Cropped pictures need not apply

Posted by Aidan Chopra, Product Evangelist

I received an interesting question from a gentleman in Greece the other day; he was trying to use SketchUp's nifty photo-matching feature to build a model based on this rendered image of a building. Needless to say, he didn't have any luck. To get the photo-matching feature to work, your image needs to be uncropped. That's why lots of renderings, magazine images and pictures from architecture books don't work; they've been re-framed. Why should this matter? It has something to do with re-positioning the center of the image. SketchUp's photo-matching feature works by assuming that the center of your image is also the image's "center of projection" (where the camera was pointing when you took the picture). When you crop an image, you move its center.


There is, of course, an exception to the "No Cropped Pictures" rule when matching a photo: If your picture has been cropped by an even amount on each side, or by an even amount top and bottom, the center of projection is maintained, and thus everything will work just fine.

Update Clarified the exception to the "No Cropped Pictures" rule in the last paragraph.

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SketchUp 6 now in 6 languages

Posted by Aidan Chopra, Product Evangelist

It's my pleasure to announce that Google SketchUp 6 is now available for download in six languages: English, French, German, Spanish, Italian and Japanese. Both the Free and Pro versions of SketchUp 6 (which includes LayOut) are available.

Those who have ever been involved in translating software know that it's a monumental task. Credit for this achievement goes to more people than I can name in this post, but special thanks go out to Chris K, Helen, Steve P and Tommy from the SketchUp team; they did a terrific job, and we're proud of them.

Incidentally, Google search is available in more than a hundred languages, including Faroese, Uighur and Twi, so it looks like Chris, Helen and the rest of the gang will be working a lot of weekends to get us caught up.

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Endlich: Ein SketchUp Buch in Deutsch (Finally: a SketchUp book in German)

Posted by Meike Schmidt, SketchUp Team

Heute möchte ich euch etwas vorstellen, das gerade ganz neu ist und bestimmt viele von euch interessieren wird: Im September 2007 wurde die erste SketchUp-Anleitung auf Deutsch, veröffentlicht, die in Deutschland bereits sehnlichst erwartet wurde. Ebba Steffens vom SketchUp-Shop in Köln und Jens Luethje, früher AtLast Deutschland, haben ihr umfangreiches Wissen rund um SketchUp vereint und zu einem ausführlichen Werk über SketchUp zusammengefasst. Das Resultat ist ein 430 Seiten starkes Werk, das sowohl Basiswissen vermittelt, Möglickeiten zum Selbststudium eröffnet, und viele viele Tipps und Tricks parat hat, wie man am besten mit SketchUp arbeitet.

Today I would like to present something new, something that you have most likely been waiting for impatiently. In September of this year, the long-anticipated first SketchUp book in German was published. Ebba Steffens (from the SketchUp-Shop in Cologne) and Jens Luethje (formerly of AtLast Germany) have combined their comprehensive knowledge about SketchUp to great effect: The 430-page book not only includes basic knowledge about the software, but also has do-it-yourself tutorials and many tips and tricks for working with SketchUp efficiently.

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Announcing Project Spectrum

Posted by Tom Wyman, Market Development Manager

When we set out to create SketchUp, we had a pretty good idea of who would use it. Architects, basically. For conceptual design. And we were right -- partly. As it turns out, there were a few uses that caught us by surprise: landscape architecture, video game design, fine arts, civil engineering, wedding cake design, book illustrations, set design, film previsualization, industrial design, urban planning, woodworking, medical instrument design, coin design (one of the "state" quarters), treehouse design... you get the idea.

It looks like it's time to add one more to the list (and this one may be the most fun of all): SketchUp is also an application for kids with autism.

A couple of years ago we learned that SketchUp can be an amazingly powerful tool in the hands of children with autism. Since stumbling across this bit of information, we have worked with parents, educators and kids to learn how SketchUp plays to the visual and spatial strengths often possessed by those on the autism spectrum. Siblings (and SketchUp aficionados) Meg and Casey may have said it best: "SketchUp is a great program and we're glad it exists to open the door into minds full of pictures". Indeed. From the literal to the imaginative, the pictures in these minds are as varied as the minds themselves:


It's been great fun to see how different kids respond to SketchUp. For many, it's a creative outlet and an opportunity to express themselves. For some, it's a source of self-esteem, and for others, it offers all that and a life skill as well. Thanks to the combined efforts of families, schools, our local autism society, the University of Colorado and a dedicated team of Googlers, we are proud to launch Project Spectrum. Our purpose is to connect people on the autism spectrum with free software and learning materials so that they can "open the door into minds full of pictures".

