Animation Round-Up

You can create the illusion of an object moving by creating multiple copies of the object positioned incrementally along the intended path of movement, saving each copy to a different Layer and saving each change on a different Scene. In many ways the method is akin to Flip Book animation.

• Each instance of the object is assigned to a unique Layer.

• The visibility of each Layer is controlled by the Saved Properties of each Scene you create.

• Camera Location remains static from Scene to Scene.

Below are some noteable tutorial showing how to set up Scene animations.In order to thoroughly examine the SKP files, open the Layers browser (and/or Entity Info and the other control panels like Shadows and Outliner) while reviewing the scene animation tutorials below in order to study the changing visibility of different elements in the model.

Slideshow animation settings are located at Window > Model Info > Animation. Right-click on a Scene tab and select Play Animation to run the slideshow.

• • How to Animate an Object Alan Fraser presents a comprehensive overview of several Scene-changing techniques and other people add additional examples.

  • Animate the rotor blade A 'fluttering' effect with rotor blades - and Olle Bergman's fluttering leaves are really cool.

  • Animation tutorial Changing layer visibility slideshow animation.

• • Animated Fountain Look for Yasser Malaika's Animated Fountain. xxx [dead link]

  • Chord Trammel George Knowles 3D Warehouse tutorial.

  • Creating Animated Movies with SketchUp Joel Metzger SUWiki tutorial.

  • Exploding Table Animation Look for Bryce's table. It relies on Hidden properties. xxx [dead link]

  • Sqirlz Water Reflection Add animated water reflection to spiffy-up a model image export. - Free

  • TV Mount George Knowles - 3D Warehouse tutorial on the use of Groups, Layers and Scenes to articulate parts.

  • Fabric roof Look for the tent_bb3.skp file. Create a slideshow animation by placing geometry on different layers and changing layer visibility on each Scenes, animation shown below. (Quite a few of the models shown in animated GIFs on this website - and the Scene set-up to create the animation itself - used a variation of this method.)

Buildings! grow! old Pro thread

Door Animation old Pro thread

Section Cut animation tips SKP tutorial featuring the lovely cubes shown in the animated GIF above. (Click the Scene tabs in the file)

Animate a section cut of your model - Skill Builder YouTube video inspired by a 2018 SketchUp Basecamp presentation, 8 minutes.

Animation in SketchUp – Matthew Chambers | 3D Basecamp 2018 58 minute SketchUp Basecamp 2018 animation presentation.

Section Cut Plugins

• • • Animate Sections How2SU - This plugin automates the process of applying animating sections to groups.

    • DoorsSK Сергей К. - Create and manipulate doors opening and closing.

    • Eneroth Cut Surface Organizer Eneroth - Places cut geometry on its own layer so it can be hidden when the model as a whole is shown.

    • Create Section Drawing tak2hata - Export Sections as drawings in SKP and DXF format with Entity Info annotated to drawings.

    • Section By Camera pgarmyn - Creates realistic internal shadows when section cuts are active from a plan or section view.

    • SectionCutFace.rb The script makes a face at the section cut. Alternatively, paint the backface an unobtrusive color to 'disguise' the backface.

    • Super Section Clark B - Places an existing section cut on its own layer and it's own scene, and aligns the view.

• Vedon Animation System Shows how to set-up posing rig 'trees' to help control the 3D placement of bezier curves in 3D space.

Post-processing in an animation program (Camtasia Studio, for example) can adjust animation speeds of select scenes or try some of the plugins listed below.

• • • Export animation with transparency alpha transparent background Green screen method via After Effects to make a Flash video - stahlman.

• • Vedon Animation System The tutorial shows how to set-up posing rig 'trees' to help control the 3D placement of bezier curves in 3D space to set up a flightpath for a walkthrough or flyby video.

  • Video animation Colin Holgate suggests settings for a Quicktime animation from a Mac. xxxx [dead link]

  • Nowadays you can upload a model to the 3D Warehouse and you will get a link to embed a web viewer. For historical reference, the first attempt to do this was with the SketchUp Web Exporter: Hack the SketchUp Web Exporter SmattUp reviews how to create custom animation output from the Web Exporter.

Presentation sub-section on the Resources page

Renderers As time goes on, renderers have been adding real-time animation.

NOTE: To download plugins from SketchUcation, join the forum and logon.

• Add Hidden Layers Jim Foltz - Very useful plugin to set newly added Layers as invisible in all Scenes.

• Animated textures

  • • Animatex Renderiza - Plugin to set up animated texture effect. Works with Scene animations.

    • LightUp The renderer can set up animated textures. See video in link.

    • SketchUp Video Moris Papasmadov

    • SKMtools,MaterialTools,ImageTools TIG - Plugin can create animated textures.

• • Video Texture Plugin for SketchUp Marc S. - Play videos (most common file formats supported) on textured surfaces.

• Bezier Spline Fredo6 -

• • BZ_Animation Fredo6 - Customize the segment intervals on a polyline flightpath.

  • Camera Recorder Chris Fullmer - Records navigation movements in SketchUp and export them as a series of images.

  • CameraKeyMaker macgile

• Create image sahi - Save a series of images of selected rotating parts to assemble into an animation. Upload the image series into a Picasa web album to make a swiveling image, like the preview image in the 3D Warehouse.

• • FlightPath2 RickW - Fee - version 1 of FlightPath is Free

• Keyframe animation

  • • Keyframe Animation regular polygon - Add movement to any number of objects in your model. - Fee - Windows, Mac

    • Podium Walker A stand alone walk thru/ fly thru animation program for SketchUp models either photo-realistically or non-photo-realistically. Fee - Windows, Mac

• • proper_animation Moris Papasmadov - Free

  • SimFonIA Animation, numerical simulation plugin for virtual prototyping, etc., include transformation processor, keyframe editor, exportation options, and bullet (physics engine.) - Fee - Windows, Mac

    • SU Animate Keyframe animation. Fee - Windows, Mac

  • PresenationBundle RickW - Plugin Suite to control scene transition speed and camera location. Plugins can be obtained individually. Fee - version 1 of FlightPath is Free

  • SketchUp Animation using mover.rb cmd

  • SketchyPhysics Chris Phillips - Physics simulation tool. A video capture program is needed to record the animation. Window 32-bit

  • MSPhysics Anton Synytsia - Physics simulation tool similar to SketchyPhysics. Windows

  • Smoothstep Animation Smooths out jerky Scene transition in exported animations.

  • Spread3D Create interactive 3D experiences (viewers, virtual walkthrough) embedded in a webpage. Free, Fee

  • Soap Skin & Bubble Reverse some SSB mesh skin faces and run the plugin animation for 'water' effect, rotor blade and more. Hunt through attachments by PavAks (Juri), catamountain and others in this Pro forum thread. xxx [dead link} (For the time being, the old info is stored somewhere inaccessible. But the animated fire effect at the top of the Model Mastery page is a painted Soap Skin & Bubble circle, created as shown in the GIF to the right. The plugin ReverseFaces is used to quickly flip faces with left-mouse button clicking in the animated GIF tutorial above.)