"About Maciej Fijalowski of VR Sketch"

Maciej Fijalkowski is the one member among the founders of the VR Sketch in SketchUp, he and his team is working on developing VR with SketchUp to make it more accessible.

Maciej Fijalkowski is the surfer, programmer and climbing gym designer about the current state of VR industry and the one behind the VR Sketch extension. He is basically from Łódź, Poland but now living at Cape Town Area, South Africa. He went to Warsaw for study; he always wanted to go and study abroad but couldn’t afford so he started to explore more as a traveler. He also worked at the University of Warsaw at the Center for Mathematical and Computational Modeling; while working there and being a student he got into Google Summer of Code and became interested in Pypy.

Later his company has introduced a new concept into the Sketch Up word with VR Sketch which enables the creation, manipulation and presentation of models in a fully immersive virtual reality environment.

A little about VR Sketch: It is an extension for SketchUp which gives anyone the ability to create, edit and view their models in Virtual Reality. It also gives designers the ability to communicate space that clearly allows them well informed decisions to make with instant feedback. VR Sketch is a small but a dynamic company which plans to revolutionize the thinking of people about the way of design and faster design. The landscape of hardware abilities will only improve and everyone can see more and more design work done in VR. Sketch will keep iterating quickly to deliver cutting edge solutions for more years.

Inspiration behind VR Sketch: As per his words, during the process of designing and creating a new rock climbing gym, he purchased a VR headset as a help in visualizing projects. Though SktechUp is a very easy to learn but it can be difficult while mapping of 2D screens to 3D space. So they thought to make something which will help to solve this problem and thus they started the company in April 2018. Maciej is now living in Cape Town with his co-founder, Duncan Fraser who is an architect and travels often.

Projects: The team has handled many things together in past but from a long time they only focused on a project called Pypy which is an open source software for a faster way to run Python code. VR Sketch is their first venture into architecture and design which has introduced to the through SketchUp 3D Basecamp with greater diversity in those attending versus the Python conferences. VR Sketch needs less of any skills which a trained architect must have and helps architects to work more easily on the 3D models.

VR Sketch works with all the high-end hardware like HTC Vive, Oculus Rift those with touch controllers and some mixed reality headsets. They have been working on more major headsets which will be function by Oculus Quest. The team has focused on doing things well for the higher-end devices and consider the availability of any design tool to be a main consideration.

Industry trends to follow for future app development: According to them, much of 3D design will move into the VR space and everyone will see huge iterations in hardware design. Headsets will be lighter and more affordable and controllers will be less clumsy. Software side will also be upgraded with major changes; this huge evolution and interconnection between hardware and software in the VR industry will create many more opportunities for them. Now they are working on a cloud-enabled collaboration which help users in working on a model with distant team members simultaneously and keep a full version control.

Dream Project: He is really interested in urban design and with an unlimited budget, he would be involved in developing a “Chartered City” as theorized by Paul Romer, where it is possible to play with new ideas every time.

Source: wwww.blog.sketchup.com



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Published By
Rajib Dey
www.sketchup4architect.com
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Disney has developed an augmented reality coloring book App to provide a 3d animated view of your drawing through augmented reality technology

Disney has introduced an augmented reality coloring book App that can be used to map color in real-time out of a 2D coloring book onto a animated 3D model. The users can give color to any character in a printed coloring book and review their work via a mobile gadget. The users can view the colored character go around in augment reality 3d space on top of the page.

The sketch is recognized and addressed, and the video stream is augmented through an animated 3-D version of the character that is textured based on the given color. There is a texturing method that uses the captured texture out of a 2-D colored drawing to both the seeable and occluded regions concerning a 3-D character in real time. There exist a deformable surface tracking system intended for colored drawings that applies a new outlier rejection algorithm for real-time tracking and surface deformation restoration. The 2d and 3d content can be generated through a content creation pipeline.

Every single character in the coloring book is generated in 3D modeling software and animated. Afterward, every surface pixel on the model is attributed a equivalent pixel space on the 2D image in the coloring book.

For more information visit, www.disneyresearch.com

We want to feature this page: sketchup4architect.com/sketchup-plugins

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Published By

Rajib Dey

www.sketchup4architect.com

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Create 3d models from your mobile with the camera and accelerometers

The 3d modelers can get help from a new technology that applies the camera and accelerometers in an average cellphone to evaluate real objects in 3D space.

Researchers associated with Carnegie Mellon University have developed this newest 3d modeling technology. The 3d modelers will get the ability to generate 3D models of the world just by flapping their phones just about an object or scene.

