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Is There A Way To Make A 2D Image Logo Into A 3D Logo In Sketchup

K

kmanning

Messages
1,218
Hi,

I have several logos I want to attach to buildings in Sketchup. Is there a plugin, or a way to make a 2D image into a 3D logo in Sketchup? I know there's a 3D Text Tool in Sketchup that creates 3D text but that won't work for logos that have a unique shape and deign. Simply extruding the 2D image using the Push-Pull tool will not work. Here's an image of a Regional Finance logo I want to make into a 3D:


Reginal Finance.jpg


Ken.
 
Hi Ken:

The simplest, IMHO is to draw a Face mapped with the texture image on it; keep existing shadows between letters as part of the background.

Zoom in and trace outlines of Arcs and Letters as Faces; extrude them above the base plane of the black background of the sign image.

Scale the width of the sign to ~ 13.5 Feet wide.

Position the sign 3D model group on the building's front wall inside the same group for the building; explode the sign object's group.

This intersects / welds the sign 3D model's base plane to the building's front wall, so it is no longer a separate object.

To eliminate flickering, delete the building's front wall Faces that 'became' the back Face of the Arcs' and Letters' Faces.

GaryGB
 
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GaryGB said:
Hi Ken:

The simplest, IMHO is to draw a Face mapped with the texture image on it; keep existing shadows between letters as part of the background.

Zoom in and trace outlines of Arcs and Letters as Faces; extrude them above the base plane of the black background of the sign image.

Scale the width of the sign to ~ 13.5 Feet wide.

Position the sign 3D model group on the building's front wall inside the same group for the building; explode the sign object's group.

This intersects / welds the sign 3D model's base plane to the building's front wall, so it is no longer a separate object.

To eliminate flickering, delete the building's front wall Faces that 'became' the back Face of the Arcs' and Letters' Faces.

GaryGB
Click to expand...

Hi Gary,

Thanks. I'll try it. But I have a question. How do you determine that the width of the sign is 13.5 feet wide?

Problems I run into so many times is not knowing the actual, height, size, and distance. In google earth and in 3D mode, I do use the ruler, or measuring tool to get measurements, such as height and length of objects, but I seriously doubt it's that accurate. When I take a screenshot of a wall with windows, for example, many times I have to use the Prospective Tool, in google earth, because the shot is not head on. Then after the image is transformed, the aspect ratio is wrong because one can easily see that the image does not have the same proportions. But how does one know what numbers to use to scale it so that the proportions are correct? If the sizes are not correct, I end up with either having too much or having too little of all the textures applied to the wall. I make these measurements but they still come out wrong. I will also need to make the background transparent so that the wall behind my sign shows and not the wall in the image because it will not match nor line up perfectly with the creative design of the wall.

Ken.
 
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USA Bricks are typically 7.65 inches long, so I counted the number of Bricks behind the sign in GE Street View to calculate the sign width.

USA Doors are typically 3 Feet wide and 7 Feet tall (but sometimes more or less).


Its probably best to remove the entire sign background and all shadows behind Arcs / Letters, as even a transparent Face may cause flickers.


FYI: I am doing a major repair and rebuild of my newest FS computer presently, and may not be able to run Sketchup or FS for a few days.

GaryGB
 
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GaryGB said:
USA Bricks are typically 7.65 inches long, so I counted the number of Bricks behind the sign in GE Street View to calculate the sign width.
Click to expand...

Oh, okay. I've done that myself.


GaryGB said:
Its probably best to remove the entire sign background and all shadows behind Arcs / Letters, as even a transparent Face may cause flickers.
Click to expand...

Yes, that's what I did. The letters and numbers are not too hard but I am having problems getting the lines to heal, that is, thin and not thick. Whenever the lines are thick and cannot be healed, you cannot make that selection and therefore cannot push or pull. I don't know why some of these lines are so hard to heal, even though the lines are perfectly straight. The major problem is getting the emblem outlined, the emblem that looks like a C. I don't know how that going to work out because it's not shaped linear. It has a unique shape and Circles and arcs used in Sketchup are linear.

