Thanks for the recommendations everyone. Some wonderful models there. The cars are really way beyond my needs at present, but might be needed in the future.

This is a problem I have been considering for some time (years). A substantial amount of my work involves modeling/ visualising automobile events, (our end user being a car manufacturer). This obviously requires many vehicle & people/crowd models. For the most part I use 2D 'face-me' component people... not too bad. For cars I either use a suggestion of a car shape in the form of an inflated bubble form (Artisan assisted) or if I need to be specific I can usually plant a photographic image into the visual post production. Its not ideal, but it works.

I am now producing more animated work including fly-throughs of the larger events... making the above photographic solutions unsuitable.

What I am now looking for is a suitable source for people models (FormFonts seems the best option) & a supplier for low poly car models. Here's the tricky bit - these need to be consistent quality, specific manufacturer & specific model/year. So warehouse isn't really going to help here - its not going to work if one model is beautifully detailed while the one next to it isn't.

The level of modeling required has proved beyond my current skills & I have not yet found a supplier on-line. My client has intimated that he might invest in this so it opens the option to us commissioning these models. I know there are many impressive vehicle modelers out there so is you are interested, I'd appreciate if you would contact me.

many thanks

Ooh thanks! for someone still not really master of the more organic modelling techniques, that's really helpful.

no... not for spelling in SU - I want to be able to check the annotations I add to my plans in LO

small voice/question here... 2013 - still no spellchecker for windows version? Have I missed it/lost the toolbar/looked in the wrong place? Where is it or why isn't it? Need it! What does everyone else do?
sincerely, poor speller/typist!

Indeed, but wasn't the Hungarian Shadow Theatre wonderful too.

A-haa! I knew you'd have the answer... many thanks!

Hi Gaieus, thank you for the attention. Here's one of the problem files. I've removed all but the offending bits (my client is very security conscious so wouldn't want me to post the whole scene just yet).

The only imports to this file are textures/images. There were some SKP files imported (created by me) & one file downloaded from Warehouse - all of which have since been deleted.

translucent file 1.skp

Could anyone throw some light on this problem, please. On a couple of occasions recently, I have noticed that a material selected from the translucent palette has not stayed translucent when in front of some other material. eg. The image attached shows glass in front of the background building texture, but not showing up in front of the tree textures. This has happened also (in another file) against one of the SU native fence textures.
I’ve tried replicating the problem but can’t recreate the error. Any ideas?

I've not thought of working this way before - definitely going to try it. Many thanks for sharing the template.

Thanks for the advice everyone. Yes, believe me I have saved all previous versions (we got up to version 'M' on this project last year)! However, with the inclusion of amendments & un-expected plan re-scaling, etc. using the previous set of notes isn't idea either. Ah well...!

I tried that Rich - I still have backward text unless I flip each label individually... time consuming. i was hoping I could flip all the positions simultaneously without flipping the actual text backward.

Can anyone tell me if there is an easy way to flip all the text notes on a plan from the left to the right? I have a plan I have been asked to reverse, left to right. Its not problem to reverse the drawing, but if I select all the notes & flip them, their positions are corrected but the the text is reversed.

I have already amended these manually, however, my client now wants the corrected plan reversed back again! Is there a short cut!?

How lovely, thank you!

@shannakae said:

as an interior designer which Renderer do you use?

Actually Shannakae, although I have Twilight I actual render very little. My business specifically is design of exhibition stands. As the design & planning process is very fast & fluid, for the most part native SketchUp output is sufficient to get the ideas across.

Don't miss out Curviloft - a definite favorite! (or did I miss that mention?) I think it took me about a year of discovering, learning & eventually honing down an extended list of plugins to about 20 regularly used ones. And as everyone here will tell you - there's always something new to discover - I still check through the newest posts almost every day.

Wonderful! I don't suppose Gaudi ever expected that!

I've had that happen - I think it was just falling over itself. I ran through the scenes again, deleting them more slowly & was OK.

@rsguernsey said:

Is there any hope for me?

... Nope - none at all! Just enjoy!

Mike, thanks so much for the comprehensive article on BIM. It has improved and expanded my general understanding of this process in preparation for a meeting I have tomorrow. How timely!