The accelerometers also known as inertial measurement units, approximately notify the phone’s software the location of the phone in space. By linking IMUs with the camera, one can get stunning results.

The tool provides superior computer vision and the users will be able to generate a 3D model of almost anything through their smartphone alone. It is expected that this new 3d modeling technology can be applied in self-driving cars, bypassing expensive and “power-hungry” radar. The team applied the technology to produce something known as Smart Fit that discovers the ideal glasses frames for any face.

A face tracker program can determine the distance amid a person’s pupils inside half a millimeter.

The 3-D model can be applied to rectify for the errors originated by the IMU, even as we utilizing the IMU to estimate the dimensions of the model.

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Published By

Rajib Dey

www.sketchup4architect.com

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SketchUp - some tips and tactics

SketchUp is known for its speed activities. It is a quick 3D modeling programme. It often uses as landscaping architects. SketchUp is not so tough to learn, but it takes some time to become expert in this trade. Kevin Pfeiffer, writer of landarchs.com has come up with this article. We made an excerpt.

Yes, there are some shortcuts to save the time; still it will take some time to learn. We are trying to present some tricks for your help:-

How to lock axis: Functioning shape on 3D space on a 2D screen is not simple. There is much confusion taken place automatically. If you shift to a circle, you may feel that it would go up along y-axis, witnessed that goes along z-axis. In that case you have to use arrow keys for locking the axis. The up and down arrows are Y-axis (Blue) and in the left, the Z-axis (green), then turn right x-axis (red). The movement will be known from here.

Image Courtesy: landarchs.com

Use of array tool: Many people simply copy and paste the sketchup shape objects and other things. Many people also repeatedly try Ctrl+v to paste it. It is suggested to use AutoCAD array tool for speedy use of sketchup.

Watch this video learning:

Photoshop for vegetation must: Sketchup has many downloadable options (3D Warehouse), but while growing vegetation, the file size creates a problem. The best rout is to use Photoshop with PNG format.

Image Courtesy: landarchs.com

For Large Tool set: see this flow chart

view> toolbars...> large tool set.

Image Courtesy: landarchs.com

Hotkeys: If the designers wish to speed up the project, then they can use hotkeys. Follow this: window>preferences>shortcuts to obtain the page. SketchUp has developed a list of shortcuts and hotkeys.

Image Courtesy: landarchs.com

Plugins: These are made for enhancing the capacity of SketchUp. Click the links

• https://extensions.sketchup.com/en/content/soap-skin-bubble
• https://extensions.sketchup.com/en/content/sketchup-stl
• https://extensions.sketchup.com/en/content/3d-tree-maker
• http://www.suplugins.com/supodium-v2.php

Side count for polygon:

This video tutorial can guide the designers.

Selecting by click: The Selection on the screen is a major problem in Sketchup. Count the number of click and then, select the face and the face and edge and the whole of the object.

Image Courtesy: landarchs.com

Measurement tool: The designers need to syn into the measurement, angle and rest of the data into sketchup. This is the similarity between sketchup and autoCAD that designers do not need to select the textbox contributing data.

Image Courtesy: landarchs.com

There is also a ruler tool which marks line on XYZ.

Image Courtesy: landarchs.com

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Published By

Rajib Dey

www.sketchup-ur-space.com

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The users of AutoCAD Architecture can get assistance from SketchUp

There are some third party tools, which always help all aspects of drawing quality. SketchUp plays here for AutoCAD Architecture. Using the SketchUp, a designer can see is how user-friendly is this application.

AutoCAD Architecture (abbreviated as ACA) is a version of Autodesk's flagship product, AutoCAD, with tools and functions specially suited to architectural work. On the other hand, the SketchUp (Formerly: Google Sketchup) is a 3D modeling program for applications such as architectural, interior design, civil and mechanical engineering, film, and video game design. A freeware version, SketchUp Make, and a paid version with additional functionality, SketchUp Pro, are available.

The free download includes integrated tools for use in uploading to Google Earth. SketchUp is part of the same product family as Google Earth. With this tool, Designers can import a scaled aerial photograph from Google Earth to SketchUp with the click of a button. This can include topographical information as well. The SketchUp Pro comes with Layout, which is a 2D companion to SketchUp Pro. With Layout, you can create professional design documents, dimensioned drawings, and presentation documents from the 3D models you created in SketchUp Pro. When the model updates in SketchUp Pro, the changes would automatically updated in Layout.

