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LayOut
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Adding Tables to a Document
Whether you’re an architect, woodworker, or engineer — basically, anyone who creates construction documents — you probably need to add tables to those documents. With LayOut’s table feature, you can create and edit tables of text in LayOut or import table data from an Excel file (.xlsx) or a .csv file.
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Adding Text, Labels, and Dimensions
Although LayOut has only a slim chance of moonlighting with an illusionist act in Las Vegas, LayOut’s text isn’t always what it seems.
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Adding and Editing Keyboard Shortcuts
Keyboard shortcuts let you customize LayOut to work more efficiently. Through the Shortcuts section of the LayOut Preferences dialog box, you can:View LayOut commands and shortcutsFind specific commandsAdd or edit a shortcutDelete shortcutsLayOut includes the following default shortcuts:
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Applying SketchUp Styles
SketchUp styles bundle preset line widths, colors, materials, and other similar effects. In LayOut, you can change a SketchUp model’s style in the styles section of the SketchUp Model panel.
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Applying Styles
With LayOut’s Style tool (), you can sample the style settings applied to one entity and apply those same settings to another entity.To apply a style from one entity to another, follow these steps:
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Arranging, Moving, Rotating, and Scaling Entities
To create a professional document, entities need to be arranged and sized just right. LayOut offers several tools to help you manipulate the entities in your document with precision.Using a GridLayOut documents include a grid that you can toggle on or off to help you align entities on a page.
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Automating Title Block Text with Auto-Text Tags
LayOut's Auto-Text generates title block text like dates, page numbers, or other custom text that you define. Auto-Text tags help improve accuracy and can even save some time.
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Bending Lines and Shapes with Paths and Points
In LayOut, you can bend lines and shapes - no telekinetic powers required! All you need is LayOut's path editor. Okay, that might be a tiny fib. You need the path editor and a little knowledge about editing vector graphics and Bézier curves.
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Choosing Colors
In LayOut, whenever you click a color swatch (like the swatches in the Shape Style panel) or select Window > Colors, LayOut transports you to the Colors panel, where you have a half dozen ways to choose and organize the colors for your LayOut document.
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Copying and Pasting, Locking, Erasing, and Other Editing Tasks
Most applications have a few editing commands in common (copy, cut, paste, undo, and delete), and LayOut is definitely part of that crowd. Moreover, the way these commands work is similar to, if not the same as, other applications.Cutting, copying, and pasting elements in the drawing areaIn LayOut, you have several
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Create a PDF
When you export a PDF of a document, LayOut creates a single PDF file that contains your document pages. To export your document as a PDF, follow these steps:Select File > Export.
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Creating Arcs
Tip: Inserted SketchUp files can now contain Dashed Lines, to learn more about managing those new line types with inserted files, see Working with SketchUp Dashes in Imported ModelsWhether you want to draw the long arc of history or just a precise section of a circle, LayOut has four arc tools that enable you to draw
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Creating Documents in LayOut
LayOut is packed with tools and features to help you create high-quality documents and presentations of your SketchUp models.
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Creating Panel Trays
LayOut’s panels contain a wide range of features and options to help you create and fine tune your documents. The following panels are available:
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Creating a LayOut Document
The first thing you will see when opening LayOut is the Welcome Window. The Welcome Window is where you can create new files from templates and continue work on ongoing projects.
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Creating a Scaled Drawing
Within a group, you can apply a scale to a 2D drawing so that all geometry in that group reflects the selected scale. This geometry includes all native LayOut entity types.
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Creating a Template in LayOut
If you consistently work from a customized LayOut document design, you can save your basic document framework as a template. Templates are also a great way to ensure documents use the same company branding, titleblocks, or project elements.
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Customizing Line Widths and Styles
Tip: Inserted SketchUp files can now contain Dashed Lines, to learn more about managing those new line types with inserted files, see Working with SketchUp Dashes in Imported Models In LayOut, you can customize the color, width, style, and end points for lines, arcs, and freehand lines as well as strokes on shapes
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Customizing Toolbars and Menus
The default toolbar is designed to help you get started with LayOut. After you use LayOut for a while, you may want to customize the default toolbar or create your own toolbars to better match your workflows.Customizing a ToolbarFollow the instructions appropriate to your operating system to customize your
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Customizing the Interface and Setting Preferences
Everyone who uses LayOut uses it a little bit differently. The folks who developed LayOut understand that and created options that enable you to customize how the interface looks and works:
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Document Setup
After you create a new document in LayOut, you may want to check and adjust your settings in the Document Setup dialog box. Each section of Document Setup contains options to help you configure your document.
