SketchUp 8 unknown material

sadistiko · Nov 24, 2010

I'm using SketchUp 8 PRO for making buildings for my new track. I find it easiest way to make low poly objects. I made few buldings and import them as 3ds into xpacker but last few buldings start to have some material I didn't make. So they use only some parts of my original texture or black dds. Some of them I found and correct, but those blank dds textures are used by material called "Foregou". Xpacker at import sais that this material Foregrou doesn't have texture. I can't find in SketchUp any face that I didn't texturise. Any clue?
I tested this last night. I deleted every face in SketchUp and I still have that one material without texture at export and I can't see it anywhere! I don't know if I'm stupid or it's some random bug in SketchUp. And please don't force me to go to another 3d program

asasinuxp · Nov 24, 2010

With SketchUp 7 I have the same problem,but I ignore it,because in BTB the model have all textures.Maybe it's a bug of BTB.

Barbje_Keller · Nov 24, 2010

I have this problems to - times to times, but when I start exporting my models to collada (old collada format - BTB and sketchup 6, suport it) I never find this problem again... You can creat yours model in sketchup 8, then save it as skethup 6 , and with it export as collada (export as kmz4 file format...)... That's all

But before, you mus be sure, that don't leave any free lines, or non texturated planes and others...

Kennett Ylitalo · Nov 24, 2010

So if i understood this correctly, there is no way of exporting with out Sketchup 6? I have tried with SU 8 but it gives the same error no matter what you do.. A little hard to find a legitimate version of SU 6 anymore.

martinez · Nov 24, 2010

These materials come if you leave some "empty" egdes or faces without material. Say you have a face that you don't need. If you delete just the face, it leaves some edges very often.
An exercise:
Step 1:
- draw a flat face and paint it with some texture.
- draw 4 egdes on it to have second rectagular. Export and you will have two faces, 10 triagles and one material.
- now push/pull the smaller face in some direction. Delete all faces from the smaller "box" - top and sides. Watch the screenshot "Sketchup_edges.jpg" for export details. Two materials - one is made from the texture and the second is blank black....
Step 2:
- Undo deleting that you have flat face and push/pulled box back.
- delete the top small face from the box
- draw four straight lines around the "box" on it's sides that they go around.
- Sketchup will produce a new face without material because lines joined - you can see the white face inside the box. Check the second screenshot... The second material will be blank white.
- if you now delete the new face and export, you will have one material again.

So, that's it - there can not be egdes or faces without material. If you don't apply texture to face, Sketchup will add blank materials. "Additions" like these are often very hard to find, so I do exports while working on more complex models to check if everything goes right...

martinez · Nov 24, 2010

@ Kennett: no, it's easy

http://www.racedepartment.com/downloads/bobs-track-builder-37/googles-sketchup-6-installer-2826/
Only collada from Sketchup6 works with BTB/Xpacker. If you use some other version, you have to save as 6, then open the file in Sketchup 6 and finally export to .kmz.

Kennett Ylitalo · Nov 24, 2010

martinez said:
@ Kennett: no, it's easy
http://www.racedepartment.com/downloads/bobs-track-builder-37/googles-sketchup-6-installer-2826/
Only collada from Sketchup6 works with BTB/Xpacker. If you use some other version, you have to save as 6, then open the file in Sketchup 6 and finally export to .kmz.

Thank you for the link.. Feel stupid now, i have seen this in the DL section, just didn't connect the dots.

And Martinez: Thanks a lot, i think i can now identify the problem.

sadistiko · Dec 2, 2010

People, I found out what is the problem with extra material when you export from sketcup to 3ds! You must NEVER use distortion tool when you positioning your texture on model! Thats it. I fix all my problematic models when I just use scale/rotate and scale/shear tools and it works perfectly. If I use distort tool then sketchup make new materials and extra textures for those parts.