For one of the designs I’m working on, I needed a bezier curve - which Sketchup Free does not support.
It looks the only vector format supported by Sketchup Free for import is .skp.
So I opened InkScape, drew the bezier curve I needed, and exported to an .svg.
I’ve tried 3 different online .svg to .skp converters by now - none of them produce an .skp file that Sketchup will recognize. I get different errors, such as “cannot import empty component” or “invalid file format” and so on.
Is there any tool (online or offline) that can correctly convert .svg to .skp?
Or do I have to buy a subscription? Just to get a single bezier curve into my design…?
As mentioned, it’s a bezier. I struggled with the circle tools for a good hour before realizing the problem - circle sections just won’t give me the “curve ball” shape of a true bezier, if that’s what you were thinking?
The one in the video above is simply 5 curves done with the normal 2 point arc tool, each successive curve will follow tangentially from the previous one.
Hmm, I don’t know, I seem to have a lot of problems with the circle tools…
They snap excessively, preventing me to drawing smaller/finer curves - disabling all the snapping options seems to have no effect on that.
And I have trouble seeing whether it’s staying on the plane - many times, I thought I had the curve I wanted, but then I leave the parallel projection view and discover the curves are going in some other direction away from the plane…
Okay, after a few more attempts, I finally managed to reconstruct the curve out of circle segments on top of an imported image. Being able to snap to the image surface was actually helpful.
What a cumbersome waste of time though.
If anyone knows of a tool that can convert any other format to .skp, please share.
If you were using SketchUp Go or SketchUp Pro you would be able to import vector file types like .dxf or .dwg. If you were using SketchUp Pro there are a number of tools for drawing Bezier and other non-circular curves.
If your time has any value SketchUp Go or SketchUp Pro would certainly be worth it even though this is a hobby thing for you.
Two small hobby projects in six months… I understand the free version only exists to entice subscribers - but a monthly subscription doesn’t really make sense for something I’m going to use for 1-2 weeks over a year…
So for one or two hobby projects a year the free version is a good option for you and the few seconds more it takes to draw curves as Box showed is really not a big time investment. Seems like a decent trade-off.
