Topic Title

I have limited experience with sketchup, but have been messing around with some free form buildings and shapes. For those of you who use sketchup as a stand alone rendering tool what is your method of taking a drawn aec or dc plan file and importing it into sketchup? I have imported my wall layers into sketchup and use those layers as a traceable layer to model the plan, then manually add my roof, windows, doors, trim etc. Is there an easier method? Would adding z-base and height definitions work?
As far as the roof is concerned I have some fairly complex shapes with bastard pitchs, etc. and have them worked out in 2-d but would like to import that info as well to sketchup.

I complete the entire model in DCAD and then export it from DCAD as a DXF file. I then open the DXF file in SketchUP and the entire model comes in. I then color, render, pick materials, add people, trees, and vehicles in SketchUp and produce a fly-around video using the slide show function in SketchUp I have now done this with about 5 or 6 pretty complex projects and they have come out quite well. Not photorealistic but pretty neat looking architectural renderings.

While usually I'm going in the opposite direction, occasionally I do import a floor plan from DCad top Sketchup to prep a client presentation.

First I check to see that the walls are basically correct in DCad for base and height, and the windows and door are correct...there's always a few that are suspect...use a 3D-view to check. Usually everything else is zero-height. With just the walls, windows and doors, counters and fixtiures "on" I export it as a .dxf-file into SU. Depending on the aesthetic or design importance of the stairs, I'll either us the DCad stair-macro before exportuing to SU; or just quickly creat simple stairs in SU once the file as been re-imported.

Once in SU, I manual draw and push-up the door/window headers, the window-walls, and the counter and cabinets. It's a bit "rough", but it gives an accurate-enough model for quick walk-thrus.

http://forum.sketchup.com/attachment.ph ... 1149810915

http://forum.sketchup.com/attachment.ph ... 1149810875

Since you only get the "vertical planes" in SU via DCad's base & height it takes about an hour or more to fix the heights and fill-in the missing wall segments at walls and doors, close-up and fix horizonatl surfaces. Then you add the details and the 3D components from SU. For the entire floorplan of a multistory house, I'd budget at-least a few hours in repairing and "filling-in"....mostly the missing headers and window sill-walls. If it were a more elaborate presentation in a group-setting, I'd probably re-export the final clean-up model to PS Elements for rendering there.

Normally, I do my exterior design/massing and drafting work in SU; and then export a hidden-line "flat view" or 3D view to DCad for construction drawings. I do the entire house; walls, windows, doors, trim, roof and rake/eaves in SU right up to prelim. constr. drawings. If there's a major revision for the final constr. drawings, I make the new revisions in SU, then re-import the revised hidden-line "view" to replace the original.

In theory, I could do major building sections this way; but usually those I have already started in DCad along with the preliminary floor plans.

Thanks for the replies, that is exactly what I'm looking for (different approaches). Our projects typically don't allow much time for 3-d views, but with sketchup I think that could change. I like the speed in which I can develop massing sketches with sketchup, but am finding I'm burning alot of time on the roofs. But maybe that speed will come with use? I've been using dcad since '85, and I guess a wishlist item might be to incorporate many dcad commands into sketchup (cut, copy, paste, mirror, etc.)

Maybe it would speed things up if you created a few "assemblies" that you could insert and apply the "FollowMe" tool to? I haven't tried it, but it seems like it would work.

The few projects I've done, I've imported a dataCAD drawing (dwg) into sketchup. I have all the lines at 0,0 z height.

I then rectangle out the building and start pushing and pulling.

I set up the 2d elevations in dataCAD as well and import those, rotate and plaster them on the faces and make my exterior looks.

We've had Sketchup for about 6 months now and haven't done many jobs with it, but the couple we have done have helped sell the job better.