SketchUp to 3DS Max

[OCT.studio]

Im working on a model in SketchUp many because allot of my clients use it and understand how it works and its quick and easy to model in. I want to model in SketchUp and render in max? in this project.

 

I know its possible to do this? do you have any advice for exporting the models out of sketchup and setting up materials? Ive had problems with the UVW mapping models from sketchup in max?

 

Any common pitfalls to avoid?

 

Thanks

Olly

[Scott Schroeder]

Yeah, avoid SketchUp to Max as a workflow all together. To get quality renders, you really should model directly in Max. SketchUp to Max is like putting a lawn mower engine in an F1 racer. SketchUp renders in Max look as if the geometry was cut from stone using the worlds most precise laser. Just way too blocky and hard edges that never exist in real life.

 

However, after my needless rant, if you must stick with that workflow as that's what you are given there are some tips.

 

One is scale of your project. You need to make sure that your scale is correct when you export so that a wall that's 4 meters in SketchUp will import as 4 meters in Max. If not, this will really screw with your textures, lighting, and cameras. Either your objects will be massive in size or miniature scale. Just make sure your units are set correctly for both.

 

Export using FBX. This is a much easier format when going into Max from 3rd party software. This can also preserve UVW mapping coordinates, but I highly suggest re-mapping everything in Max. This format can also convert to whichever scale you are going into, such as meters or what not.

 

Though, to be honest, if you are just using Max to render then I'd seriously look at purchasing Vray for SketchUp and avoid all of the pitfalls that come with exporting from SketchUp.

[Brodie Geers]

haha, I would totally disagree with Elvis. I'm primarily a SU user but am getting more into 3ds Max and my final output is Maxwell Render. First I want to answer your question and then address a couple of VE's points.

 

Which version of 3ds Max are you using. I think starting with 2011 they began incorporating a SU importer and in 2010, I believe it was, they had a download that would incorporate a SU importer. That is almost always the best way to go and it works wonderfully from my experience. It imports the SU model quickly and maintains components, geometry, and UV's (as I recall whatever texture map you use in sketchup comes in in the diffuse map of a Standard 3ds Max material and the UV's are maintained). If you have an earlier version of 3ds Max let me know and we can go from there, I've found some tricks going both directions.

 

To VE's points,

 

Just way too blocky and hard edges that never exist in real life.

 

There's no reason this needs to be so. The reason this is typically true is because SU models are typically made to look good in SU, not to be rendered. That means people don't add the detail necessary, but there's no reason a SU modeler can't add the appropriate detail. Where you may run into poly limits are with things like vegetation, high poly cars, and high poly furniture. Those things can be added once you get to 3ds Max, but as for architectural detail I use lots of bevels and rounded corners with no issues (primarily for exterior hospital renderings which of course get quite large).

 

I'd seriously look at purchasing Vray for SketchUp and avoid all of the pitfalls that come with exporting from SketchUp.

 

I don't recommend Vray for SU for the reason I mentioned above. Although you won't reach a poly limit in SU with your building or site, should you want to add some high poly objects in your scene, you WILL run into a poly limit. Vray for SU offers no workaround so if you already have Vray for 3ds max and 3ds Max don't waste your money - again I haven't had any conversion issues with newer versions of Max. There are a couple renderers out there (like Maxwell) who incorporate their own separate Studio programs which also serve as an in between where you can place high poly objects.

 

-Brodie

[OCT.studio]

Thanks For your help! Im using Max 2011 so it dose have the SU import option ect.

 

I can see both side of the story,

I dont really like using Sketchup with max, But as an architect i see more and more people using it?

 

In max is there a decent snap tool setting to replicate the snap function in SU ive played with the snap mode but cant quite get a similar effect?

[Brodie Geers]

I'm probably not the best one to answer that but I've run into similar issues and found Max much less intuitive. In Max you usually don't want snaps turned on because it wants to snap to everything so toggle snaps with the "S" key. From there if you right click on the snaps icon which should be up top on your toolbar you'll get some options (similar to AutoCAD if you're familiar with that program). Check whichever options you want. There's also an Options tab. Down at the bottom Use Axis Constraints and Display rubber band do interesting things, although I never quite understand what. I play with them until I get it working right. Currently I only have Display rubber bands checked and it works how I want, which means that I can turn snaps on and either grab the point to any snap or I can just grab, say the Z gizmo and the movement will be constrained to that axis (similar to selecting Move in SU and then using the up, down, left, right keys to constrain movement to the Blue, Red, or Green axis.

