Merry Christmas, KB! Thanks for sharing! I am jealous of the beach for new years indeed... always lived here just below the line of the 'great white north'... so can not imagine a toasty christmas. (except when I lived in Houston as a very little kid)

clarification:

@unknownuser said:

Antics Technologies will no longer be offering Antics3D for purchase or download, and subscriptions can no longer be renewed after 28th November 2008. We will continue to support existing customers, and allow access to content until at least June 2009. For more information please visit

@cerevellum said:

The order of operations:

1. Select some geometry
2. Right click, select Flattening Script
3. Left click on a face (this decides the plane the geometry will project to)

This doesn't work for me at all. please test on attached scene.

1. select all the geometry on the lower plane
2. Right click, select Flattening Script
3. Left click on a face above

FlatteningTest.zip

thanks! I wanted this first time I saw it!

unfortunately I'm at work, and they refuse to give me SU7 for a few more weeks... no way we could get an SU6 version, is there?!

hmm...

edit - yes, it appears that SU7 is avail. for Pro version only at the moment. that's curious.

http://www.sketchup.com/store/

if it weren't for alexschreyer's post, and blog, I'd be deeply confused... thanks Alex!!!

good work, Solo!

The veg is ok - but I'm not happy with Vue's glass in these... are you? The podium glass seems much better.

the concrete is also very flat-looking...

I always use Path Tracing Progressive #17?! preset for exteriors lit only with sunlight... it's unbiased, but very fast... usually ready after 60 passes, but you can let it 'cook' longer depending on how much indirect lighting you are seeing.

I always do a tiny bit of tonemapping in Photoshop to give a finished/polished touch.

very nice, marked001

no, actually, the states are not countries... just states.

the "International" stands for Canada and USA... we take the same licensing exam now... use basically same code book... except each state or province have their own 'isms' - such as California may have extra codes for earthquakes, etc.

http://www.Visalighting.com has a FANTASTIC website - with all their models in Revit and SketchUp format - + IES info for all their light models! Who could ask for more?!

@unknownuser said:

So please read first and then give Your opinion.

well, when read by a native speaker on a forum, it comes accross a little harsh, while I think I know you a tiny bit enough to know it wasn't meant like that.

on the other hand... it's good advice for us all to follow.

Here's my opinion: Dubrovnik is a lovely city to visit - is it just as lovely to live there?

he charged $20USD for Subdivide and Smooth Plugin (http://www.smustard.com)
@thinkbuild - yeah, that's what I was thinking... I can see a BIM plugin for SU coming... but then, Whaat's way ahead of us on this I imagine. I hadn't thought it would be possible before seeing that vid.

Good looking model!
There are many great render engines for SU. Some, like Kerkythea, are no-nag freeware and easy to use.

the SketchUp tutorials.

basic SU2KT video tutorial.

Here's an exterior rendering example, similar to your scene.

@anssi said:

Very nice and useful! But can it create a rectangular or profiled spiral stair handrail?

ha! asking for features and haven't even touched it yet.

holy... Whaat have you done...

Hey Ivica, long time...
great work.
you claiming you built all that from scratch with SU alone?

I'd like to see more serious study done with your models along the lines of the 'surprising' lighting composition/effects achieved in
Germ of a Thought
Circular Reasoning
and somewhat in
Pearls of Wisdom

they are sublime!

thanks guys, after a few final tweaks/model fixes here's my 'final'.

only bad thing from my opinion is the really low-poly couch and chair models... but hey, it's proof it's sketchup all the way.

this was rendered in MLT overnight at 2200px wide, on a quad core.

Hi Tom!

well, I set up all my materials and lights for a photorealistic rendering of the space.

then I rendered it in Kerkythea using the render preset called "Metropolis Light Transport" (MLT: aka Mutton Lettuce and Tomato)... this normally takes a long time to clear up... it will look very grainy as it renders progressively. It's usually clear enough for a client after 100 passes or so depending on the scene. All I did was after 2 or 3 passes (very grainy and unpresentable) I saved the render in progress and overlayed it in pshop... converting it once to a blurry/soft light blend layer and once to a blurry/diffuse glow/soft ligh blend layer... hope that makes sense. This gave me my light and my metals and specular reflections... and translucent materials.

then I did the little famous 'paint pockets' effect from the old digiwatercolor tut.

Meanwhile, It's still rendering the MLT for the client to see later... which by the way is looking something like this now. but still grainy in the high res.

Hi folks!
Here's another Kerkythea/SketchUp/Photoshop tag-team combo... it's nothing new... but it's kind of fun to do these.

this utilzes the MLT rendering after only a few passes to give some life and light to a SU model. 2mins of pshop.