GaryGB said:
FYI: I am doing a major repair and rebuild of my newest FS computer presently, and may not be able to run Sketchup or FS for a few days.
Click to expand...

Okay.

Ken.
 
IIRC, if one uses TIG's Weld plugin Ruby script it should join the individual Edge Poly-lines of the 'C' letter and Arcs in the sign so that a Face can be extruded.

IIRC, the Poly-line and Spline drawing plugin Ruby scripts I recently linked you to by TIG and Fredo6 may also form Faces for the 'C' letter and Arcs, that can be extruded if Edge vertices are coplanar.

There are other plugin Ruby scripts that can make a Face form if Edge vertices are coplanar.

A simple default Sketchup feature may also form a Face by drawing a Rectangle over the vertices of a Letter or Arc (I do not recall if one needs to drag the Mouse cursor to the Left or Right to get it to work better for this function); again, Edge vertices must be coplanar.

One must orient the grouped building's front wall Face on the Axes of the Sketchup 3D workspace in order for it to extrude in a true perpendicular direction.

GaryGB
 
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You can use Convertio to import a PNG or JPG version of their logo and it'll output a DXF. You can then import it into SketchUp. If you're using an older version, you can import the DXF into Blender and convert it to a DAE or OBJ and import it that way. If you have an SVG, you can import it into Blender and also convert it. Once you're in SketchUp, you can push/pull the logo and make it 3D. This is much simpler and saves time over tracing it by hand. Just be aware that for it to import to SketchUp, I believe you need to have faces and not just the curves/outlines, so you can create faces in Blender and then export it to a format SketchUp can import.
 
FlynZSky said:
You can use Convertio to import a PNG or JPG version of their logo and it'll output a DXF. You can then import it into SketchUp. If you're using an older version, you can import the DXF into Blender and convert it to a DAE or OBJ and import it that way. If you have an SVG, you can import it into Blender and also convert it. Once you're in SketchUp, you can push/pull the logo and make it 3D. This is much simpler and saves time over tracing it by hand. Just be aware that for it to import to SketchUp, I believe you need to have faces and not just the curves/outlines, so you can create faces in Blender and then export it to a format SketchUp can import.
Click to expand...

Hi FlynZSky,

I knew about using Convertio to import these files but I cannot import these type of files using Sketchup 17. Since you've posted that I can use Blender, I could import the DXF file into Blender, export it as a dae file, and then import it into Sketchup. But Blender does not have an import for DXF files listed under Import. I've even installed the latest version - 4.5, and it still does not show a DXF import. Apparently, there must be a plugin I need, and hope I can find one for my version of Sketchup. I was thinking that it was only available in the Pro versions of Sketchup. I'll check and see.

Ken.
 
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Well, it's just like I figured. I've googled if a dbx file was available for Sketcup 2017. It said the plugin was available for the free versions of Sketchup. I clicked on the link and downloaded the plugin extension. Sure enough, it's only available for the Pro versions of Sketchup, and there's no reason they can't make if available for the free versions of Sketchup, especially if that extension has been out since those days. This goes to show that one cannot rely on google searches. Now, I guess I have to rely on Blender but I have to get the extension, if it's available.

Ken.
 
kmanning said:
Well, it's just like I figured. I've googled if a dbx file was available for Sketcup 2017. It said the plugin was available for the free versions of Sketchup. I clicked on the link and downloaded the plugin extension. Sure enough, it's only available for the Pro versions of Sketchup, and there's no reason they can't make if available for the free versions of Sketchup, especially if that extension has been out since those days. This goes to show that one cannot rely on google searches. Now, I guess I have to rely on Blender but I have to get the extension, if it's available.

