Welcome to our forums! Please introduce yourself :)

Hi, I’m Archibald.

I’m new to SketchUp and want to explore what it can do. I have experience with MS PowerPoint, and besides making presentations, have used it for precise drawings and designing. Ppt is easy to use but limited in what it can do. I’m expecting that SketchUp is the opposite, very hard to use but very powerful.

The reason I suspect SketchUp is very hard to use is because there are tons of tutorials around on the web, and there must be a reason for that. Furthermore, I’ve already spent a few hours on it, and my experience is that it is a lot of fun, but so far I can’t do anything that is actually useful. The advice on the Web is of limited usefulness. There are dozens of tutorials on how to make a rectangle, and I now know how to do that a dozen times, but I can’t find any info on how to edit a shape precisely.

That’s why I decided to join this forum. Hopefully participants can point me in the right direction.

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I am Paul. I am retired. Just started to learn SUp.

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I moved a post to a new topic: Position 3d model on TOPO parcel map

Hello,
my name is Emilia, I’m an architecture student from Poland. I have been using SketchUp since 1 year for architectural modeling. I like this software, because it’s easy and gives many opportunities to design different forms.
Moreover, I’m interested to design for 3d printing, so I would like to increase my skills and know more tricks how to create good and interesting models.

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Who are you, who, who? I am semi-retired
What is your industry and profession? Plastics product designer (Consumer products and Automotive industries)
Where do you use SketchUp? Personally/professionally? Personally
Why do you use SketchUp and what is your favorite thing about it? (Besides using it to impress the babes…) I just started with Sketchup Make. I’m still lookin’ for the babes. Don’t they come with the software?
How proficient are you in SketchUp? Beginner, intermediate, advanced? Beginner
What is your current set up? Computer type, SketchUp version…etc. (Your lake house and Ferrari don’t count) MacBook Pro w/ Sketchup Make 2015
Do you have a 3DW page with your models, Extensions, or a website you would like to link to or show off to us? No
Do you enjoy long walks on the beach…? Well, my wife does . . . so I guess that means that I do too.

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I moved a post to a new topic: Pull an arc face

Hi my name is roger.I live in manhattan ks and work at kansas state university. My hobby is model trains. I want to use sketch up in my hobby to make things for my layout. Just started using sketch up about a week or 2 ago. Thanks in advance Roger

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Hello! My name is Kyle, I have been using SketchUp for about, gosh, 9 years now. I have used SketchUp professionally while I worked at an architecture firm a few years back, but currently use SketchUp in a purely hobbiest capacity. I have used SketchUp to model houses, cars, engines, quadcopters, things to be 3D printed, landscapes including golf courses, deserts, and mountains, and many skiing related projects. I use SketchUp for building snow parks and that is where most of my time in SketchUp is spent these days. I am currently working on a plugin suite called Park Tools to help Terrain Park designers streamline the design pipeline. I will try and post updates and I am sure I will be asking for lots of help from the community. Feel free to contact me and chat, email or Skype works best. Kylechickering@yahoo.com and KyleSesHello, respectively.

I love SketchUp and look forwards to getting involved in the community.

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I moved a post to a new topic: Having problems with Make and my Tiny House design

Who are you, who, who? I am Benedict, from Newport, RI.

What is your industry and profession? I am an educator; I teach chemistry

Where do you use SketchUp? Creating models for chemistry.

Why do you use SketchUp and what is your favorite thing about it? I started using SketchUp several days ago and I am still trying to find my way. I am still trying to build a hollow cube and also trying to figure out what is the position of my cursor.

How proficient are you in SketchUp? I am trying to become a beginner :slight_smile:

What is your current set up? I have an HP pavilion HPE, running Windows 7

Do you have a 3DW page with your models, Extensions, or a website you would like to link to or show off to us? No.

Anything else you would like to tell us? I like people :slight_smile:

Do you enjoy long walks on the beach…? I play bridge.

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Who are you, who, who? I’m Duke! I’m a 50-year-old male from the east coast of the US.

What is your industry and profession? I’m an architect.

Where do you use SketchUp? Personally/professionally? BOTH! Like many architects, I use SU professionally to do fast, easily-presentable design studies. Personally, I use SU for a somewhat obscure hobby - autocross, which is a kind of solo racing in which cars drive around a challenging course laid out with traffic cones in a large parking lot. I use SU to design courses ahead of time. Geolocation gives me a scale image of any parking lot I need. The perspective camera make it easy to check visibility from a driver’s-eye view. Plus, I can print plan views for use in laying out the course on site.

Why do you use SketchUp and what is your favorite thing about it? See above. My favorite thing is the low learning curve, coupled with the extendability.