Check out this video to learn more about Meg, Casey, and Project Spectrum:

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Demeter: A new energy analysis tool for SketchUp

Posted by Chris Cronin, Account Manager, SketchUp

Recently, a number of us were introduced to a team based in Scotland who are working on a great SketchUp integration called Demeter. It's a building energy analysis plugin for SketchUp created by Greenspace Research, and it allows SketchUp users to perform an energy analysis by adding attributes to their model and then connecting the data to the GreenBuildingStudio web service, which returns an energy report. Check out the video to see it in action:

A tool that empowers designers in the conceptual phase, the stage in which they are able to have the greatest impact on the building's carbon footprint, is a big step towards building more efficient buildings. According to Greenspace, here's what the plugin lets you do:

• Assign properties to surfaces (e.g. surface types, opening types)
• Identify enclosed spaces (e.g. rooms)
• Assign surfaces to spaces
• Check contiguity to make sure that selected faces are enclosed
  
• Integrate with the UK and US versions of Green Building Studio to allow for localized energy reports
  
• Import existing gbXML files (gbXML is an industry wide standard and has been adopted by some of the leading CAD vendors such as Autodesk, Graphisoft, and Bentley)
• Export Sketchup models as gbXML
• Export Sketchup models directly to GBS for instant analysis
• Attractive 3D user interface using Rich Internet Application technologies including Adobe Flash and Flex

The plugin is currently in beta, and Greenspace Research is currently looking for beta testers. Visit them for more information or to sign up for the beta program. Also, Greenspace Research, along with GreenBuildingStudio, will be demonstrating the plugin this week at Greenbuild in Chicago. (Wow, that's a lot of green!) We're told that interested parties should stop by their booth for additional information.

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3D Warehouse now showing in 13 languages

Posted by Lori Meiskey, Software Engineer


Interested in checking out 3D models of Sportstadions van over de hele wereld (Sports Venues of the World)? Or maybe you’d like to Vytvořit nebo přidat do 3D sbírky (create or contribute to a collection)?

Now you can -- and in thirteen languages.

We're excited to announce that viewing and editing 3D models in the 3D Warehouse is now more globally available than ever before. Starting today, 3D Warehouse is available in eight new languages, including Arabic, Korean, Brazilian Portuguese, traditional Chinese, Czech, Dutch, Polish, and Russian. The product was already available in English, French, German, Italian, Japanese and Spanish, which brings our count up to thirteen. You can set your language by changing the Interface Language setting in Google Preferences.

We look forward to new models and collections contributed in these languages. And as always, 更多模型 (model on).

Update Added Korean to the list of newly-supported languages.

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More SketchUp videos on YouTube

Posted by Tyson Kartchner, Learning Guru

Video tutorials have been part of the SketchUp experience since... well, for quite a long time. SketchUp has grown a lot since then, and since we try our best to keep up, we're very happy to announce our latest and greatest additions to our existing videos. We've created two new series of videos: One is aimed specifically at new SketchUp users, and the other showcases every tool available through the toolbar. You can find all our new videos on our YouTube channel.

And we aren't stopping there -- we're working on covering as many features and capabilities of SketchUp as we can. We'll be uploading the videos as we go, so be sure to subscribe to our channel to be notified whenever there's a new one. Just so you know, we're currently working on some cool SketchUp technique videos, as well as more in-depth videos on LayOut. Stay tuned!

One more thing: Here's a cool video we uploaded about a month ago:

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Make 3D scenes on the web

Posted by Aidan Chopra, Product Evangelist


There's a nifty new site on the interweb that I thought SketchUp fans might like to know about. It's called SceneCaster, and it lets anyone with a Windows computer (a Mac version is due next year) create interactive, 3D "scenes" that they can share with the world. The folks at SceneCaster have even created an application for Facebook. Scenes can be rooms or (eventually) outdoor spaces, and you populate them with 3D models that you find online. In fact, one major source of models is our very own 3D Warehouse, which makes SceneCaster a great accompaniment to SketchUp.

If you get a chance to try it out, come back and comment on this post -- let us know what you think.

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Land F/X: Landscape CAD integration for SketchUp

Posted by Chris Dizon, Account Manager, SketchUp


A few weeks ago, at the ASLA Annual Meeting in San Francisco, the SketchUp team learned about a pretty cool piece of software called Land F/X. It's basically an AutoCAD-compatible (and thus Windows-only) drawing application for landscape architects that also happens to work with SketchUp. You can use it to create a link between a 2D view of your project in Land F/X and a 3D model in SketchUp. The integration allows you to design your project in one application and have it update in the other – pretty neat. As part of the package, the folks at Land F/X have even provided more than 200 SketchUp tree and shrub components that you can use.

You can get more info and see how Land F/X integrates with SketchUp by going to the website. If you're interested, you should also check out some of their excellent videos: Designing with 3-D and Assign 3-D Components are both particularly relevant to SketchUp users.

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Model twice, build once

Posted by Adam Hecht, Geomodeler


This weekend, a handful of us from the SketchUp team will be in beautiful Austin, Texas attending Maker Faire. In case you didn't know, Maker Faire celebrates the "Do-It-Yourselfer" in everyone; it features tools and tricks for enhancing all your arts, crafts, engineering, and science projects. We'll be at the Google booth, demonstrating how to use SketchUp to explore ideas digitally by creating mock-ups of attendees' projects. To give you an idea of what Maker Faire is all about, here are three things I'm working on at the moment (you can see photos of the finished products in this web album).

This year we'll be sharing a booth with the team from YouTube; they have some exciting new resources for folks who get inspired to make stuff by watching videos. If you're in the neighborhood, be sure to stop by our booth and say hello!

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