Teaching Dynamic Components to the web: a SketchUp summer research project

Hey there. My name is Brandon, and this summer I interned at SketchUp.

I attend the Colorado School of Mines and, as you might guess, I study computer science. Regardless of your major at Mines, all students are required to take a class on drafting. When I was offered a position on the SketchUp team this past spring, I was hesitant to believe I could accomplish anything in three short months. After all, it took me an entire semester to learn another 3D modeling program (which will remain nameless). Thankfully, SketchUp is as easy to use today as it was when I first opened it in middle school.

One of SketchUp’s most powerful feature sets are dynamic components, groups of geometry that have advanced functionality. To use a dynamic component today, you’d download one from the 3D Warehouse (or create it from scratch) and open it in SketchUp before you can change its parametric options. My summer research project was to investigate the feasibility of configuring those parameters from within a browser, before downloading the component to your computer. Another way of looking at it: can we teach a web browser to customize a dynamic component?

Here I am presenting a prototype of my research project to the SketchUp developer team

Last year, we unveiled the SketchUp Showcase which featured the prototype of a web-based model viewer that lets you to rotate and view models in a browser without having to install any additional software. It’s still a prototype, but this viewer offered me a basic way to display a dynamic component online, and then redraw it as parameters changed.

I spent a great deal of time making sure that when an input parameter changed, the browser displayed component transformed just as it would inside SketchUp. To pull this off, I thoroughly investigated how dynamic components work. This involved hours of playing inside SketchUp on my own and bugging numerous engineers for help. Reading through the source code didn’t hurt, either. This allowed me to properly rewrite the dynamic component functionality in JavaScript so that the behavior in a web browser would be consistent for users.

A screenshot of my research project in action: the configurator changes the material in a NanaWall dynamic component, then the component is re-drawn in a web browser

Proving that a web application could configure a SketchUp model was only one part of my research. I also had to investigate how to teach a web browser what a dynamic component is in the first place. You see, what our viewer prototype reads and displays is the geometry contained within a SketchUp file. But dynamic components are more than just geometry; they contain attributes like variable values and formulas.

To close this gap, I used SketchUp’s Ruby API to create an extension that exports the component along with its dynamic properties wrapped up in a separate JavaScipt object. The browser is then able to reunite the geometry from the exported file to its JavaScript counterpart, so the component can be parametrically manipulated. In a way, the extension acts like a moving truck. All the geometry gets packed and sent in one file, while all the attribute data gets sent in another. Everything ends up in the same place, albeit in pieces, and everything works just the same after being reassembled.

My extension exports a dynamic component to the web, packaging its dynamic properties separately so that they can be read by web browsers

This idea of using technologies that require no additional software fits pretty well with SketchUp’s development philosophy, and my research this summer hints at the potential of a SketchUp configurator for the web. For example, components could be viewed and modified on mobile devices, allowing people to share and collaborate more effectively. 3D Warehouse users might be able to manipulate components online, allowing them to find the right modeling asset even faster. Reporting tools could be built in to model viewers, allowing real-time cost analysis, helping designers keep projects on budget and on track.

There were many other highlights from my summer at SketchUp: helping launch SketchUp 2013, learning a ton about LayOut from architects and designers at the AIA National Convention in Denver, and mastering high-tech hardware configurations via our office espresso machine and 3D printer. All in all, I feel pretty lucky to have joined Trimble, and I’m curious to see what’s next from the minds behind SketchUp.

Posted by Brandon Rodriguez, SketchUp Web Intern

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SketchUp Pro for set design: A conversation with Andy Walmsley

Andy Walmsley (AndyWalmsley.com) is an Emmy award-winning set and production designer whose work has appeared in television, Broadway, Las Vegas, and beyond. Andy uses SketchUp Pro extensively in his design work, and, in this post, shares how he came to production design as a career and how 3D has changed his work.

Walmsley’s set model for America’s Got Talent, designed in SketchUp Pro

What kind of sets do you work on?

I’m very diverse, especially for someone in my field. I am essentially a set designer although there are many fancier names for my job: art director, production designer, scenic designer, scenographer. Most people in my line of work tend to specialize in one genre. For example, the guys who do Broadway theater set design rarely (if ever) work on TV sets. Television designers who do ‘drama’ don’t do entertainment shows (like award or game shows). And the designers who do opera and ballet don’t do musical theater. Movie designers just do movies. Rock n’ roll touring designers also specialize. I am very unique in that I design for major TV entertainment shows, Broadway musicals, Las Vegas spectaculars, museum projects, ice shows, cruise ship performances, theme parks, circuses, corporate events: essentially, I’ll design a set for any genre as long as it’s entertainment.

The production design for the Tennis Channel's Wimbledon Primetime

How did you get into set and production design as a career?

