My model dissapeared

My model has been taken over by an off white screen, I can’t move, select, or zoom out of the screen that I am in. If anyone could help me that would be greatly appreciated. I cannot undo, because apparently theres nothing to undo.

EDIT: I am fairly new to Sketchup, grateful for any advice

Can you upload the .skp file so we can see what you are working with?

What do you see when you go to Outliner? Can you select the objects there and use Zoom Selection?

sketchup render1.skp (14.2 MB) here it is, thank you for responding quickly! hope you can help

There’s a camera a long way from everything else. I erased that and then was able to zoom in to see the rest of the model. Try that for yourself. Select the camera in Outliner and delete it. Then use Zoom Extents.

There’s some stuff quite a distance from the origin which isn’t a good idea. Also I notice you aren’t leaving Layer 0/Untagged as active which you should be doing

A bit of a puzzle here.

Zoom Extents shows nothing.

Window/Model Info/Statistics shows a large number of edges and faces.
Fix Problems in that window shows errors, and lists them:

Entity CComponentDefinition (564460) has an out of range persistent id - fixed

Entity CComponentDefinition (565848) has an out of range persistent id - fixed

Entity CComponentDefinition (567236) has an out of range persistent id - fixed

Entity CComponentDefinition (568624) has an out of range persistent id - fixed

Entity CComponentDefinition (590295) has an out of range persistent id - fixed

Entity CComponentDefinition (613879) has an out of range persistent id - fixed

Entity CComponentDefinition (627183) has an out of range persistent id - fixed

Entity CComponentDefinition (707232) has an out of range persistent id - fixed

Entity CComponentDefinition (768234) has an out of range persistent id - fixed

Entity CComponentDefinition (768386) has an out of range persistent id - fixed

Entity CComponentDefinition (848083) has an out of range persistent id - fixed

Even after those fixes, nothing shows with Zoom Extents.

I tried Purge unused. Nothiing in Statistics gets deleted, so there’s a model in there somewhere!

Dragging a component out of the component browser still doesn’t show anything in the model window, even after Zoom Extents again.

I see @DaveR has started to reply, and he may be able to help, but I’m stumped for the moment.

@DaveR, how did you see that and how do you ‘erase a camera’?

Finally got a model view back, but not quite the way Dave described.

I went to Camera/Standard Views/Top, and saw a small + in the middle of the screen.

THEN tried Zoom Extents, and got this back after changing to ISO view:

Try that in your model. Or wait for another reply from DaveR.

Or I could upload the model I’m now seeing, saved back to v2019, which is what your profile says you are using…

There’s a camera listed in Outliner. I first selected it and use Zoom Selected to go to it. Then I deleted it and hit Zoom Extents and went back to the model showing basically what you show.

How can I track down the camera? I am unsure where to find the “camera in Outliner”

thank you

I looked in Outliner, but didn’t see ‘camera’ in the un-expanded view of the contents. When I look again, I see that it IS there, I just didn’t spot it, and probably wouldn’t have known its significance.


I’ve never seen or used a camera object, perhaps because only once or twice have I used a renderer, and didn’t remember seeing it then.

John, thank you SO MUCH!!! Very frustrating, but I am grateful you were able to solve the problem. I appreciate it!!!

@DaveR is the guru on this. I just blundered around and struck lucky. He spotted the significance of the camera, which would have passed me by completely without his explanation.

Sounds like you solved it while I was heating my dinner.

Only by accident!

The problem camera is located here:

As you can see, it is very small and easy to overlook. It is probably causing issues because it is jammed right up against the side of that other thing but only half-way overlapped. That is sure to cause confusion about what it can see!

I also notice that you are not using layers/tags appropriately. You have a layer other than layer0 active, and there are a lot of edges and faces that use layers other than layer0. Because SketchUp layers are not like layers in 2D apps, this is very likely to lead you into issues at some point. You can search the forum to find no end of posts explaining why you should always leave layer0 active so that when you draw edges and faces they use layer0. Only associate groups, components, images, dimensions, and screen texts with other layers.

It is indeed Steve. I found it only AFTER seeing your post, and could find it in my copy of the model by going to Outliner, selecting the camera object, then R-click and Zoom Selection, then zooming out a little with the mouse scroll wheel.

thank you so much for your help, as a beginner in any software its frustrating, and im extremely helpful you guys were able to help me figure everything out!

If you haven’t watched them, go to learn.sketchup.com and view the Sketchup Fundamentals to get a better grasp of using components, groups and layers in SU.

As Steve and Dave both say, it sounds as if you aren’t understanding how Layers (Tags from SU202) work. It is a very different concept in SU from most other drawing programs.

Layout however uses a different sort of Layer, much more like Photoshop or other photo editing programs.

ALWAYS draw raw geometry in SU on Layer0/Untagged unless you really understand what you are doing. And assign Layers only to objects - components or groups - NOT faces or edges. Otherwise confusion reigns.

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