Sketchup Materials again?

[mailee]

I have downloaded some wood JPEGs and am trying to use them in Sketchup. I have got them into the materials browser but the grain is too big. I have opened the editor but each time I try to alter the aspect ratio it wont let me?? I double click on the 'chain' and it breaks but when I move the cursor it closes again?? Can anyone help? :?

 

[SketchUp Guru]

Do you want to change the aspect ratio on the materials? Or do you just want to change the overall size? What operating system are you running? Are the materials in your In Model materials library or in another library? How did you go about importing them? Seems I have more questions than do you.

FWIW, when I import materials into SketchUp, I draw rectangles of the desired size at least in one direction. Then, when I import the material, I apply it to the face so it fills to that length or width. For example, the attached wood material is of a board that is 8 feet long. I don't know off hand what the width is on this particular one but I don't really care. I would draw a rectangle that is 8 feet long and perhaps 8 or 10 inches wide. Then I would drag out the material to the 8 foot length and let the width fall where it will. This eliminates the need to do any scaling of the materials in the browser. All of my good wood grain images seem to fall in the 8-14 foot long range and when I am importing them I'll make up a bunch of faces of the needed lengths for applying them.

 

[mailee]

Hi Dave and thanks for replying. It is the grain of the wood that I want to alter. If I pull the material out to cover the size I need say 6' length and 4" wide the grain is too big. I have some pictures of woods that I downloaded off the internet and I added them to the materials wood library using the materials browser. I have added them to the wood library and not into the model library as I thought they would be useful for using in other designs too. I am running Windows XP on both of the computers I use. My Sketchup is the free version 7. HTH.

 

[SketchUp Guru]

How did you go about adding the image files to the Wood library?

To edit the images they need to be in an In Model library. Then you should be able to edit them and change the aspect ratio. Of course that won't really make the wood grain the right side. It'll just make it appear stretched. In some cases that can work well enough to give the idea.

So apply the materials to either your model making sure you are applying them to faces and not to components. Open the components before applying the materials. Then switch to the In Model library in your Materials browser and edit the materials there. If you want to save the editing, open the secondary pane (little plus icon in the top right of the browser. Set the Secondary pane to The Woods library. Then click and drag the thumbnail from the top pane to the bottom pane. Unless you change the name of the material you'll be prompted to approve replacing the existing material with the new one.

 

[mailee]

I have just tried to alter the image after importing it into the model but it still didn't work I am afraid Dave. If I click on the chain link it breaks but as soon as I move the cursor it connects again?? I did manage to stretch the image to something like the size I wanted and saved it and then dragged it into the woods library so I can use it again but it still isnt the correct size. I then tried to rotate the image to the horizontal and save this in the wood library but when I did it also rotated the material in the model? Oh and sorry for the late reply but my internet has been down.