Sketchup + Lumion + V-ray : Full Course for Architects

Open SketchUp to explore the modeling environment, templates, unit settings, and basic tools. Navigate the orbit, pan, and measure with the bottom toolbar, and access menus and plugins like V-Ray.

Explore the left toolbar in SketchUp, enabling the large toolset, shadows, styles, and V-Ray plugins. Draw lines along the red, green, and blue axes to form surfaces.

Master Sketchup selection techniques and shortcuts, including customizing preferences and using escape to cancel commands. Use left-to-right versus right-to-left selection to control which lines get selected.

Draw rectangles with the instance rectangle tool in Sketchup, adjust size by value, and manage them with groups and explode while following the golden section.

Learn to draw circles and arcs in SketchUp by setting center and radius, adjusting segments, and creating curves with point-based methods—including start, middle, end points and polygon-in-circle techniques.

Move drawn shapes in sketchup, place them on surfaces, and push/pull to extrude ten meters into 3d volumes; rotate groups along blue and green axes and orbit to view.

Explore scale, offset, and follow me in sketchup to shape volumes, pipes, and spheres along paths, with axis scaling, radius control, and hiding lines for precise modeling.

Measure with tape and line tools to set dimensions between points, define a 90-degree angle, add editable 3d text, adjust origin and axis, and orbit, pan, and zoom to review.

Position a human camera to walk through the SketchUp scene and analyze viewpoints, then use the section plane to cut, move, rotate, and reverse direction for volume analysis.

Explore SketchUp's options and preferences menu to customize defaults, manage entity info, materials, styles, shadows, and dimensions, set autosave, backups, shortcuts, and display options.

Explore entity info and the default tray to view properties of surfaces and lines, including area and materials. Learn how components and layers work, and when to use make unique.

Learn to use Sketchup styles to customize scenes, edges, colors, and backgrounds, and organize your work with tags and layers for precise visualization.

Master scene management in Sketchup with Lumion/V-Ray, adding and updating views, and using sun shadows. Learn to apply soften edges for smooth, soft surfaces and coplanar effects.

Learn how to use tags in SketchUp to organize geometry, assign walls and floors to tags, color by tag, and control visibility and line styles by tag.

Learn to draw a handmade floor plan in SketchUp, using offset to create 20 cm walls, add openings, and switch to a top view with parallel camera.

Create and export animations in SketchUp by organizing scenes as animation paths, adjusting frame rate and looping, then save the file to desktop and preview with moving shadows and sun.

Learn to model stairs in SketchUp using the 1001 bit tools plugin, setting width, tread depth, and riser height, then build lighter, spiral, or escalator stairs.

Learn to create windows, doors, and meshes in the plugin by entering dimensions, selecting surfaces, and applying frames or glass to quickly build a variety of profiles and angles.

Learn to create window frames, panels, and screens with Sketchup plugins, adjusting extension depth and frame width, then shape roofs and edges with curves, fillets, and chamfers.

Prepare SketchUp models for Lumion by separating parts with color, assigning materials as instances, and exporting to Lumion to enable GPU-based rendering, lighting control, animations, and virtual tours.

Navigate Lumion with wasd and right-click to move and orbit, using the left and right menus for modeling, render, and settings, while tuning editor quality, resolution, and proxies, 360 panoramas.

Place and adjust a lamp in the scene, set brightness and core angle, toggle visibility, use target light and library options, and randomize rotation or size for landscape placement.

Learn to use area and line lights in SketchUp with Lumion/V‑Ray, adjusting brightness, width, length, and falloff, plus precise movement and copying with Alt and Shift.

Explore standard material settings in SketchUp with Lumion/V-Ray, including offset, orientation, emissive, saturation, and transparency, and learn texture movement, rotation, edge smoothing, weathering, leaves, and flicker to fix overlaps.

Explore lumion material library options for stone, glass, and metal, selecting indoor or outdoor stones like travertine and marble, and refine color, texture, and reflections with edit material.

Create landscapes in Lumion by shaping terrain, raising hills, adding water and lakes, applying ocean mode, painting with street maps, placing plants with scalable sizes, and undo changes when needed.

Use two point perspective and real skies to adjust heading, sun angle, brightness, and cloud styles for realistic renders with real-time previews of focal length and camera height.

Control sharpen, exposure, and color correction to refine rendering, keeping sharpen at 0.1 and exposure at 0.5, then adjust temperature, tint, vibrance, brightness, saturation, and gamma correction for realism.

Enable and manage reflections in Sketchup with Lumion, balance high quality and normal quality to handle heavy projects, adjust reflection planes for glass and surfaces, and copy settings between views.

Explore orthographic view in Lumion to show models in isometric perspective with adjustable angles and zoom, and apply depth of field for foreground and background blur.

Explore sun and lighting effects in sketchup with lumion, adjusting sun height to influence skylight, choosing real sky or sun, and applying god rays and volumetric lighting for dramatic renders.

Explore sky weather effects in SketchUp with Lumion, including precipitation, rain or snow, fog, moon fog, and aurora; adjust rain amount and phase, and leverage camera shake and vertical rendering.

Create a 360 panorama by selecting a position and height, then build a 3d tour with 360-degree views, apply effects, and publish via a vr editor website.

Apply animation effects from the modeling environment to the model, adding sun rays. Move characters and cars with keyframes, set end positions, and enable motion blur for the entire movie.

Install the V-Ray plugin for SketchUp 2022, complete setup, and enable V-Ray toolbars, lights, objects, and utilities. Prepare for the V-Ray Asset Editor in the next lesson.

Adjust diffuse color, change and replace textures, and balance reflection, glossiness, refraction, and bump on V-Ray materials in SketchUp, using a concrete example to illustrate surface realism.

Create realistic grass by applying diffuse, bump (as normal map), and displacement maps in V-Ray, assign textures via the asset editor, adjust height and density, and preview with interactive rendering.

Download free PBR materials from polygon.com and apply them in SketchUp with V-Ray, using diffuse, reflection color, reflection glossiness, bump, and displacement maps, adjust displacement, then render.

Learn how to set up dome light and HDRI images in V-Ray for SketchUp, including selecting HDR skies, adjusting intensity and exposure, and mood lighting with rectangle lights.

Explore vray artificial lights, including rectangle, sphere, and spotlights, plus IES patterns, adjusting color, Kelvin temperature, exposure, and intensity; create luminous materials for lamp shades and screens.

Provide a Lumion tip for architects, as part of the SketchUp + Lumion + V-ray course, and end with a music outro.