If you are a new user of SketchUp, then get rid of worry

SketchUp is not a headache for the new beginners. Therefore, do not lose your sleep. There are help menu, help centre, SketchUp Reference Guide, quick Reference Card where a user can print a PDF showing helpful shortcuts. There is a link for SketchUp as well as a link for Layout. Here are a few helpful tips to help uses get started.

• When using your mouse, the left button is for tool operations and the right button is for the context menu.

• The middle button (wheel) has several functions: click and drag to orbit, shift click and drag to pan, double click to re-center your view, and scroll to zoom.

• The spacebar operates the Select Tool. You can use ctrl spacebar to add to a selection set, shift spacebar to toggle in and out of a selection set, ctrl A to select all, and shift ctrl to subtract from a selection set. Finally, please print and read the Quick Reference Card before proceeding to use SketchUp.

File Formats

One of the many features of SketchUp is that it uses a wide variety of file formats in the likes of DWG, DXF, OBJ, FBX, XSI, and WRL. If the users do not want to take the time to import a file into ACA, they can also create a screenshot of the file and save it in BMP, JPG, PNG, PDF, EPS, and TIF formats for presentation purposes.

How ACA file to import into SketchUp ?

Importing ACA file to SketchUp is not a big deal for the designers. All the designers have to do is to know the basic feature of SketchUp. This process will be much easy if these are possible.

• Let us begin by opening SketchUp and Select the file Menu.

• Select the import.

• User can see the option button, under the preview area.

• Select options and then select the options that need in the dialog box that opens.

• Click OK.

• Now select the file that you wish to import and click open. If you do not see the file you are looking for, be sure to click on the drop-down next to File Type to ensure that you are searching for the correct file type.

• Congratulations! You have now successfully imported a drawing into Google SketchUp! It is important to note that the SketchUp file will have the same 0,0 origin as your AutoCAD Architecture drawing.

• The designers should begin it by right-clicking and selecting Make Group.

• Then select the Line tool and select any corner of the perimeter to start the line.

• Now, enter the wall height in the Measurements box and press enter. Next, select the Rectangle tool.

• Begin your rectangle by selecting the endpoint of the line you just drew and end the rectangle at a point on the wall. Continue it until all exterior walls are erected. The designers will definitely found that it is easier to form the exterior first.

• Now that all exterior walls have been erected and closed, the designers have to create a face. The face is used to build the roof once you are ready to do so. Next, select the face, select the Offset tool and enter the thickness for the exterior walls you have just created. Now select the face and use the Push/Pull tool. Push the face down to create the interior face of the walls. This will develop the interior face of the exterior walls so that you can continue to create the interior walls at this point using the steps above.

Doors and Windows are added

Therefore, after the creation of walls, a designer will need to decide other important things such as header heights, doors and window sizes and styles. Once you are ready, be sure you are in X-ray mode. Now the designers have to insert the door component you selected and place it by referencing a point on an opening in your imported AutoCAD Architecture file. Then he/she have to keep continuing the placement all door components using X-ray mode. Next place all windows using the same method stated above for door placement. For example, if designer are going to place a window component above an overhead door, he/she will reference a point on the window and a point on the door.

Model in 3D

A camera is used by SketchUp to represent user’s point of view of the model. You are a camera that is looking at your model as you work. SketchUp uses several tools for viewing your model in 3D space. These are tools familiar to you in AutoCAD Architecture: Pan, Orbit, Zoom, and Zoom Extents. Each of these tools can be found on the Camera toolbar.

Dynamic Components

Dynamic Components can be defined as components that have parametrics. For example, a cabinet component has doors that open and close. A component is only considered dynamic when it has parametric data. Dynamic components will display with a special badge when parametric data is present. Attaching attributes to a component is what makes the component dynamic. Attributes are items such as the component's name, description, location, size, and number of copies. Some attributes are predefined, which means that they are automatically available for every dynamic component. There are also custom attributes that are unique attributes defined by the developer of the dynamic component.

Every attribute of a component has a value that can be a textual string, a number or the result of a formula. Each attribute and its associated value is called an attribute name/value pair. Formulas can consist of predefined functions, mathematical operators, or the values of other attributes. Functions are shortcuts that perform an operation, such as calculating the square root of a number. It is important to note that all SketchUp users can use dynamic components. However, only SketchUp Pro users can develop dynamic components.

To make a component dynamic, right-click on the component, select Dynamic Components, and then select Component Attributes. Select Add Attributes and a dialog box will display with attributes that can be added to your component. Once you have added the attributes, the new dynamic component can be saved to a component file for additional use later.

