Would a dynamic component work with random attribute built into it. But when you take your first instance and copy it to other locations, I don't know if it re-calculates the random#. I haven't really used the random feature before.

But I can see where it would be nice to quickly click on component instances and have it randomly replaced with a component from a specific list. At the start of the ruby it could ask for names of components to include in the list, or maybe the ruby is written for rubys with specific prefix in their name.

Often I think the problem is due to auto cad files where things that appear to join or intersect, do not. There are some 3rd party AutoCad tools to clean up the drawing. I've also brought them into Illustrator prior to SketchUp and used their gap detection tools. You set a tolerance and it fills any gaps smaller than that size.

I assume you have tried a restart on the computer with same results. Does seem odd.

You may also consider bringing the final product into Adobe Illustrator or Photoshop (via PDF export from Layout). Not only can you add your line shadows, but you could alter the line style, and of course you could alter the underlying photo.

Good thread. I may get in to a large ruby project soon, and I'm glad I ran across this. Will give me insight on how best to name and organize my code/scripts.

Tried this link on Mac using Safari with the plugin installed.
http://www.renderplus.com/pano3d/pano_from_o3d.html

Is this a known bug?

Looking at sample on O3D site it also doesn't work. Maybe I'll try Firefox on Mac?
http://o3d.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/samples/simpleviewer/simpleviewer.html

I do a lot of panoramic work, there are plenty of free panoramic options there to view panoramas, as well as to create them. But It appears that O3D also does other things.

I like to save as dwg/dxf. At that point it is still full size (1"=1"). Then I import it into Illustrator, which now lets you scale to a desired scale (e.g. 1200units =1"). You can't keep it 1"=1" if you are designing a building because Illustrator as pasteboard size limits. At this point you can save your Illustrator file and then import into InDesign.

A different approach is to set your scaled drawing up in Layout, and export as a PDF. You can open this in Illustrator and manipulate (but not to the level of manipulation you can get from a dwg file). The nice thing about this method is that you keep your raster artwork and your vector artwork.

This video just in the SketchUpdate could be nice.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OI4K6DLdY4k

It would be great if on Mac there was a control panel that just gave per application control of gestures. Much like 3rd party mouses let you program buttons. Now the new Wacom tablets that work both with pen and touch support gestures, so even people without a laptop or with a older laptop can use them. Since Wacom already has nice system preference module for older trackpads for per-applciaiton control, maybe they will have a solution.

By the way, on windows, when Windows7 is out, won't there be gestures as part of the OS?

Instead of post processing the rendering, just keep your camera level in SU. Without the camera tilted up or down verticals are vertical no mater how wide your shot it. Of course that doesn't mean you can still get away with 90-100deg shots without them looking odd.

If you want to you can crop the top or bottom of the resulting image (as needed). This basically mimics what happens with a tilt shift lens, used in architectural photography for much the same reason. Trying to fit tight spaces onto a single photo without looking too awkward. Although sometimes the awkward look is nice.

I completely different action is to create an interactive panoramic export of the entire field of view. There is a script to export six cube faces, there there is software on mac or PC to turn this into interactive file.

Generally the PDF should be fine, unless you run into issue with font not on printers machine that may not be included in the PDF. But when exporting from InDesign you can package fonts with the file or with PDF export.

I agree keeping it Vector (PDF) is better than raster. You can always have the printer run a test of early version to test the workflow. And you could always dump to raster at the end and just swap those links into InDesign in place of the PDF's.

By the way a great workflow from Layout>PDF export is into Adobe Illustrator. It brings in Layout Layers (but doesn't not keep the SU layers of any viewports). You can do offset lines (someone mentioned this as LO feature request in a different post), you can use any of Illustrator's pens for very cool line styles. You can turn layers on and off, add text, make last minute changes etc. Then this cal all still be linked into InDesign to layout the book.

Dimensioning in Layout was also added in 7.1, I expect it was added largely because of the input on this forum (Ok on the LayOut forum).

Also as an architect creating many site/context models in SU, being able to easy find existing 3DWH/GE buildings is a really nice tool. And making texturing/modeling easier when I have to make my own context is also nice. Even just pulling up StreetView as a visual aid to examine the neighborhood and distant views is nice.

Here are a few reasons you may want to use components even for objects that don't appear more than once.

• you can save the component off to external file to archive various versions or progress models.
• keep high and low polygon versions of components depending on what you need at the time
• have multiple people work on model at same time (in separate components) or just for yourself, can work on individual components outside of the main file.

I find this behavior doesn't lend to good workflow either. If I have 1st, 2nd, and 3rd floor plans I want them to line up. I often also have the same plan on multiple pages with different view settings.

For now the trick is not to pan after you scale. If I need to pan to frame how I want to, I instead use a clipping mask. Not ideal workflow. I expect this can be improved upon in version 2.x or 3.

Dave, that looks really nice. Any chance of posting it as a higher res PDF. Would be interested to know the workflow for the table. I haven't done anything with tables yet, and pulling data from SketchUp.

Just change it to say "SketchUp Layers" instead of "LayOut Layers" and then make it work

FYI, a work around for this for objects drawn in LayOut would be to make the assigned color or line weights slightly different. Then if you have Adobe Illustrator you can select objects with matching stroke, color, etc.

Once (if) SU layers can be exported to PDF Layers, then there can be some very powerful editing in Illustrator, it would be like having style by layer.

If you want to do some vector post processing on Layout Files bringing PDF into Adobe Illustrator is a great option. You can turn things on or off, change line style, added or change text.

You can also turn around and save the Illustrator files back as dwg file. CS3 and CS4 support importing and exporting to scale, so you can bring your exported dwg back to full scale.

Illustrator can also be used to bring PDF's into SketchUp as vector files using same technique. PDF opened, saved as dwg, and then imported into SketchUp.

Looks like a bug to me.

Transparency does odd things to non transparent objects behind transparent objects. For example I often use follow me NPR trees at transparency less than 100. On screen is fine. But when I export PNG not only is my tree transparent, but so is the building behind it. Not sure that it explains what is happening here, but maybe related.

One comment on the rendering. It might be nice to move the camera slightly so the far edge of the table doesn't line up with the change in material on the floor. Was confusing at first glance.

Well, you could name your scenes, clipa01, clipa02, clipb-01 . . .

Then before you export you could select the scene you want turned on all at once, and check "Include in animation". As default you can leave them all off until you render.

Another option is not to setup an animations in your master file. Create a new file for each animation, and insert your master file as a component. So each animation is its own file, but they are all linked back to changes made in the model. What is nice about this if you have multiple people working on a project, one can be working on the model, while the other is working on how the animation runs. I've done something like this where I had site plan where context was very simple block buildings, and someone else was updating individual buildings at some time, that were each their own component that has been saved out from the file.

If you have a vector PDF file (which should be the case, unless it was a scanned print), then you can open that in Adobe Illustrator and then can save out to a dwg/dxf at full size (in CS3 you set units per inch). Then you just open in SketchUp.

Still not as good as opening the original dwg file, since you won't have layers, but at lest it is vector data vs. an image.