How to setup instruction manuals (Ikea style)

Hi all,

what is the best way to put together assembly manuals like Ikea?

I want to do this in Sketchup and Layout.

Is the method as in my file the correct one?
Or should I draw only 1 product, and then make parts invisible in certain scenes? (I think this goes wrong with highligting the parts).

I would love to hear what you guys think about this.

Document is just a simple example, original drawings are much more complex

Sample SketchUp Community.skp (203.7 KB)

What you have there works well enough but that could get to be a bit of a problem with a more complex model. If you string the model out over a large distance you can create some graphics issues in LayOut. Better to keep the model closer to the origin. I would use tags to control the visibility of the objects and stick to as few scenes as possible. You could make two copies of each of the parts that need to be highlighted and then choose to show or not show the highlighted or unhighlighted version for each viewport. Those parts would overlap in the model space. In that case you could use a single scene in SketchUp and just control tag visibility for each viewport in LayOut.

Edit to add: Here’s a quickie example from your model. In this case a single scene is used for all of the viewports.


More scenes would be required for additional camera positions but using the same camera position as much as possible is what makes these sorts of plans work. Prevents the user from getting turned around.

2 Likes

Thank you for your quick reply.

Would it be possible to send me an example how to work with tags in the samplefile i’ve send?

Here you go. Look at both the SketchUp file’s Tags panel and the way tag visibility is controlled per viewport in LayOut.
Sample SketchUp Community dr.skp (182.9 KB)

IKEA LIKE PLAN.layout (239.0 KB)

Thank you DaveR!

Could you send me the .layout file for version 2022 (can’t open the 2024 version unfortunatly).

Thank you in advance!

Here it is. You should update to 2024. You can do that with your subscription license. You don’t have to stick to SketchUp/LayOut 2022.
IKEA LIKE PLAN 22.layout (238.9 KB)