SketchUp for Design

We don’t always need to work in 3D. Space layout planning for interior design, event planning, facilities management, etc. is often easier and faster in 2D. As it turns out, we can do this quite effectively in SketchUp’s 3D modeling environment or on LayOut’s 2D sheets, without even creating a full 3D model.

In this tutorial video I describe various ways how you can print scaled, parallel-projection views from SketchUp for Web as well as SketchUp Pro/Desktop (where I will be using the LayOut software).

I cover all the relevant aspects and then show how you can use the PDF file format as an intermediate print file format. This video is an update to my older one on this topic. Since that video was posted, SketchUp for Web has been introduced and printing in SketchUp Pro/Desktop has changed. Hence the need for an update.

SketchUp 2024 removed the option to save files in all previous version formats, now only offering a version-less format from 2022. A Ruby script workaround lets users save to older versions.

In this tutorial I show how you can use my Scale By Tools SketchUp extension to create various designs for patterned panels. We start with sine and power equations and then use images to form intricate screen designs.

In this tutorial I show yuou how you can import geometry that was created in SketchUp (and an image) into Trimble Creator so that we can add parametric behavior to it. I cover the basic import workflow, model cleanup, texturing, and parametric sizing here.

We don’t always need to work in 3D. Space layout planning for interior design, event planning, facilities management, etc. is often easier and faster in 2D. As it turns out, we can do this quite effectively in SketchUp’s 3D modeling environment or on LayOut’s 2D sheets, without even creating a full 3D model.