I come from a family of performers. My great grandfather was a very famous British comedian; my grandmother was a silent movie piano player; my grandfather a big band bass player; my dad was a famous comedian; and my mom a fire eater (yes, a fire eater). So I grew up backstage in Vaudeville theaters, TV studios and the circus. For a while I wanted to be a TV cameraman, so my mom bought me a little Lego TV camera crew and I built Lego TV sets and had my little plastic crew shoot my masterpieces. The models got more and more elaborate, and one day a family friend, magician Paul Daniels (the UK’s David Copperfield) saw my models and said, “You know, people actually do this for a living.“ I owe a lot to Paul and even more to Lego.

Have you worked on any projects that folks might have heard about?

Just a few. Most famously, I designed Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? (before I started using SketchUp). My original design for that show is the most duplicated scenic design in history, as the set has been built to every identical detail in 108 countries around the world. That set was also used in the Oscar-winning film Slumdog Millionaire. I designed for American Idol which is often considered the most successful show in the history of American television. I was nominated for three Emmys for that show and won the Emmy for ‘Outstanding Art Direction.’ I’ve worked on America’s Got Talent, So You Think You Can Dance, and a bunch of other well-known TV projects.

Walmsley's 2009 Emmy-winning production design for American Idol

I’ve designed about 14 Las Vegas shows now, which is more than anyone else I know. In theater my most famous show was Buddy — The Buddy Holly Story. That production was duplicated in 13 countries. My other big theater gig is Blood Brothers, a fantastic musical which is still running in the UK nearly 20 years after I first designed it.

What is your favorite part about your job?

The ultimate satisfaction for me is to spend a few days creating a model, virtually walking around every inch of it, then only a couple of months later find myself walking around the real set. Most of my sets are huge; they usually occupy sound stages that are 100 feet by 200 feet in size. To be walking around something that you visualized and that came out of your head (via SketchUp) 10 weeks previously is an amazing feeling of power. I think a lot of designers are megalomaniacs, and I think I can see why.

A concept design for an "extreme musical chairs" variety show

How long have you worked with 3D modeling software?

I initially invested in a full Mac set up in the 90’s. As if by destiny, the week my hardware and software arrive in the mail, I also landed a huge job and didn’t have the time to learn how to make the leap from a drafting table and pencil to digital tools. Then another job came in, and another, and from that moment I have never been out of work, but also couldn’t find the time to learn to work with the new tools.

Fast forward ten years. I had moved to The States to work on American Idol. Shortly after arriving, I purchased a bells-and-whistle drafting table and rented some office space at Henson Studios so that I could set up a model-making office. Pretty soon, I was being mocked by colleagues for still drafting on paper. I signed up for a Vectorworks course that the Art Directors Guild was offering and struggled for the first month. The instructor, Don Jordan, had the patience of a saint, and during one of the class breaks he showed me a new program that he thought I might find easier to grasp — and that was SketchUp. I remember staring at the screen like a caveman looking at the first wheel: I was in love immediately.

I’m musically inclined so I often relate my experience with 3D modeling to this metaphor: musicians can pick up some instruments and just instinctively be able to play them. I can grab almost any instrument that you blow into and get a tune out of it in seconds. But string instruments, I am hopeless with. SketchUp is just one of those instruments that I could play instantly.

Why is 3D important in set design?

Let me describe the process as it was prior to SketchUp Pro. I would go to a meeting about a new show and get briefed, go back to the office and start drafting roughly in pencil, then take those drawings to my two or three model makers (who I had to pay every Friday). They would then spend a week or longer building the models. I would take the model (often on a crowded London train) to show to the producer, he would inevitably want to make changes, I’d take the model back and the assistants would break the model apart to rebuild it with the adaptations. All of this was extremely time consuming, very expensive. Model materials aren’t cheap, and model-making employees (and their models) take up a lot of space. I also don’t miss constantly breathing in toxic glue and paint fumes.

One of Walmsley's older, physical production models for American Idol

Now with SketchUp Pro, I don’t even need an office. I go for the initial briefing and can usually turn around a very complex SketchUp model in one (or max) two days with no office, no employees, no equipment, no fumes. The best part: I can now email designs to my producer without travel and I can make changes by quickly editing the SKP file, often in a hotel, an airport or a Starbucks. Now, that is Freedom. I have said it many times, and it sounds a bit overdramatic, but SketchUp literally changed my life.

Tell us about a particular design problem that you’ve been able to address in SketchUp.

Glossy floors. So much of entertainment involves GLOSS. We love glossy floors and reflective surfaces: it’s all glitzy showbiz stuff. It’s also a curious modeling problem to solve. Sometimes I will assign the stage floor a smoky, transparent surface and then copy the entire model above and scale it inside out underneath my transparent floor. It will really look like the above scenery is reflected in the floor but really you are looking at a complete copy of the model under the floor.

Do you have any advice for other SketchUp users?

