1: choose leader text tool

2. If you choose to fill at this point, it is filling the leader arrow not the text, which is confusing, I think

3. Click once to start, drag out and click again to set arrow and ready to type text

4. Choose fill color

5. Type text and hit escape. Text displays with fill, as expected. (though it is a little confusing that there are two fill settings for the tool and that you have to choose the text fill after you locate the leader arrow)

6. Choose leader tool again and it will not retain the text fill attribute. I can find no way to get the tool to remember the text fill. I have to eyedropper from the right one to the non-filled one. And, if I eyedropper, the tool will not pick that attribute up for the next time.

Can anyone confirm this? mac and/or windows?

Am I really the only one experiencing this? I find that hard to believe.

Come on Su Team; you guys have some cleaning up to do with this mess of a version 14 release. I have never seen an update go backwards in so many places.

Still can't move dimensions to one end of the line without 5 clicks, instead of one right click in SU

Can't open multiple files in Mac anymore

this leader text issue

I see no appreciable speed up in Layout vectors, either.

But the warehouse is awesome?! and now I can make arcs in a couple of different ways? You kidding me? Poor showing boys, I just have to say it out loud. FIX WHAT YOU BROKE!

Still doing it; something is definitely broken in the new version 14.

Is this the "under the hood" massive improvements we keep hearing about?

Nothing like an update that destroys the ability to open files and crashes reliability with no warning; that's a good one...

I don't seem to have the ability to sample a leader text with a fill and have it "stick"

I choose leader text, set my preferences (font size, color, fill, etc) and everything works as expected except that it always reverts to no fill. Have tried to sample before choosing leader text, eyedropper , etc and nothing works.

As soon as I hit escape when I am done typing , fill turns off, no matter what.

Pretty big one for me because I use a white filled text box extensively and now I have to sample and paint everything after I set the page up and write all the leader text. Pretty easy to miss one...

Thanks Andrew!

Anything I can do to help them out, just let me know!

I just got a new Mac Pro 2013, with a spanking fresh OS install and SU install and it is also crashing that system.

I feels like SU is keeping things in memory, even when the file has been closed, and it glitches out when you try to open another file. Doesn't do it with small files; just my big VBE's

Sometimes, the new file will open in a window, and be visible, but all the layer and scene palates are unpopulated for a sec or so and then crash. Other times, it just crashes before you even see the new file window.

Really glad you saw this! Thanks...

I am running Mavericks (OSX 10.9) and Sketchup 14.

If I have one of my large files open and then try to open another file, or a version of the same file from yesterday, SU crashes every single time.

So, I try to be smart and close out of the working file and then open the old file (which sucks because I copy and paste between files all the time). SU crashes every single time.

When I restart, SU automatically opens the file that I had already closed before it crashed?! So, then I try to open the old file and SU crashes every single time.

The only way I have made it work is to close the working file. Then quit SU. Then open SU, then open the old file, then copy the geometry into a new file, then save that to the desktop, then close both files and quit SU again, then open sketchup, then open working file, then open geometry file, then copy and paste.

So, that is awesome.. This started to be a small, infrequent annoyance in 13 and I figured it would get cleaned up in an update. Something in 14 is crushing my system however.

I have probably sent 40 bugs plat reports to Trimble in the last few days.

And back to 13 we go...Very Disappointing. VERY

Awesome! Here's hoping the improved vector rendering is, in fact, improved, huh?

Labeling is going to be a treat too, I would image. Sweet frame, btw!

All 2D documents were produced in Layout.

@unknownuser said:

Really great work Chuck!. I am also interested in seeing some of your construction docs in layout. Have you compared the detail and time to produce this work against some other BIM programs like Revit, Vectorworks or Archicad? It would be interesting to me and I am sure others to see how our SU stands up next to the "$eriou$" software.

Hi Jim,

An essential component of these VBE's are that they are readily distributable and accessible to and by contractors and builders.

I have worked in various different modeling and drawing softwares and, for me, Sketchup and Layout, even with all their blemishes, were the way to go.

But I can't really give an indication of time comparisons, ease of use, etc vs the big softwares, sorry. I can say that I wish Trimble was more aggressive with the development of both Sketchup and layout; there are definitely aspects of both that cause me heartache and time wasted. Both are way too unstable, in my opinion, and Layout just takes too many damned clicks of the button to be a real joy (I would pay serious money just for the ability to move a dimension to one end of the dimension line, as in Sketchup, without the 6 well-timed clicks it takes now; that alone costs me days of time over a year, for example)

Hi Frenchy! Everything is manually built from existing architectural and structural pdf's or designed and built by me

The reason why these VBE"s are so powerful is that they are a complete 3d blueprint of the project in question. While I do use a lot of plugins in my workflow, I very very rarely use automatic geometry generators and I also almost never work off the DWG's. I want to place everything as if I were building it on the site; no shortcuts out there, and I would do the builders a disservice if I didn't treat the virtual build with as much concerted precision.

My job for these large projects is to virtually build what is shown on the plans, identify issues, communicate these issues along with possible solutions, implement any changes, and then generate shop drawings for the interested parties. I would just propagate architectural and structural mistakes if I took their DWG's and started blowing and going. When you are doing shops for millions of dollars of worth of subcontractor services, you had better be worried more about precision than speed in model creation, you know?

Thanks for taking the time to check it out and post kind words!

