Hi jpalm32, hi folks. @jpalm32 said: @jean lemire said: Hi folks. If you right click on the name of a group or component in the Outliner windowto get a contextual menu and then choose Zoom extentsin this menu, the view zooms on this particular group or particular instance of this component. Just ideas. Wow! Didn't know that . I posted that to show that there are a lot of usefull functions that are often overlooked since many new (and not so new) users forget to check if a context menu is available for objects or items or dialog or tools, or whatever. The first thing that I teach new users for any software is: 1 - Open each and every menu and sub menus and sus-sub menus to read what lays there. Judging by the questions aked here and also in the Google hel groups dedicated to SketchUp (SU), many have never done that. Having done that, they would have found the Help Menu that gives access to the Help Center. 2 - Place the cursor on each tool icon to read its name which, usually, is a good clue to its use. 3 - Right click on all objects, icons, menus, buttons, items that are shown to see if any context menu lies somewhere. 4 - Print the Quick Reference Card. 5 - Read the help, especially about the user interface. For SU, you soon discover the extreme importance, especially for beginners, of the status bar that sits at the bottom of the Model Window where SU is constantly giving clues as what to do after the selection of a tool, for example, and also about the Measurement tool bar that sits also at the bottom but the right of the Model Window. 6 - Take a few hours to view all the video tutorials that can also be accessed from the Help Center. 7 - Search the Youtube channel dedicated to SketchUp Just ideas.

Thanks for the replies folks, I have been pondering this, perhaps it could be an option in some future version of sketchup. I very much appreciate the time taken to reply and there is a fair bit to think about that will make things easier. On it.

@dave r said: DOD3R, I'm curious about something related to your post. Tutorial videos take time and, as you say, time is money. Would you be willing to pay for those tutorial videos? I am very well aware that tutorials = time = money. I am sorry a did'nt write it well previously, but I wanted to say that who would benefit most from these tutorials is trimble and they should produce and may be pay for them. Why I should not pay for them. I think there is a really little audience for these videos and even less would pay for them it would be really bad bussines. Why sould trimble pay for them or at least give bigg support for it? Because there are lot of tutorials how to make circle and puspull it. or lot tutorials for chair or whatever. And that is why lot of people thinks sketch up is NOT real deal. And opposite is true Trimble wants to sketchuppers to make houses to build and want them to by build by trimble products. Another way Trimble can look at it is. This is the cutting edge of sketch up usage for architecture. I think really small precentage of sketch up users can really even understand Nicks tutorials. Trimble as a devoloper of a program needs some people to use it on its limits so the can find them and push them little further. And even another way to look at it is that I belive we can help each other improve our workflows and I hope that even Nick learn something from us by sharing his workflow. Fun fact. I did'nt learn much new things ( maybe 2)from Nick tutorials I was aware of every feature he uses, but I never put it together this way. We need more tutorials witch explains how to use sketch up, but instead we have a lot of tutorials about how sketch up works. @unknownuser said: I've actually been giving a lot of thought to this lately. One major aspect of SU & LO that is so remarkable, is how it is so easy to customize a work flow. I've developed one that works really well for me, but certainly may not for others. In what I've discovered, there are certainly some practices that are more efficient than others, yet I will fall back to a process that is more familiar to my given process. I would love to document this in the Rey near future down to the detail that DOD3R mentions. I'm getting pretty swamped with work in the new year, and want to schedule some serious time on opening up LO further. All I hear in the back of my head, is Paul Lee, yelling CAD MUST DIE! This will be a big year for SU & LO in my opinion. I'll try my best to help. Yes! great. PS: Sorry for my english is bad obviously, but I hope it make sense. I would like to qoute: “Write drunk; edit sober.” ― Ernest Hemingway I will work on part to nex time

@mike amos said: Trying to rotate a simple cube along a path, any ideas? I have searched the forums and found reference to a plug-in which is apparently no longer available. Ta. As an animation? What kind of path? Straight? Curved? Single segment? Multi-segment? Component Stringer requires you to pre-select the path and component before executing the plugin. It places a copy of the component at the beginning of each segment.

Just wanted to say. I use Octaine with TIG's exporter. Works fine! Got an gtx 580 as graphiccard. Strength - You see quite rapidly where you're going in the render. I often use an ambient occlusion "sneeky render" that's very fast and gives good enough results, at least for me. There are different rendermethods to choose between. And an online database of materials where you can drag and drop from the menu. So easy setup if you're not a perfectionist. Also node-based interface, but one doesent have to bother about that if one doesent want to.. Another thing, if you are a paying costumer you will get full access to the whole site with bigger forum where you can get beta and test versions. There's quite some activity going on there. Can't tell how mature the software is yet, compared to for ex Thea. Octaine requires a good graphiccard.

I am rendering with renditioner. The cg textures site is just pictures which are not suitable for mapping to a 3d object as far as I can see. I was hoping to map the texture to the model. Even apples and oranges are something of a challenge as the majority of so called textures on the web are just images. I wish folk would not describe their images as textures, it just muddues the water for search engines. Thanks for the replies anyway folks.

