SketchUp Import

Does anybody have the magic formula to export from SketchUp into SL? There is a scrap of a Ruby script out there but nothing fully functional. As nice as the SL editor is I find I can be far more productive in tools such as SketchUp and Blender that are made for 3D building.

Of course, maybe I just haven't learned to fly very well!

Cheers, Scott

P.S. If you haven't checked out the Prim.Docker tool, you might give it a gander. I find it very handy.

Sketchup uses simple polygonal extrusion modeling. SL uses parametric objects. There's no easy translation between the two.

If you're interested in using Blender, search the forums for "Offline Builder" and "OBJ Importer", both by Jeffrey Gomez. The offline builder is a plugin for Blender that allows it to create SL-style prims. The resulting build parameters can be translated to an LSL script to reproduce the build inside SL.

The OBJ importer takes any existing mesh, and substitutes one prim for every triangle. The results are ridiculously prim-heavy, but it works. I find it's a great problem-solving tool for constructing a scaffold to lay out the shape of a complex 3D object in SL. Then it's just a matter of replacing (by hand) all the hundreds of triangles with more efficient prim combinations. For large, complicated shapes, it's a huge time saver.

Those are your options at this point in time. There's no instant import. SL's modeling system is uniquely designed with bandwidth being the main concern. Parametric objects keep the data describing each build to a bare minimum. Actual mesh data would be several hundred times heavier, not suitable for real-time application in a streaming environment. One day we'll get there, but it's a long way off.

Thanks much for the insight. Greatly appreciated. Blender/OfflineBuilder seem to be the ticket.
Cheers, Moose

There has been a plugin created for SketchUp that can export to ascii and then can be imported to a notecard to create the Object here is the link

http://eightbar.co.uk/2006/09/29/google-sketchup-second-life-export/

Very cool. Thanks for the link, Richard.

That's awesome. I've always found SketchUp to be a pretty quick and intuitive way to sketch out quick designs. I like Blender for a more full set of features, but Sketch Up UI is just plain hard to beat for quick brainstorming.

I have to agree, we have switched to Sketchup for rapid prototype of an idea, it is probably one of the easiest modeling tools that exists for static objects. I wouldnt want to be modeling characters with it though.

Richard

I'm an architect and use sketchup heavily through design development. I would love to be able to import unbuilt projects or non-copyright projects for use and comments in the future. Hopefully the future upgrades will allow more of a direct import or at least streamline the process a little more. I will try what was mnetioned above about convertingto ascii prior to import.

Right now we are trying to find the magic formula. In our studies at the Technische Universität Dresden, we develope a Sketchup to Second Life Exporter (SUSL). There will be two approaches. One part of it shall be able to export from 2D floor plans. You import floor plans and SUSL will build up the house and export it into a script. This script is executed in Second Life and will build the house automatically (like the offline builders). The other aproach ist a 3D object analyzer. It will analyze the structure of a Mesh i.e. a house, and try to find SL Prims in it. Its really tough, but there are good ideas. After finishing our thesis in end-october we would like to make it open source. If you are interested in this project we would apreciate your comments and ideas. You can find our developer blog at: http://www.queo-blog.com/?cat=6

The second idea, while the hardest would be of the most benefit.
I personally look forward to your work. However one point to make.
If you can, make sure that it generates the least amount of prims possible. If it make the object with thousands of prims it will be worthless.
An island has a max prim count of 15000. (i think)
Thanks for your work. Good luck.

You are totally right. We try to minimize the amount of Second Life Prims in this approach. Furthermore there is already a solution for the importer which has a fairly high Prim Count. Its the "obj importer" which translates all triangles from a mesh into SL while making triangles out of cubes.