How proficient are you in SketchUp? Beginner, intermediate, advanced? I consider myself Intermediate. I’m very good with all the usual tools. My weak point is Ruby and I don’t have a lot of depth in extensions. I’ve been using SU for about 10-11 years.

Have you gone to a SketchUp 3DBasecamp? Nyet. Entirely self-taught.

What is your current set up? Computer type, SketchUp version…etc. Various, both Windows and Mac based. I use SU2014 right now but will probably upgrade to 2015 once I update my Mac’s OS.

Do you have a 3DW page? Duke_W | 3D Warehouse This contains a collection called Autocross Toolkit which I developed to help with course design. Please feel free to DL it and I would love feedback and objects to include.

Anything else you would like to tell us? I’m a small-l libertarian, I guess that counts as something to tell.

What is your favorite Emoji? Probably the pretzel from the Seinfeld emoji set.

Do you enjoy long walks on the beach…? I would, except the beach is always crowded with annoying people.

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I’m Jim; retired EE; use SU for my woodworking hobby.

Started drafting with a pencil and straightedge many years ago, graduated to DesignCAD for DOS, then for Windows. Discovered SU early this year, wow am I a beginner, but learn something new almost daily.

Will Google SketchUp 3DBasecamp.

Toshiba Laptop running Windows 7 Professional with a 22" external monitor.

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Who are you, who, who?
I’m Justin, a guy from the UK.

What is your industry and profession?
I’m a student studying Media Production BSc.

Where do you use SketchUp? Personally/professionally?
I used to use it academically sometimes but mostly I use it personally at home.

Why do you use SketchUp and what is your favorite thing about it?
I use it because it’s free and I love the simplicity yet near unlimited freedom (except those ■■■■ curved faces).

How proficient are you in SketchUp? Beginner, intermediate, advanced?
I would say I am an intermediate user, I’ve used it for about 5 years.

Have you gone to a SketchUp 3DBasecamp?
No. Not sure what that is.

What is your current set up? Computer type, SketchUp version…etc.
I use a self-built desktop PC with SketchUp Make 2015, but I used to use my Macbook Air which I still use for other things.

Do you have a 3DW page with your models, Extensions, or a website you would like to link to or show off to us?
Yes! Please check out my City Projects: Justin Kreule | 3D Warehouse

Anything else you would like to tell us?
I have a series of YouTube videos showing me building large scale cities that took many hours to build (see photo). Please check them out and subscribe if you like them! https://youtube.com/c/justinkreule

What is your favorite Emoji? :neutral_face: or in it’s more primitive form,

:l

Do you enjoy long walks on the beach…?
Sure, why not.

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Hi folks,
I’m Myles. I just turned 70 and have been following/using SketchUp before it was bought by Google. I didn’t have much use for it technically so I was just playing around with it and showing it off to family and friends. Since retiring and actively working on my model railroad and doing elaborate, scratch-built structures, my SU experience and skill has been developing steadily. My current project is a Bourbon Distillery. Did I mention that I live in Louisville, KY… which is the reason to select Bourbon as an industry. I found a picture of the I.W. Bernheim distillery as it appeared in 1870. The building is a great example of victorian industrial architecture and I decided to build that. Using the “Match New Photo” function I was able to import the picture and draw a good representation of that building.

Having only one view, I had to imagine what the un-seen sides looked like.

From this accurate SU representation, I imported parallel project screen prints of each view into Adobe Illustrator CC 2015, and drew comprehensive working drawings.

These were then used by a commercial laser-cutter to create parts for the model, such as the attached kitchen.

And the main building of which I’m in the process of creating a prototype.

It’s been a great project that’s really been a marriage of many, modern technologies.

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I have been building and selling accessories, vehicles, and architectural builds in SEcond Life. I designed a pendant there and found it could be downloaded saved as a .dae file and uploaded to shapeways for printing. I need to edit the design, so after trying out various modeling programs, I chose SketchUp maker version because its dashboard is simple, and it’s easy to understand. I’m a hobbyist, and would like to sell some items via shapeways one day. Sketchup videos are pretty straightforward, so that’s a plus. I’ve also found handy free extensions. I’m glad to meet other SketchUp users here.

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My name is Sajit. I am a piping Engineer at Abu Dhabi in the UAE. The industry that I work uses 3D modelling tools like SmartPlant and others. I have been trying my hand at doing some plant layout and Piping conceptual studies using Smartsketch. The layout option is a good one to get dimensional plan and elevations of the 3D. I have not been able to do anything useful so far. So much so that I have not found a reason to buy the pro version. One of that is SmartPlant cannot export a volume on to which I can add a Smartsketch 3D entity. The bottle necks may be intentional for a business interest.

