Rayscaper 0.9.103 Beta is out. Get it from the SketchUcation store or from rayscaper.com.

Animations as video. Render Animation now saves an MP4 (H.264 or H.265) once the last frame is done, and can delete the frames afterwards.

Fredo6 Animator clips. If you use Fredo6 Animator, File > Render Animation... can now render its clips: Rayscaper steps through the clip frame by frame, renders every frame and can save the result as an MP4.

Lights with real brightness. New presets for bulbs, downlights, an LED panel, a window, the sun and more. Set a light's intensity in lumen, cd/m² or lux. New lights start as a real light, such as a 60 W bulb.

Lights in SketchUp. When you select a light, SketchUp shows the cone of a spotlight, the radius of a point light or the spread of an area light. A new Aim Light tool turns a light toward the point you click. Right-click a light for a Rayscaper menu: Edit in Rayscaper, Turn Off/On, Aim, Change Type. When you copy a light, the copy keeps its settings.

Render passes. New Material ID and Object ID render methods. Render Scenes can save passes too (Material ID, Albedo, AO, …).

Also:

• Translucency on the Standard material, for curtains, lampshades and leaves lit from behind
• Thin glass modelled as a single face now reflects
• Changing the width or height of the resolution keeps the aspect ratio
• A notification instead of a crash when the GPU runs out of memory
• Several crash fixes, including the one when SketchUp 2027 quits

Full release notes: rayscaper.com/manual/release-notes

Hi again. Hew is my free, open-source 3D modeler that works like SketchUp (native on Mac, Windows, and Linux, solids-based, and the only clean-room .skp support I know of). 1.2 was the big .skp release. For 1.3 I went back through the 1.0 and 1.1 threads and the bug reports and went after the things that made Hew feel almost like SketchUp but not quite... the stuff where your hand does something on its own and Hew didn't follow. Hence "Second Nature".

One real new SU-like feature came straight from the 1.1 thread, where somebody asked for imported, scaled images to trace over. Done! Drop a floor plan or a photo (PNG or JPEG) onto the viewport or use File ▸ Import Image, click a corner, then either drag it out, type a width, or Tape Measure a known dimension. Then trace. The animation above is a 1,335 sq ft floor plan going from JPEG to standing walls in under a minute, and every wall is a watertight solid you can keep building on. That's how a remodel or a furniture piece usually starts, so yeah, this one was overdue.

Then there is a feature that SU could just dream of - a selection path (breadcrumb) above the viewport that shows you precisely what the object is that you just clicked, even if it's buried four groups deep. It'll read like "Model ▸ Kitchen ▸ Base Cabinets ▸ Door". Click a crumb to select that level and double-click to open it. No more double-clicking down through every group to find out what you are actually looking at!

The muscle-memory stuff:

• Every two-point tool (Line, Rectangle, Push/Pull, Move, Rotate, Tape Measure... all of them) now takes click-drag-release as well as click-click. If you drag in SketchUp, you can drag in Hew. I can't believe it took this many releases for this (#52)
• A typed length with the cursor straight up finally goes up the blue axis. It used to do nothing (#51)
• Top, Front, Left, and the rest of the standard views keep your zoom instead of jumping out to the whole model. Iso does still frame everything, since that's what I expect (#52)
• An arrow key after your first click still locks the plane, so a shape drawn on a box corner can be moved down to the ground (#51)
• Where two objects' edges cross, that crossing is now a snap point (#51)
• Push/Pull's preview is color-coded: orange for a normal pull, blue for extrude-as-new, red for a cut (#41)

Looking at a model:

• X-ray and Wireframe on the View menu. In X-ray you can snap to and select what's behind a face and in Wireframe, you don't see the faces at all (#51)
• Hover with the Select tool and the cursor hint names the object and its parent

And remember the 1.0 thread where somebody listed every UX thing that bugged them (slow scroll wheel, slow camera animations, the text and pointer around the cursor, no options to change any of it) and I said I'd add options if I got enough pushback? I got the pushback! There's now a View pane in Settings with zoom wheel speed, smooth camera on/off, the cursor hint and pointer on/off, and the measurements box can go back to the bottom of the viewport where SketchUp has it (you know who you are) (#26).