 

-Brodie

[Scott Schroeder]

You need to choose the snaps in max wisely. There is 3D, 2.5D, and 2D snapping options. I almost always stick in 2.5D (to be honest I can't tell you the difference between 2.5 and 2) but I'm always in 2.5D to avoid snapping on the Z axis. You can also customize where you are snapping to, similar to AutoCAD. Again, I primarily only have the vertex snap on or grid snap if I need to build to the grid such as creating assets to go into Unreal.

 

The axis constraints on is pretty much a must. What those do is keep you restricted to the active axis. Say for instance, you want to move an object in the Y axis only. Having his on will allow you to drag and move an object in that active axis only and not all over the view port as you do when they are off. Rubber band, to me as a Max user since version 3, is annoying. Old habits and likes die hard I guess.

 

I'm not a native SkechUp user. I only get what clients try to give me, which I use as a base to remodel in max, and spend hours ranting about how poorly it's modeled. So, I guess, SketchUp can be good in the right hands but the problem is everyone is not exactly familiar with proper modeling rules. I know of several large viz firms that simply refuse SketchUp models for that very reason. They'll use them for pre-production but will almost always remodel the scene in Max to avoid issues.

 

For now, the biggest check you need to make is again the scale of objects. Make sure they are proper size and you should be fairly okay.

[Brodie Geers]

Good tips about the snaps. I'll have to do some more testing. I'm not sure I've even tried the 2.5D snaps.

 

I can understand your vitriol given the fact that you're getting SU assets from an outside source. Anyone model not specifically made for rendering is going to cause a lot of issues. It's bound to be low poly and even if it happened to have the right level of detail the normals are bound to be facing all over the place. I'll see if I can't send you one of my models VE and see what you think.

 

As for scale, I think if you're using the Sketchup importer it takes care of that for you but it's worth a double check.

 

BTW, 3ds Max to SU is a more difficult transition. If you need to go back my recommendation is to turn all of the materials to standard with the texture in the diffuse slot (I think there are some auto converters out there to convert from Vray to Standard). If you export a model with Vray materials SU won't bring in the textures. From there I usually export as either .3ds or if it's a large model then .dae but you can't use the Autodesk Collada, you have to download this exporter http://code.google.com/p/opencollada/downloads/list

 

-Brodie

[Jonathan Sanchez]

My workflow: Model basic structure in SU. Send to Max where I'll clean, fix, then detail. I find this workflow to be the most efficient for my style of work and it has worked well for me. I've not had to sacrifice detail either.

[Brodie Geers]

My workflow: Model basic structure in SU. Send to Max where I'll clean, fix, then detail. I find this workflow to be the most efficient for my style of work and it has worked well for me. I've not had to sacrifice detail either.

 

What kind of cleaning and detailing do you do in Max that you find better than working in SU? I try out that sort of thing occasionally but it always feels like I could have done the same thing easier in SU.

 

Currently the only thing I really love Max for is the ability to generate good UV's with a loft/sweep so I'm using it to create curbs and sidewalks for that purpose. It's also nice for placing high poly geometry but sometimes that's actually easier in Maxwell since it can be less buggy and I already have things set up there.

 

-Brodie

[Jonathan Sanchez]

What kind of cleaning and detailing do you do in Max that you find better than working in SU? I try out that sort of thing occasionally but it always feels like I could have done the same thing easier in SU.

-Brodie

 

When I export from SU, usually have to weld, remove unnecessary lines, smoothing groups and that sort a cleaning. As to why I use 3ds, exactly for the reasons u mentioned: materials, uv's, high poly counts... 3ds is just way more powerful in these aspects compared to SU. I'm not too familiar with Maxwell so I couldn't compare it to that. The main advantage I take out of SU is its very lean and efficient modelling tools for very basic structure modelling.

[M V]

I hear a lot of people complain that SU models are 'blocky' or 'simple' or 'not to scale' this has nothing to do with SU and everything to do with where you are getting the file from. Architects know just enough about SU to be dangerous some of the time so thats why you end up with models that are a disaster. I think SU is making huge strides at being a better program and their marketing team has got to be doing something right because the user base is huge and getting bigger.

[M V]

The other thing I am hearing is "I do all my modeling in SU and only use max for high poly stuff". Once SU can handle the higher poly objects, I think MAX is going to lose a considerable number of subscribers. It's just way to expensive and has way more tools that we need for Arch Viz stills in my honest opinion. Animation is a different ballpark but products like Lumion are very promising for getting fast slick aniamtions together without the hassel of MAX.

[greatcurve]

Currently, Lumion has trouble with FBX file from Revit due to the MR materials, so Max still comes in handy for cleaning and exporting from Revit.

