Take 2 on next project

Been working on learning Sketch Up by working on the design of the next project. Some overhead cabinets. There are no face frames on these, I want a more.... well for lack of a better word, primitive look. I want them to add to the illusion that this is a old house, not a new house.

Being that I typicaly just work from a rough sketch and design as I go this is a bit of a stretch for me. Of course I have identified what would have been some problems ahead of time using Sketch Up. I think I might be becoming a believer now that the learning curve is leveling off some.


Tomorrow I hope to finalize some details and start cutting wood.

Jeff

Looking good, Jeff. I'm hoping Dave will jump in and explain how to get the inside and outside surfaces straightened out. (Like the blue door panels in your pics.) That dog bites me pretty often.

More and more I'm using SketchUp to design my flatwork. Very useful tool.

Jeff, that looks pretty good. I like those little corner details. Will those be mortises cut in a single piece of wood or built of small pieces?

Vaughn does have a good point about the blue faces. Remember Jeff how we switched that color on the TV cabinet so as to make it more obvious? To fix that select the back face surfaces, right click and choose Reverse faces from the menu.

It's wise to stay on top of those face orientations because they can cause you problems later. Fortunately with SU6 you can go back to Monochrome view and find those back faces even after you have painted them all.

Whats the deal with the blue faces? Why are they blue and what the point behind switching them? I know I have done it but wasn't sure why I was doing it.

Thanks

Aaron, the blue faces are the back faces. Having them exposed can cause problems in a number of areas. For one example, take a look at the SKP file I have included as a zip file. Use Push/Pull on the square nearest the origin and pull it up into a cube. Double click on each of the other squares as you go down the line. Watch what happens to the last one.

Leaving back faces out can also create problems when painting.

I think the SU folks should have made the default back face color a little more obnoxious. Certainly they should have made it more of a contrast from the face color. You can modify it in SU6 by going to the Edit tab in the Styles dialog and then go to the Edit Face Styles dialog. If you do that with a a freshly opened session of SketchUp, you can save that color as part of the template by using Save As to save the blank drawing under the Templates folder. You can choose a new name for it or use the one that shows in the Preferences>Templates dialog.

Another thing related to back faces is that if you ever decide to render your SU models in any sort of rendering program, those back faces show up as black no matter what color they are painted.

All in all I think it is just good housekeeping to correct them as you go.

Dave Richards said:

Jeff, that looks pretty good. I like those little corner details. Will those be mortises cut in a single piece of wood or built of small pieces?

Click to expand...

I just take a square block, cut a hole in the middle with a hole saw. Slice it in four pieces and start sanding and rounding over the edges;. I used these on the mating piece, the Laundry Room cabinet. Then just glue it in place.

Remember Jeff how we switched that color on the TV cabinet so as to make it more obvious? To fix that select the back face surfaces, right click and choose Reverse faces from the menu.

Click to expand...

Well................... Maybe? Dave we went over so much I don't know. But I do follow what you said and I can change that. I didn't understand why it was blue and honestly didn't give it that much thought. But that makes sense now. I always have a hard time getting the panel in these doors. Should be simple but for some reason I have trouble getting it to expand or grow it or what ever they call it once I get the panel drawn in place.

Hold the phone! Wait just a doggone minute! You have a hole saw that makes square holes? Where can I get one of those?

So do you suppose a tutorial on frame and panel doors would be well received?

I could do any kind you want.

Dave Richards said:

I could do any kind you want.

Click to expand...

THAT IS A GROSS UNDERSTATEMENT if I ever heard one!