Will this be Windows only (like Quest3d)?

By the way Lumion is the official name of Silex3d (http://forums.sketchucation.com/viewtopic.php?f=80&t=29201&p=254399&hilit=+silex3d#p254399)

Great news. Excellent work Pixero, I hope we can have the opportunity to learn from you!
I tried the SketchUp>>LightUp>>Unity workflow before and I was impressed, but I had trouble with my complex SU models (I tend to overdo things..). Since I'm officially done with my university study I'll definitely mess around with Unity again!

By the way, has anyone tried out PlayUp's new Unity exporter (http://playuptools.blogspot.com/2010/04/exporting-to-unity-3d-now-available.html)? It seems like a quick way to export stuff from SU>>Unity.

Hi,

I found an interesting announcement from the creators of Quest3D (real-time app for simulations, visualizations and games). It's called Silex3D (http://silex3d.com/), and this is what it says in their 'about' section:

"Silex3D is the next generation tool for 3D visualization. Using advanced real-time 3D technology it creates a lightning fast workflow between packages such as AutoCAD, Sketch-up, and 3D Studio Max and high quality visualizations. With the introduction of a new 3D engine in Silex3D, the quality of real-time 3D graphics has been lifted to a new level. Developing high-definition movies, high-resolution images and real-time presentations can be done faster, more efficient and cost-effective.

The first version if Silex3D will be released in Q4 2010."

The website shows some samples (videos, images) for the render quality. There's also a video that shows integration with Google 3D warehouse (http://silex3d.com/?p=301). What I liked about their original software, Quest3D, is that scripting can be done through graphical nodes or 'building blocks', which is a good approach for us with a more design/architectural background (but in reality in turned out that Quest3D might be more daunting than similar apps such as Unity, which uses JavaScript). It would be interesting if Silex3D uses graphical scripting (that is, if it contains scripting at all...). As I understand, Silex3D should be able to do walkthroughs, but I'm not sure of if this is via real-time rendering (animation), or via an interactive application.

It seems real-time 3d engines are slowly being marketed towards architects. Hopefully we'll hear more about Silex3D soon. Please discuss. Thanks.

Thank you all for your suggestions, I think those tools (booltools, spray, scale/rotate) would be perfect for the job. Yes Chris I agree that the point of interest is the placement, but I don't know geometry math and that's why I thought of using Protrude's (greeble) divison to create some kind of a mathematics-based placement at least...

I see the community active and interested in a fractal and a voronoi plugin for SU, so hopefully we'll see a good one in the near future. But until then, for the meantime I think clicking and adjusting manually with the mentioned tools will be totally fine .

Thanks

Thanks numbthumb, but I was thinking more of how to produce random sized holes. Using the protude.rb plugin I managed to do random sized openings but I'm limited to squares/rectangles.

I wish to replace these random squares/rectangles with circles/ellipses. I know I can do them manually but I'm planning to do a lot so it wouldn't be practical... So I'm asking if there is a faster way to do it.

Hello everyone, first of all I would like to say that this is my first post in my favorite Sketchup resource website, and I'm grateful for this community .

I'm struggling with modeling a large perforated surface (a wall) with random sized circular and/or elliptical holes. I thought of using the Protrude Plugin's division feature then using Subdivide on each extrusion, then intersecting the result with my wall, but it was a bad idea because Sketchup crashed when I tried it. The result I wish to have is close to this:

I kind of wish there was a plugin that could generate 2D voronoi-like random patterns on surfaces. If there was a way to convert the square divisions produced by Protrude.rb into circles and ellipses then that would be amazing. Are there any suggestions from the Sketchup gurus?

Thanks