Hallo Artists

I've been away from Sketchup and CAD in general for around 6 years, but is planning to return, as I miss the design process.

Previous I always made floorplans in AutoCAD Architecture, and afterwards the 3D in Sketchup. Have also used ArchiCAD for some years as a tool for both.

As I plan to return to designing slowly, I would like to save the money of AutoCAD and ArchiCAD.
So I was searching for a way to use Sketchup for the initial floorplans (I always begin there), and found plugins like Dibac and Instant Architecture, where it should be a bit easier to work with walls, making adjustments during the process.

But what is your experience - can you get a decent workflow with 2D floorplans in Sketchup, and which plugins do you recommend? Can you somehow make it work, switching between 2D and 3D in Sketchup?

Hallo guys,

Just playing around with Enscape and is quite amazed of it's simplicity and quality if tweaked correctly.

Does anyone have any problems regarding amount of proxies from Skatter?
I have a scene where only some is loaded into Enscape even though it works in other render plugins like Thea render...

@pilou said:

@unknownuser said:

I was thinking of trying Twinmotion which should be similar. But maybe Unreal it a nice alternative

I believe that Twinmotion has the Unreal Engine inside!

Correct as far as I know
And I'm thinking maybe Twinmotion is so much easier for archviz, that it's a good investment?

Have anyone experience using Unreal studio for archviz?

I've been using Lumion, which is very easy to use, and I was thinking of trying Twinmotion which should be similar. But maybe Unreal it a nice alternative

@solo said:

Can you screen capture the SU model? me thinks the vegetation may be the issue.

For the vegetation I used Skatter and Thea instances. Only a couple of plants on the terrace are full models.

@pixero said:

How heavy (MB) is your scene?
I have successfully worked with SketchUp files that was about 650 MB.
Grouping lose geometry and using layers to show/hide stuff while working is a good practise.
If the SketchUp file is somehow acting weird it could work to start a new SketchUp file and copy every thing over to it.

Well the scene is only 244 MB, so it shouldn't be to bad...

I've attached some sunset renders (no post processing yet!) so you can see the scene.

@dave r said:

@unknownuser said:

My PC is brand new with a strong GPU, CPU and a 32Gb ram!

Specifics? What kind of graphics card? What operating system? Windows 10?

Are you using SU8 as your profile indicates? In SketchUp's Preferences>OpenGL, do you have Hardware Acceleration enabled or disabled? How big is the SketchUp file? Have you tried purging unused?

Yes... of course

CPU: Core i7-8700K 3.7GHz
Primary GPU: Geforce GTX 1080 Ti 11Gb (For the screens)
Secondary GPU: Geforce GTX TITAN Black 6Gb (Dedicated to Thea - no screens connected)
System ram: 32Gb
OS: Windows 10 Pro
Sketchup: 2018 Pro

Hi,

Lately I've begun using Sketchup for rendering (using Thea plugin for Sketchup), and as the scene gets bigger sketchup is struggling to handle it.

Where is the bottleneck...? My PC is brand new with a strong GPU, CPU and a 32Gb ram!

David

@stinkie said:

Thea’s a fine app. It’s hybrid rendering mode (GPU + CPU) is blazing fast. It’s been over a year, though, since the latest version of the core app, Thea Studio, was released. Since then, the developers have gone shtum. Questions about Thea’s development remain unanswered, promises about forthcoming news turn out empty.

VfSU’s development used to be abysmal. It’d take ages until bugs got sorted, if at all. However, that has changed since Chaos Group took over. Today, the app’s development is going strong. Vray may be a little slower than Thea, currently, but I have no doubt whatsoever that’ll change. Over the course of the years, Vray (not just VfSU) has only gotten better, and easier to use.

From my perspective, going with Vray looks like the safest bet, at the moment.

Yes... maybe you’re right

I wrote to Thea contact today (I couldn’t post on the forum because I’m not a licensed user) asking about the new sketchup plugin and if I have to pay for upgrading to V2 when coming if I buy now.
I got a reply only some hours later (quite fast ) of course without news beyond what’s on the website regarding the new plugin. But I have to pay for upgrading from V1.x to V2

If they reply that fast someone must be at work... maybe working on exciting things to come

Regarding problems with sketchup crashing after installing Vray 3,6 I just received this workaround from Chaos group support:

*This error seems to be caused by an incompatibility between V-Ray 3.6.1 and Dynamic Components plugin in SketchUp.
Please try the following:

1. Uninstall V-Ray
2. Open Sketchup and from the drop down menu Window --> Extension manager disable Dynamic Components extension. Then create a scene and save it, it doesn`t matter what it will be, the important part is to make a save.
3. After that close Sketchup, start it again, check in the Extension manager if Dynamic Components is still disabled and close Sketchup again.
4. Install V-Ray and start Sketchup and try to render with V-Ray.*

And there will be a sub-release fixing this problem!

