[Books] Sketchup for dummies review

Sketchup is easy to use but to mastering it and creating wonderfull things you need some help. Sketchup for dummies! For dummies ? Don’t be shy and try the experience thanks to Rebecca Huehls

The friend of your dreams!

I often use Sketchup for buildings purpose. I plan my works and build scaled plan to check the requirements but if you are a geek like me, You want a realistic model like this :

But before you make your dreams or your plan, be prepared!

When and why read this books

Firstly, Sketchup is easy to use thanks youtube channels but when you want to build more complex things, you have to find a solution and it is too late. Too late to create component and understand how to compose and build parts together and having a maintanable and extensible model.

After watching a lots of videos I have found a great and easy to read book. Sketchup for dummies. The book is not really for dummies! It is well organized and you could read less than 50 pages to master components and buildings.

If you are in a hurry you could start reading the chapter 4 “Building Buildings” and 5 “Falling in Love with Components”.

You should consider reading this book when you fell a little bit lost with videos.

Chapters

Table of contents is well organised and title are OK if you known what thing you would like to build. But first chapter 4 and 5 are the first chapters to read and practice before going deeper with your models.

When I started using sketchup 7 years ago, I have built models quickly but it was really difficult to keep the same speed due to interaction with existing. That is why this book is for!

Chapters are separated between architectures categories, 3D printing, and lived objects like cover composed with complex forms.

Conclusion

If you are interested in learning sketchup quickly or in depth, this book offers a bigger experience than videos. Tools are well described and there is always an example. There is also “geek part” to go deeper than “normal” case and that is why the book is easy to read by pass with last pass “geek” mode.

You could buy this book at amazon

The author is really sympatic and you can enhance your experience by using twitter at : @rebeccahuehls