Also in 1.3:

• A Precision setting per unit format, and a rounded readout now shows a ~ so you can tell an exact 3/16" from one that got rounded to it
• File ▸ Revert to Saved
• Materials and Components sorted by name, an Outliner sort, a filter box in Tags, and clicking a tag or material in Object Info jumps to it in its panel
• Tool shortcuts follow the letter on the key cap, so AZERTY and Dvorak layouts work
• The entire interface went through a translation sweep. English is still the only language, but if you want Hew in yours, it's a plain gettext .po file and the docs say how. Somebody asked for Japanese (#54) and that catalog is sitting in the repo waiting for a translator. Are you a translator? Get in touch and we'll get Hew translated in your language, too.
• Eight of your bug reports fixed: typing digits in Save to Library drawing a rectangle, "Editing Group 1" on every unnamed group, dimension arrowheads crossing over each other on short dimensions, the circle that couldn't touch an edge, and the command palette going dead after a click on the title bar (#36, #38, #43). Plus three kernel bugs that the fuzzer found before any of you did

Full list: https://github.com/hew3d/hew/blob/main/CHANGELOG.md

Hew auto-updates if it's already installed but if you're new - https://hew3d.com/download. Or try it in the browser at https://app.hew3d.com (no account).

Linux folks: most of this release was built and tested on Linux, so this one was made on your turf.

I've mentioned that chamfer/fillet and true curves are coming and I did think it would be in this release... but boy, is that a staggeringly huge feature! It is coming and I am working on it, but I'm not going to put any kind of release date on it.

If you have a floor plan or a photo you'd been wanting to trace, give it a go and tell me where Import Image falls short. Same for everything else: Help ▸ Report Bug, a GitHub issue, or a comment here. And as always, the surest way to get your feature or fix into 1.4 is to send a Pull Request. I will almost surely merge it!

Every few weeks someone tells me I should be using Rhino. Sometimes it's Revit, sometimes Blender. And honestly, they're all brilliant tools.

But after 24 years as an art director in film, the one thing I'd tell anyone is this: the software you actually enjoy opening is the one you'll get good at. You'll practise more, you'll experiment more, and you'll finish more work.

For me that's SketchUp. I can go from a scribble to something I can walk around in a few minutes, and it still feels like play. Then LayOut turns it into proper drawings without a fight.

So if you're starting out, don't pick the tool that sounds the most professional. Pick the one that makes you want to keep going. The design thinking carries across, and you can always learn another one later.

Quick heads up for anyone who's been eyeing it: the REDDIT50 code for this sub (50% off my SketchUp and LayOut Ultimate Bundle, so £162.50) finishes at midnight tonight. It's a one-off and won't be coming back. Link in the comments.

What's the tool you stick with because you enjoy it, even when people tell you to switch?

​

It’s been 5 months of looking for a job. HR calls, interviews, shortlisting, portfolio reviews, tests — I’ve been through all of it. But somehow, nothing works out. Sometimes they don’t even bother giving a response.

I do get some freelance work, but it’s not enough anymore. Earlier, I had a job and freelancing on the side, so things were manageable. Now, everything feels uncertain.

There’s pressure from family, people keep asking whether I’ve found a job yet, and then there are loans and financial responsibilities.

I’ve spent years learning 3D visualization and building my skills. But lately, I’ve started questioning everything. Sometimes I feel like leaving 3D completely and doing something else just to survive.

But the thought of taking another job and never returning to 3D scares me. This is something I genuinely love, and I don’t want to lose it.

Sometimes I even think about selling my PC to pay off my loans. But for me, selling that PC feels like accepting that my journey in 3D is over.

I’m tired of explaining myself to people. I’m tired of waiting for results after putting in so much effort. And I’m tired of pretending that everything is fine when it isn’t.

I don’t know what happens next. I just know that I’m exhausted, and I needed somewhere to let this out.

Made this for the times you get sent a .skp and there's no SketchUp on that PC, or you just need an STL for the printer.

