Im doing some 3d stuff for my gf's dad, and i am going to be using this program Sketchup, Ive never done 3D before, but this program looks pretty nifty.

It looks like its real time-cell rendered, and also has a very vector style interface and tools.

check out the video, especially people who know anything about 3D programs, id love to know what you think.

video:
http://download.sketchup.com/downloads/training/tutorials40/a1-watch_me_first_high.wmv

That looks really cool :)

That makes me want to be a 3d cad dude.

Yeah its been around for a while. Great program, easy to use if you're only doing something simple. People on Bit-Tech draw hardware for designing computer mods and some of the detail they go into is amazing. Really good program imo.

this program rewls! so handy for quickly making 3d models. thx for the tip domino :D

sorry protius? good for doing something simple? or detailed?

has anyone made any cool models with this ? :D ph34r my ameture 3d modelling skills with this here castle...

http://images.ausimages.com/upload/2005-04-25/TN_castle4.jpg

http://images.ausimages.com/upload/2005-04-25/TN_castle5.jpg
:P

Interesting mix of influences there.

Wish I was artistic.

dude that rocksors!!

ill post what i do in a couple of days im flat out with other shiznit.

Your castle looks like its built to be wheelchair accessible :)

skate park man! ;D

heh, the mixed influences you see Obes are just me using sketchups ez to create geometry... i didnt really plan for it to turn out like that... i was just mucking round hackin nstretching bits till it looked cool :P

to bad you cant create AVI flythroughs of it

Can you output the geometry as DXF of OBJ files?

yep... outputs from sketchup are 3DS (3D studio max), DWG & DXF (AutoCAD) & VRML. + 2d jpgs. i cant do avi flythroughs in sketchup... but i could probably export as dxf to bryce & do a flythrough in bryce. but for the moment i am still getting used to the various ways you can quicly align & join shapes. the tutorials for sketchup are very good (although the nasal yankee voice is annoying) & quick to dl on cable.

This sounds pretty cool, I might have to give it a go. I'm doing games animation at Qantm, so it could come in handy when I start doing some mapping :D

I modelled my apartment up in sketchup, you can check out the model and a fly through if you want www.plaestudio.com/apartment.zip (6.10mb)

here is a piccy, *go-go gadget html skllz

Wow, that's awesome man. I should really get this. How big is it? Is there a trial period?

its about 14 meg i think, and there are is 8 hours of design time, which is plenty for one model.

I do a lot of my work in Solid Edge ... 3d cad package. This looks quite neat for doing basic models though where you don't need the complexity of making individual parts and building them into assemblies. Going to give it a go for some stuff :)

I modelled my apartment up in sketchup

Could you perhaps include the location of valueables as well?

I was saying its good even for simple things.