When drawing a circle, the default setting is that your radius is from the center of the circle to a vertice on the circle’s edge. However, in the past, there was a shortcut or modifier that I used to cause the radius to be from the center to the midsection of one of the segments that make up the circle. The problem is, I don’t remember how to do that, where I learned it, and can’t find any information on it. It was a quick handy shortcut that I can’t find anymore. I looked through the system shortcuts but couldn’t find anything related. The Instructor and the link for “more advanced operations” also had nothing on it. If someone could remind me how to use this shortcut that would be great.
Since the convention for mesh models is that the vertices, not the midpoints, represents the curve I don’t know if such a feature is suitable. Trimble must have though about it when adding the feature for the Polygon Tool and come to the conclusion to not add it to this tool.
The only reason to break the convention of letting vertices represent the curve is as a work-around for Offset and Follow Me which don’t honor curves but I’d rather have those tools corrected than Circle tools changed to allow for the workaround.
Well, technically, you can create circles with the polygon tool, and use the toggle feature, but it would be handy if it was integrated into the circle tool. However, I think there are some subtle differences between how a circle drawn with the circle tool and one drawn with the polygon tool work. Changing the number of segments in a polygon alters the radius of the polygon, or “circle”, which is inconvenient when one is trying to boost the resolution of a “circle” when working with small geometry. I just wish SketchUp had a template that would accomodate smaller geometry.
I agree. While I haven’t had trouble with the Offset tool, the Follow me tool has been a pain. Dragging a curve around a right angle or pivoting around a point… doesn’t work well.