Ken.
Click to expand...
Hi Ken:

Perhaps you are typing the file extension incorrectly, as DBX is a code specifier used in SCASM / ASM files. :duck:

https://www.fsdeveloper.com/wiki/index.php/Flickering_ground_polygons_fix_(SCASM_tweak)


A number of DXF plugins are available for Sketchup 2017 Make (free):



A Raster-to-Vector tracing utility like Convertio can work, but manual tracing may be best, if one is going to display multiple local signs.

A sign ~ 13 Feet long seen at a distance from a user aircraft having lower LODs / MipMaps ...may not need many vertices in Poly-line Edges. ;)

GaryGB
 
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GaryGB said:
Hi Ken:

Perhaps you are typing the file extension incorrectly, as DBX is a code specifier used in SCASM / ASM files.
Click to expand...

If you're referring to google search, I typed it in as DXF for Sketchup 2017. After I've installed the plugin and imported a dxf file, it said it was for Sketchup Pro only.


GaryGB said:
A number of DXF plugins are available for Sketchup 2017 Make (free):
Click to expand...

I'll try the links. What I've typed should have found the one for Sketchup 2017.


Ken.
 
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I've searched everyone of the links and no plugin for Sketchup 2017 was found. At SketchUCation, it is no longer available. It appears to me that they want everyone to purchase the Pro version before having access to the plugin. I've done every search and has not found one.

Ken.
 
Hi,

The only thing I could find for Sketchup 2017 free make is the Universal Plugin, which includes the .dxf extension. I've tried it and it is really a lot more trouble than what it's worth. From what I've read, I would not have to worry with tracing in order to make a face and all I would need to do is to push-pull the faces, but that is not so. When I input the .dxf file, it had more holes than what I care to count. I would still have to retrace just about everything so that I can push-pull the faces. Some had dashed lines that I had to complete just to make a full face. I can use the polygon tool plugin in Sketchup and do the work in a lot let time than importing a .dxf file. Gary, you've said that manual tracing may be best, and you're right. Regarding the TIG Tool, I can't figure out how to use it. There are no instructions on how to use the tools in any of these plugins.

Ken.
 
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kmanning said:
Hi,

The only thing I could find for Sketchup 2017 free make is the Universal Plugin, which includes the .dxf extension. I've tried it and it is really a lot more trouble than what it's worth. From what I've read, I would not have to worry with tracing in order to make a face and all I would need to do is to push-pull the faces, but that is not so. When I input the .dxf file, it had more holes than what I care to count. I would still have to retrace just about everything so that I can push-pull the faces. Some had dashed lines that I had to complete just to make a full face. I can use the polygon tool plugin in Sketchup and do the work in a lot let time than importing a .dxf file. Gary, you've said that manual tracing may be best, and you're right.
Click to expand...

I'll check on DXF plugins available for Sketchup 2017 Make (free) Sunday as I make backups of my new computer's M.2 NVMe SSD drives.


In the mean time, some links:

https://www.google.com/search?q=Ske...HBDYuMTG4B_UNwgcFMy05LjjIB6IC&sclient=gws-wiz

https://sketchucation.com/pluginstore?listtype=1&author=0&category=0&search=DXF&submit=?

https://forums.sketchup.com/t/import-dwg-or-dxf-files-in-sketchup-make/14489

https://forums.sketchup.com/t/dxf-to-push-pull/15242


One may also consider the option to utilize a closely-related CAD file format: the DWG:

https://sketchucation.com/pluginstore?pln=tt_architect_tools


kmanning said:
Regarding the TIG Tool, I can't figure out how to use it. There are no instructions on how to use the tools in any of these plugins.
Click to expand...


I'll have to install Sketchup on my rebuilt computer that has little more than Windows 10 on it's (4) SATA-III SSD drive 1TB RAID-0 so far.

Then I'll have to tinker with TIG's plugins to refresh my memory (assuming you refer to drawing and welding features of TIG's plugins).

GaryGB
 
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