Fixed the shadow bug!

Earlier today, we announced a maintenance release for Google SketchUp 8 (free and Pro) that is a free upgrade for all SketchUp 8 users. One of the bugs we’ve fixed is the oldest and thorniest in our bug tracker. Most folks call it the “Shadow Bug.”

Let’s roll back the clock a little bit before I explain the fix. In the spring of 2001, we introduced real-time volumetric shadow rendering in SketchUp 1.1. At the time, only video games were really doing this sort of rendering, and it was pretty exciting to see shadows cast from a model that you made yourself. When I got my first demo, I declared them to be the most “Undeniably Sexy” thing that I had seen all week. It was shortly after that that I left my day job to join @Last Software – SketchUp was clearly something that I had to be a part of.

Awesome though shadows were in most cases, there was a fatal flaw. When the camera passed inside a shadow volume, there were places where the rendering algorithm just plain fell flat on its face – leading to flashy, jagged and just plain wrong-looking shadows from some points of view. Unfortunately, there wasn’t any obvious way around that problem.

In the SketchUp 3 and 4 release cycles (launched in July of 2004), we worked on this problem some more and found a new algorithm that looked promising. Unfortunately, we found that this algorithm, while usually better when the camera was inside the shadow volume, failed even more spectacularly than our original algorithm in other common uses. Admitting temporary defeat, we pulled the new algorithm out and went back to the drawing board again.

Hero engineer sporting early @Last Software t-shirt

As I’ve often said when asked about “the shadow bug”, the only way we’d be able to fix it is if we came up with a clever new algorithm. As luck will have it, one of our engineers (the same guy who implemented the original shadow rendering ten years ago) never quite gave up on the problem. And a few weeks ago, he figured out a new solution. Just like that. I’m proud to say we’ve (finally) fixed shadow rendering for all those cases where the camera was inside the shadow volume and included it as a part of today’s maintenance release. Need a visual? Here’s a video that shows the our new and improved shadow rendering at work:

There’s lots of other good bug fixes in M1, and it is both free and recommended for all users. Here's how to make sure you have the latest version of SketchUp 8:

Windows: Choose Help > Check for Update
Mac: Choose SketchUp > Check Web for Update

Source: Official Google Sketchup Blog

An important update for SketchUp 8

Sometimes a haiku says it best:

new SketchUp version
shadows work much better now
farewell artifacts!

You'll want to download today's free update for SketchUp 8 as soon as possible. It contains (among a great many other things) fixes for for raster image export at high resolutions on Windows, and for the dreaded Shadow Bug. If you listen carefully, you can hear the sound of millions of modelers uncorking Champagne to celebrate. Believe me – we're thrilled, too.

Here's an overly-dramatic video that shows the Shadow Bug fix in living color.

Augmented Reality for SketchUp

The first time I saw Augmented Reality in action, I wondered if I'd accidentally fallen through a wormhole on the way to work; it's the kind of thing you'd expect to see on Boba Fett’s BlackBerry. AR is downright futuristic.

In the 3D modeling sense, AR involves combining a live video stream with a 3D model to create the illusion that the model is a physical object in the real world. All you need is a webcam (the ones that are built in to many laptops work just fine), a 3D model (SketchUp takes care of that), a printed-out paper "target" and a piece of AR software that can put everything together. This video shows AR in action:

DoubleCAD XT and SketchUp

Having been here for almost seven years, I've concluded that there are as many SketchUp workflows as there are SketchUp users. Trying to recommend a single catch-all combination of tools and methods is like stapling Jell-O to a piece of paper — difficult, messy and ill-advised. When tools like DoubleCAD XT (and DoubleCAD XT Pro) from IMSI/Design come along, things get a little easier to explain.

Most SketchUp modelers who design things for a living spend their time somewhere between the second and third dimensions. Models are 3D, but construction (or fabrication) requires 2D documents. Often, those 2D drawings are too complex to use LayOut in SketchUp Pro to make; LayOut isn't a dedicated drafting tool, after all.

A SketchUp model imported into DoubleCAD XT Pro

New SketchUp 8 book in Portuguese

We know from examining our charts and graphs that the good people of Brazil are crazy about SketchUp. We can officially add 3D modeling to the long, long list of things for which that country is famous.

The first book about Google SketchUp 8 is now available, and it’s in Portuguese. Written by architect João Gaspar, Google SketchUp Pro 8 passo a passo was launched in Sao Paolo on December 3rd, 2010. It’s the author’s third book about SketchUp; he also wrote volumes about SketchUp 6 and 7.

Source: Official Google Sketchup Blog

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