I thought this might be the case but I wanted another opinion before I make any recommendations to my company. Thank you for the feedback.
Tim

I have been given an assignment to look into creating some appliance models in SketchUp. There is a company independent of mine that has been contracted to produce cad files of these appliances. These cad files are available to me to use to create the SU models. I did a quick test to see if the cad files would work.

After importing the cad file into SU, I saved it and checked the file size, 1.4MB. The next thing I did was to look for things in the model that could be removed. The end product need only be a shell of the appliance. These cad models show everything i.e. all of the "guts" of the appliance. I removed a lot of the interior stuff and re-saved. The file is now 1.3MB, still too large in my opinion.

As you will see in the attached file, there are also a lot of facets in this model. These should be hidden or removed to create a more presentable model. If at all possible, I would like to be able to use the cad file as a beginning point but I am not sure how to reduce the file size.

Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
Tim

appliance.dwg.zip

Mike,
I'm not the same Tim that wrote the article you mentioned but I agree it is a good article. He has done all Tims proud.

I have been impressed with the rendering examples on the Podium site and the fact it works within SketchUp is very appealing. It looks like it will make SketchUp even more fun to use.

Regards,
Tim

@mike lucey said:

Hi Tim,

I understand Tavi (TBD) is working hard on the Mac version and its hoped to have it soon,
lets keep our fingers crossed

I've just read another good article of yours '3D Modeler Cheetah 4.4' in Mac User, well done

Mike

I became aware a few weeks ago that that there will be a Mac version of Podium. I have monitored their site in anticipation and came across a thread on their forum trying to gauge the interest in the Mac version. While I doubt it will hinder the release for the Mac, it might not hurt to chime in if you are interested in this. The specific thread is under Wishlist/please release Mac version http://www.websitetoolbox.com/tool/mb/supodiumforum.

Tim

@unknownuser said:

@unknownuser said:

I am a SketchUp pro user and have been looking for a good rendering
program. My company is looking at Turbosketch which I am just
beginning to try. I came across this thread regarding Cheetah3D and
was impressed with the quality. I would like to know how easy it is to
import a SU model into Cheetah to get these results. It doesn't look
like Cheetah supports the .skp extension. I love modeling in SU but
wouldn't be opposed to using another app along side. As I said, I am
looking at Turbosketch which integrates right into the SU model. Any
insights would be appreciated.
Thanks,
Tim

Tim,

The .3ds and .fbx exports from SketchUp work well with Cheetah. You can also get some nice animation work out of it. I just tested a scene I've using with other renderers and it was a bit slow compared to Modo which I use quite a bit. Your best bet would be to go to the Cheetah forum and ask. There are a decent amount of SketchUp to Cheetah users there.

I'm afraid I've been away from Cheetah for many months and there have been a lot of changes since I've used it to any great extent. You really can't go wrong though– it's only 120 bucks! It's a great little program.

Jeff,
Thanks for the info. I did post to the Cheetah site and got some good feedback. I see you are from Valpo. I work in Louisville but live in southern Indiana. Thanks fo ryour help.
Tim

I am a SketchUp pro user and have been looking for a good rendering
program. My company is looking at Turbosketch which I am just
beginning to try. I came across this thread regarding Cheetah3D and
was impressed with the quality. I would like to know how easy it is to
import a SU model into Cheetah to get these results. It doesn't look
like Cheetah supports the .skp extension. I love modeling in SU but
wouldn't be opposed to using another app along side. As I said, I am
looking at Turbosketch which integrates right into the SU model. Any
insights would be appreciated.
Thanks,

Tim M

I recently saw a posting on the SU Blog that Podium is going to offer a Mac version next year. Not knowing anything about Podium and being on a Mac, I am curious about this software and what others here feel about it. I went to their website and it seems like it gets incredible results. What also excited me was that it works within SU. Any feedback would be welcome.

Thanks,
Tim