The improvements in LO’s scale-drawing have been very welcome… but what would be a great addition to this feature is the ability to get surface area calcs quickly from LO linework. For example, calculating impervious surface areas on a Site Plan… this is a pain to do in SketchUp, particularly for complex projects that are modeling on sloping terrain. It would be great if I could just trace over the feature I need to measure (a driveway for instance) in LO, and see the plan-view surface area of that geometry, without needing to dive back into SU. Surely this can’t be too complicated!? TIA!
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Hi @WestgateDesignWorks … have you used the Label tool in LO? It provides the square footage as you described based on the drawing units in the referenced SU file. We use this tool all the time. It’s great for quick take-offs!
But the Label tool doesn’t provide area for scaled drawings in LayOut, which is what I understand he’s asking for.
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I just pulled the square footage from a shade study we did for a client a few months ago (presented in LO) using the Label tool. I checked it against the square footage in the entity info box in the source SU file. The value is the same.
But did you DRAW the outline in LayOut? You seem to be referring to getting the area from a face in a SketchUp viewport and yes, the area should be the same as what is indicated in the SketchUp model. The OP specifically asked for the area in LO line work created with the Scale Drawing tool.
There is no option to choose to show an area in a scaled drawing in LO.
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Correct. And I was pointing out that the existing label tool can accomplish what he was describing so that he has a fix today rather than hoping it possibly appears as a new feature in the future.
FWIW using LO to draw over complex terrain created in SU adds several extra steps that would only yield approximate results because a 2D area would not take the change in elevation into account. It only takes a few seconds to select all of your paved areas, for example, and get an instant, accurate square footage using existing features.
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Thanks for the feedback here; I have known about the auto-labeling options w/ LO references to SU geometry, and occasionally use it. Regardless, it seems like a no-brainer to incorporate the simple math into LO’s scale-drawing functionality to be able to compute surface areas. When I draw site plans, this would be particularly helpful for calculating impervious surface areas, which are measured orthogonally in plan view; I actually don’t want the net sloped-surface area of a roof for my impervious calcs, I want to know the XY planar surface area. Doing this in Sketchup requires either draping the linework onto a plane, or manually drawing offset lines to trace out a closed perimeter, at which point I can get the surface area that I need. If LO could do this natively, I’d just draw on top of my site plan, which would save time. A acknowledge it is a somewhat niche application, but it seems so simple to just add it in; it would just recycle the same code that SU uses to calculate surface area in bounded geometry, I assume?
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It is a little bit more complicated than that. For example, you would also need a way to set the units and precision for that tag within LayOut since there is no SketchUp model to pull those things from. That means we have to add extra data to a Label to hold that information, and hook it up to some UI controls so that you would have a way change the settings as you may want. Don’t get me wrong, adding support for getting coordinates, lengths, and areas of native LayOut entities is absolutely something that we would like to do in the future, but there’s usually much more to a given feature than it initially looks, and we always have to balance every feature request against others (LayOut Components?), as well as bug-fixes and other internal requirements.
Adam
I dont find it ll that difficult to do what your describing in sketchup. When making a 2D of a terrain or a “Drip Line” of a roof I make an X, Y rectangle and project the lot lines and setbacks or roof line to it. I just know that I need it when working on my site model. I do it mostly with native tools but im sure there are extensions that would help. I often have a survey that I import and scale then get my lot lines and existing data like streets from that.
I get the feeling that you have experience with other applications that had tools like you want to see but as gets discussed in many threads Layout isnt meant to be 2D CAD.
Thanks Ivan; I agree, I don’t find it ‘difficult’ to calc these areas in SU, just somewhat cumbersome/inconvenient. I actually don’t have any experience with other drafting tools, but I do see a lot of logic for why Layout would be improved by emulating some specific features of other 2D drafting software. Anything that helps workflows be more streamlined is appreciated!
2026 has improved Layout loads BUT ALAS!!! Still not able to find the area of a scaled shape drawn in layout. This is by far my biggest failing with layout. For a 2d drafting and presentation software we need this feature. PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE!!!
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I agree it would be a nice addition to work with the ‘scaled drawing’ feature.
LayOut is not a drafting program. It is a presentation and documentation application designed to work hand in hand with SketchUp. Yes, you can ‘draft’ with it. But that is not its primary function.
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Then why do people keep using it as one? Because it works!
Exactly Dave! I design my plans in Layout and need to either trace around > export to Sketchup > determine area, OR run rectangles around (I have dimensions embedded in them) and calculate the area!
I too would like this option. I am working on a masterplan for a site, and to me it makes sense to be able to draw a 2D shape in LO over my plan, and use it to calculate the area of the site for development or footprint of buildings vs landscape, etc.
Doing it in SU is not simple because there are objects in too many planes, and my model is quite complex, so creating an annotation polygon in LO is much easier. Using the Label tool as mentioned in this thread doesn’t work on 2D shapes created in LO.
I’ve managed to get what I need by exporting a DWG from LO and then measuring that via DWG True View, but it would be much more efficient to be able to do it straight in LO.
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