Some requests for Printing

SketchUp Feature Requests
#1

I’m still new to SU, but am very impressed with the functionality and ease of use. Nevertheless, I’m bold enough (or uneducated enough!) to suggest some new features related to printing.

  1. On Document Setup … I can tell SU the print scale (inches in drawing to feet in the model), and it will tell me how many pages it would take to print. I’d like the choice to tell it how many pages to use, and it could figure out the print scale. And, it should do these calculations, either way, without me having to tab to another field, instead of pressing ENTER, which causes the setting to be displayed quickly before the dialog box disappears.

  2. That dialog box sometimes sets the Print size unreasonably (e.g., to 1 ⅝" by ¾") when I adjust the print scale. This might be a bug rather than a feature, but it shouldn’t do this at all, it seems. The print size reverts to something “normal” (10 3/16" by 4 13/16", which seems a bit odd) when I press “Fit View to Page”. When I unclick it, and again change the “In Model” spec, so do the specs for “Print Size”. I’m not sure why these are related.

  3. It would be handy if there were “up/down” buttons to the right of each field to increase the Print Size or Model Size by, say, 1" and 1’ respectively. Or, to increase or decrease the “Number of pages to use” if that were implemented.

  4. It is worth considering if “Page Setup …”, “Document Setup …” and “Print …” could all be combined onto a new “Print …” menu, where it would permit changing all the parameters just before printing (and remember these settings with the rest of the model). I’m on a Mac, where this might not be possible or desirable. Just an idea …

Ken

#2

What version of SketchUp are you using?

#3

Pro 2018 on Mac high Sierra

#4

Why not use LayOut? You have much more control over how things look and fit on the page. Printing to scale is a walk in the park, too.

#5

Haven’t really tried it yet. On first quick attempt, I wasn’t at all sure I needed it just to print a 2D floor plan … seems like overkill for that.

#6

Is it overkill if it gets you what you want?

If you look at where they’ve invested efforts regarding printing, you’ll see it’s in LayOut. Printing from SketchUp hasn’t changed in years. Even if they were going to change printing in SketchUp, it surely won’t happen before your project needs to be finished.

Printing onto multiple pages is easy with LayOut, too.

#7

Ok, thanks for the inside tip! I’ll try Layout.

#8

To be more accurate, it was identical in version 3 already (and probably before), about 15 years ago.

2 Likes
#9

This topic was automatically closed 91 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.