Managing scenes in SU

That required a new feature in layout. maybe we could select the section plan, press an option called “Draft on section”, then a 2d mode could display in the “SketchUp Model” window, and the drawing unit of this mode could be Sketchup model unit, this draft could be connected with the section.

I don’t want to draft on sections in layout. I want to do it in my model, interconnected into my model.

I design in sketchup. Drawing section details into section faces allows me to iteract between model and section. As I draw a detail I know if the model is working or not. If not I change it accordingly. So my models are accurate and relating to sectioned details which I draw in every section.

If I was to draw in Layout and cahnge the wall thickness by 2cm and the intersection with the roof would have a zinc detail, how would I then relate the 2d layout detail with the model?

Would you allow me to load a LO detail into SU as reference too?

That would probably work but… You’d still have to twist all LO tools to work as SU tools work as I draw something in SU in seconds that I take minutes to draw in LO.

Also, the time it takes to reload something in Layout would kill my workflow which is based on drawing, modelling, drawing modelling and so on. Right now it’s as simple as getting in and out of context groups/components, and hiding rest of model. That suggestion would imply jumping between 2 apps and wait for huge reload times.

Please SU team, do not stab me in the back like that.

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Having a way to draw a draft on section could save much time in many cases, but as you said, if we edit the model, a lot of things will become very messy.

Since Persistent IDs have been implemented in SketchUp 2017, I believe that a lot of advance options could be created in Layout.

So to make the “Draft Section” connected with SketchUp model, maybe we could choose which draft vertices we want to lock with Section vertices (in Layout or in SketchUp).

And if the object is deleted in SketchUp and drawn again from scratch, a red circles could highlight the disconnected draft (similar to Dimensions in Layout 2017).

I don’t want to do it in Layout. I want to draft in Sketchup.

If you want to add two more features to your list:

  • linestyles, linetypes, by edge, group, layer in sketchup;
  • ability to make section cut profile disapear so the interior of walls doesn’t interfere with section faces.
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When we have a lot of scenes and we want to browse the “Scenes Window”, SketchUp takes awhile to generating Thumbnail, and that is an annoying issue,

So, I suggest to have an option to show and hide Thumbnail in the “Scenes Window”, so we could save that with our default template.

That’s already available under View Options at the top of the Scenes window.

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I missed it, thanks !

And you can run it in list view.
I have my template defaulted to not generate thumbnails…

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If scenes could be grouped, which would be great, I’d typically want one group for all drawings, one for renderings etc. The drawing group would benefit a lot from having nested groups for plans, sections, details etc and maybe even a level for drawings of different buildings for really large projects.

Introducing one level of groups in a way that doesn’t allow nested group is in my view not an improvement. Instead I see it just as a door to something better closing. SketchUp already has Dynamic Components, it doesn’t need more features that have great potential but just turn out as something half-baked.

Regarding scene thumbnails I think it would be a good idea to have it as an opt-in rather than an opt-out, at least for the architectural templates.

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Take a look at the Layers Panel extension for SketchUp…

Scene groups would be awesome, especially if they could be organized like tool icon drop-downs in toolbars.

On the Layers issue, I would like to group my Layers, but my enthusiasm for this feature comes with a serious concern: Adding the ability to group “Layers” could encourage people to think (even more than already) that the arguably-misnamed SU “Layers” are truly Layers, and newbies especially would therefore more likely try to organize their model using the Layer panel, instead of using SU’s “Layers” as they really function, which is more like an unsorted list of Hiding Tags that get applied to non-sticky objects to facilitate batch-hiding. It already can take years for people to learn that organizing an SU model happens using Components and Groups, and the hierarchy can be easily viewed in Outliner (at least, if people named their objects and organized them nicely). Outliner already shows how the hiding functions of Layers are inherited. Grouping Layers would probably have to carefully avoid any hint of inheritance, by not being able to batch-hide the layer-group all at once. What I mean is that the Layer-group couldn’t itself be a Layer. The image made by @sketchuparchive could be dangerous.

The only advantage I see in having Layer groups is to avoid scrolling to find the Layer, like what we’re wishing for in Scenes. Layers is already a vertical list, though, and the scrolling isn’t that bad.

My suggestion for an immediate solution for Layers: When I want to “group” layers, I simply create a number system. Adding a number, 0-9, to the beginning of the Layer name and then sorting the Layer names alphabetically creates a grouping effect, organizationally. If a Component Instance has a Layer just for that one Component Instance, and there are other Layers solely for sub-components, then I name the Layer for the top Component in a way that it will appear alphabetically immediately on top of the Layers for the Subcomponents. That keeps them all together on the list.

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As for Layout vs SketchUp control, I prefer that as many things get controlled in SketchUp as possible instead of Layout. I don’t use Layout for presentations. I use Google Slides or (when I have to) PowerPoint’s Online version. My clients and sometimes an entire team of people like to work on our documentation live, on the cloud, collaboratively. This system creates a much faster feedback cycle, which some of my clients need, and it prevents version control issues and emailing digital paper back and forth.
I hope that someday Layout will be less like digital paper and be cloud-based and collaborative, like Google Docs. Until then, I prefer full control of presentation options to be within SketchUp.

But then, I look forward to presentations not being paper-based someday. Once documentation detaches from paper and paper mentality, then documentation will be untethered from 2D constraints as well. That’s another topic, though.

I have [quote=“Julian_Smith, post:50, topic:18707”]
Take a look at the Layers Panel extension for SketchUp…
[/quote]

I had posted a request to integrate the Layer panel into SletchUp long time ago, since better organization should be from Sketchup interface it self, not from another floating Layer window on the screen.

If the Developer could add an ability for the plugins developers to add their plugins window as a Tray, that will make things more organized, then we will disable the default layer window and enable Layer panel Window in the Trays.

If we import a lot of reference drawings from others firms in our SketchUp model, then the layer window will become very messy and the layers from the reference drawings with similar name in the SketchUp will be merged without any notice, so my suggestion is to have an option when we import a model in SketchUp to choose if we want to group the layers and materials (Default Name of the Group could be the file name of the imported objects).

To avoid any confliction,these things should be coordinated with the developer of the Layer Panel plugin.

Eneroth3 here says it all. It’s pure logic. Can you believe how cool it would be to control section planes (I means which one is ON) from Layout. And if I push further the request, having the Section Cut Face or Skalp plugin into Layout creating a vectorial cut face editable from layout… but I guest I’m dreaming here.

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I certainly would rather have linestyles in sketchup and draft details on section faces there. Drawing in Layout is a pain and drafting in section cut faces in the model, helps you fine tune it as well as reach better design iteraction between model and details.

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How do people feel about Curic’s Scene Manager. It organized scenes quite well.

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I use it, it works rather well.

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I need this too !!
I have more than 100 scenes.
It is too long list.
please make “folder” like “Tab”.

2021-02-09_141212

This has been requested often but doesn’t seem to be high on developer’s list of priorities.

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I like it’s functions to organize by folders by I prefer native scene manager advanced properties for managing scenes. I end up using native all the time.