My problem is that I have gotten super fast on SketchUp, but done so using my own little tricks and not really utilizing the software properly. Have you ever seen a bad driver in a car? They can drive well enough but they are using the wrong hand on the wrong side of the steering wheel. Doesn’t seem so safe, right? That is me with SketchUp: I make it do great things, but I always think there may be a better way to save time beyond just working quickly. One of my resolutions this year is to get some one-on-one training from a real expert to help me master some of the fundamentals. That should help me get up to super, scary modeling speed but with my hands at 10 and 2 on the steering wheel.

Posted by Mark Harrison, SketchUp team

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Announcing the Visiting Professionals Program for Higher Education

In our line of work, we meet a lot of SketchUp ninjas. These people have gone way beyond memorizing keyboard shortcuts and customizing templates; they bend SketchUp Pro and LayOut to their will to solve complex design and process problems, to collaborate more efficiently with clients and partners, to build successful businesses. Frankly, these are the folks who make SketchUp do things that even we never imagined possible.

We’re inspired by these 3D experts, and we want to help transfer their expertise and knowledge to the next generation of SketchUp professionals. Our new Visiting Professionals Program is an exciting opportunity for U.S.-based university students and faculty to learn how SketchUp Pro and LayOut are used in professional practice across a variety of disciplines.

The SketchUp Pro Visiting Professionals: a veritable roster of 3D ninjas

The SketchUp Pro Visiting Professionals Program provides access to real-world experts in architecture, planning, landscape architecture, interior design, construction, video game design, film and stage design -- just to name a few. Our program participants include professional designers, renowned educators, and published authors. Beyond SketchUp Pro, these are professionals who have a lot to share about managing schedules and expectations, getting client buy-in and selling project ideas, and working across multiple software platforms to develop flexible workflows. After all, for most people, getting work done means choosing the right tools and making them all work together.

Visit our program site to learn more about what a visit to your school might include, and browse our directory of professional specialists. Then, apply to have a SketchUp Visiting Professional come to your institution. We will be facilitating a limited number of no-cost, U.S. visits for the 2013-14 school year.

Posted by Allyson McDuffie, SketchUp Pro for Education, Program Manager

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This ain't our first rodeo

It’s always been a SketchUp tradition to include a member of our team as the default component. Functionally, we include these 2D figures to lend a sense of scale and perspective when you first open SketchUp. Without a scale figure, it would be impossible to tell if you were looking at the origin from 10 feet away or from 10,000.

But our scale figures are also subtle nods to the friendly folks on our team. Bryce, Sang, Susan; these people have all played an important role in the development of SketchUp. They’re also great friends. So, who is the scale figure for SketchUp 2013?

Introducing Derrick, the scale figure for SketchUp 2013

It has been about one year since we were acquired by Trimble. It has also been one year since we lost the person who made it all happen. Derrick Darby was Trimble's champion for our acquisition, and was very excited to move to Boulder, Colorado and continue his career with us. Sadly, he passed away just as the deal was closing, leaving behind a beautiful wife and three talented sons.

Derrick had the kind of rare, infectious personality that made us feel like we’d known him for a lifetime, even if we’d just met him. He was a true southern gentlemen. And although he wasn't with us as we unpacked on our first day at Trimble, we wouldn't be where we are today without his leadership and thoughtfulness. Derrick was a visionary and an innovator who previously sold two of his own companies to Trimble. He had been around the block with technology creation, acquisition, integration and strategy -- creating jobs and opportunity for many along the way. Derrick liked to say that the SketchUp acquisition wasn’t Trimble’s first rodeo. We hope it's one that continues kicking up dust for generations.

A few past and present members of the SketchUp team

So, picking a scale figure for SketchUp 2013 was an easy decision. Derrick remains an integral part of our team and family, and we couldn't think of a better way to remember him than to share a bit of Derrick’s personality with world of SketchUp users. The next time you open SketchUp, take a moment to interact with Derrick's component (Tools > Interact) and send some good vibes to guy who was largely responsible for SketchUp’s third act.

Posted by Chris Keating, on behalf of the SketchUp team

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Making custom patterns for LayOut

The major new feature in the newest version of LayOut in SketchUp Pro 2013 is Pattern Fill. It lets you fill any shape in your document with a pattern. LayOut ships with a library of patterns to get you started, but creating and adding your own is possible, too. This post is a tutorial on how to do just that.

The Basics

Patterns are made up of image tiles. When you assign a pattern to a shape, LayOut fills that shape with image tiles to create the pattern you want to see. The following picture shows this concept in action:

A sampling of patterns that ship with LayOut. Each is made up of image tiles which repeat to form the pattern.

There’s nothing magical about image tiles in LayOut; they’re just JPG, TIF, GIF or PNG images. All of the pattern tiles we’ve included with LayOut happen to be PNGs because that format supports non-lossy compression (which makes them look good) and alpha transparency (which makes parts of them see-through). If you can, you should make your pattern tiles PNGs, too.

To add a pattern to LayOut, all you have to do is choose Import Custom Pattern... from the drop-down menu in the Pattern Fill panel. You can choose any image you like; LayOut will automatically turn it into a pattern by tiling it (copying it in a grid).

