LumenRT: Explore rendered models in real time

Plain ol' SketchUp lets you walk, run or crawl around your model till your fingers fall off, but you’re limited to SketchUp’s selection of non-photorealistic rendering styles. Pushing your model through a fancy rendering engine can make it deliciously photograph-like, but then you’re stuck with a single image or a pre-baked path in the form of an animation.

Now you can have your cake and eat it, too. LumenRT Review for SketchUp (by the good people at e-on Software) is a tool for turning your models into interactive, photo-rendered environments. The output is a stand-alone file — a whole mini application, really — that anyone can open and explore like they’re in a video game. Take a look at this video to see how the navigation works:

The results are really pretty incredible. The LumenRT Downloads page includes a number of sample “LiveCubes” (self-contained 3D environments) that you can download and explore at your own pace. One of my favorites features Tadao Ando’s Church of the Light; here’s a video of the LiveCube on YouTube:

The computer specs necessary for creating and viewing LiveCubes aren’t minor, but serious SketchUp modelers are likely to be alright. The really good news is that LumenRT is available for both Windows and Mac, and it works with both the free and Pro versions of SketchUp 7 and 8. Licenses cost US$295, but they’re only $195 for a limited time.

Posted by Aidan Chopra, SketchUp Evangelist

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Organic modeling with the Artisan plugin

SketchUp plugin wizard Dale Martens (a.k.a. Whaat) recently released an amazing and incredibly useful organic modeling toolset called Artisan. Based on Dale’s popular Subdivide & Smooth tools, Artisan is perfect for people who want to use SketchUp to model organic shapes and terrain features. Artisan includes a set of “deformation” tools that allow you to sculpt, smooth, flatten, pinch and apply textures just like you would with a brush.

The toolbar for Dale Martens' Artisan Organic Toolset for SketchUp

Eric Lay modeled Patrick Beaulieu's "Bobby Bubble" character, then rendered him (her?) with Twilight Render.

Use Artisan's Sculpt tools to "paint" 3D deformation onto surfaces.

You can add or reduce polygon complexity in your model, allowing for more or less detail. There’s also a suite of vertex tools that you can use to model based on controlling vertex points. Oh—and did I mention that it’s a ton of fun to use? Have a look at some of the features yourself...

As anyone at the office can tell you, I’m no artist or designer, but I thought I would give the Artisan tool a try over the weekend. Below is something that I whipped up; not too shabby for an hour’s worth of work.

I modeled this hamburger. Er, yum?

If slimy, unappetizing hamburgers aren’t your thing, no worries. It’s not a stretch to see how the Artisan tools might be applied to a whole range of different markets and use cases: character design, product design, environmental design, construction, civil engineering, architecture and, of course, landscape architecture.

Peter Stoppel modeled this scooter.

Peter also modeled this wedge of landscape.

Artisan is also incredibly useful for freeform terrain modeling. This model is by Daniel Tal.

For more information and video tutorials on the Artisan Organic Toolset for SketchUp, check out this website. You’ll also find a great writeup on the Artisan tools in SketchUcation’s February issue of the CatchUp news magazine.

Thank you to Dale for building this great plugin, and special thanks to Eric Lay (a.k.a. Boofredlay), Peter Stoppel (a.k.a. Solo) and Daniel Tal for your great graphics.

Posted by Chris Dizon, SketchUp Sales

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Shaderlight Winter Wonderland winners announced

Our friends at Shaderlight have just wrapped up their Winter Wonderland rendering competition; the winning entries are delightful:

First Place: Luke Holdmann, Milwaukee, USA

Second Place: Abedallah, Christchurch, New Zealand

Third Place: Zoungy, USA

Kate from ArtVPS (makers of Shaderlight) tells me that the Mac version is on schedule for release in March. Can't wait!

Posted by Aidan Chopra, SketchUp Evangelist

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Photo-rendering with Shaderlight

If I had a nickel for every time someone asks me which renderer they should use with SketchUp, I’d have a fleet of helicopters perched on the turrets of my castle. One look at SketchUp’s Fan Photos page on Facebook is all you need to understand our community’s obsession with delicious photo-realism. There are piles of fantastic rendering tools to choose from, and more become available all the time. Happily, most of them have a “free mode” that you can use to try things out.

Shaderlight, an awfully-impressive (and relatively new) offering from ArtVPS, is one such rendering tool. Its interface is clean and straighforward, there’s a free version available and the video tutorials are easy to follow and comprehensive. It’s currently only available for Windows, but I’m told that a Mac version is in the works. Here are some tasty sample renderings to whet your appetite:

Boat interior rendering by Sully114

Rendering by Daniel Tal

Kitchen rendering by Eric Schimelpfenig

Villa interior rendering by Sully14

In the interest of fairness to all of our rendering friends, our plugins page lists some of the other tools you can investigate if photo-realism is your bag.

Update: The target launch date for Shaderlight for Mac is early March.

Posted by Aidan Chopra, SketchUp Evangelist

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Making your rounded models look better

When you're working with rounded objects whose edges have been smoothed, it's sometimes hard to make things look good. That's because curved surfaces don't automatically produce a profile edge that helps to differentiate them from the background. You can see what I'm talking about in the images that follow; notice the (what I consider to be) unsatisfying outline of each of the rounded objects below?

Without Profiles turned on, rounded objects don't stand out.

Turning on Profiles in the Styles dialog box produces a completely different result. At a Profiles setting of 2 pixels, perimeter edges become clearly visible. They're a little chunky, though—and that's not always the effect I'm aiming for.

Profiles that are 2 pixels thick often look too bold and cartoony.

Dialing down Profiles to 1 pixel solves the problem (see below).

Using a Profile thickness of 1 pixel makes rounded objects pop out from the background.

While this trick might seem obvious, it actually took eight years to soak into my brain. I never understood the benefit of setting my profile thickness to a single pixel. After all, edges are already that thickness—why spend the computer cycles to draw them again? Now I know. I thought others might benefit from my epiphany, embarrassingly late though it is.

It's worth mentioning that telling SketchUp to draw Profiles can slow things down considerably if your model's pushing the limits of your polygon budget. I only switch Profiles on when I need them.

Posted by Aidan Chopra, SketchUp Evangelist

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iClone: Bringing your architecture to life

'Tis the season... for software competitions! The folks at Reallusion (the talented makers of iClone) have recently launched the Bring Your Architecture to Life SketchUp & iClone Rendering Contest. With a combination of realistic materials, detailed landscape entourage objects, spiffy lighting effects and full-fledges animation, iClone is a really nice way to present your models.

If you use SketchUp on a Windows computer, you should definitely give iClone a whirl. The material incentives for entering this competition are substantial; An iPad, a Sony Cyber-shot digicam, SketchUp Pro 8 and plenty of other goodies await the winners.

The deadline for entering is midnight on December 15th, 2010. Visit the contest page on the Reallusion website for more details. Also wander over to this thread on SketchUcation—you'll find links to tutorials and advice that should give you a jump-start, if you need one.

Posted by Aidan Chopra, SketchUp Evangelist

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