AC 21 to SKP 2017 texture size problem

[Anonymous]

Hi all, sorry for bugging you guys again, but i really appreciate if someone can have a look at this weird problem i just stumbled upon, might help others too.

My office currently working on a job that requires me to save my AC21 model as SKP file. The resulting skp file would then be rendered by one of our colleague using other rendering program (Vray).

I checked the model to make sure everything is ok but then i noticed that the texture is Ok but the size is all 2.54 cm x 2.54 cm (1x1").

When my colleague tried to apply the same texture to newly created element in skp (for example, he added a simple rectangular plane), the texture would be very very tiny.

apparently the AC 21 to SKP export function scaled all faces by some factors.

Does anyone here have a clue on how to reset the scale of all the exported faces in SKP so that it would be set to scale according to the texture size in archicad (i.e. a 100 x 100 cm brick wall in AC21 should generate a 100 x 100 cm brick wall texture in skp)

thanks in advance
best regards
-John

[Anonymous]

Pin up for this issue. Still not solved in AC22.

[Erwin Edel]

We had a temp guy here years ago who swore by sketchup+vray for renders and I believe we had similar issues. I think we may have solved it by exporting to 3DS and importing that to Sketchup, but since it's been 5-6 years, my memory is a bit hazy.

[Daniel Kovacs]

Hello All,

I saw this thread, and took a look into the issue. Here is what I found.

So, ARCHICAD (like most other apps) is using the SketchUp API kit to export the model to SKP format. We provide the model to the API in the format it requires, and then the API does the rest. This means we have little control over how the conversion happens.

Based on what I saw during my tests and inspecting the API, it seems the textures are exported in a unit size (so the textures go out as 1x1 unit squares), and then individually stretched on each surface. I think this happens, because the way SketchUp handles surfaces is different than how other apps do. What I mean, is that the way a brick surface is applied to a wall, a slab, and maybe something curved, is different in ARCHICAD, but all work with our surface system/logic, but in order for SketchUp to do the same, it would need to create a separate texture for each (so there could be 5 separate brick textures that actually look the same). So, in order to keep it consistent, it creates a single texture, and the size and positioning is custom for each model surface.

Now, I think this makes sense (and we have no control over it), but the real problem I see with this situation right now, is that even if you work in Metric units in ARCHICAD (e.g. Meters), the model goes out in Imperial to SketchUp (Feet & Inches). In this case, it makes sense why the unit of textures is 1x1 inches, but I would expect that if I work in Meters, the model should export in meters, and so the Textures should also be 1x1 Meters.

I have let the developers know about this, and they are looking into whether we can control the units during the export (task #265120 in our system). I hope this can be worked out.

As a workaround, I like what Erwin suggested. If you export into a different format, the textures are exported differently, and if SketchUp supports the import of that format, it might handle the texture sizes better.

Regards,