because as I said its a skyscraper... and all faces are rounded... its quite time consuming to position each individual glass panel.
The ideal solution would be to transform EVERY COMPONENT in a glass panels group (all of them already positioned) in a new component, thus then I would edit the texture of one of these new components and only them would change, not affecting all other glass panels in the building.
Is that possible or should this be a question to the ruby forums?
Thank you
Danke
Muito Obrigado
Muchas Gracias
wonderful.
so many incredible plugins being released. I wonder why some of these obvious ones were not bundled from the start with Sketchup.
haha, yeah, but I had already used the plugin before. I just had forgot how to use it!
worse of all is that Marian asked if I had pressed enter and I had already clicked the reply button and written YES and I was going to click submit than I thought... "well, maybe I should be sure I really pressed enter"... i created a new profile, created the soapbubble face like always... and pressed enter and MAGIC, it started "calculating" in that cool way this plugin works. That was what made me feel ashamed, I almost answered "yes" to the question like if it was some obvious thing to do... when in fact I had not done it! 
@whaat said:
@aceshigh said:
hey Whaat, any thought on the matter? Thanks
Yes, your scene scale is too big. I won't get into the details, but the plugin will fail if you are using a huge scene scale. Your scene is about 10km across!
yup, it was supposed to be a sci-fi city.
well, so you suggest that I scale down it. Haha, I cant even begin to understand whats the difference, to the PLUGIN, on the scale of the scene. Thanks for the help!
its also not working to me. It creates the skin, but then, no matter what I input as pressure and measurements, nothing changes. It stays FLAT. Very frustating