« Predict how much solar power your house could generate | Main | New Google Earth Imagery - January 23 »
January 21, 2011
Make your SketchUp models more realistic with Shaderlight
We've been big fans of Google SketchUp, since before they purchased it (and made it free) back in 2006. Every year we've seen improvements made to the product and last September saw the release of SketchUp 8, with a handful of excellent new features.
One of the great features of SketchUp is the many plugins that it supports. One of the newer plugins on the block is called Shaderlight and it's quite amazing. It's one of a variety of products that help turn your SketchUp rendering into a very photorealistic image. For some examples, check out the images below which were both created by "Sully114":
Boat Interior
Villa Interior
Those photos are very impressive, and the Shaderlight folks have put together a video to show you how it works. It's a great demo of the system, showing how powerful it is and yet how easy it is to use.
As with most products like this, you can try out a free version of it to see how well you like it, and then upgrade to the Pro version ($199) if you're wanting more out of it.
Posted by mickmel at January 21, 2011 10:00 AM
Comments
Posted by: Craig Stanton at January 23, 2011 2:46 PM
Download the trial version of Shaderlight...then download a free program called Kerkythea.
Compare the two
I tried both and was really impressed by Kerkythea.
I actually thought it did a better job than Shaderlight...although Shaderlight's trial version does have many functions disabled.
Nice thing about Kerkythea is that it is free
Also 3rd party developers have created lots of interesting models and textures that you can also download for free
Posted by: Brad Naksuthin at November 6, 2011 11:24 AM
Kerkythea is also available in Mac and Windows..for free.
I do think Shaderlight is also Mac enabled...at least the trial version was for me
Posted by: Ernie Geefay at November 6, 2011 11:27 AM
Post a comment:
NOTE: Please use English. Comments are moderated.
Man, I was super excited about this, until I read that the plugin was Windows only at this stage. It looks super realistic. Since you've got your eye on this, can you do a repost when they publish the Mac version.