 

BTW, the difference between 2D and 2.5D snaps is that 2.5D recognizes distant snap points along the Z-axis, but does not snap to them, only their projections onto the 2D plane.

[hockley91]

Sketchup has gotten much much better at importing into 3DS Max. However, when I export from Max into other programs things get buggy.

 

For example...I spent all the time setting up my model in 3DS Max from a sketchup model. Everything looked great until I was asked to do a crowd simulation. Then I had to export from Max to either a .3ds file or .obj file. since that was the only options.

 

The Crowd simulation really messed up during the import process from Max. I then exported to 3DS directly from the sketchup file and the same problems were happening. Normals and see through walls were everywhere.

 

I went in max and tried to convert to mesh all the geometry and tried an overall "Standard" color texture over the entire model and that still didn't work.

 

However, after testing and remodeling portion of the model in Max, the model comes through fine. Even things modeled in Autocad came through fine also. All exported to .3ds file format.

 

Almost everyone in the office models with Sketchup except me. I do it all in Revit, Autocad and 3DS Max...everything I model comes in without any issues.

[Chris MacDonald]

I model as much as possible in Sketchup, it's just so fast for modelling - the only downsides I can see with it are the poly counts and the lack of proper CAD curves (i.e non faceted) - though the option is there to increase the number of divisions in your arcs & circles.

 

Once I've modelled the building in sketchup I will generally construct the site in 3ds max, bring in foliage & vehicles and render in VRay; I've never had a problem with this workflow. I think a lot of the problems people have with Sketchup are when they receive files from elsewhere (architects/designers) who aren't necessarily that clued up about how to model properly within the program. With extensive use of groupings you should end up with a model that imports perfectly into max every time, and no annoying multi-sub materials either.

 

Sketchup is in fact more than capable of producing models that are worthy of photorealistic images. It's down to the user, not the tools.

[OCT.studio]

Maker thanks for the insight.

 

how do you deal with the textures? do you add them in SU and then alter them once in 3d max or do you just import a blank SU model into max and go from there?

[erickdt]

If you read Peter Guthrie's blogs you'll see that SU to MAX is his workflow as is Alex Roman's workflow. That said, I don't think anyone can argue with the validity of that way of working.

 

I myself have been modeling in FormZ and exporting an AutoCAD file into MAX for years which works awesome. Although I love MAX for its camera/lighting and rendering tools I've always found it to be time consuming to model in. Where MAX really shines (in terms of modeling) is its ability to easily create organic forms necessary for furniture, props, etc.

 

My 2c...

 

E

[Chris MacDonald]

Maker thanks for the insight.

 

how do you deal with the textures? do you add them in SU and then alter them once in 3d max or do you just import a blank SU model into max and go from there?

 

I rarely apply actual textures in Sketchup - though there's no reason you couldn't because whilst it wont bring in the materials/maps, it will remember the UV coordinates (I export from Sketchup as .3ds). Generally I just apply a colour in sketchup and give it a name that will indicate to me what it is supposed to be when imported into max.

 

I always avoid applying more than one material to an object because (depending on your export settings) it will import into max with a multi-sub object material applied to it, which whilst it isn't the end of the world; it is annoying.

 

Once the model is imported into max I select all and vertex weld it and sometimes adjust smoothing groups on certain objects, and then using the colour picker to select materials that I'd applied in sketchup I begin to set up my materials for VRay.

[Brodie Geers]

how do you deal with the textures? do you add them in SU and then alter them once in 3d max or do you just import a blank SU model into max and go from there?

 

I apply all of my materials in SU. I find it more intuitive and faster. Basically I just apply materials as I model (normally applying either the diffuse or bump map from my material as the SU texture) and get my UV's set correctly. When you import the .skp into 3ds Max it will import your geometry with Standard materials applied with your SU texture map in the Diffuse slot. Part of the advantage to this over just using colors is that you don't have to remember that pink is brick, brown is glass, yellow is aluminum, etc. You can tell at a glance that the material and UV is correct. From there it's a fairly simple matter to replace the Standard material with your final material (Vray, Mental Ray, Maxwell,...) and you don't need to worry about UV's in 3ds Max.

 

A few caveats though. This works great for planer/box mapping but SU isn't very good at anything else so you may want to tweak UVs if you've got a circular stone column or something. Second, if you import large scale textures into SU you can bloat your SU file. So you'll need to create lowres versions of them. I've got some of these stored, others I have a quick Photoshop action setup to speed the process.

 

-Brodie

[Jonathan Sanchez]

i import all my models blank from SU and apply textures in 3ds.

[hockley91]

Okay, these were some great replies. I might just have a go at it then myself. I honestly haven't had a chance to really work in that environment. I've done some, but not a lot. I've been working so much in Revit these days. However, most of, if not all the modelers in my office use Sketchup for modeling.