@pbacot said:

I thought it was beautiful. I liked the dance of the stairs. Yes I wonder how you get paid enough for all this.

Thank you sir!

Well, enough is a relative term, you know? Spending days making animations that I don't get paid for can be a bit of drag, but, after putting the effort into these jobs, if I don't generate any presentation materials, I haven't done myself any favors.

When a prospective client comes in, sees these animations and 600-700 pages of technical shop drawings, they tend to believe that I can be their solution without too much discussion.

Thanks guys!

I market (really my entire VBE career has been word of mouth) myself as a builder and fabricator with 25 years of on-site experience who taught himself Sketchup, et al.

Builders and contractors really appreciate having a builder on the other side of the VBE. That's why I call it a virtual build, because it is, in all seriousness, built by a builder as if he was building it on site. No automation, no parametric input, no glossing over details. I build every part of it. So, I find all the things that wouldn't be found until on site and causing delays. And I almost always have suggestions for solutions that end up being what happens. It helps that my go-to engineer loves the VBE and can work with it without needing a bunch of superfluous drawings. These guys finally have someone who thinks like they do, understands their world, and can produce drawings, models, and animations. I can be as addicting as heroin, I have been told, haha.

On the very complicated jobs, being able to design the timbers and hardware and then produce shop drawing for all the fabricators ensures that there are minimal installation unexpectedness. Over 50% of my work is on jobs out of state that I have never visited; and often, I will be feeding shops to companies in two or three different states.

After 8 years of this, I have a "family" of contractors and fabricators who use me for all their projects because I make their life better and less stressful, and, most importantly, everything works and fits when it hits site.

I just laugh when architects look at my VBE's and wish they looked prettier. They in no way understand that this is a tool and not just a pretty model to watch.

Jeff, I go back and forth with the black background. It makes things a little harder to see than if I went with white and edges, but I think the black, especially when I am using color-coded VBE's makes for a more dramatic effect. And since these animations are usually after-the-fact marketing products, more dramatic is better.

@mike lucey said:

@otb designworks said:

Putting these things together is time consuming...

I imagine it was very time consuming but well worth the time / effort as there will more than likely be a 'pay off' when it comes to manufacture, fabrication and erection. There is little left to the imagination so no excuses for mistakes!

Thanks for posting, its nice to see this type of SU work ...... its not all about nice pictures

That was exactly how fabrication and installation went. A few snafus from the fab side of things (very insignificant and easy to fix) and everything pretty much just clicked together. I know the GC's were very pleased with the steel company, so that's all we are looking for!

And what do you mean, mike? My lurid, color-coded VBEs aren't nice pictures? Haha, just kidding; I for sure know what you meant...

How about a little structural steel detailing job?

All Sketchup and Layout.

Once I get the animations done, I will be putting together shop drawing slideshows, along with some fabrication and installation pictures.

Putting these things together is time consuming...

Thanks, guys, for the kind words and taking the time to watch the vid!

I am working on a couple other videos, showing interiors, shop drawings, fabrication, etc. Stay tuned...

Hi Jeff,

yes, that is all it is. This was never intended to be used for any sort of presentation purposes, so I had everything color coded and not textured to start.

But, once I had it all built, it seemed a shame to not try to show it in its best light, so I tried to get things as close to what is being fabricated without taking forever to do it. The stone was the easy part; placing all the wood grains in the correct orientation on that huge timber frame was an exercise in patience, let me tell you. I am getting too old for so many non-paying hours, you know?

Worst part was doing all this on my ancient 3.1 Mac Pro while I have been waiting 5 weeks for my new 6.1 nMP. Just the final cut express time was agony knowing that there was a blisteringly fast alternative just over the horizon.

Thanks for taking the time to watch!

I thought everyone might like to see a pretty complex model with lots of detail.

Not my design, but I was heavily involved with facilitating fabrication, primarily with designing the timber frame joinery, steel bracket connections, excavation planning and implementation, and real-time support.

I trademarked the term Virtual Build Environment (VBE) as a term to describe the use of a fully detailed, easily distributable and accessible 3D model for design, fabrication, management, etc. I know this isn't a new thing in the great big world, but it sure is in the world of US high end construction and the companies I work with have implemented me into their normal workflow. Pretty addicting having me and a full VBE on the other end of the phone when things go sideways on the site.

I produced over 200 pages of shop drawings, RFI's, and presentation materials, all in Layout, for this project, and we aren't done yet.

I would try the following:

Export out at 2560x1440 (twice the resolution of 1280x720)

30 fps (I know everyone says anything over 24 is overkill, but I get better results at 30 YMMV)

antialias on

png image sequence. (no compression and relatively small file sizes)

Open the image sequence in Quicktime 7 Pro and export out at high quality, H.264, 30fps, 1280x720HD.

Exporting at twice the resolution and using Quicktime to scale it down will give you much crisper linework. If you are using a style without edges, then you can probably get by with just 1280x720.

I would use a scratch disk as we are talking 10's of gig of raw images. MAKE SURE you save the images into a new folder (I call mine source images) or you will end up with thousands of images in a folder or the desktop (yikes!)

Also, try to minimize big camera moves with lots of side to side head movement as this will cause jaggies. Nice, smooth choreography with gentle pans will give you smoother and cleaner final output.

Garry, your Kung Fu is good! Can't believe I managed to miss this thread.

Thanks for the inspiring journey through your process.

Just seeing that I should be running this through my mac to see how it works. Will let you know...