Architectural_Design_with_SketchUp

Chapter 5 Rendering in SketchUp
This tutorial helps you understand how to use a rendering program—Kerkythea, in this
case. For more information about Kerkythea than we can cover here, read the Getting Started
tutorials that you can download from this website:
www.kerkythea.net/joomla/index.php?option=com_remository&Itemid=42&func=select&id=6 (Short link:
http://goo.gl/IkRP0)
A more thorough reference is Robin de Jongh’s SketchUp 7.1 for Architectural Visualization
(Packt Publishing, 2010), which explains rendering with Kerkythea in more depth.
As this tutorial demonstrates, Kerkythea offers many modification options that are useful
for advanced users. Nevertheless, they can be daunting for others who may prefer simplicity.
Thus, I encourage you to peruse the list of software presented earlier to find the rendering
software that is right for you.
Setting Up Rendering Components
The approaches and techniques presented in this chapter are applicable to any rendering software.
Therefore, they are presented in a very general but usable form. Be aware, however,
that you may have to adapt the concepts slightly to work with your software.
Use this chapter as a reference when you are working on photorealistic renderings.
Modeling
First, let’s look at some modeling-related issues. You will need to consider much of what is
discussed here in SketchUp while you are creating your model and before you send it to the
rendering software.
Edges and Faces
A SketchUp model of any size is made up of many faces that are bounded by edges. When you
look at a shape such as the sphere shown here and turn on the display of Hidden Geometry
(in the View menu), you’ll see that it is made up of several polygonal faces, which in turn are
bounded by edge lines (four in this example).
In addition, a model can have temporary guidelines (dashed lines) and guide points
(little crosses) that you may have created when you were modeling using the Measure and
Protractor tools.
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