SketchUp Guru
Established Member
Right, here's a start on the lighting tutorial. This image was rendered from the SU model at the link below.
Wall Cabinet Model
The lights are simply drawn as rectangles with their front faces toward the cabinet. Placement in your model is mostly a matter of preference. I made the large rectangle which is painted yellow as the main light source. There is one on the ceiling that casts some light mostly into the drawer and onto the top of the cabinet. The red strip was added to create another highlight on the vase.
Once you've got your model and lights ready. Export an OBJ file from it. This is under File>Export>3D Model. Change the export type to OBJ. Click on Options. Check Triangulate All Faces and Export Texture Maps. Uncheck Swap YZ coordinates. Leave Units as Model Units.
The color of the surfaces doesn't seem to be important. You'll change that in Kerkythea when you set the Self Luminance. I selected colors for the lights that weren't used eleswhere in the model and made sure I could remember which light was what color.
After opening the model in Kerkythea (K from now on), click on the materials button. There are no materials showing. Right click in one of the squares on the left side of the dialog box. Select Build..., Select all and OK (I'm doing this from memory and I'm old so bear with me.)
Now that you have all your materials, find the lights. Right click on one of them and select Edit. Go to the Advanced tab and adjust Self Luminance. Change the color to white by clicking on the black square and picking the color from the palette. You could choose other colors if you were so inclined.
Set the slider or type in a new value for the light. I didn't use anything higher than 20. You'll need to play with the settings but you can use the quick render setting to get an idea of what you have going on and make changes as needed.
There is a drop down menu at the bottom of the edit dialog box that will let you switch to the other colors and edit them as well.
You can play with some of the other settings such as transparency and reflections but they aren't need for the lights.
Play with the navigation controls along the left and top edges of the drawing window. Zoom back as needed and adjust your viewpoint as desired. I still haven't quite figured out the easiest way to set the view so I poke at it until I get what I want. It's too bad this part isn't as simple as SU's navigation controls.
From here you should be able to start playing with Materials and Render settings. When you click on Render, choose ##Current View##. Leave size fairly small. You can pick a new one from the drop down menu or type the desired demensions. The larger you go, the longer it takes to render. Save that long render time for the final product.
While you're working on your view and the lights, use the .05 render setting which is Quick. After you start to settle in with your settings, you can go to some of the other higher quality settings.
Hopefully that will get you started. Play around with the model I drew if you like. Move or change the lights. Adjust the reflecting quality of the wood or vase materials and see what you get.
Alright, now I'll work on a SketchUp tutorial for the dovetails . It will be a SketchUp file with page tabs at the top. You can just click through the pages to work through the tutorial.
Dave
Wall Cabinet Model
The lights are simply drawn as rectangles with their front faces toward the cabinet. Placement in your model is mostly a matter of preference. I made the large rectangle which is painted yellow as the main light source. There is one on the ceiling that casts some light mostly into the drawer and onto the top of the cabinet. The red strip was added to create another highlight on the vase.
Once you've got your model and lights ready. Export an OBJ file from it. This is under File>Export>3D Model. Change the export type to OBJ. Click on Options. Check Triangulate All Faces and Export Texture Maps. Uncheck Swap YZ coordinates. Leave Units as Model Units.
The color of the surfaces doesn't seem to be important. You'll change that in Kerkythea when you set the Self Luminance. I selected colors for the lights that weren't used eleswhere in the model and made sure I could remember which light was what color.
After opening the model in Kerkythea (K from now on), click on the materials button. There are no materials showing. Right click in one of the squares on the left side of the dialog box. Select Build..., Select all and OK (I'm doing this from memory and I'm old so bear with me.)
Now that you have all your materials, find the lights. Right click on one of them and select Edit. Go to the Advanced tab and adjust Self Luminance. Change the color to white by clicking on the black square and picking the color from the palette. You could choose other colors if you were so inclined.
Set the slider or type in a new value for the light. I didn't use anything higher than 20. You'll need to play with the settings but you can use the quick render setting to get an idea of what you have going on and make changes as needed.
There is a drop down menu at the bottom of the edit dialog box that will let you switch to the other colors and edit them as well.
You can play with some of the other settings such as transparency and reflections but they aren't need for the lights.
Play with the navigation controls along the left and top edges of the drawing window. Zoom back as needed and adjust your viewpoint as desired. I still haven't quite figured out the easiest way to set the view so I poke at it until I get what I want. It's too bad this part isn't as simple as SU's navigation controls.
From here you should be able to start playing with Materials and Render settings. When you click on Render, choose ##Current View##. Leave size fairly small. You can pick a new one from the drop down menu or type the desired demensions. The larger you go, the longer it takes to render. Save that long render time for the final product.
While you're working on your view and the lights, use the .05 render setting which is Quick. After you start to settle in with your settings, you can go to some of the other higher quality settings.
Hopefully that will get you started. Play around with the model I drew if you like. Move or change the lights. Adjust the reflecting quality of the wood or vase materials and see what you get.
Alright, now I'll work on a SketchUp tutorial for the dovetails . It will be a SketchUp file with page tabs at the top. You can just click through the pages to work through the tutorial.
Dave