I made this little component a while back. Just import into your model and scale as needed. Use it for any images you want to face the camera. It's sized for people PNGs, but you can use it for whatever. FaceMeBlank.skp

Next stage. [image: fOt8_5.jpg]

Reinstalled plu-ins as I had suggested I would. Just thought there might be a quicker way. Not something I was concerned about.

Bricks are a pain. Mason is a bigger pain. Using TGI and Artisan UV spraying helps. Including SU texture alignment option. Oh and pink cows do exist! [image: BhkC_Pinkpig1.jpg] [image: A0jj_Pinkpig2.jpg] [image: A7ap_pinkcow.jpg]

My statement maybe off the mark above but I perfer turning off openGL and to use the smaller DirectX8 My machine seem to run faster. Shetchup dosn't need much of a graphics support. "OpenGL has always been better in the professional graphics market than DirectX, while DirectX is used mostly for computer games. Currently both OpenGL and DirectX have a large enough overlap in functionality that either could be used for most common purposes, with the operating system itself often being the primary criterion dictating which is used, with DirectX the common choice on Windows, and OpenGL being used on nearly everything else. Some esoteric applications still divide the applicability of the two APIs:" Now Troobleshooting Safe mode doesn't use the NVIDIA driver or nor DirectX9c , so modeling would be slower and the infomation will be helpful. See if it stable there? Try tweaking your NVIDIA control panel to tune-up sketchup (turn on/off openGL) Old programs like sketchup can use DirectX8 or DirectX9c if installed Right click, SketchUp.exe - properties - compatibility - xp The frame work you may have loaded is MS thus work better with DirectX For OpenGL 3.0 DirectX10 need to be loaded to pc . [image: yw28_pic_0063.jpg] Win7-64bit more buggier than 32 bit I went to SketchUp Help Forum and found this Welcome to the Google SketchUp Help Forum http://groups.google.com/a/googleproductforums.com/forum/#!forum/sketchup pc Sketchup 8 Very unstable on my system By jimminy121212 - 9 posts - 35 views - updated Mar 29 (16 hours ago) SketchUp Version: 8 "Win7-64bit SP1, 2.13 GHz Intel Xeon, nVidia Quadro 2000, 12 GB Ram I am experiencing crashes all the time on my system. It often seems to do with panning, especially when inside a group or component or just after closing one or the other, though not always. I would say it just seems generally unstable and buggy on this computer. My toolbars and menus won't stay put either. Every time I open SU I have to realign everything". "SketchUp Pro does provide technical support. Go to Help > Contact us and fill out the technical support form. The support staff would be the ones who can interpret the splats". "You write that your model is getting large. There are some techniques to help you manage larger models" https://sites.google.com/site/sketchupsage/faster. "Try tweaking your NVIDIA control panel" https://sites.google.com/site/sketchupsage/problems/gpu#TOC-Graphics-card-control-panel-tune-up. "Something could be conflicting with SU which causes the program to crash. I personally had a mouse driver become corrupted over time and end up causing nasty problems with SU. I remember another nasty crash problem being attributed to a printer driver for someone else. Some SU plugin may cause problems. Troubleshooting crashes without knowing knowing where to begin poking around is a bit of a crap shot. To help isolate system conflicts try running SU in clean boot, keeping note of running processes. I've used HijackThis to record a log of running processes. If the problem still occurs in clean boot, try safe mode and record the running processes for comparison with the running processes in normal mode and clean boot. Safe mode doesn't use the NVIDIA driver, so modeling would be slow." just trying to help.

Call me a cynic but, the problem is not just google sketchup developers. Just about every company out there will take the wishes of their marketing department/group over users EVERY day of the week. One direction in which software is developed, just not for the better of the (should be) major interest group (users).

OK, broken the problem down, it is apparent that quite randomly, sketchup is breaking an arc (curve, whatever you want to call it) into its constituent lines. I know of the weld tool but frankly this is getting too much. Is there a way to stop this from happening or is it an inherrent sketchup problem? This occurs BEFORE I do anything else with the geometry.

Do we not all LOVE file corruption, something from childhood springs to mind about being sent to try us. It was VERY succesful in this case. Tried again, something with cleaner and sharper lines but to my mind it comes across as a mustang coupe want to be. Oh well, car designer I am not. [image: KjB3_SportsCoupeAgain2.jpg]

The ceiling height is 8' and the width is a bit more than 26' but that is not important. The two characters are different heights. The area behind the television is the kitchen which will have a small breakfast bar the dining area is on the right by the brick wall. The space where the camera is located is access through patio doors to the garden and beyond my mother in law's tongue is a lift and stairs. The building is intended to be 100% less abled friendly so the lift is not one of those afterthoughts stuck in the space of a closet. PS. my mother in law's tongue has been scaled down so as not to be too intrusive (unlike my mother in law) and is decidedly less prickly too.

Thanks for the info, it's appreciated.