Your Surface Book seems to have a keyboard that you can use.
If you remove/disable/fold it down, you miss the modifier keys which are needed for changing modes of pointer tools, the character keys for switching between tools and some keys for controling start/end of operations (enter, delete, esc). In that case you should use an onscreen keyboard. If you have a configurable OSK, you can customize it to show only the buttons you actually need for SketchUp (e.g. maybe only modifier keys).
So a pointing device with hover mode and primary&secondary click (like a trackpad or 3-button mouse) is essential. I still like to use a stylus in combination, since for some tasks it feels more natural (you click where you see something on the screen) and for tasks similar to lasso selection it is more precise.
And now we have touch screens, ipads, and the like. We are a big step closer. Nothing like there yet but getting closer. Of course, as has been pointed out here, to make this kind of thing work is not just a question of the hardware. The software must be designed to enable it too. Maybe when the techies realize that using a pen-like device on a drawing board-like surface is so intuitive and natural that everyone will want to do it, things will start to fall into place?
During my education as a architectural draftsman I drafted with drawing ink on paper (Shortly after, we moved to cad). Now, 25 years later, I consider purchasing a Wacom Cintiq 24". The pen has two buttons. Would be possible to use them for Pan and Orbit. Everything else with shortcuts, like I do it anyway. On my keyboard and/or the little remote, which comes with the Wacom.
Could be a lot of fun.
If in 3ds Max you create a cube and apply a material to it (simple, with a texture in diffuse slot), and then export it as FBX (or OBJ), and then import it into SketchUp, do you have the same problems with the material?
Apple tried to breed a conventional mouse wheel with a trackpad, and results of course were the Magic Mouse. The intention was to incorporate more gesture based actions on the mouse surface, to ultimately match the trend towards tablet based devices and their heavy use of finger gestures.
Anyway, it all goes back to when I got an Intuos tablet for my 18th birthday, I was really bad with it to be honest but when I got my first job after University at WIRED magazine everybody in the office had one, no matter what job you were doing (using a pen helps reduce RSI most associated with using a mouse).
Rather than using a tablet a few times a week to draw I was using it everyday all day for all tasks from emails to In Design. Naturally at this time I started using it with SketchUp thinking nothing of it. Over the years tablets have advanced, they are now displays with multi gestures and with more advanced inputs.
Wacom were good enough to lend me a MobileStudioPro 16 so I thought since I have both an OSX and Windows powered input at home I would take some questions over the weekend. Feel free to ask me any questions and I will do my best to answer them.
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Hello. I'm really new at all this and I have trouble with some of the basics.I want to simulate an office building but I cant seem to figure out the correct way to save my progress, which is causing a lot of frustration. I'm using SketchUp 2014 with OpenStudio 1.5.
Hi @iasonas_fng, sorry for your troubles. When working with OpenStudio you only need to save your OSM file, you do not need to save the SKP file. When you open SketchUp you can go to the OpenStudio menu and choose open OSM, re-opening a SKP file linked to an OSM sometimes causes problems. I am a little unsure what you mean by "Selecting Save As or Export from the OpenStudio menu doesnt seem to do anything so I start with Save As .skp model from the File menu", can you expand on that? When you choose "Save" or "Save As" from the OpenStudio model it should prompt you for where you want to save your OSM file if you have not already saved it.
Clicking "Save OpenStudio Model As" in the OpenStudio menu does nothing. The prompt you mention only appears when I try to save in .osm after I have already saved in .skp format. When reopening SketchUp, selecting Open OpenStudio Model does nothing. I can only open the .skp file, which doesnt really load anything. After that, if I try to open the .osm file I get the "Validity check: Failed to load file" error message.
OpenStudio does not store any of the energy modeling information in the SketchUp (.skp) file itself, but rather uses SketchUp as a visualization tool. Modifications made to the energy model (including the energy model geometry) are stored in a separate file. The Legacy OpenStudio SketchUp plugin stored this model information in a .IDF file (the EnergyPlus input file format). The current OpenStudio SketchUp plugin (which you are using) stores this model information in a .OSM files (the OpenStudio input file format). The plugin has its own save, save-as, open and open buttons in the OpenStudio toolbar. These buttons are described in the OpenStudio SketchUp Plugin Documentation.
Thanks for the quick reply. I read through those tutorials but it doesnt seem to work for me. I go to the Plugins>Openstudio>File menu, select Save OpenStudio Model As and nothing happens. No pop-up box, no error message, nothing. Any ideas?
After uninstalling and reinstalling everything a few times, I finally got the menus working.It probably had to do with the install order.What I did was:1) Install EnergyPlus 8.12) Install Sketchup Pro 20143) Install OpenStudio 1.5 (without the legacy)and use Administrator Rights during every step.Just saying, in case anyone else has the same troubles in the future.
Perhaps it will help to consider the SketchUp file format (.skp) and the OpenStudio file (.osm) as containing the objects required to managing two completely separate object models. Aside from some links and pointers described above, they are independent files.
OpenStudio related model objects (OpenStudio surfaces, subsurfaces, construction definitions, material definituions. schedules, etc.) will be saves to the .osm file when one saves the Plugins->OpenStudio -> File -> "Save OpenStudio Model" command.
I was working in my .osm file into sketchup normally. So i started to organizing my folders after work and when i tried to load the .osm file into sketchup was showed the message "Validity check: Failed to load file". (All files have been moved from folder)
If you release your touch on the pad, as happens if you cannot go any further in the limited space, then you have to use the keys again to get into the desired command, at which point you can release the keys and keep Panning and Orbiting.
Thanks for the question. Your post did the same thing thing for me that you wanted: it showed up first in Google search to remind me of the correct keyboard commands. My normal workstation has a 3-button mouse just for SU, but sometimes I'm on a laptop with no mouse, or only a magic mouse.
I am having the same exact problem. The Rhino to Sketchup workflow so essential in my office and we need materials to be preserved on transfer but all but one similar objects end up in Sketchup with default material. The Rhino 6 Sketchup export has been a great improvement in that it now preservers both layers and vectors. Hopefully the material preservation issue can be fixed.
Good find. It looks like exporting to a down-saved version of sketchup works but its only when you have your rhino materials assigned by layer. Materials assigned by object are having the same problem even in a down-saved version
Is there a way to export Revit geometry to rhino or sketchup with the texture data to make renders ?, Why is this not possible ? or even vice versa without having to go through the trouble of assigning materials through object styles. For a small project this is feasible but for large projects its tedious and time conusming. What is the most efficient way to do this ?
To answer the "when" question...Most of such creators collaborate with Autodesk at different levels and in my personal opinion I doubt it is or will ever be in Autodesk's strategy to kill such businesses by replicating the plugins/codes which those firms have created. At one point in time Autodesk might consider to fairly acquire a plugin (which they have done in the past) but not replicating it....Revit itself was acquired from the original developers
andrewbmorrell , definitely make sure to activate the "Use Viewport Aspect Ratio" in the Output tab of our Visual Settings after setting the resolution itself to Custom.
From there on you can simply activate view synchronisation and switch from view to view in SketchUp while taking renderings/screenshots through Enscape, which should then match the SketchUp viewport output as well.
Now the question I have is can it work the other way? Can you setup a view in Enscape and have it sync to the SketchUp viewport? I see that the SketchUp window tries to at least match the 2pt and field of view, but when I export the 2, they do not match exactly. This has always been something I have been disappointed with. Ideally, I would like to setup a 2pt perspective in SketchUp and just have Enscape match that, but since thats not an option, I am looking into another way to accomplish it.
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