How does LayOut decide how big to draw each individual tile in the pattern? It looks at the source image’s resolution (pixel density) and uses that. Every PNG, JPG, TIF, and other raster image is saved with a resolution when it’s created. This is expressed in pixels per inch, or ppi.

Consider an image which is 1200 pixels wide by 600 pixels high. If this image is saved at 300 ppi, its physical size would be 4 inches (1200 pixels ÷ 300 pixels per inch = 4 inches) by 2 inches . If it were saved at only 100 ppi, its physical size would be 12 inches (1200 px ÷ 100 ppi = 12 in) by 6 inches. The higher the resolution, the smaller the physical size.

Example: A simple geometric pattern

A pattern composed of parallelograms, or hexagons, or cubes, depending on how you look at it.

Let's make a pattern that looks like the one in the image above. This pattern is relatively simple to create for three reasons:

1) It has only one basic unit.
The “cube” is repeated over and over; there is no other shape.

2) It isn’t trying to look “random”.
Patterns that are supposed to look like a random distribution of elements are much trickier to create. I’ll cover them in a separate article.

3) It has no horizontal or vertical lines at its edges.
The following procedure isn't ideal for making pattern tiles that are made up of horizontal and vertical lines (like bricks and other rectilinear units). Those patterns, while common, are actually special cases that require a completely different technique to make sure they look right when they're tiled together. You can see three examples of these in this article’s first image, above. I'll outline that different technique in a separate article.

The technique that follows uses LayOut and Photoshop. While it’s possible to create pattern tiles using only LayOut (or even SketchUp, for that matter), Photoshop (or another image editor like GIMP) makes it much easier by providing pixel-level editing and tools for resizing raster images precisely.

Step 1: Use LayOut to manually draw a sample of the pattern.

LayOut is an obvious way to create simple pattern tiles like this one. The addition of SketchUp's Copy Array feature to LayOut in SketchUp Pro 2013 makes tasks like this one a lot easier.

Step 1: Start by manually creating an area of pattern. For something this simple, LayOut works well.

Step 2: Outline a single tile with a rectangle.

Drawing this rectangle on a new layer makes it easier to turn on and off later on. Giving it a thick and brightly colored outline makes it easier to see what you're doing.

Step 2: Use the Rectangle tool to outline a single tile.

Step 3: Fill the "tile outline" rectangle with a bright color and turn off its stroke.

This step makes it easy to crop away everything you don't need once you're in Photoshop. Choose a fill color that doesn't appear anywhere in your pattern tile.

Step 3: Convert the outlined rectangle into a filled shape with no stroke.

Step 4: Duplicate the page and delete only the rectangle.

Step 4: Duplicate the page and remove the rectangle on the copy.

Step 5: Export a PDF.

In your exported PDF, include both the page with the rectangle and the one without.

Step 5: Export both pages as a PDF file.

Step 6: Open the PDF in Photoshop.

In Photoshop, choose to open both pages of the PDF as separate image files. Set the image size to something quite large, like 5000 pixels wide. You'll downsample (make them smaller) later on.

Step 6: Open the pages of the PDF as separate Photoshop files

Step 7: Copy / Paste one file into the other.

In the open file with the colored rectangle, choose Select > All from the menu bar, then choose Edit > Copy. Move to the other open file, then choose Edit > Paste Special > Paste in Place to create a new layer.

Step 7: Copy/Paste in Place the contents of one file into the other, creating a new layer in the second file.

Step 8: Select the colored rectangle.

Choose the layer containing the colored rectangle, then activate the Magic Wand tool and click once on the rectangle to create a selection from it.

Step 8: Use the Magic Wand tool to select only the colored rectangle

Step 9: Crop the image based on the rectangular selection.

Choose Image > Crop from the menu bar to crop the file based on the selection rectangle. Choose Select > Deselect when you're done.

Step 9: Crop the image, leaving only a single pattern tile

Step 10: Hide the layer containing the colored rectangle.

When you hide the layer with the colored rectangle on it, you should be left with only a single pattern tile in your Photoshop file. Save the layered image as a PSD file.

Step 10: Hide the layer containing the colored rectangle.

Step 11: Resize the file.

Choose Image > Image Size... to open the Image Size dialog box. Make sure the Resample Image checkbox is checked, and the drop-down menu below it is set to Bilinear. Type in a new width, in pixels, for your pattern tile, then click OK.

Note 1: If you create a very large pattern tile, you won't ever have to worry about blurriness or visible pixels when your pattern appears in LayOut—it'll be sharp as a tack. On the other hand, making your tile too large could bog down your computer; it all depends on how large each tile will appear, how many tiles LayOut will end up drawing, and how zippy your computer is.

