I am using SketchUp with OpenCutlist to produce shop production packets for custom millwork and cabinet fabrication. Right now I use materials in SketchUp in the way that OCL intends, which is to differentiate sheet goods from dimensional lumber and rough lumber. I am also including the finish in those materials and that is where I would like to make some changes.
I am looking for an ingenious way to produce cut lists and documentation that refer separately to material and finish as two distinct characteristics. In our shop, fabrication and finishing are two very different processes. The fabricators need only to know which type of raw material to pull for a cut list and whether it is stain grade or paint grade. They donāt need to know that itās going to get marine varnish or which paint color or sheen.
The goal of this is to pare down the number of OCL materials that we use so that we can conform to tighter modeling and drafting standards. Finishes may vary widely from project to project, but materials will largely be the same, or selected from a narrower subset of standards.
Iāve thought of using OCL-defined SketchUp materials to apply at the component level, and then going into the components themselves and āpaintingā the faces and edges* which would override the component material in sketchup (the visual would be a paint color, for instance) without corrupting the OCL cutlist material. However that seems kind of labor intensive and against SketchUp best practices. Is there a better way? Iām open to solutions that involve an extension, even if it costs money.
*In woodworking we refer to the narrow faces of parts as āedges.ā I would never apply a material to what SketchUp calls an edge.
I currently do not use Edge Banding and Veneer, but I would like to use edge bands in the future for our cut lists. And yeah, I understand by coloring faces that I wouldnāt be able to do that.
As far as SketchUp best practices, I guess not. Itās against my best practices though. I prefer to keep materials out of components.
You could use tags to highlight different finishes
Few people know that you can use materials in colours by tag.
However, this makes it easy to switch between a view by material and a view by finish.
The other good news is that Fredoās āReport on areaā extension is able to calculate areas from colours per tag.
Attached are some screenshots and a small sketchup file where the method is applied
On the first screenshot, colour per tag is disabled. On the second screenshot, colour per tag is enabled.
@EstOuest I certainly considered color by tag, but I think using that to indicate finish would require compromising the model organization scheme that we use. I think Iām leaning toward just painting faces with finish and painting components with raw material. That also lets me do cool stuff like indicating which sides of parts get finished at all, and even visually indicating the bad and good side of sheet goods.
I think itās either doing it like @boris.beaulant suggests or something very advanced that would require an extension.
@bmike Interesting. I guess that makes sense for modeling small things at a high level of detail. I work primarily with wood textures that have grain orientation and a uniform finish The fastest way for me to apply materials to those parts is to their axes oriented so that the grain defaults to the right direction on all sides of the piece and then just paint the component with the texture.
That said, Iām not using a separate texture to show end grain, which you would need to do if you were going for the most realistic appearance of wood thatās possible.
It also makes sense for large things like custom timber frame homes and barns. I donāt render every project - but I do use LayOut and materials to give clients a first look at what things could be like - both exterior and interior. If I used the same basic components over and over again Iād have a system - which sounds like you doā¦
When I am doing production work for someone that will hand cut a timber frame I will sometimes color code the reference faces - this would be similar to what you mention in indicating finish or āthe good sideā. It seems you can keep doing what you are doing - painting the component with the overall material, but then leverage another layer of data by having the choice to paint individual faces within.
You might find āmaterial replacerā and āmaterial toolsā plugins useful - both by thomthom.
@bmike I use replacer but I havenāt tried tools. Thanks for the tip.
I donāt ever truly render models (i.e. with lighting and shadows) but I do generally create drawings that are as close as possible in appearance to the design intent. My line drawings are generally full color for elevations and grayscale for sections and plan views, and our buildable packets usually need to indicate grain direction since it comes up so much in our work.
The way our projects flow, I need to do āshop drawingsā for client / designer / GC approval which are actually just more detailed schematics than were in the architecturals. Then when I get approved to build, I essentially have to do another deeper set of buildable drawings that includes cut lists. This has proven to be an albatross around our companyās neck as weāve grown and the projects become more complex. Iāve been using drafting and modeling tools for over 20 years and am just very fast at this stuff, but itās too much for just me to do anymore and I am having to train others who donāt have 20 years experience. In short, I have to pare down the complexity of our drawings and adopt more standards and automations. This paragraph has been an offtopic rant, but if there is anyone who has dealt with the problems that I am facing and has advice for me, I would be all ears. Everything that I know about running a millwork fabrication business has been self-taught in the 5 years that Iāve been with this company.
Soā¦ anyway! I think the new new is going to be to create and maintain the use of some boilerplate OCL materials that indicate only the raw materials. That lets me use the same 10 or so standards for almost all my projects: a few species of sheet goods, each with their built-in various thicknesses along with some dimensional, rough lumber, and hardware standards. Our fabrication packets will only indicate material and whether itās paint or stain grade, theyāll always see wood grain in the packet drawings even if itās going to be painted (helpful since it takes the guesswork out of orientation and nesting on sheets).
Then the finisher can just work with the earlier full color schematic that I had to produce for designer approval anyway.