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Drawing Basic Lines
Tip: Inserted SketchUp files can now contain Dashed Lines, to learn more about managing those new line types with inserted files, see Working with SketchUp Dashes in Imported ModelsTo draw the most basic lines in your LayOut document, you can use the orderly Line tool to draw straight lines or its freewheeling cousin
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Drawing Lines and Shapes
LayOut's line and shape tools make it easy to draw visual elements that give your document a polished look.With the tools available in LayOut, you can better organize the content on each page of your document.Learn more about drawing with LayOut’s line and shape tools with these articles:
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Drawing a Circle or Ellipse
The LayOut Circle () and Ellipse () tools let you draw circles and ellipses. These tools appear in both the Main and Drawing toolbars. You can also access the tools by selecting Tools > Circles from the menu and clicking the tool you would like to use.
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Export as Image Files
When you export a document as a series of images, LayOut exports each document page as a separate image file, in either .jpg or .png format. To export as a series of images, follow these steps:
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Exporting CAD Data from LayOut
DWG and DXF are file formats that open in popular CAD programs. When exporting documents with SketchUp viewports to DWG or DXF, there are a few things to keep in mind:
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Exporting or Printing Your LayOut Document
After you work hard to create and polish a LayOut document, you want your document to go out into the world and make its mark. You can present your work on-screen, but that isn't always enough. Here are other ways you can share your document:
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Extracting Source Content from a LayOut File
Creating a LayOut document is mostly about bringing content into your document. But if you ever want to reuse or update a document’s referenced content in another format or program (and you don’t have the original file or updated the content after you imported it into your document), you can extract any file that your
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Filling Shapes with Colors and Patterns
Do your shapes seem a little empty inside? To help your ideas stand out on-screen, use LayOut's Fill features to add a pop of color, and use the Pattern features to create hatches, which symbolize materials in architectural drawings, as shown in the following figure.
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Formatting Text
Dressing up your text can add that extra professional touch to your LayOut document. For example, you might match the fonts and colors to your company’s or your client’s branding. And you definitely want to size the text so it’s easy to read.
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General
The options in the General tab can change some of the basic functions available in your LayOut documents. Auto-RendererThe Auto-Renderer section helps you control what happens with the SketchUp models in your LayOut document.
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Grouping Entities
In LayOut, groups are a way to keep related elements organized in the drawing area. Groups can also make selecting and copying multiple elements easier. For example, if you know you'll always want to select a text box and a shape together, make it a group so you just need to select it once.
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Importing CAD Data into LayOut
Computer Aided Design (CAD) is a general term describing software used to create, modify, analyze, or optimize 2D or 3D designs. LayOut's CAD file importer is a flexible tool that helps you import the data you need from CAD files and work with that data in different ways.
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Importing a SketchUp Model
LayOut is mainly for showing off your SketchUp models. To insert a SketchUp model into a LayOut document, follow these steps:
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Inserting Images
Images can enhance your LayOut documents all sorts of ways, from a photorealistic rendering of a proposed design to a small branding element like a logo. The following table outlines the file formats that LayOut supports. You can insert an image file in any of these formats into your document.
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Introducing the LayOut Interface
The LayOut interface contains the tools and features you need to create 2D documents and presentations from your 3D models. LayOut and SketchUp are made to work together.
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Labeling Items in Your Document
With LayOut's Label tool (), you create a label entity with a text box, a line (technically called a leader), and an arrow or endpoint pointing to a specific item in the drawing area. The following figure illustrates a few ways you can customize labels:
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LayOut and SketchUp Pro are designed to work together.After you insert a SketchUp models into a LayOut document, you can design the document to highlight your 3D model's best features.
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LayOut Tools
The default toolbar contains the most often used tools. To help you understand what tools are available and how to use them, take a look at the following table:
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Making Rectangles
Tip: Inserted SketchUp files can now contain Dashed Lines, to learn more about managing those new line types with inserted files, see Working with SketchUp Dashes in Imported ModelsRectangles are simple shapes, but for those of you who like pizzaz in your rectangles, LayOut has four rectangle tools.
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Making a Clipping Mask
You can mask out a portion of a model or image by creating a clipping mask. When you create a clipping mask, you see only the portion of the model or image that appears within a shape. To create a clipping mask, follow these steps:
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Managing Changes and Updates to SketchUp Files
Although LayOut enables you to edit view and style settings without switching back to SketchUp, LayOut doesn't enable you to edit the actual model. For that, you must open the model file in SketchUp.When you need to edit the geometry or other SketchUp-only features, LayOut does make it easy to open a model in SketchUp
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Managing and Navigating Pages
You can create as many pages as your document needs and manage them all right from the Pages panel. The Pages menu also has commands to create and navigate pages.The Pages panel contains the following options to help manage your pages:
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Marking Dimensions
LayOut's Linear Dimension () and Angular Dimension () tools can label a distance or angle. In the following figure, you see an example of a linear and an angular dimension.