Note 2: When it comes to digital images, there are some "magic" numbers to be aware of. They're the powers of two (2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256, 512, etc), and using them makes it easier for your computer to resample an image when it needs to be displayed bigger or smaller than its native size. Making your pattern tile image width one of these numbers says to the world, "I know what I'm doing."

Step 11: Resize the image using the Image Size dialog box.

Step 12: Change the image resolution.

Choose Image > Image Size... to open the Image Size dialog box again. This time, make sure the Resample Image checkbox is unchecked. The fields in the Pixel Dimensions area of the window should be uneditable.

Here, you're setting the physical size of the pattern tile on your page in LayOut. The value you type into the Width field is the physical width your tile will appear in LayOut when the pattern is set to 1x scale in the Pattern Fill panel. If you want an individual tile to be 0.5 inches wide in LayOut, enter that measurement into the Width field, and click OK.

Step 12: Change the image resolution (the pixel density) so that the pattern appears the correct size on your page in LayOut.

Step 13: Save your image as a PNG file.

As I explained at the top of this article, PNG is the image file format that offers both lossless file compression and support for areas of transparency. Both are desirable qualities in a pattern tile, so PNG's almost always the way to go.

Step 13: Save the image tile as a PNG file. Giving it a meaningful name will save time in the long run.

Step 14: Import your custom pattern into LayOut.

Back in LayOut, open the Pattern Fill panel (Window > Pattern Fill) and choose Import Custom Pattern... from the drop-down menu at the top. Find the PNG file you created in Step 13 and open it.

To make your custom patterns available in every new LayOut document you create, put them in folders on your system and use the Add Custom Collection... option from the drop-down menu in the Pattern FIll panel.

Step 14: Use the Pattern Fill panel to import your custom pattern into LayOut.

In my next couple posts, I’ll outline techniques for creating pattern tiles that are rectilinear, ones that incorporate transparency, and ones that are supposed to look like a random distribution of elements. Stay tuned, and good luck.

Posted by Aidan Chopra, SketchUp Evangelist

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Introducing SketchUp 2013

Less than a year after joining the Trimble family, it’s our pleasure to announce the arrival of SketchUp 2013. For this release, we focused on two things: building an ecosystem that makes it easier for millions of SketchUp modelers to find and use the plugins and extensions they need, and continuing to turbocharge SketchUp Pro’s documentation and presentation features (in the form of LayOut). We think you’ll be really excited about both—we certainly are.

Extension Warehouse: A smarter approach to SketchUp plugins

Can SketchUp do X, Y, or Z? Extension Warehouse is the place to find out.

Over the years, our beloved plugin developers—the folks who use our Ruby scripting tools to build add-ons for SketchUp—have created some truly amazing features. Historically, these extensions have been crazy useful, laughably affordable, and (for the most part) incredibly difficult to find. No more.

For 2013, we built a repository of extensions—an Extension Warehouse, in our parlance—that provides a one-stop shop for anyone looking to customize their copy of SketchUp. This one new feature is actually dozens (eventually hundreds) of new features, all ready and waiting for you to discover. Using the Extension Warehouse to find, install and update plugins is a simple operation. And best of all, it all happens right inside SketchUp.

By far the best way to get to the Extension Warehouse is by clicking its icon in SketchUp 2013's main toolbar.

When you visit the Extension Warehouse, you’ll notice it’s every bit a modern app store: most-popular lists, user reviews, download statistics, introductory videos and more. Clicking a plugin’s “Install” button takes care of just about everything that used to make Ruby scripts so cumbersome to use. No more digging around for your plugins directory. No more unpacking files and folders into precise locations in your file system. No more wondering why this can’t all be easier. Because now it is.

LayOut in SketchUp Pro 2013: More tools for turning your models into drawings

We’ve heard that you’d like to take your SketchUp models farther into the documentation part of your workflow. For that, we’re continuing to turn LayOut in SketchUp Pro into a full-fledged tool for creating scaled, annotated and dimensioned drawings from your models. In this version, we’ve added hatching and other pattern fills, speedier vector rendering, better zoom, more useful callouts and other improvements we think you’ll love.

The complete list of details about what’s new in SketchUp Pro 2013 is too long to include in this blog post. We’ve written another one just for that purpose: SketchUp Pro 2013: A closer look at LayOut.

SketchUp Make: A new brand for an old favorite

We decided that the free version of SketchUp needed a name and a brand of its own. Now the word “SketchUp” refers to a product family of which there are two members: SketchUp Pro and SketchUp Make. The latter is still free, international, and aimed squarely at every treehouse builder, 3D printing wizard, and pinewood derby all-star in the universe. It’s a reflection of our commitment to our “3D for Everyone” mantra, and I’m super proud to say it’s here to stay. Read all about it here: re(Introducing) SketchUp Make.

