Book Image

Taking SketchUp Pro to the Next Level

By : Aaron Dietzen aka 'The SketchUp Guy'
Book Image

Taking SketchUp Pro to the Next Level

By: Aaron Dietzen aka 'The SketchUp Guy'

Overview of this book

Anyone who’s worked with it will know that SketchUp is the quickest and easiest way to create 3D models. While its approachable interface makes it super easy to learn, this book will show you how the extremely capable SketchUp software can take you far beyond what you may have initially thought possible. Get ready to level up from a basic user to becoming a SketchUp ninja! Each chapter will take you through the capabilities of SketchUp, challenging you to use tools in innovative ways. This includes organizing your model, modifying native commands, customizing your interface, utilizing inferencing, and much more. Additionally, you’ll learn about the extensions that can be added to SketchUp to supplement the tools you have been using, allowing you to make your 3D modeling process quicker, easier, and more powerful. By the end of this SketchUp book, you’ll have an enhanced understanding of how to use the impressive range of tools and be on your way to customizing SketchUp for your one-of-a-kind workflow.
Table of Contents (21 chapters)
1
Part 1: Getting More Out of Native Tools
7
Part 2: Customizing SketchUp and Making It Your Own
13
Part 3: Extending SketchUp’s Capabilities for Modeling

Figuring out what keys to use for shortcuts

We have a list of commands that we know we want shortcuts for, and we know how to apply shortcuts to commands. At this point, it seems like we should just hop in and set the shortcuts! Yes, that is an option, but I would recommend taking just a minute or two to think about what keys you actually want to use for these shortcuts.

In setting your shortcuts, there are basically two schools of thought – mnemonics or location. Let’s look at how each works and what your keyboard might look like for each.

Assigning shortcuts based on mnemonics

Simply put, mnemonics is a system that helps you to remember. In the case of keyboard shortcuts for SketchUp, this means choosing keys that will help you to remember which key command they are connected to. This is the way that most of the default shortcuts are assigned.

In the default shortcuts, the M key is the shortcut for the Move command because it is easy to remember that the...