
Realistic Material Reflections for Interiors with SketchUp 2025 (it’s possible with a TRICK!)
Interior reflections like these (on the floor) can easily be done right inside SketchUp with this little trick
SketchUp 2025 introduced some very nice visualization capabilities: PBR (physically-based rendering) materials and environments. While those are great (especially for exteriors), indoor material reflections are a bit trickier since objects cannot be reflected even with the new PBR materials.
In this tutorial I'll show you how you can create some good-looking reflections (in e.g. floors or mirrors) with a simple trick. Check out the video below for a walk-through of the process. But in short, here's what you need to do:
Step 1: Create an inverted copy of the model
As a first step, turn your entire model (or at least what will be visible) into a group - or even better: a component (to retain the live link between the two copies). Then flip it along the reflective surface either using the Flip tool or by copying/scaling it. In my case I need a floor...