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Is maxwell 2.7.5 compatible with Sketchup 2013

Posted: Thu May 01, 2014 10:18 pm
by crcgrp
This is what I have now at work and I am having some really weird texture issues.

Fire usually works, but when I export to render, some textures go to grey.
These are textures within sketchup, not linked MXM.

Also, clip maps don't seem to be work, the image in the clip just goes to green.

Re: Is maxwell 2.7.5 compatible with Sketchup 2013

Posted: Thu May 01, 2014 10:39 pm
by JDHill
Yes, it (2.7.25 is the actual plugin version) is compatible with SU2013. Regarding the issues you mention, what do you find if you export to Studio and look at the materials & textures that are being written?

Re: Is maxwell 2.7.5 compatible with Sketchup 2013

Posted: Thu May 01, 2014 11:08 pm
by crcgrp
It's a sketchup linked image, but it doesn't seem like the linked image is exporting, its not there in studio

but sometimes in fire it works

Re: Is maxwell 2.7.5 compatible with Sketchup 2013

Posted: Thu May 01, 2014 11:23 pm
by JDHill
It sounds like a case where SketchUp is either failing to write the image, or is writing a corrupted one. You will find the written images (the ones contained inside the SKP file) in the /textures folder, next to the output MXS.

Re: Is maxwell 2.7.5 compatible with Sketchup 2013

Posted: Thu May 01, 2014 11:38 pm
by crcgrp
Yes, it looks like it is not being exported. Any idea why?

Re: Is maxwell 2.7.5 compatible with Sketchup 2013

Posted: Fri May 02, 2014 1:16 am
by JDHill
I couldn't say, but I've seen it quite a few times (most often with geo-location maps from Google, it seems) before -- it may help to use the "Edit texture image in external editor" button in SketchUp, save the image somewhere, possibly using a different format, and then re-assign the newly-saved image.

Re: Is maxwell 2.7.5 compatible with Sketchup 2013

Posted: Fri May 02, 2014 2:49 am
by crcgrp
It is a geo-location image. and I did use the edit button, and saved it to an actual location. I also exploded the image and pulled it down to make a volume.
It's weird. I didn't try with a different file type or name. I'll try that tomorrow.

Thanks

Re: Is maxwell 2.7.5 compatible with Sketchup 2013

Posted: Mon May 05, 2014 11:32 pm
by crcgrp
So, I have opened the image in photoshop and saved it to different formats and with different names and it still won't export/render. Any idea why this is happening?

Re: Is maxwell 2.7.5 compatible with Sketchup 2013

Posted: Mon May 05, 2014 11:40 pm
by JDHill
I really have no way of guessing about that. The plugin asks SketchUp to write the image to disk, and if it fails, it fails (I more commonly see that on OSX than Windows, incidentally, though I'm not sure why it should be so). When you say you're saving it with different formats & names, you do mean that after doing so, you replace the texture in the SketchUp material, correct? And that you then save the SKP file, and then re-open it? Just to be sure the new image is actually being put into the SKP. Another idea, if a long shot: have you tried resizing the image before reassigning it? Have you tried using a completely different image, to confirm that it's related to the image, and not somehow to the material itself? You could always try creating a new material from scratch. But I'm just shooting in the dark here, since like I say, it's something that lies outside the plugin's domain.

Re: Is maxwell 2.7.5 compatible with Sketchup 2013

Posted: Tue May 06, 2014 12:41 am
by crcgrp
I've tried pretty much all of the above. I think maybe the size of the image is too big to export?
I opened a new model and made a small square and applied the same image to it, import image as texture. and it renders.

Re: Is maxwell 2.7.5 compatible with Sketchup 2013

Posted: Tue May 06, 2014 9:40 am
by numerobis
i had this problem too recently. A sketchup texture was not exported no matter how i saved it in PS. I only got the constant colour in the render.
I solved it by creating an MXM.

(SU 8/ Plugin 3.0.5)

Re: Is maxwell 2.7.5 compatible with Sketchup 2013

Posted: Tue May 06, 2014 7:08 pm
by crcgrp
creating a basic MXM with the google earth image worked. But now, the trees i use, that have clipmap branches/leaves, don't work.

Does this have something to do with the new "Material Assistant"

Will I need to make MXM of each of the branches/trees to be able to use them in maxwell?

Re: Is maxwell 2.7.5 compatible with Sketchup 2013

Posted: Tue May 06, 2014 7:20 pm
by JDHill
It is not possible to answer that without more information. If you want to upload or email (jeremy at nextlimit dotcom) a SKP with some of these leaves in it, I'll take a look.

Re: Is maxwell 2.7.5 compatible with Sketchup 2013

Posted: Tue May 06, 2014 7:23 pm
by crcgrp
I'll email you a tree. and it's weird, because it works in Fire, sometimes. But sketchup isn't exporting the tree texture.

Re: Is maxwell 2.7.5 compatible with Sketchup 2013

Posted: Tue May 06, 2014 7:58 pm
by JDHill
Thanks, but unfortunately, I have not yet been able to observe any failure with these files. It will not be anything related to material assistants, as the materials being used are all still just using default settings. Whatever the cause for the failure, it is always an option, short of actually creating & linking an MXM, to assign the desired texture directly in the plugin's material editor, by setting Texture > Source to Use Specific Texture, and browsing to the file:
  • Image