Please2D is a small plugin that will lock the camera direction of selected scenes, so that orbiting is disabled. This applies only to scenes which have a camera in 2D Projection.
You just click on the toolbar icon to select the scenes where you wish the camera direction lock to apply:
Here is a short video:
Please2D is published at Sketchucation.
Nice. Will give it a go. I don’t have much need for it, but I do share models with clients and I can see this being useful for part / shop drawings…
Does locking the camera stop you working in 3d?
Answer is NO.
Please2D only locks the camera direction. Say, you are in Top view, then nothing prevents you to draw a line between 2 points which have different Z coordinates, provided you can see them in the viewport.
Forcing a real 2D drawing is something much more complex to do, because standard tools do not interact with the API. So, there is no way to know what is drawn or transformed. So, if a genuine ‘2D Please’ CAD-like feature is really required, it should be implemented natively in Sketchup.
Very cool. One thing I’ve done to force drawing on a fixed plane, is to create a rectangle above what ever geometry i was drawing over with a transparent material applied to its face.
Once I start drawing on that plane, I could then toggle on/off either hidden lines or xray mode while using the axis locks if needed to align the new 2D drawing to the 3d model while keeping all my new line work on the fixed plane.
It would be cool to also have drawing locked at a certain level on a locked view.
Like some sort of alt+click before drawing would set the drawing plane and then, no matter what you drawn and what inference you found, the result would always be locked to that plane until you alt+clicked again.
If I remember right, AutoCAD used to draw on the same Z plane from the initial point you started to draw on unless you snapped to something out of that plane. If you did not initially snap to anything, it would default to the Z=0 plane. Maybe SU or a plugin could emulate that behavior?
The issue I see with this approach is that when we draw from a wall, with an active section, on an architectural project, we never actually know what point we are starting at. It might be something in the wall, the section itself or some section hatch created by a plugin. So, the ability of defining the plane that you want to draw and make sure that is where you’re drawing, would be key for something like that.
I will create a feature request for this directly to Trimble.
The alternative way would be to emulate the native tools while constraining them to plane.
For instance, you have your own Fredo Sketch plugin with the move and rotate tools that expand the native move and rotate tools. Maybe those could be used to constrain on the plane we want.
Maybe the line tool and the freehand tool could also be adapted to do something similar. I think your FredoSpline tools would also be useful.
The problem is that there are a lot of drawing tools to constrain. I couldn’t use a 2D mode without rotated rectangle, for instance.
A lot of work, but this would certainly be useful.
Thinking about this, it would be even more useful to have the possibility to have it working on perspective scenes too.
I usually work on perspective because it makes it much easier to see all the walls in the space I’m working with and, therefore, be sure where I’m picking my points, as well as if I’m working on the right plane.
So, if this would work in a perspective projection too, I wouldn’t actually need the 2D constrain on tools and Please2D would be useful for me right away.
Drawing 2D at specified height in Perspective or Parallel, using different inferencing points at different heights.
Thanks Mihai. I had forgot about that plugin. The only issue is that it’s a bit outdated as new Sketchup tools have some addictive functions, but I think that solves a lot of possible workflows.
For me I still think the best workflowwould be to have Please2D able to be used in perspective camera scenes. However, as it’s very easy to use a shortcut to change from parallel projection to perspective, I’ll give the plugin a spin.
You’re welcome!
If you want, you can also test Fredo Tools > DrawAlong and draw in which 2D plane you want (X, Y, Z).
That’s the closest approach, probably. I also forgot about it. Maybe it could be adapted to remember a standard plane per scene and adapted to some sort of 2D plan workflow
FredoSketch, DraAlong, MoveAlong and FredoSpline already allows to constrain drawing and transforming along a given plane (axes, local axes or custom).
Hi @Fredo6, can you please tell me why these errors can appear when I try to launch Please2D (in SketchUp Make 2017, SU 2022 and SU 2024)?
This is a bug.
Fixed in version v1.0b, published at Sketchucation.
need more fixes to do a great performance, we need for SU2024
Awwww… been trying to find something like this for ages for prepping CNC components, but it crashes every couple of minutes.
Could you invoke the menu Tools > Fredo6 Collection… > Default Parameters.
In the dialog, uncheck the option for hard lock of Orbit.
By the way, which version of Sketchup do you run?
