SketchUp Cut/Paste & Push/Pull Tips!

[Morphire]

Hello everyone.

I've designed stages from scratch for a few different bigger matches now and have come up with some very nice shortcuts that have helped me get out of the design mode and into production. They are based on two very simple techniques. Cut/Copy and Paste, and the Push/Pull tool.

Cut/Copy and Paste

Most of us work from a template that either contains a basic stage resembling a berm or a platform with a backstop. Often times there is a big bunch of props pre-populated in that template that we proceed to move into place or option drag into place. SketchUp being what it is, the biggest complaint new users have is that pesky problem with placing objects above or below the plane of the shooting stage. Targets are either buried in the ground or they are floating above it. The basic way we teach people around this is to be specific about where you grab an object when you drag it into place. If you grab it by one of the bottom most corner points of the stand then you can use that point to place it on the plane of the shooting bay to ensure that the prop isn't buried or floating. Very tedious and time consuming.

Now here is the time saving shortcut. Take the time to work on your starting template making sure every single prop is already placed on the plane of the shooting bay properly. Then when you need a prop, simply select it and copy it to the clipboard using edit>copy or a keyboard equivalent. When you then paste the prop, it is automatically locked to the same plane where the original copied object was as long as your arrow is pointing at a clear area of the shooting bay and not another prop. This constraint allows you to much more simply place objects using bigger, less precise movements of your mouse instead of all that zoom and pan crap trying to make sure the exact point is place in the exact plane. I pretty much never just move an object once it's placed in my model. I always cut and paste it again so I don't have to lock it to the plane of the bay. This saves me steps with every move I make.

Push/Pull

Now the other is a BIG one. I don't think most people use the push pull object anywhere near as much as they could. If you need hardcover on a target, zoom in and use the pen tool to start clicking out the outline of the hard cover you need on the face of the target. Finish by double-clicking your original starting point to complete this into a closed object. Now grab your paint bucket and paint this new hard cover area black. You will notice right away that it doesn't look right as SketchUp is trying to blend these two different colored objects into the same plane. The trick is to grab the push/pull tool and point it at the newly drawn hardcover area and pull it out away from the target just the littlest bit. This will add a thin layered opaque hard cover object on top of the target just like hard cover should in real life. You notice the targets scoring perfs and letters don't show through the hard cover when you do it this way too. Personally I remove all the scoring letters on all my target models anyway as all they do is complicate the model and make it preview slower and print slower. They are an unneeded complication IMO.

Another trick for the push pull tool is even cooler and saves a TON of time. Fault lines are a bear to generate in sketch-up if you are actually trying to model them one stick at a time as I've seen so many do. Remember that sketch-up allows you the freedom to design without mimicking real life. If you need to make a shooting area, get into parallel projection and take an overhead view of your shooting area. Now turn on your grid and use the pencil tool to draw out the outer edge of the shooting area on the ground being sure to complete the area by double-clicking your originating point to finish. Then use the offset tool to grab that outline and drag inside the shooting area a smidgen to create the width of the fault line. Now use the paint bucket to paint between these parallel lines neon orange or whatever color you like. Then use the push/pull tool to pull upwards on the orange area to raise it up and make your completed fault lines. Pretty slick, yes? =]

[kmbr45]

Kevin,

Thanks for the tips. I've just started playing with SketchUp for IDPA stage design and once I get it figured out it will be a blast!

Daniel