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The marketing name under which the software is sold or downloaded.Part of what makes the different versions of SketchUp so confusing is that there are really two distinctions to be made with each SketchUp name: And while the fundamental features of each SketchUp platform feel familiar, there are some distinct differences between the three current SketchUp platforms, and the recently retired SketchUp Make platform. All of these products provide an excellent 3D modeling platform, whether you are modeling for 3D printing, architectural design, landscape design, interior design, woodworking, film, gaming, or just visualizing some remodeling ideas in your own home. There are currently three main flagship SketchUp Products: SketchUp Free, SketchUp Shop, SketchUp for iPad, and SketchUp Pro. Combine all this with an intuitive inference system and universal measurement input, and you get incredible speed, flexibility, and accuracy that allows you to get creative, without having the tool get in your way. Tags provide additional control on object visibility, regardless of where objects are nested. The simplicity behind being able to organize faces and edges into an infinite number of nested groups and components gives you control over how you want to organize your model.
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Decide for yourself that this will represent a wall or a floor.Īlthough SketchUp is not parametric by nature, there are some extensions, like Medeek Wall, you can install in SketchUp Pro that introduce parametric features, and include several object-specific tools. Of course, you can group it and label it, and assign it a tag that you name “wall”.īut my point is, you’re not confined to working within certain tools for certain types of objects that the SketchUp team has decided you should be creating. There is no “Wall tool”, or “Floor tool”, but you’re free to draw a rectangle and extrude it and hereby declare that this extruded rectangle shall now be known as a “WALL”. That’s sort of the beauty behind SketchUp. SketchUp is, at its core, a surface polygon modeler, meaning, everything is either a face or an edge. What you’ll find in all of the SketchUp 3D modeling platforms is an easy-to-use, fun 3D modeling program.
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You can start using it right now, at The SketchUp foundation To recap, the current free version of SketchUp is called SketchUp Free, which is a web-based version of SketchUp that runs right in your browser. 😥 You’ll learn more about the differences between all the various SketchUp products below. Most notably, you can only use extensions on the desktop versions of SketchUp. There are several differences between the desktop and browser versions of SketchUp. To replace SketchUp Make, Trimble launched an entirely web-based SketchUp platform on which you’ll find SketchUp Free.
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