David

@juju said:

@pixero said:

I would say Thea.
They have been working on version 2 for a long time and it will hopefully be ready soon.

There was a post by Thomas somewhere (unsure if I saw it on the Thea forum or here) in the region of February 2017 that they're busy with the new version 2 and (as per the my recollection) from the wording implied that it wouldn't be long until release. I purchased Thea late February 2017 with this in mind, but here we are almost a year later...

I'd say if you already have Thea, stick to it for as long as you can bare it; as Pixero pointed out it is probably one of the better / faster / more versatile rendering apps for SketchUp out there at the moment, but whatever lead they may have had in the arena has probably run out.

Hmm... that's what I fear too... I used Thea render years ago, but I can see not much has happend since. I don't have a licence and price isn't a problem, so I have to find out which one to buy
But I can see Thea is still faster then Vray ...though I miss fur

@pixero said:

I would say Thea.
In my opinion it is the best integrated renderer for SketchUp.
They have been working on version 2 for a long time and it will hopefully be ready soon.
Vray for SketchUp used to be really buggy. The latest version is a lot better but it's not faster than Thea so I'll stay with it and see what version 2 will bring.

Thanks
Version 2?! sounds interesting

I can see a new Thea for Sketchup plugin is on it's way too... with full control of materials like Vray - but of course I don't know when it's going to be ready

I've been trying both Thea and Vray, and can see pro/cons for both renders... but I don't have a lot of experience in visualization.

Which render plugin can you recommend?

Had the same problem, and tried the above solution.
It works partly - at least Sketchup isn't crashing anymore, but i still get an error message:

Error Loading File su_dynamiccomponents.rb Error: #<SyntaxError: C:/Users/dbk/AppData/Roaming/SketchUp/SketchUp 2018/SketchUp/Plugins/su_dynamiccomponents.rb:28: syntax error, unexpected ',', expecting ')' UI.start_timer (5, false){ ^>

Any ideas what's wrong?

David

Hi everyone,

We are looking for someone to visualize the houses we build. I usually make the 3D model in sketchup my self, but I am to busy to make the final presentations.
We hope to find a solid cooperation

Is anyone interested?

Best regards
David

@jeff hammond said:

maybe look at VisualARQ in combination with rhino.

Home - VisualARQ

VisualARQ (www.visualarq.com)

me personally, i don't need the parametric walls and layout capabilities etc of visual Arq but it seems you would benefit..
if i were starting fresh, rhino would be in there for sure.. then sketchup.. and i might like learning modo though i don't think i'd use it in my actual work..

it all depends on who you're dealing with or what other people need to see your files.. most of the architects/engineers i've been sharing files with lately are done via sketchup while many of my drawings are done in rhino.. most everybody seems to have a copy of sketchup along with basic knowledge of obtaining dimensions etc..

that said, if i were looking at this from a student point of view (or whatever) and wanted to have knowledge in apps which makes myself available to the largest group of potential firms.. i think i'd focus on autoCad / Revit as my main learning points. (similar to what arail has said earlier)

That looks really cool!!

Think you guys, for all your replies!
I see everyone is in love with, not surprisingly, Sketchup

I'm also very happy with sketchup, absolutely the fastest tool I have tried, to get a 3D model look fantastic!
But there is also a lot of software I haven't tried, Vectorworks seems to get some attention when I search the internet!?
I do need to be able to open standard cad formats, like dwg, which is used mostly in my country. That's why I'm thinking about an additional tool, besides Sketchup. Sketchups 2D capabilities is limited compared to other applications.

@krisidious said:

That's why I've made a lot of my own and you can too or find them on the 3Dwarehouse. door openings, windows, hvac etc. I even have a trick with components where I have 2D component groups that you open them later at the 3D stage and insert the 3d model version and it populates the model with all the 3d doors and such.

far too much money for just that.

Interesting!

@krisidious said:

I think you could cut Arch Desktop out of the loop and just go straight to Sketchup with your 2D drawing as well.

Yes.. I have tried that, but there is absolute some time saved in using the intelligent objects, just in 2D (AEC Objects in autocad architecture) to get the floorplan adjusted/modified as needed. But it is definitely a lot of money to use on Autocad for just that feature!