We know there’s been some confusion about choosing the right version of SketchUp in the past, so we want to be absolutely clear about this going forward. If you’re working on a personal project, SketchUp Make is for you. If you’re doing professional or commercial work, SketchUp Pro is for you. You’ll notice we’ve clarified that SketchUp Make is “not licensed for commercial work.” We think SketchUp Pro can help our professional users do amazing things, and with their support, we have every intention of making it an even better tool for modeling, documentation, and communication. And if you need 3D modeling in the classroom, in a makerspace, or in your garage, this change doesn’t affect you at all: SketchUp Make is free and here to stay.

Upgrade and Support, all rolled into one

Starting today, we’re introducing a simplified Upgrade and Support program for SketchUp Pro. It goes like this: When you buy a new license for SketchUp Pro 2013, you’re also buying a year’s worth of included upgrades (major and minor), email tech support, and phone support for installation and licensing issues. If you already have a SketchUp Pro license that you need to upgrade to SketchUp Pro 2013, you can purchase the same Upgrade and Support program separately. We think it’s a good deal, and we think you will, too. Find out more about it here: Upgrading to SketchUp Pro 2013.

Posted by John Bacus, SketchUp Team

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(re)Introducing SketchUp Make

In 2006, just a few weeks after we closed our original acquisition by Google, we introduced a slimmed-down new version of SketchUp that allowed people to quickly and easily build 3D models of the buildings that mattered to them for representation in Earth. One of the biggest features we added was actually something we took away… the price tag. This new version of SketchUp cost nothing to use—and because SketchUp is SketchUp—anyone could learn how to do so in almost no time at all.

As most folks probably now know, the free version of SketchUp has been a huge success. In the past six years or so, its user base has grown into the millions and spread around the world. Today more than 30 million people a year use SketchUp in a dozen different languages, at a rate of almost 40 starts per second. Read that again if you need minute for it to sink in… SketchUp is used almost a billion times a year. And still that number is growing.

While there are certainly communities of folks who still use SketchUp as a “geo-modeling” tool for Google Earth, the reality is that that this kind of use has only ever represented a small subset of all the things people are actually doing with it.

We found that SketchUp has been used to plan structures at Burning Man. It has also been used to launch ocean cleaning drones. Not only has it become a tool of choice for 3D printing enthusiasts, it’s been used to design the printers themselves, helping to kick off a broader revolution in personal manufacturing. On top of it all, SketchUp can be used by kids to design the best pinewood derby racers ever. Truly we’re seeing “3D for everyone” playing out at a grand scale.

SketchUp Make: Used by people who make things (sometimes even to make things that make things)

As it turns out, there’s now a name for this diversely creative and inventive group of folks who have been using SketchUp for years. We call them “Makers,” a term coined by Dale Dougherty and his gang at Make:. We’ve been a part of Dale’s movement since the beginning, and we’re in it for the long run. And it is in honor of the Maker movement that we’re re-launching our free 3D design tool under the new name “SketchUp Make.”

But really, there isn’t much else changing here—SketchUp Make is still free for non-commercial use, still powerful and still under active development. We’ve added a batch of new features to the 2013 release of SketchUp Make (check out our new STL import|export extension, for example) and we’re looking forward to developing and supporting it well into the future. Let’s go make stuff together!

Posted by John Bacus, SketchUp Team

Have questions about SketchUp Make? We'll be listening here and on this thread in our help forum.

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SketchUp Pro 2013: A closer look at LayOut

LayOut in SketchUp Pro has always existed to help you quickly and easily turn SketchUp models into compelling, communicative drawings. When we first released LayOut several years ago, its features put it firmly in the “presentation drawings” category of tools; it was equal parts layout, illustration, and slide software. Our users liked it, but they wanted it to do more—they wanted it to replace their bloated, complicated CAD systems, too. The live link between SketchUp models and LayOut model viewports has always been perfect for developing construction drawings that can evolve along with your designs.

A couple of versions ago, we decided to fully commit to making LayOut into the application that so many of you have been asking for. We added dimensions, vector rendering, and the ability to snap to points in your model viewports. We added DWG and DXF export, and configurable dashed lines. We made LayOut even faster, made it easier to move elements around precisely, and made lines editable—our Line tool may be the most intuitive vector drawing instrument around. Some of our users began to use LayOut to do complete sets of construction drawings.

For SketchUp Pro 2013, the improvements we made fall into three categories: a big, new feature, annotation refinements, and usability upgrades that make LayOut faster, smoother and even more pleasurable to use. Let’s take a look at these in order:

Pattern Fill: Hatching for materials, poché and other applications

Glance at LayOut’s updated Shape Style panel and you’ll notice a major addition: Pattern Fill. In response to our pro users’ (vehement) requests for the ability to add areas of hatching to their plans, sections and elevations, we built a feature that does that—and more. Simply building a Hatch tool with a limited library of symbols would have satisfied the request, but it would have been a single-purpose answer to the problem.

This drawing is 100% LayOut in SketchUp Pro 2013. Notice the dot screen patterns used to indicate the ground cover and to poché the walls.