 

I'll have to research more about the groups and things. That may be an issue with why I have so many problems when I get stuff from them. Plus, the textures are already applied and it just looks like a mess when it's in 3DS Max.

 

I'll work on it....

[mrstardust]

Since this thread already exists, i thought i could just jump in with my problems aswell...

I started using sketchup roughly a week ago and i´m still in the process of wrapping my head around the whole concept, since i come from max.

Like many others i was a bit scared when i imported the sketchup model into max and had all those badly triangulated faces (at least thats´what i learned).

I´ve also had problems of getting the idea of grouping and making components, so i basically had to remodel my basemodel twice already, because it was impossible to change anything after my inital modeling mess.

As it now seems like i have to remodel again, i thought i might get some things clear before i start again...

 

1. Grouping of Objects.

I did some grouping and layering on my second attempt, its just not enough to separate the model efficiently in max for things like UVmapping/unwrapping. for example i have all the floors, walls and windows grouped together in groups like "level 1", "level 2" etc., instead of groups for the floors, walls and windows...

So now i´m thinking, if it would be faster to remodel the whole thing or if i should try to separate the objects further in sketchup (nesting groups and such), wich seems to me like a tedious and problematic way of doing it.

One thing i thought of is to put different materials on the objects i want to seperate and then just export by material, i haven´t tried it yet though.

 

2. Exporting vs importing.

Since Max now has the ability to directly import sketchup files, i was really happy. Then i realized that all the "Export to 3ds" Options were missing on import: Basically i could only chose to split objects by layer or not.

So i imported splitting by layer, but i didn´t get the right layers at all. It kind of seemed reversed, because when i unticked that, i did get the right layers imported from sketchup.

So my question is: As neat as it might be to directly import in Max - I guess i should stick to exporting via sketchup, right?

 

3. Future workflow.

In case i will have to remodel again, i wanna make sure i get things right this time, so i can do the texturing and rendering in Max without all the problems i´m going through right now. So this is what i would do:

A) Make a group or component for every object that will get a different texture later on, or that will need to be unwrapped/mapped seperately later on.

B) Make Layers for the different levels of the building for convinient hiding/unhiding in Max.

C) Either put a rough texture on every object on creation or use a color with a description of the texture to use later on.

D) Once i´m done, export to .3ds. I´m not sure about the settings i should use there.

I found this blog post pretty useful:

SKetchup to 3ds Max does work

 

He recommends to export as a single object, but that would give me a hard time refining the model in 3DS Max, since i would have no way of efficiently hiding parts of the geometry.

Splitting by material again would mean i´d get different objects for every material, wich also would be unconvinient for refining the model in 3DS Max,s o wich method would you recommend?

 

E) Round corners.

I´m pretty sure this has also already been covered, but i´m still gonna ask it...:

How do you handle round corners? Do you do them in Sketchup aswell? And if so, whats the most efficient way to do them? Or do you chamfer in Max? Or do you just use fake rounded corners like the option in mental ray?

 

Sorry for the long post, but i´d like to be thorough this time...

[Brodie Geers]

Some interesting questions. Your workflow is very different from mine. I just found this video series the other day which may help you. He describes a method of modeling in Sketchup so that when it comes into your other modeling program (he uses Modo but 3ds Max will have the same issues) it still allows for editing (quads instead of triangles and such).

 

 

However, I don't think this is a very good method for modeling. The advantage of modeling in Sketchup - the reason it's so fast, is partly because you don't have to follow all of the 3ds max rules of modeling. When you model in Sketchup as you'd model in 3ds Max I think you're shooting yourself in the foot. You'd might as well model in 3ds Max at that point and save yourself the headache of transitioning programs. That said, I haven't tried it so maybe there's some speed advantage still to SU if you get used to the process and develop a good flow with this method.

 

Broadly, I would say that your problems are arising because you want to do further editing in 3ds Max. My fundamental question is, do you really need to do further editing in SU? Why?

 

Regarding rounded corners - I do those in SU using Fredo's Round Corners plugin http://forums.sketchucation.com/viewtopic.php?t=20485

 

As for groups and such I do whatever is best for SU and don't worry much how it comes out in 3ds Max. I may even just explode all the groups before going to 3ds max so I just get one big object depending on what I'm doing. What's best for SU, imo, is to group objects (not materials) and to group them primarily to decrease editing time. Actually I never use "groups" I always use "components" since it does the exact same thing but saves memory if you copy it around. So on a building I make each window and door a component (so then if I change one it changes all of that type). My exterior and coping aren't grouped so I can easily access them without entering a group and if the building grows 2' I can stretch the exterior and coping at the same time. Canopies will get their own component. Then I'll group the whole building together to keep it separate from the site. The site too will be one large component.

