Sketchup Models #5: Easiest tappered legs ever

Hey a quick note here. I just noticed I said to “pull it down to its final length”. I should have said to “move it down to its final length”. You use the move tool to move the surface of the smaller rectangle down in the blue axis. If you use the push/pull tool it will no auto fold and you do not get a taper.

-- Wipe the blood stains from your blade before coming in.

Good work Waid.

And you’re making a component of the leg and flipping the copies as you place them, right?

As an additional note, if you want to taper all four sides of the leg, you can use this same process but you need to hold Alt to invoke Auto Fold. For an equal taper on all sides, you can use Offset to draw the foot.

-- Until you spread your wings, you'll have no idea how far you can walk.

nice

-- When in doubt - There is no doubt - Go the safer route.

Yea I make a component of the leg. Then you only cut the mortise once. err… twice.. There is one on each inside face. Its a shame how I have to learn things on my own for it to stick. I’m betting this method is in every tutorial ever and somehow I’ve missed it.

-- Wipe the blood stains from your blade before coming in.

Do you want to do another session sometime?

-- Until you spread your wings, you'll have no idea how far you can walk.

Sure man that would be great. Trouble is figuring out what to work on.

THANKS!

hmmm You ever think of hosting a session with several people? I wonder how many PC’s can connect with skype and video before your bandwidth is choked out?

-- Wipe the blood stains from your blade before coming in.

If you come up with something you’d like to see, let me know. We’ll do it.

I have thought of having several folks on at a time. I can handle up to 14 or 15 people with GoToMeeting. I don’t know how many can be in a conference call on Skype. I do wonder what it would do to the bandwidth. It might shut things down. I’d need to do it when my wife isn’t around so she’s not on the computer too.

-- Until you spread your wings, you'll have no idea how far you can walk.

DaveR, have you thought of using CamStudio and releasing a set of tutorials? I used to use it to do that for 3DS Max a few years ago.

-- Ooo, er.

I use SnagIt8 for doing screen captures. I have better luck keeping the sound synched up with that as compared to CamStudio. I already do videos for the Design. Click. Build. blog when I can. I also do still screen captures when that seems to make more sense for what I’m trying to show.

I enjoy doing the personal stuff because I can tailor the presentation to exactly what my audience needs.

-- Until you spread your wings, you'll have no idea how far you can walk.

Ahh, I’ve been out of the video tutorial loop for a while, never tried SnagIt. I just found myself answering the same questions multiple times and the production of a few ‘intro’ type videos managed to free up some of the unpaid time I found myself using massive amounts of :) Then again there were probably 10-15 questions I was fielding ever day. I love helping out like that, just got to be too much after a while. Glad to see people offering free advice in any case. Take care!

-- Ooo, er.

For those interested in screen captures for whatever reason, try Screen Hunter software. Its a totally free download, saves to the clipboard or a graphics file, and will capture the entire screen (ala the Print Screen Key) or a region. The region option allows the user to draw a custom sized box around anything on the screen to save it. I own both SnagIt 8 and Screen Hunter and usually use the Screen Hunter for straight captures. It won’t capture live action, but I use Camtasia Studio for that. I produce teaching videosd on many computer applications to aid my students in their studies.

-- Robert, Fort Worth, homebell@charter.net

Funny how Waid’s thread got off topic. Sorry about that Waid.

-- Until you spread your wings, you'll have no idea how far you can walk.

Hey don’t sweat it Dave. Just roll with it.

-- Wipe the blood stains from your blade before coming in.

Once I start roll I can’t stop. Too much inertia. :-)

-- Until you spread your wings, you'll have no idea how far you can walk.

The ability to move lines and afect the entire mass of the object is one of the best features of Sketchup…

-- David, South Windsor, CT "I love the smell of sawdust in the morning"

Hmm here is a wiered anomaly with my leg method. It appears that the tapper can not be to a point where the end is less than half of the original width.

I guess it might be better to just draw guide lines on the bottom of the foot and move the sides over to make the tapper.

-- Wipe the blood stains from your blade before coming in.

I guess the second easiest tapered legs would be done like this?

This topic is probably to simple to keep anyone’s interest but I am finding that the move tool is having a revolutions in my sketchup use. I never touched it two weeks ago and now its my go to tool.

-- Wipe the blood stains from your blade before coming in.

Just draw a diagonal from the corner of the small square to the corresponding one on the larger one before moving the smaller square.

-- Until you spread your wings, you'll have no idea how far you can walk.

Here’s another way.
I draw the square leg all the way down to the floor. Then put a reference line where I want the taper to start, then go to the bottom of the leg and move the line of the side you want tapered in whatever amount you want. I’m at work (without sketchup) but I’m pretty sure thats the way I have been doing it.
I’m going to double check tonite.

Bently, that does work. Just draw in the fold line as you indicate using the Line tool. You could also scale the bottom face of the leg if you want the taper on more than one side. That would be quicker than moving a single line at a time.

-- Until you spread your wings, you'll have no idea how far you can walk.

Looks like I’m going to play around tonite. :)

Dave I think your diagonal line is the trick. I have done Bently’s way and it is also fast and easy but it does require extra moves with the creation of the reference lines and then deleting them. I think if the final taper is smaller than or equal to half the size of the original width then the diagonal line and then a move of the surface is the least moves. In the end we are talking about a difference of about 8 seconds but over a life time of sketchups that could add up to like … what… a half hour? We have now all just gained a half hour to our lives! Although I spent more time than that on this thread. hmmm I guess we broke even.

-- Wipe the blood stains from your blade before coming in.

LOL. ;)

-- Until you spread your wings, you'll have no idea how far you can walk.