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Offsetting a Line or Shape
The Offset tool enables you to offset a line or shape quickly and easily.For example, perhaps you're a graphic designer who needs to outline a complex shape or an architect who needs to offset a footer in a foundation plan.
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Performance
The Performance section is full of options that can help you adjust the way LayOut handles graphics to improve overall performance.
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Perspective and Scale
A SketchUp model’s view can affect both perspective and scale. You can choose any of SketchUp’s standard views in LayOut in the SketchUp Model panel under Camera. By default, most SketchUp models are in Perspective view. Changing to Parallel Projection, an orthographic view, can better show a model’s scale.
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Presenting Your LayOut Document
To access LayOut’s presentation features, select View > Start Presentation or click the Start Presentation tool () on the default toolbar. Your document becomes full screen, and you have access to the following presentation features:
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Printing Your Document
Sometimes it can be handy to print your document onto actual, physical paper. To print your document, follow these steps:Select File > Page Setup.
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Rendering Models
When you make changes to a SketchUp model in your document you may need to render that model before it reflects those changes. You can control how and when LayOut renders your SketchUp models in the Viewport section of the SketchUp Model panel.
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Saving a LayOut Document
To save your LayOut document, follow these steps:If this is the first time saving your document, select File > Save or File > Save As.Navigate to the location on your hard drive where you want to save the document.In the File Name box, type a name for your document.Click Save.LayOut uses an auto-save function and
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Selecting Scenes
SketchUp scenes help you save a specific view of a model. If you have more than one scene saved to a model you can switch between them within its viewport.To change a SketchUp model’s scene from the SketchUp model Panel:
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Selecting Things
To select an on-screen element in LayOut, you just click it with the Select tool (). You can then move, resize, rotate, or otherwise edit the selection. If only changing an actual building were that easy! Like SketchUp, LayOut has a few tricks for selecting multiple entities, too:
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Setting Preferences
LayOut’s Preferences dialog contains options that can help you customize LayOut in a way that works best for you. Each section of Preferences covers a different set of options.
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Shaping Polygons
A polygon is a piece of geometry where three or more straight lines join at endpoints to create shapes. The number of the lines determines the shape. For example, a pentagon is a polygon with five sides while a polygon with six sides is a hexagon.LayOut’s Polygon tool () enables you to draw a polygon with three or more
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SketchUp Model Effects
SketchUps Environments, Shadows, and Ambient Occlusion effects add detail and depth to a model. You can use the Effects section of the SketchUp Model panel to adjust all of these settings.EnvironmentsEnvironments add a panoramic background and image-based lighting conditions to a Sketchup model, providing real-world
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SketchUp Models in LayOut
SketchUp and LayOut are designed to work together. When you bring a Sketchup model into your LayOut document you can make changes to that model without going back to SketchUp. You can then sync up both your LayOut document and SketchUp file, sharing changes across both.
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Splitting and Joining to Create Complex Shapes
The Join () and Split tools () work together to help you create more complex lines and shapes by altering those you have already added to your document.To split a line or shape:
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Typing, Importing, and Changing Text
Although documents tend to include more visual elements than text, you likely want a little text to add headings, bullet points, or other text to your document.In LayOut, you use the Text tool () to type text into a bounded or unbounded text box.
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Use the Zoom and Pan tool to view your model
LayOut provides several options to help you navigate your documents. The Zoom tools () and the Pan Tool () can help you focus on a specific part of your document or give you a wider view of your whole document.
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Using Inferences
An inference point is another point in your document you can use as a guide when you draw or move an object. LayOut’s inference engine is similar to SketchUp’s with a few differences that make how inferences work in LayOut unique.
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Using Layers
In LayOut, layers enable you to control the entities on your document pages as follows:
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Using the Drafting Tools
LayOut’s drafting tools can help bypass unnecessary selections and eliminate extra work when performing simple 2D tasks like detailing and diagramming. These tools can be found in the Main Toolbar.Fillet and ChamferFillet and Chamfer share space in the LayOut interface.
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Viewport Camera Tools
The Camera tools help you adjust how a model appears within a LayOut document. To start using the Camera tools, you need to enable editing the view by selecting your SketchUp model and performing one of the following actions:Context-click the selection and choose Edit 3D View.Double-click the selection.Press
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Working with Dashes in SketchUp Files
In LayOut's 2D paper space, you have the most control of the quality and styling of the linework in your SketchUp model.To get the most out of your model in LayOut, you'll want to set up scenes that capture model views and styling, and also assign tags to objects whose lines you want to style distinctly.
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Working with Scrapbooks of Reusable Entities
LayOut’s scrapbooks help you store and access a wide variety of reusable entities. The Scrapbooks panel contains several premade scrapbooks for common entities like arrows or signs.
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