 

If you send me your email I'll see if I can find an example of one of my models which you can take a look at.

 

-Brodie

[mrstardust]

Hi Brodie,

 

nice to see you here aswell, since you´ve been really helpful already...

 

Some interesting questions. Your workflow is very different from mine.

 

Well. I don�t really have a workflow yet, hence the interesting questions.

 

When you model in Sketchup as you'd model in 3ds Max I think you're shooting yourself in the foot.

 

That about sums up the feeling i got the last couple of days...

 

Broadly, I would say that your problems are arising because you want to do further editing in 3ds Max.

 

Yeah, meanwhile i really can only see 2 possible reasons for that:

 

1) Doing some more complex shapes. For example: Its really easy in Max to create some splines and just give them thickness to get things like wires and such.

Generally speaking, organic forms seem to be easier to model in Max than in SU. But then again: None of that applies to the project i´m working on right now, so i kind of jumped ahead with the assumption i´d need further editing in Max.

2) Round corners...The plugin you mentioned seems perfect for that though.

Since i only tried to achieve round corners with the follow me tool in SU so far, and since that is limited to rectangular shapes, the plugin really could spare me the troubles in Max.

 

I´ll definitely stick to Max for modeling difficult props though, theres just too many great modifiers to speed up the process of modelling those.

That might also be the reason for my concerns: I actually wanna do both exterior and interior of the project i´m currently working on. Wich might be a bit over the top, but since i don´t just wanna use it as an exercise, but maybe also for my future portfolio, i thought it might be a good idea.

 

What's best for SU, imo, is to group objects (not materials) and to group them primarily to decrease editing time.

 

Well, on my first attempts i didn´t group anything, nor did i use components and it got near impossible to edit anything later on...

And like i said: Because i wanna model the interior stuff in max, i got to be able to quickly hide and unhide the exterior geometry.

Another reason is, that i might want to improve the overall look of the building by breaking up the parts, that are made of the same material and then uvmap/unwrap those to break up the tiling of the textures or add some dirt to them (for example: most of the exterior on my prohect is concrete, it would look rather gruesome if i just used one tileable texture for that...)

And i guess it would be quite a nightmare if i would have to do that with one big hunk of geometry...I haven´t really done alot of that in previous projects, so i´m also not quite sure how to tackle that problem best from a Max-perspective in the first place...

 

I´d still love to look at one of your files, i´ll send you my adress by PM...

 

Thanx again for shedding some more light on the workflow!

[Brodie Geers]

I think you're correct that Max is better for organic shapes. There are a few people who do very impressive organic shapes in SU but I still think it's mostly a novelty to do characters in SU. However, the new subdivide and smooth (whatever it's called now) can be really helpful for things like furniture (i've only used the trial). But really, in ArchViz the vast majority of what we do isn't organic so SU still provides a lot of usefulness for us.

 

The native SU tools are great but very few pro users stop there. There are just too many amazing plugins that take things to a new level. There are very few things I find SU simple CAN'T do which 3ds Max can so if you find something seems impossible is too difficult or takes more time in SU, there's probably a plugin for the task. Here's a good list of some of the best plugins

 

http://forums.sketchucation.com/viewtopic.php?f=323&t=16909

 

For example, you mentioned in 3ds Max you can easily add thickness to a spline. Using a couple rubies you can do the same thing to create handrails and such. You could use native tools, drawing lines, place a circle at one end, then use Folow Me to bring the circle along the path creating a tube. But using plugins you could use Bezier to create a nice Bezier curve, then select that curve and use Pipe Along Path to instantly turn that curve into a tube which has whatever inside and outside diameter you input. Both plugins can be found here...

 

http://rhin.crai.archi.fr/rld/plugins_list_az.php

 

I´ll definitely stick to Max for modeling difficult props though, theres just too many great modifiers to speed up the process of modelling those.

 

By all means use whichever program seems faster too you. SU will be slower overall until you get the hang of it if you're already a competent Max user, but the more you learn about it the faster you'll become and the more you'll probably use it to create many of your assets. It can be helpful to take an object which you believe is better created in Max and post it on the Sketchucation forum asking 'how would you model this in SU.' You'll get some interesting answers from pro users which will give you a better idea which technique is faster.

 

If you're doing some unwrapping in Max that's definitely a reason to group things accordingly. The main thing is just learning what the conversion from SU to Max does to your model and grouping accordingly so you can best manipulate what textures you need to.

 

-Brodie