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By: Dylan Smith

Google Sketch Up: Tools I Use


References: http://help.sketchup.com/en/article/116174


By: Dylan Smith
I used different tools within sketchup in my project work. In the user interface, the
drawing axes and guides are very useful to make my model aligned, they guide me to
make less human error; they helped me get the project started.

A Principal tool like the very useful Select tool let me select shapes that I wanted
to specifically move or color. The Paint Bucket allows me to fill in shapes with color or
textures to make the model more detailed. Drawing shapes required me to use different
tools such as: the line tool, arc tool, rectangle tool, circle tool and the polygon tool. The
Line tool was used to make roofs come up on the Castle steeple and village buildings, the
program also automatically fills in area enclosed by lines with faces to make our work
easier. The Arc tool was used to produce arched entrances inside my Castle model.
Rectangles were used to join the outer wall with the inner wall. The Circle tool was used
to create walkway intersections and the fountain. Polygons were used to make the main
castle and central walls. The Offset tool allows making different sized versions of other
shapes. I was able to make more complicated buildings that way. The Push/Pull tool let
me make buildings from rectangles, circles and polygons. The Scale tool lets me adjust
the structure to a more realistic size. Rotate tool let me put pieces together to build the
outer wall. The Move tool privileges me to change where selected lines and faces are.
The Tape Measure tool allowed me to make some lines congruent to each other. The
Orbit tool let me change my point of view and fill in empty spaces I wouldnt otherwise
see. The Zoom tool let me have a closer look at object to see fine details.

The main castle was made by a polygon that as pulled up with the Push/Pull tool
and the Offset tool made the top asterisk shaped, the center top was made into a smaller
By: Dylan Smith
polygon with the Line tool and was pulled up, offset, new polygon pulled up, offset, new
one pulled up and finally topped with a roof made by joining a vertical central line with
lines that connected to the sides of the top polygon. With the rectangle tool, a flag was
made. Offsetting the main castle polygon twice made the inner wall and pulling up the
face made with those two lines. I made the outer wall by create a single rectangle and
cutting a chunk out to make one end angled. I copy/pasted them in a line to make one half
and did the same on the opposite side. The main entrance building was made with
rectangles pulled up and aligned with each other using the guides, and the center was
made with a smaller rectangle on top and a flag. The back building was created with a
simple large pulled up rectangle, which was then offset to a smaller rectangle in the
center. The smaller rectangle was also pulled up and the corners of each rectangle were
connected with lines to make the roof. The houses in the village were made with
rectangular prisms with roofs made with lines that come from the middle of the building
up, joined to the outside edge of the buildings. One building, a church, while it was made
mainly with a rectangular prism; the steeple was made with a polygon pulled upward and
topped with a roof made the same way as the main castle roof. The entire castle structure
is surrounded with a moat made with the Arc tool. The pathway that traverses around the
castle was also made with the Arc tool. A large wall spans across from one side of the
outer wall, to the other, attaching the inner wall to it. Trees were imported as models, and
textures were added to every object in the project.

I used many different tools within SketchUp to do a project. The tools in-program
let me make a large, complex structure that required more effort than my previous
SketchUp project.

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