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Hello, my name is Wil and I am a semi-retired prosthetist and my interests are many and varied. I enjoy using many computer programs and have been using them daily since I bought my first Trash 80, in 1980, I think. Anyway, since then a lot of water has gone under the bridge and I am still learning. At my age, learning is a never ending process. It seems to start all over again each morning. Anyway, over the years in my spare time I have used many programs. I really liked Samna’s word processor and Wordperfect in the early days, but like many, I relinquished those in favor of Word after much kicking and screaming. I built a 17,000 sq. ft. commercial building with the help of Generic CAD. Yes, that is true and I believe the cost of the program back then, when dot matix printers could cost as much as an automobile, was about $300.00. It worked flawlessly. I think I had to buy a plotter for the blueprints that cost something like $4000.00. I was also a QDOS fanatic. What a cool program that was. And, so my evolution has now brought me to Sketchup in the CAD world. The most recent CAelD programs I have used are TurboCad 2D and Alibre. I have also been introduced to Parametric Technologies, Solid Works, etc., but those were always out of my price point. So far, I am very impressed with Sketchup and hope to be able to get past the casual novice stages with this program. I really want to be able to work on small mechanical engineering objects (projects), but the jury for me is still out as to how practical that might be, even with the Pro version, which I believe may be necessary. I am also interested in home design and remodeling and have already had some good success with this. So far, it seems Sketchup is a very good system for the building profession and others, I’m sure. So here goes. I’ve been using Sketchup now for about 6 months or a little longer and have watched many great tutorials. Now, if I can just get the toolset burned into my mind (love shortcut keys), I think I will be on the way. I’m already amazed at the 3D Warehouse contributions and the talented folks who dream up and produce the many wonderful projects. Thanks for the opportunity to participate. I already have a couple of questions and will post them later today or tomorrow. And, thanks too in advance for your patience with youngsters like me. Regards, Wil

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Hi there.
My name is Claire OÇonnell and I home school all three of my sons. My middle son, Ferdia, has ASD with a severe language delay but his visual spatial skills are good. So we started him on SketchUp earlier this year.
To date, he is self taught and creating some good buildings and scapes from his imagination. But I would like to get him involved in a “tutorial” to help ensure that he is learning in a thorough fashion, without “holes”. I have looked at your videos which are great and am going to start him on them, As language is a barrier for him, we will do it with the volume down and I will try to check if he is missing any of the info. So what I’m wondering is, are there any “lessons” or suggested “projects” which I give him to follow instructions to help him learn and where I can track his progress? I’m thinking that you may have some good suggestions for us rather than me trying to re-invent the wheel.
For your remaining questions above, I’ll answer as best I can here:

  • Industry = educating autistic teen with view to him being involved in architectural industry as an adult, he has a definite flair for 3D and building/design
  • Using SketchUp for educational project
  • His favorite thing would be creating buildings modeled on film\imaginary scenes, I can figure out some ways to show if you’d like…
  • Proficiency = beginner
  • Have not been to 3D Basecamp, would love instruction
  • Currently using SketchUp 2015, Pro version I believe, good computer/graphics card, will have to get my IT expert (= eldest son) to answer any questions on this…
  • Will set up a page for him this week to show models, perhaps a blog, or is there some method you would suggest/prefer?
  • He is proficient in Dysney Infinity, building complex movie scapes, may sound unimportant but it was his skill in that which led us to following this up with SketchUp and the idea of it leading into a profession.
  • Loves the beach…!
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Hello all, My name is Jackhg, i am a newbie, an older newbie, always wanted to learn 3D type software, my mantra is to learn a new command or technique everyday, and use the command, make mistakes with the command, and incorporate that command in the next days drawing(s). There are really some very acomplished folks here, I have a lot to learn. Thanks for your time to read my hello and truly thank you for uploading your speciality in drawings, hope all of you have a great rest of 2015, that brings the best of everything to each of you.

Thanks in advance for helping me.

Jack HG

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I am Don Butler, 82 years old and a retired technogeek.
My first computer (in a manner of speaking) was a Timex/Sinclair with a memory expansion board. Next stop was a Commodore VIC 20, then the venerable Commodore 64. After that I got serious.
Today I use the Intel i7, lots of memory and dual monitors. Since I’ve been out of the loop, as they say, all that isn’t very important now.
My current activities are photography and woodworking.
I seldom make anything in the workshop until I have modeled it in SU.
Dave R. is my favorite SU mentor.
As to proficiency, I’d say I’m on the first part of the curve without incentive to go higher.
And in reference to emojis. I don’t care for them although I see the occasional one that makes me laugh.

Don

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