V2 Pro tools

[RPSchmitz]

Other than the online Twilight Render tutorial "Advanced tools" are there any step-by-step directions (with examples) of how to use the advanced tools? I'm having trouble making them work. For example, selecting an edge and then select loop and copying the edge down to make changes in a roof edge as in the Barcelona Pavillon tutorial. I'm using SketchUp 2022.
Thanks.

[Fletch]

Are you referring to "Modeling" video tutorial in the "Six Essentials" video tutorial series? (Link in my signature below)

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Not really - we will make a special video tutorial for these tools, as you suggest!
Meanwhile, please tell us what problems you're having and we will try to help you here.

some quick tips:

Selecting "loop" in SketchUp can be problematic because Twilight render is not a quad modeling software, and the loop tool is mathematically predisposed to work best with models made of quads. So the loop can often be not what one would expect to be selected by the tool.

be sure you are hovering precisely over an edge when you right-click to use a Twilight edge tool because otherwise the choice may not appear. similar comment with faces - be sure you hover over the selected face to use the tools related to faces.

if you are using the latest version of Twilight there is a hidden new special tool "grow selection" . You can even assign your own custom shortcut to use it (highly suggested, I used "CTRL+Numpad+). If you select a face (or any faces in your scene) and right-click a selected face you can find a new choice "grow selection" under our Face tools and it will select the edges that surround those faces, if you then do it again it will choose all touching adjacent faces and so on. If you have a custom shortcut for this function it makes doing quick selections of difficult selection sets go very quickly.

[RPSchmitz]

Thanks Fletch. I'll try your suggestions and see if I can find that hidden tool. Yes I think it was in the 6 essentials that I couldn't duplicate your actions. So, I think it would be useful if you could create a video explaining all these tools. Also, I think your videos are fine if one is just listening to the overall features. But if you're creating one for folks to down load the model and duplicate your actions I would slow it down and tell folks to pause the video to replicate the move then restart it.

[Fletch]

I would slow it down and tell folks to pause the video to replicate the move then restart it.

Did you know that Youtube has a speed option for videos and you can speed up or slow down any video? It is assumed that people watching know about pausing and slowing down videos, and can freely do so for themselves. But I will try to remember to mention it when I make future videos.

[RPSchmitz]

Thanks Fletch, I'll try to remember that. I've used YouTube to post some animations but haven't worked with it that much. Not a pro at it like you.

Yeah, I still can't get those tools to work. So maybe there's a compatibility problem between programs.

I don't understand this: What's the quad problem?

Selecting "loop" in SketchUp can be problematic because Twilight render is not a quad modeling software, and the loop tool is mathematically predisposed to work best with models made of quads. So the loop can often be not what one would expect to be selected by the tool.

Is the loop tool part of SketchUp or Twilight Render?

[ntxdave]

Did you know that Youtube has a speed option for videos and you can speed up or slow down any video? It is assumed that people watching know about pausing and slowing down videos, and can freely do so for themselves. But I will try to remember to mention it when I make future videos.

Yes, I know about pausing but no. I did not know about speed up or slowing down a video. How do you do that (I do most of my watching on a. IPad)?

Ignore my silly question I just watched a YouTube video and found the link (the one that looks like a gear). As with a lot of software this is a link for settings. I see that you can adjust both the speed and quality. All these years and I never tried that link before. There are many times (especially watching tutorials) when I could have and will use this facility.

THANKS for mentioning/pointing this facility out Fletch.

[Fletch]

Yeah, I still can't get those tools to work. So maybe there's a compatibility problem between programs.

Maybe there is - you are the first to report it. If you can use something like the Mac app "LiceCAP" it's available for free it will record your screen and actions to GIF video format for low-memory easy share here on the forum. Then you can show us precisely what's going wrong and we can fix it? It saves a lot of back-and-forth on the forum with us guessing what you mean by "doesn't work".

I don't understand this: What's the quad problem?

Quad modeling is the "proper" way to model in 3D according to professional standards (3D artists, not Architects) SketchUp does triangular modeling and will 'break' the quad mesh quickly in order to keep everything as triangles. move one vertex in the Z direction of a rectangle that is on the xy plane and it will split the face into 2 triangles. This doesn't happen in programs that support quad modeling.

see attached quad modeling examples where I modeled with quads and rendered with SketchUp and Twilight Render.

Selecting "loop" in SketchUp can be problematic because Twilight render is not a quad modeling software, and the loop tool is mathematically predisposed to work best with models made of quads. So the loop can often be not what one would expect to be selected by the tool.

so if the mesh is triangulated, the math sometimes doesn't know which way to turn when following a loop of edges around a model.

Is the loop tool part of SketchUp or Twilight Render?

Twilight

[Fletch]

Another quad modeling (note especially the electric cable) example I ran across today.