@pbacot said: It does work. What I have is nested components from CAD, which are no use for me in the SU model as components, except as reference. Still I must go into each level (context) to find the components. The components clutter the component list and probably make the file heavier. Would you want to change the nested components into groups also or just explode them?

And a big thanks to SketchUcation for all they do!

That seams it should belong to a FR.

You're right. There's no sliders in LO for shadow weight. Even just turning on Shadows or adjusting the time and date in LO results in the modified scene for the viewport. So if you make the scene show as modified by changing the style or something in LO and then go back to SU to adjust the weight of the shadows, the change won't show in LO because you've already disconnected the viewport from the original SketchUp scene. Make style changes and shadow settings in SU and leave the viewport tied to the original scene and you won't have any problems. It isn't good practice to create modified scenes in LayOut.

@pbacot said: Thanks Mitch! Anyway I do like to have the wrappers the default color--and I still want to keep the texture which has been applied on the faces as well. So color by layer and purging the texture don't necessarily help. I think the component color is added by the plugin which made the components--it also textured the faces--which is what I want. This may be happening every time I use the plugin and I notice some problem with UV --I wanted to eliminate this factor for sorting this out in the futer. Removing the 'wrapper' color should have no effect on any texture that has been applied to the faces inside the component.

@rv1974, do you always 'model' in 'Parallel Projection'? that can to cause weird outcomes unless using 'Standard Views' i.e. no orbiting... Peter, I assuming you don't... john

+1 I know is more than a year of this FR, but the behavior still the same. I only work with straight leader lines with/without elbow. With elbow the text is on the top, with no elbow (straight line) the text is on the middle with no option to fix the align on text window. The workaround is to make 2 straight lines to behave like a leader line with elbow.

@twilightrender said: Yes, Twilight Render V2.5 is available. The Pro version is a free update for all licensed V2 Pro users (but there are some improvements for Hobby users too!). You can find all about it on our website (http://www.TwilightRender.com) and our user forum (http://www.TwilightRender.com/phpBB3). Animator inter-operation is planned for. While it may not be available immediately upon Animator's public release, we hope to follow soon after. I really appreciate your reply. If I read the documentation correctly, the only thing available for the Hobby version is the new Procedural Patterns. I am not sure what they do for me but I will update and take a look. As for Animator, I am one of the beta testers so will watch for the ability to test with Animator. IMO, this is great news. For meek, I have been animating a car was and I need some better water/foam materials and your new materials might help a lot. I might be able to take advantage of some of the other materials also. Again, I really appreciate your response.

[image: soEL_Capturar.JPG] When this happens you clearly know something is wrong and needs fixing. This is bad. However when this happens, people don't notice the tiny deviation and look at the error like it's correct. Much worse imho.

@brettsichellodesign said: Just have it in a right click menu would be a solution I think. Agree!

Warning! "It will realign North in each processed view, but all recent versions of SketchUp allow only one North at a time, so you'll need to copy the model's SKP for each shadowed view and use the scene-tabs to get proper shadows..."

I checked. I have no problem copying and pasting a SU model reference to another page or another document. I just did a copy and paste of a pdf as well! I have to research and see why I was not able before--or exactly what I was trying to do. Maybe it was due to an upgrade.

Here's the issue, I think. If you use leader text on a pdf image, the leader arrow points "stick" to the image so selecting all of it and moving is not a problem. If you add a clipping mask to an image, and then the leader text, the leader arrow points will not "stick" to the image. They will stick to the page location. HOWEVER the way to move them is to move by dragging a leader when you select all of it and perform the move. All of the selected leader text will move as expected along with the image. This is true if you simply write leader text in empty space as well--it sticks to the page unless moved by the leader. It seems these methods are a little inconsistent and, even if documented, not intuitive. Yet, given that the leader apparently MUST be "stuck" to something, this is one solution. I only wish that adding a clipping mask did not change the behavior.

I've been working on various files, components saved to file to model then to reload, and various LayOut files in Dropbox. Needless to say with multiple people using files, and downloading versions to work on each computer, it's getting crazy just to think about it and for sanity it seems I need to work all on Dropbox versions (while saving copies everywhere else). So far that works, but I haven't had anyone else try to use these files and test their linkages at other sites.

It's OK. I was mostly just trying to find out what's possible for the sake of discussion. It worked out. Thanks for the note.

On El Capitan it does exactly what you describe: global menu bar and dock hide.

No I haven't tried that plugin. I'll take a look. Usually I receive dwg files but I can ask for DXF. Peter

Thanks guys! Interesting, now I have a few options.