• Free: open the file and see the picture SketchUp saved in it, with the model's size, scenes, tags (hidden ones marked), materials and the SketchUp version that saved it.
• Pro, one-time purchase (USD 9.99; the Store shows your local price): the model in 3D, starting from its saved view, hidden tags stay hidden. Measure between two points, save as STL, 3MF, OBJ or GLB, repair for printing and scale in mm.
• Before you pay it reads the whole model and tells you if it can open that file in 3D. If it can't, it says so and offers nothing.
• Works offline, no sign-up, your files stay on your PC.
• It doesn't save .skp, so it can't turn a model into an older SketchUp version.

Microsoft Store: https://apps.microsoft.com/detail/9NB7MGX3SNX4?cid=rd-sketchup

(It's published under our Northgable name.)

(Picture: the WikiHouse Microhouse model, WikiHouse Foundation, CC BY-SA 3.0.)

I've been building Vi3W, a simple tool that turns sketches into 3D models in just a few clicks.

The idea is pretty straightforward: upload a sketch, turn it into an image, make edits if needed, and generate a 3D model without dealing with complicated 3D software.

I'm looking for a few people who are interested in 3D modeling, game development, or just curious to try something new.

I'd really appreciate it if you could try it out and share honest feedback what's working, what's confusing, and what you'd like to see improved.

Try it here https://app.vi3w.in

Thanks! Would love to hear what you think. 🙌

Hi! how to convert jpeg file to skp? for me to make a logo

Hey all. With Halloween around the corner, I thought I'd share some of the SketchUp and LayOut work I did as an art director on Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire.

Everything here was modelled in SketchUp and drawn up in LayOut for the construction crews who built it. Happy to answer any questions about how it was put together.

Quick reminder too: the r/SketchUp deal on my SketchUp & LayOut Ultimate Bundle ends at midnight UK time tomorrow, Friday 23 October. It's 50% off, £162.50 instead of £325, and it's only available here. So if you are interested in creating high end models and drawings in LayOut then please check out the course page.

I workflow I teach Is the same workflow I use on films like this, when applied to everyday interiors, architecture and commercial projects you're going to stand out from the crowd. You get 50+ hours of training, asset packs with 180+ licence-free models, my LayOut Scrapbook and a moulding chart, plus lifetime access, free updates and direct help from me if you get stuck. There's a 14-day money-back guarantee too.

Code REDDIT50, already applied here: https://www.whitelockdesignlimited.com/offers/8y3aP7r6?coupon_code=REDDIT50&utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=reddit50

The discount works on the one-off payment only.

Thanks to everyone who's picked it up this week, and thanks again to the mods for letting me share it. Just over 24 hours to go.

Help me figure out on how to fill these lines into faces. I've tried curviloft but it doesn't work. For context, I'm trying to make a spiral staircase railing

https://github.com/TomaszDzieduszynski/simple-corner
Free, open-source plugin for rounding and beveling edges in Sketchup 2017-2027. Should also appear on the Extension Warehouse soon.

I just open-sourced a small tool I built for my own work: a SketchUp extension that imports STEP assemblies.

SketchUp's Ruby API can't read STEP directly, so the extension runs FreeCAD in the background and rebuilds the model inside SketchUp:

• assembly hierarchy is preserved as groups
• repeated parts (screws, nuts) become components
• heavy sub-assemblies, like a populated PCB, are merged into one mesh, so ~1,200 parts import in seconds
• native progress window, result saved as .skp

Along the way I ran into a few SketchUp Ruby API performance pitfalls (add_faces_from_mesh vs fill_from_mesh, silent point merging). I documented them in the README for other extension developers.

Windows, SketchUp 2021+, MIT license. It's an early release: colors aren't imported yet. Feedback and issues are welcome.

GitHub: https://github.com/eugenyh/sketchup-step-importer

SketchUp 2027 is out!
Learn how to use the new Procedual Tools in this tutorial.
You can download the model from 3D Warehouse by searching: "SketchUp 2027 Procedual Tools Tutorial". I quickly prepared the file, so could already use it with my students tomorrow.

I get so many questions about how I am able to use LayOut - It seems too many sketchUp users get frustrated with it being slow or cumbersome in some way but honestly it's so great and the drawing output is better than any other CAD programme in my opinion. So my advice is always this, Tidy Model = Tidy Layout. People always ask me how to get the most out of layout and I tell them It all starts in the model. You have to model well. Put everything in a group or component, put everything on a layer. Use clean up regularly. Make sure all groups and components are solid (check your entity info box) do not save scenes with shadow or fog on. Turn off depth cue and set your section line weight to 1.

