I guess we can try a competition or two to further gauge interest. I'll start one up on Monday.

Boo, have any ideas for a topic?

@d12dozr said:

Its a joke...

I hate when I fall for those . . .

@hellnbak said:

I'd be in if there could be a "slo-mo modeling contest". Couple of weeks might do it.

Not sure if I understand you correctly . . .

You mean simply a "modeling contest" as opposed to a "speed modeling contest." One with no time limits?

Or are you talking about a speed modeling competition with a longer period for submitting entries?

I've been thinking the same thing! Last week, I offered to start one one up (over in the Discussions forum) if there is enough interest.

Head over, vote, and add any comments you guys have.

Well, it's been a while since I've been on these forums (with the exception of an occasional check-in). In fact, it's been a while since I've touched SketchUp! I wanted to push myself to get back into some recreational modeling and thought I could use a little motivation . . .

It's been almost a year (July 2012) since we have held a Speed Modeling Competition on these forums. I know there was very little participation toward the end, which (at least in part) lead to it's suspension. Now I was never faithful in joining these competitions. I attempted probably a dozen, and submitted a total of maybe 4 entries. However, I would love to see these friendly competitions start up again, and I guess the best way to do that is to show some initiative.

By the way, for those of you who don't know, the Speed Modeling Competitions are just what they're called. You have 30 minutes to model anything you want within a certain category, then everyone votes for the best model. The winner then picks the category or topic for the next competition.

So if there is enough interest, I would be willing to commit to running the SMC's for at least a couple of months. (I am entering my senior year in high school so I don't know about committing for a long period of time, maybe I could start by taking on 3 months.) I could set up the competitions and the voting, all that I would need is for a moderator to sticky each competition for everyone. I would also be willing to stretch myself to enter as many competitions as possible, even if my entries are ahem well . . .

Let me know what you guys honestly think. I have created a poll to help gauge interest. Would you be up for this? Any suggestions or comments are always helpful!

Thanks for your time!

Alright, cool! And I think I'll try some lettering on the side, too. Thanks for the suggestion.

@d12dozr said:

Yep, its in the free version too. It was introduced with the Solid Tools, the rest of which are PRO only, but Outer Shell is available to everybody.

I also thought this was pro only! Awesome!

Thanks for the tips guys!

How does this look?

lego_duplo_for_print.skp

Would anyone with any experience in 3D printing be able to take a quick look at this model and let me know if it will be alright to print? I am planning on printing with Sculpteo and just wanted to make sure everything turns out all right.

Are the letters on the top going to be a problem? If so, I can remove them. Everything else I believe is above the 1mm minimum wall thickness. I'm just not sure about the faces, "solidness", etc. The model was not designed with 3D printing in mind so I'm just not sure.

I really have no experience with something like this so any help would be awesome!

P.S. I am printing with Sculpteo's keychain-maker tool which offers a free plastic model with the cost of shipping (6 USD). I am planning on using it as an example of 3D modeling in a speech. It doesn't need to hold up too well, but I hope it does.

2x4 Lego at standard Duplo size.

Pilou,

Some of your images are broken. Great tutorial though, I am going to try it on a model of mine that I've wanted to try something similar on for a while but never got through the SketchyPhysicsness of it.

Loving the tutorials, Kerky! Goes to show how just a plain model (with a few tweaks) can look great without a bunch of rendering or post-processing.

Keep up the good work! Hope to see more from you.