Automatic Cabinet Texturing

We’re very excited about our latest addition to CabWriter; automatic cabinet texturing. Texturing is the term SketchUp uses to apply images to components, or parts, of a model. These images can be anything; wood grain, stone, brick, grass, tile, or just a simple color. SketchUp provides a tool that allows the user to select a texture and manually apply it to previously selected parts, but this process can take a lot of time in a big model. However, texturing your cabinets, can make it easier for you, and more importantly, your customers to better visualize what the final product will look like.

Now, with CabWriter 5, we’ve added a new set of parameters to the Materials tab, as shown below right, allowing you to specify the texture to apply to each type of part on your cabinets. This can be the same for the entire project, or can change for every cabinet or a group of cabinets, just like any other parameter. If the textures are setup before you start drawing, CabWriter will texture the cabinet automatically when it’s drawn. Alternatively, you can change the specified textures at any time and use the Texture Model command to texture the entire model in one fell swoop, or the Texture Selection command to texture just the currently selected cabinets or parts of cabinets. You have total flexibility to texture in a fashion that makes sense in your workflow. Or, set the textures back to Default and no texture will be applied to those parts.

It’s important to keep in mind that CabWriter’s automatic texturing function is simply using the native SketchUp texturing tool to apply images to your parts much more quickly that can be done manually. The resolution of the textures will only be as good as the images themselves and it’s important to keep in mind that it will never be of the same quality as Photo Realistic rendering is. There are quite a few plugins on the market that will add photo realistic rendering to your model and are fully compatible with CabWriter, but they tend to be expensive and have a very steep learning curve, but create amazingly realistic results. While the automatic texturing provided by CabWriter does not reach that level, it is quick, easy, cheap and still offers great results as shown in the animation in the upper right.

Best of all, we have assembled a collection of over 250 different wood grain textures that you can download for free as a CabWriter license holder. These textures have been modified to provide a more pleasing look when used as a texture.

Watch Automatic Texturing in Action