Patterns in LayOut are simple raster images—usually PNGs—that can be any color, and can include an alpha channel for incorporating transparency. Most of the patterns we’ve included are single-colored lines with transparent backgrounds. This allows you to use any background color; just pick one from the Fill color well in the Shape Style panel. It’s a pretty flexible system that allows for an infinite number of combinations.

Almost all of the patterns we included in LayOut have transparent backgrounds. To add a solid color behind a patterned area, just click the Fill button in the Shape Style panel.

The new Pattern Fill panel acts as a browser, but it also provides two other important pieces of functionality: Rotate and Scale. These are pretty self-explanatory, but they mean you can orient and size any pattern to whatever is appropriate for your drawing.

LayOut in SketchUp Pro 2013 ships with over a hundred example patterns, but adding your own tileable images (or ones you find online) is dead easy. You can create a pattern tile in any other graphics program. We used a combination of LayOut and Photoshop to create ours. Making patterns that tile seamlessly can be a little tricky, but we’ll be posting a tutorial in the next few weeks.

A sampler of patterns in the new LayOut. You can also add patterns you make yourself or find elsewhere.

Patterns are stored in folders on your system, just like materials, components, styles and plugins are in SketchUp. We organized the ones we made for this release into four main categories:

Material Symbols represent common graphic notations for construction materials; they’re what most people mean when they refer to “hatches”. We built two dozen of the most common ones for this version, including old favorites like Steel, Cast-in-place Concrete, and my personal favorite, Earth Compacted Fill.

Geometric Tiles include rectangles, circles, hexagons and other shapes, arranged in common patterns like running bond, herringbone and checkerboard. We imagine that these can be used to represent anything from brick, to paving, to kitchen and bathroom tile, but of course you can also use them more abstractly if you like.

Site Patterns is a category we created to include the kinds of things you might use in a site drawing: Trees arranged into rows, in plan and in elevation. Parking spaces, both at 90 and 60 degree angles. And, as a bit of a joke, something Aidan calls “Mown Lawn,” in four attractive shades of green.

Tonal Patterns are things like dot screens, parallel lines, and sketchy edges. If you’re old enough to remember the beautiful drawings architects and illustrators were able to make with Zip-A-Tone and other, similar products, you can imagine the potential for these. Tonal patterns work alongside linework in drawings in ways that fields of solid color can’t. Your pochéd sections cuts will never look the same.

Better annotations make better drawings

LayOut’s Label tool lets you quickly and easily create a note with a leader line that automatically sticks to whatever it’s pointing to. It’s a simple concept, but there were a few things we did to make ours work a whole lot better:

Curved Leader Lines: It was recently pointed out to me that the reason architects use curved callouts is so that they can be easily differentiated from the straight linework in the rest of their drawings. That makes a ton of sense, so we set about making it easier to create curved leader lines in LayOut. The old way involved no fewer than five clicks. The new way takes only two. If you want the line to curve, just click-drag when you’re creating it.

Creating a callout with curved leader lines is simple. Just remember to click-drag your mouse button when you’re placing an endpoint. Double-clicking an existing leader line with the Select tool lets you edit it at any time.

Improved Arrowheads: Most of the time, your leader lines terminate in an arrowhead. And most of the time, that arrowhead is a solid, black triangle. And in previous versions of LayOut, the only black arrowhead looked like it had eaten too many pastries. By astoundingly popular demand, we’ve added a slimmer, trimmer option, available in classic black and more discrete white. We also improved the alignment of arrowheads to make them look better when their leader lines are angled or curved.

Dashes in Dimensions: In the new version of LayOut, you have the option to add a dash to your non-metric dimensions. The difference between 8’ 6” and 8’ - 6” on a small printout with tiny type is anything but trivial.

Usability Improvements: Faster, smoother, and more efficient

There’s a lot to be said for making software more usable. This is less about features and more about tweaking, fixing and otherwise improving little things that add up to making LayOut a better application:

Copy Array lets you use keyboard modifiers to easily make multiple copies of entities, all at once, just like you can in SketchUp. Since our developers coded this feature into our test versions a few months ago, I’ve used it almost every day.

Speedier Vector Rendering means significantly less time waiting for LayOut to vector-render the contents of a model viewport. You should consider using vector rendering whenever you’re dealing with crisp linework in a document that will be printed or exported at a large physical size.

Better Zoom is probably the thing you’ll notice first. We increased LayOut’s maximum zoom level by a factor of ten, from 1000% to 10,000%. When you’ve got a lot on your page, and things are small and close together, being able to zoom in farther is a godsend. You’ll see.

We increased LayOut's maximum zoom by a factor of 10. Now you can zoom in far enough to select and edit the smallest entities on your page.

Numbered Pages in the Pages Panel is a handy tweak that makes it easier to print or export specific pages in your LayOut document. No more counting down from the top of your Pages panel to figure out it’s page 43 that you want to export to PDF.