How to export a SketchUp File, into AutoCAD Architecture ?

Exporting a Google SketchUp file into AutoCAD Architecture is same easy.

• Once you are ready to export, select the File menu and select Export.

• Next, select 2D Graphic or 3D Model, depending on the file you are exporting.

• Select the export file type from the drop-down. You are exporting to AutoCAD Architecture, so you would select AutoCAD DWG.

• By selecting the Options button at the bottom, you can choose which AutoCAD version you are exporting to as well as the drawing scale and size.

• Select OK and then select Export. The export is now complete! It is important to note that you can alternate between ACA and SketchUp multiple times. Your drawing does not have to be complete before importing it into SketchUp or from SketchUp into ACA.

The use 3D Warehouse and it is free

The 3D Warehouse (formerly Google 3D Warehouse) is an accompanying website for SketchUp. It is a free cloud service that allows users to search, upload, download and share 3D models. The site enables modelers to upload their work from within SketchUp or by uploading .SKP or .KMZ files via the 3D Warehouse website. The 3D Warehouse currently holds over 2 million models. Individual models can be viewed in 3D on the web using a modern Internet browser that supports WebGL, or with the SketchUp Mobile Viewer application compatible with current iPad devices. Users can search and download models from 3D Warehouse from a web browser or from within the SketchUp desktop application. In 2008, PC World reported that 3D Warehouse allows users without significant artistic inclination to make and populate 3D models. Also in 2008, The New York Times reported that the 3D Warehouse had become a virtual ‘dictionary’ of the 3D vocabulary, reporting its suitability in filmmaking.

A great feature of SketchUp is the 3D Warehouse, which allows you to search for 3D models made by other users as well as contribute 3D models of your own. It contains 3D models of buildings, cars, bridges, interior furnishings, and much more. A new feature allows you to search for similarly shaped models instead of relying on a text search. This really saves time when you are in a hurry to find a specific item. The 3D Warehouse is a wealth of information and can help you design quickly when facing a tough deadline.

Layout Tool

The SketchUp contains a vast library of colors, textures, shadows, lighting, and so on. The Rendering tools and materials libraries in ACA combined with the tools in SketchUp can produce awesome presentation renderings.

To use the library:

• Select the File menu and select Send to Layout.

• This will open Layout, a feature that is included with SketchUp Pro and is used for creating and sharing presentations made from SketchUp.

• You can add title blocks, save templates, add graphics, and create multi-page documents. Layout gives you more control over color, style, and weight of the lines and faces in your SketchUp model.

End Note: SketchUp is an endless magic. You can make almost anything

An intelligent designer can use the SketchUp in various ways for the classic drawings. Nevertheless, we can tell you that it is just some examples that we have brought to you. There are gigantic things to be discovered by the enthusiastic designers. The world of SketchUp is next to endless. So, the crazy designers, now it is your turn to spot those. Download the free version, try it and see how you like it. There is nothing better than going to a meeting with awesome drawings that took only minutes to complete.

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Published By

Rajib Dey

www.sketchup-ur-space.com

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Visualizer for SketchUp can generate photorealistic virtual image with a single click

Imagination Technologies has just launched Visualizer for SketchUp. This latest sketchup program facilitates the users to snap real time virtual photos of their 3D designs in SketchUp(R) with a single click.

The sketchup users can access Visualizer for SketchUp through getvisualizer.com. A free seven-day trial and a license version for $19.99 are available in getvisualizer.com.

Visualizer for SketchUp can transform any sketchup model to a photographic version. Visualizer is similar to a smartphone camera inside SketchUp. With the progression of the work, the image in the Visualizer revises in real time and produces quick visual view for the design underway. After getting the satisfactory result, the users can apply shutter button to snap a quick picture and distribute with others, present to the client for demonstration, or have an idea regarding the quality of the design.

By reproducing the pathways of light in 3D space precisely, users will be able to view shadows, delicate lighting details as well as focal depth and exposure of the virtual camera itself. With the physical dimensions and geolocation information obtained from SketchUp, the resulting picture depicts how the photograph of the model will appear in real-life.

Visualizer ascertains material properties directly from the information previously existed in the SketchUp model devoid of any modification. To manage focus and exposure, just draw an exposure and focus point just about the image and the picture revises in real-time.

Visualizer for SketchUp applies Imagination's highly powerful PowerVR Ray Tracing software for generating photorealistic images in real-time.

 

  

 

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Published By

Arka Roy

www.sketchup-ur-space.com

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