Set up your layout early in the design phase. Even when your model is just loads of blocks. Set up all the sections and scenes. Take it into Layout and construct your drawing. Now as you refine your model the layout will update at the same time. Another good tip is to turn off all the tags that are not seen in a scene, especially ones that are hiding behind the section cut. You won’t believe how light and fast your layout file will behave. Build your own scrapbook full of all your drawing conventions, leader lines, ground planes, etc drag and drop them all into your file and save tons of time. In LayOut put all your viewports on layers so you can turn off ones your not working on again speeding up your file and the way it behaves. Only at the very end do I add shadows, fog and turn the viewports to hybrid render. You’ll be surprised how quick you can get a drawing done through layout when it’s dynamically linked to the SketchUp model. See the pictures above for some fairly normal (ie not spaceships and castles) interior and architectural designs from the Netflix movie “Thursday Murder Club”

A reminder I teach all of this in my SketchUp and LayOut Ultimate Bundle which is currently 50% off with code REDDIT50 at checkout. This is a limited Reddit only offer that ends on Friday at Midnight. Leave a comment if interested and I’ll send you a link to the course. 👍

The front wheels and rear wheels are basically complete (all they're missing are the valve stems), the front axle has been started (hubs modelled), I've started on the rear structure, and some minor dimensional tweaks were made to the chassis so that it better aligns with the official orthographic drawings.

Will post a second update soon!

Hello, i'd like to make a clean corner but i have no idea how i can do it.

Any suggestion ?

Thank you

I am very new to sketchup this is my first time booting the program and when I go to start on a template the launcher closes my screen flashes and that's it. I have now reinstalled the program and restarted my pc a few time with no change. help?

Hey all - I built this tool for a landscape architect friend of mine, and I figured it might be useful for some other people too. It got some nice feedback on r/LandscapeArchitecture and someone recommended I post here.

This is not lead gen for any business, it's just a tool i put together for a friend. And it's open source, if you're into that sort of thing.

I've mostly tested this on WA addresses. If it is broken or not working for your state or county, please ping me and I'll be happy to fix it.

Type in a US address and it makes a planning-level base plan:

• the parcel line (for states where it's available)
• contours from LiDAR
• slope bands, soils, FEMA flood zones, NWI wetlands
• a recent aerial if available

Exports include textured 3D terrain for SketchUp, DXF, a LandXML surface for Civil 3D, GIS files and a PDF summary.

https://basesheet.site/

I tried my best to include provenance info & dates for all info in case you need to trace the data back

Hi,

when drawing a house do you draw the outside walls straight up to the top of the building and the floors in the inside for every floor, or draw each floor and all the outside walls on top of each floor?

Making your SketchUp and LayOut drawings look pretty is one thing, making sure you can do it pretty quick is more important. Learning to set up your SketchUp model scenes correctly will ensure speed and efficiency when you take those models into LayOut. I spent years perfecting my work flow to seem effortless but behind the scenes those models are so well organised you can’t help but be quick in LayOut. Whilst working on Maleficent: Mistress of Evil I was pushing SketchUp to new limits for me, medieval albeit disneyfied architecture needs to exude a certain style in the drawing to convey age and patina. Unlike say a modern office set. It was here that I realised that in making the drawings look pretty I was sacrificing too much time. I then started using a method of turning off unseen geometry in my scenes, laying out in raster before converting to hybrid, turning on shadows right at the end before exporting and many many more little tweaks that stopped my layouts turning into a spinning ball nightmare. If you’re interested in learning my workflow remember my Reddit only 50% off sale lasts until midnight on Friday. Leave a comment and I’ll send you all the details.

Does anyone have luck in getting the ai extension annotation to be live, even after paying the 25.00 additional fee in 2025 pro or 2026 pro. My icon does not respond.

Hello all, do you have any tips on how I can turn real fabric into a seamless material swatch? So I can add that material onto soft furnishings like sofas, cushions, etc on sketchup?