Let's take a look at some (advanced) basics on circles in SketchUp. As many of you already know, circles in SketchUp aren't exactly circles. Tune in to learn more.
Liked, as always. Just wanted to add: Another reason to use a large number of sides is if you use Sketchup (as I often do) to check geometry or trigonometry problems/puzzles. For example, you might be asked to calculate the area of a complex shape involving circles and arcs, and having done so, you what to be sure your answer is correct. Same with spherical volumes, etc. In this case, I probably don't even save the drawing. But Sketchup is great for automatically calculating areas, arc lengths, volumes, etc., that might take quite some time to do by hand, or even with calculator or spreadsheet. Just keep in mind that it's not perfect; since, as you mention, it doesn't really know what a circle is--it only knows polygons.
Thanks Aaron, these bite sized tutorials are certainly making me a better modeller. Could I ask you to cover the arc tools, in particular for creating more complex curves? I often want to create curves from several different arcs, but struggle to fully understand how to blend them into one smooth curve.
Another great video Aaron. Thank you! I know you said this wasn't strictly a beginners video, but I think the instruction could be improved if you started off by explaining: 1) How a circle is represented in SketchUp 2) What "sides" are 3) Why you should care
Very interesting, I’ve never seen a wonky couple circles like that so I must be pulling them on same axis within my drawings. But now I’ll be conscious or aware of it. Thanks Aaron for this little nugget. Sometimes ya just have to leave AutoCAD mentality behind where the default for circle segments I believe is set to 1000, we do go up to 2 or thousand segments when we’re blowing up a .005 rad to 10,20 or 100 X for use on a comparator for machining parts.
FYI, I've tried 3D printing cylinders with different numbers of sides and compared print times and smoothness. Each was about the diameter of a typical coffee cup. Past about 48 sides, I saw no difference in smoothness or print time. Between 24-48, smoothness spoke for itself (roll it) but print times were maybe within a few minutes of each other. Essentially, the slicer software (namely Cura) just gives up past a certain point depending on the size of the finished product. This is likely dye to the travel time of the nozzle for each segment. 36 sides is usually my go-to because it's easily divisible (36*10=360, etc.).
I have used some CAD program (Autocad, ArchiCAD , SketchUP and finally Rhino) I still use sketchup for some kind of work (not too much precision ) but if you want to 3d print or laser cut your design, sketchup is insufficient and the way sketchup makes a circle is a reason. It's a very good beginner's CAD although i have seen some models very-very nice and detailed!
Hi Is there a way to draw, using native tools, the true intersection between a circle and another geometry (line, circle...) or find the true tangent between two circles (think belt-and-pulley kind of thing)? I'm using an extension for that but was wondering. Cheers for the videos.
I wish it were possible to set the default number of sides in Model Info for circles and arcs. I realize once you create a circle with x number of segments that information is retained, but it seems cleaner to be able to set that number just as you mentioned when starting your model we should think about the needs in that model. Having a setting for circles and another for arcs on the units tab under Model Info would be nice. To me this sounds like it fits right in with what you are saying about keeping the number of segments on all your circles the same throughout the model. If you set it once up front then you are more likely to maintain that number of segments as you draw. Or maybe this is possible to set somewhere else that I don't know of. Still a little green when it comes to the finer points of SketchUp.
Hi, Thank you for going over this. I'm working in skp 2017 and don't see the "segments" option under entity info. I couldn't find it anywhere actually. Can you help me find it?
Piping in the market goes by DIAMETER. After starting the circle could we press a MODIFIER to TOGGLE between diameter and RADIUS entry? This would be similar to what happens with the rectangle tool. Press control (Windows) to switch between center vs corner based entry.
I wish the circle tool worked like the rotate tool, where you could chose any line segment as a center axis simply by hovering back and forth along it for a moment before drawing.
Aligning a circle to an axis seems like a good idea. However, not aligning them could be an interesting method. If you draw equal sized circles, (with few sides), on top of each other, but turn one a bit off the axis, some interesting shapes can be created.
@ 5:38 ? How would U change that Solid Circle into one with a Conical top IE: That 1st circle of 49mm x 8mm with another circle top that 31.5mm Pulled up 12mm making slopping side on top of the circle at the bottom
Draw first circle 49mm. Push Pull 8mm. Press CTRL and Push Pull 12mm. Select the top circle and change the radius in Properties. It's the segments you can't change, not the radius.
I always have trouble with the "inferencing" trick of hovering your cursor over the edge so it snaps to the center when you get near it. I guess I'm just impatient and I don't give it time to get its bearings. One other trick is to use the tape measure tool and (assuming you used the axis trick when laying it down in the first place) go from outermost point to outermost point while keeping an eye on the measurement in the corner. If it matches your initial diameter, you nailed it. That's a good way to work it out if something happens to your geometry and the circle gets broken up.
It seems like there was something missing. A long time ago, in a galaxy far away, you mentioned, I believe during one of your live drawing sessions, another "feature" of drawing circles on axis. If I recall it had something to di with moving, or dragging, or scaling ... some aspect of a circle that could be modified but only if the circle had been drawn on axis. Am I imagining this? I certainly haven't been able to imagine what the original trick was.
Why can't sketchup simply implement a "real" circle behaviour like autocad does? It makes it quite impossible to be accurate with complex volume rotations.
As a software developer (not Sketchup) I would think that's a major modification to the core engine of Sketchup, and one that isn't deemed necessary for most users. It's like the difference between a pixel-based drawing program (like MS Paint) and a vector-based drawing program (like Adobe Illustrator or Inkscape)--totally different design models of how to represent a drawing.
Neither your "square one" nor this "deep dive" video cover how to define the circle axis. Here you mention "try to draw along the same axis" -- but then don't explain how. The tool tips (at the lower left within SketchUp) don't help either. The arrow key can be used to align along the model axes, but what about other orientations? By trial & error I found the shift key seems to help, but it's all still a bit mysterious to me and I can't find a video to explain. What about a "deeper dive" video?
