I kind of see what the OP was getting at, but I really hope google doesn't take any cues from Pixologic/Zbrush:

Include loads of features that demo really well, but are more or less useless in practice
Have a tricky, unfamiliar UI for no good reason
Consistently miss promised release dates
Add new features before fixing existing bugs (oh, hang on...)

I know I'm just software bashing here, and I do actually like (and use) some features of Zbrush. But other than 'Google should do something new and impressive with SketchUp', I'm not sure what they could really learn.

I presume feature film work would come under 'digital entertainment'. I'd never really thought of the film industry under that banner before, but I guess it's quite a fitting description.

I guess that means that 3ds Max is like this:

I work in a large VFX studio. I've got unlimited access to Maya/Renderman, Houdini, Massive - you name it, it's all there!

They also, on my request, own a copy of SketchUp.

Sometimes, SU it all you need. And if it's all you need, it's probably the fastest solution too.

You don't need a ferrari to round up sheep - you need a sheepdog.

AJ

(And just to be really pedantic, 3ds Max wasn't used on Avatar, maya was, but I realise that's sort of beside the point for this argument)

I had looked into it, but the materials used for 3D printing tended to be quite fragile/brittle, as far as I could tell. CNC milling from real materials (i.e. aluminium) seemed the way to go, although more expensive.

I also couldn't find anyone capable of printing semi-flexible 3D models (i.e. hard rubber), instead of solid resin. Is this because it is impossible?

Thanks for the help

AJ

Thanks for the reply. I guess just 'giving it a go' isn't a bad idea. I just wondered if anyone had used SU for this sort of thing before, and whether there were any major schoolboy errors I should try to avoid...

Cheers!

AJ

The blue things are the banners that furl down in the final video, and show video clips of various teams as the camera pans past them.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=raHZw7wPMeg

I was working for a visual effects house, so I got to have a lot of input into the design of the sequence and layout of the shorts, but not the overall concept of the video. The art director from the agency gave me the brief for the stadium design - it had to have the Champions League logo as a roof (totally impractical), it had to have some very large banners around the pitch (totally impractical, as you point out), and it had to be the biggest, most impressive stadium ever (again, probably totally impractical).

I sat down and did the rest. The 3D model was then done in maya by the 3D modeling and texturing team at 'Rushes', based on my SketchUp model.

Thanks for your comments. I don't usually get any feedback on these kind of images after the job is finished - basically because it doesn't make any difference, and the client is long gone...

If there is anything bothering you about any of the images, chuck it out there, feedback is great.

I also forgot these, a rush job for the Macy's Christmas Special 'Yes, Veronica' (produced by 'Bitstate'). It's a steampunk-style heartrate monitor, a bit like a victorian ECG:

SU:

Are you sure it's Sketchup? I remember lego instructions looking like this in the early 90's, and always assumed they had some kind of in-house tool to produce them. That or someone really, really good with a technical pen...

Here's some examples of how I've been using SketchUp in my professional work. Some of these are pretty old, but I don't think I've posted them before.

UEFA champions league promo concept art:

SU:

Concept:

SU:

Storyboard:

SU:

Matte painting:

Detail:

The cityscape was modeled in 'blocks' in sketchup - I think I did about 4 or 5. The 'blocks' were then seeded to Vue as an ecosystem, and 'grown' into a fully fledged city. This is what the render looked like before processing:

'The Day of the Triffids' matte painting

Plate:

Paired with 'Vue', I'm actually using Sketchup quite a lot for photo-real matte paintings. I'm working on 'Narnia' using it at the moment, and it was used extensively on matte paintings for 'Leap Year'. Hopefully I can show some of that work later this year.

Here are the Sketchup elements for the above matte, based on a 'Camera Match' to get a correct camera, and then rendered in 'Vue' using my 'Camera2Vue' script. The buildings weren't SU (though I think they could have been) - they were already rendered in C4D and provided to me in advance.

Hope people like seeing these - I know SketchUp only played a small part in the creation of each one, but it proves it is a serious tool, capable of being used on the biggest projects...

Take care

AJ