Faster Screen Redraw should make LayOut feel snappier, especially as your document gets more complex. Every time you zoom, pan or move an entity on the page, the tiny elves in your computer have to re-draw the picture on your screen. For 2013, our engineers optimized the code that controls how fast this happens.

Posted by Sandra Winstead, LayOut Product Manager

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Upgrading to SketchUp Pro 2013

We’re super excited about the launch of SketchUp Pro 2013. We listened very carefully to user requests which led to some amazing new changes, such as hatch patterns in LayOut and a new Extension Warehouse. However, there’s another feature that we’re excited to announce today, but it’s one that you won’t find in the toolbar.

Going forward, purchasing major version upgrades for SketchUp Pro will no longer be an unpredictable process. Now, you can get ahead of the game and pre-pay for major versions with our yearly upgrade, maintenance, and support program for $95 ($150 for network licenses). So with your license upgrade (or new license purchase), you’re also purchasing one year of coverage for future upgrades to SketchUp Pro. If you’re on the program and we release a new version of SketchUp Pro in nine months, your license gets upgraded at no additional charge. Pre-paying for upgrades in this way has been a popular feature request from Pro customers who want to have a predictable budget and make it easier for their company to be on the latest version.

But wait, there’s more! With this program, customers are also entitled to one year of friendly email technical support from our crack team of experts and—for the first time in six years—phone support for installing and licensing issues. If you’d like to get the nitty gritty details about our support going forward, check out our new Knowledge Center article for more information.

So, if you’re an existing SketchUp Pro customer and you’d like to upgrade to SketchUp Pro 2013, head over to our online store to keep up-to-date with SketchUp Pro. A few other things you should know about upgrading:

• You can upgrade any active commercial license from SketchUp Pro 8, 7, 6... you get the gist.
• You’ll need your most recent license info: serial number, registered user and company name. If you can’t find that stuff, retrieve it here.
• If you purchased your license through one of our authorized resellers, please contact that reseller directly for their upgrade terms.
• After you upgrade, we’ll email you license info and a link to download SketchUp Pro 2013.
• Non-expired EDU licenses may upgrade to SketchUp Pro 2013 for free; you’ll need to contact your educational reseller to upgrade.
• SketchUp Pro licenses (still) never expire, so if you decide to skip an upgrade one year, you simply keep using your current version of SketchUp Pro.

If you have questions or comments about the upgrade, maintenance, and support program, please check out this handy Q&A. We’ve also started a Help Forum discussion where SketchUppers will be happy to lend a hand.

Posted by Tommy Acierno on behalf of the SketchUp team

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Making our space at Maker Faire Bay Area

SketchUp Maker Faire checklist:

• SketchUp design
• Engineering toolbox plugin
• Cutlist plugin
• Lumber cutlist
• Miter saw
• 18-bolt cordless drill
• Gorilla glue
• Safety glasses
• Band-aids

Through our years attending Maker Faire Bay Area we’ve realized this: we generally spend less time talking about SketchUp and more time using it. For us, Maker Faire is usually more of a workshop than a trade show.

Recognizing that, we wanted to do something a bit different for Maker Faire Bay Area next weekend in San Mateo, CA. For starters, instead of setting up a booth to tell people about SketchUp, we decided it would be more fun to create a space where we could work with people on SketchUp projects. And since we designed it ourselves, we decided to make it ourselves too.

Our Maker Faire 'designer-space' concept: excuse our sawdust

We thought designing and building our own furniture was a good approach since we’re participating in Maker Faire’s Model Makerspace (in the Sequoia building). This is a prototype makerspace that pulls together the requisite tools makers need to make ideas real: electronics, laser cutters, CNC routers, 3D printers, science kits, and of course, 3D modeling. The idea is to teach folks how to set up their own makerspaces, and we’re excited to be a part of that effort.

We like to say that nothing great was ever made that didn’t start with a great drawing. We’ll be working on drawings of our own project over the weekend, but we’d rather help you take your idea to the next level. Do you have a SketchUp project or even a rough sketch of something you want to create? Send a model or an image of your project to sketchupblog@gmail.com, and we’ll hook you up with free admission to Maker Faire Bay Area*, and then help you work on your model.

We'll be rolling up our sleeves on modeling projects all weekend in the Model Makerspace.

Of course, there are plenty of people who visit us at Maker Faire who have never used SketchUp before. At past Maker Faires, we noticed we were spending a lot of time teaching folks SketchUp one at a time, and A LOT of folks want to learn. So we had another idea: why not to teach everybody at once? So, in addition to our design studio in the Model Makerspace, we’re also hosting a Mass 3D Modeling Teach-in on the Maker Faire Center Stage at 7pm on Saturday. Come one, come all: learn, draw, then build something rad.

Posted by Mark Harrison on behalf of the SketchUp Team

*If you live in the Bay Area, send us a workable project. We’ll send you a discount code to get Maker Faire tickets online (on a first-come, first-serve basis -- limited availability).

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