Site Context and Terrain
Site Context and 3D Terrain
Using real-world terrain for site context can help you fully visualize your model. That said, sometimes real-world terrain may not be what fits your unique vision. In either case, take a look at these articles to get started importing or creating your own site context:
- Site Context with Add Location
- Creating 3D Terrain
- Sculpting and Fine Tuning Terrain
- Placing Models and Objects on Terrain
- Terrain Visibility
How SketchUp uses Add Location data
Imagery Tiles to SketchUp Materials
After importing from data with Add Location, SketchUp merges the 256 x 256 pixel map tiles into larger sized images, creating SketchUp .skm files. These files are similar to the Materials applied by the Paint Bucket tool.
In order to display the Add Location imagery at full resolution, it's often necessary to break a site up into images that can be handled by your graphics hardware. The maximum size image for SketchUp materials depends on your graphics card. This can range from about 1024 pixels square up to 3072 pixels square. If you need to edit the imagery file inside the .skm files, keep in mind that you might have to edit multiple images. For more information on editing SketchUp Materials files see Editing Materials in Adding Colors and Textures with Materials.
Importing Large Amounts of Data
Importing lots of tiles can quickly add several dozen all the way up to several hundreds of Mb worth of imagery data to your model. In order to keep SketchUp performing well, think about what resolutions you might need. For example you might want to import a small region at very high resolution and use lower resolution data for the outer regions of your site. Adding imagery and information to your model may reduce SketchUp’s performance. See Improving Performance in SketchUp for information to help keep your model running as smooth as possible.
