Blue Marble Project

The Solaire 30″ Infrared Grilling System was recently added to the Google 3D Warehouse. Made by Rasmussen, the Solaire grill has a bunch of great features for outdoor cooking and it was an exciting challenge to translate those selling points into a dynamic 3D SketchUp model. This dynamic component includes configurable options which can be accessed from the Dynamic Component Options Dialog. Use the Interact tool to Open/Close various parts and turn on/off the Grill Burner. You can even see the flames when you turn the knobs!

Sustainable Industries has released their annual supplemental issue - 2009 Top 10 Green Building Products. Blue Marble Project is proud to have played a role in the creation of this year’s issue by supplying Sustainable Industries with the 3D computer models that were embedded in the downloadable PDF version of the issue. The 3D SketchUp models can also be downloaded from the Google 3D Warehouse.

Here’s a sample of one of this year’s winners - the T5 from Tennant Company:

Google recently updated the Embed Code that users can copy from a 3D Warehouse model page which enables you to post an interactive 3D View of the model on any site (or blog).

Here’s a model we created recently for Dacor that includes installation information - could be a nice thing to have handy on the job site.

We’re certainly excited about this update as we think it only helps improve upon the many ways in which SketchUp models can be re-purposed as portable online media content.

Another exciting aspect to this recent update is the ability to quickly snatch the Google Earth Embed code for Geo Located models. This is a model of the Renaissance Montura LAX Hotel in Los Angeles, CA.

For more information about this 3D Warehouse feature you can check out this post on the Google SketchUp blog.

For the folks out there who are keeping score of their 3D Warehouse fame, you can toss out whatever spreadsheets you’ve been using to tally the weekly download stats of your models. Google has FINALLY pushed an update to the Warehouse stats that show aggregate download and chart past performance. Thanks to all the hard working, underappreciated guys and gals on the Warehouse team. This is something I know we’ve been bugging you about constantly for the past year and I know this was a tough problem. The stats charts looks great and the aggregate info is a tremendous improvement!

We’ll hold off for at least a week or two until we start bugging you again about getting aggregate stats for collections…

To read more about this feature update check out this post on the Google SketchUp blog.

The Thermador Appliance Dynamic Component Collection is the third in a series of beautifully modeled and textured appliance collections that were launched just in time for KBIS 2009 (see also Miele and Dacor). For Thermador, we again leveraged Dynamic interaction options to create appliances with doors that swing open, and information dialog boxes that link back to the manufacturer website. The Column Refrigeration units also include options for specifying RH vs LH door swings. These models also include installation information including cutout dimensions and utility hook-ups as can be seen in this 48″ Duel Fuel Range from Thermador’s Pro Grand Professional Series.

The Dacor Appliance Dynamic Component Collection we’ve recently added to the 3D Warehouse includes some of the most intricate appliance models ever posted to the warehouse. We’ve taken full advantage of Dynamic interaction options to create appliances with doors that swing open, drawers that slide out, and information dialog boxes that link back to the manufacturer website. These models also include installation information including cutout dimensions and utility hook-ups as can be seen in this 48″ Built-in Refrigerator from Dacor’s Epicure Series.

We launched this collection just in time to demo the collection at KBIS 2009 and the reaction was phenomenal. This is one component collection you’ve just got to download and check out for yourself.

We’ve only just begun working on the Miele Appliance Dynamic Component Collection but we’re already seeing a rapid uptake of this beautifully textured model of their CVA 4062 Coffee System (complete with frothy beverage). This dynamic component features an options dialog with that includes information about the product, links back to the Miele website, and options for whether or not to include the optional warming drawer.

This article was originally posted at our sister site: the School blog

Welcome to a new series, GreenSketchUpGuide, here in the School blog.  I’m an architect and marketer in the building products industry, have been working closely with Google and School for over two years and have ideas about SketchUp and sustainable design to share with you.  My blog site, GreenDesignGuide.com, covers a broad range of topics for the residential design + building community but this series, GreenSketchUpGuide, will focus on particulars.  For example, why is SketchUp so valuable to designers and the companies trying to communicate with them about sustainable building products and processes?

Let’s turn to a case study that’s been incredibly successful.  In May of 2006, the cofounder of SketchUp software stopped by the Whirlpool Corporation booth at the AIA Architects National Convention.  Google had just purchased SketchUp and they were exploring some big ideas.  He shared their vision for creating an online repository of 3D building products in the Google 3D Warehouse that could be accessed by architects and designers who want to design with specific branded products they can trust.  What’s more, the 3D models would be free to download, easily imported into SketchUp and available for any designer using a CAD program that recognizes the .skp file format.  That’s a big vision and it took a few months to get my head around it.

But we quickly started drawing 3D appliance models in SketchUp to meet Google’s fall launch deadline.  As it turned out only Whirlpool and Marvin Windows met the deadline.  But the online press coverage we received was sensational.  Appliance websites, CAD websites and even financial websites picked up the story.  One industry observer put it this way, “Maybe IKEA, but I never expected a company like Whirlpool to be the first to collaborate with Google in creating 3D visualization solutions for architects and designers.”  I knew we were on to something, I just didn’t know how big it would become.

I visit architecture and design firms often and learned quickly how widely SketchUp was being adopted by the design community… once I started asking the right questions.  Usually I meet with principals and partners of top design firms, established professionals about my age. When I asked them about SketchUp, they pointed to younger designers and recent college grads that introduced SketchUp to their firms.  The principals immediately saw the productivity gains in their design process, the benefits to their business and were on board.

It’s been exciting to see “next gen” architects having this much impact on established design firms.  However, nobody at the time seemed to know about the building product collections in Google 3D Warehouse.  Don’t they have time to keep up with appliance industry press releases?  I mentioned this challenge to my friends at Google and that’s when they introduced me to School!

Sorry, I’m out of words.  Come back next week for more of this exciting case study (Update: Read part 2 of this case study here).

Perhaps this notion is best described by someone who’s been thinking about the web a bit longer than we have. In this video, Kevin Kelly describes the evolution of the web over the past 5,000 days, and talks about where we’re headed over the course of the next 5,000. One of the key points for web developers - create portable content for the web. This is a concept that is perfectly well suited to 3D SketchUp models and the Google 3D Warehouse. From a marketers perspective, web 3.0 shifts the focus away from the notion of having to force people to your website by creating ’special’ content that can only be viewed on your site. Rather, sites like Facebook, YouTube, etc. and even the 3D Warehouse, allow companies to invite traffic to their own sites by distributing content and information about their brands via platforms where people feel comfortable consuming media on their own terms.

The 3D Warehouse is a distribution platform that hosts 3D Computer Models of Buildings which plug into Google Earth, making it a perfect location based media solution for marketers who are interested in improving their visibility amidst the sea of GeoWeb platforms and data.

More broadly, the 3D Warehouse hosts 3D models of ‘places + things’. The ‘things’ part of that equation means that product manufacturers, distributers, and retailers can use the 3D Warehouse as marketing/advertising platform to distribute information via 3D product models. Architects, Designers, and consumers all then have access to freely download and interact with the 3D models on their own terms, by incorporating 3D products into their projects.