Clearing Up SketchUp Toolbar Confusion
A little pet peeve of mine is when someone turns on every single SketchUp toolbar. It’s not just because it clutters up your workspace. It’s because – and trust me when I say this – you’re not going to use all of those tools. This is especially true if you’re new to the software. But my biggest source of annoyance is that if you go through and turn on every toolbar available, you may not realize this but you now have doubled if not tripled some of those individual tools.
Yup… you read that right. You may have just DOUBLED or even TRIPLED some of your tools.
I’ve seen this happen with so many people I’ve worked with – design students, interns, and even experienced designers who have been using SketchUp for a while. So definitely don’t feel bad if you’ve done this too.
Let’s Compare These Toolbars and Get Rid of Some Confusion
When you’re just starting out working in SketchUp the best thing to do when it comes to the many toolbars native to the software is to pick one of just two toolbars to work with. It’s best to turn on either the “Getting Started” toolbar or the “Large Tool Set” but not both.
Why one of these two? Both of these toolbars condense down and simplify the many native tools SketchUp has to offer. If you’re just starting out in SketchUp you’re definitely not going to use every single tool at your disposal. These toolbars help you avoid the overwhelm of all the many, many tools you have to choose from.
So now you’re thinking, “These sound great! I don’t want to be overwhelmed… but why do I only want to choose one of these toolbars? Why not both?”
Here’s the thing that a lot of people don’t realize when they first start out in SketchUp and even later on for some. Because they condense down all the other toolbar, each of these toolbars have many of the same tools. So if you go through and turn both of them on, now you’ve just doubled most of your tools.
The “Getting Started” toolbar and the “Large Tool Set” are great way to start out using SketchUp. Once you get more familiar with the program you can definitely go through and turn on the regular toolbars and stop using these introductory ones. Then you can go through and customize the way you set up your display, the way the toolbars are organized. The whole look of your workspace can be customized.
Okay so now what?
I’ve created a little freebie for you. It’s a handy cheat sheet that compares both the “Getting Started” toolbar and the “Large Tool Set” so you can figure out which one is going to work best for you. Which one do you want to start out with?
Keep in mind that because these toolbars are intro toolbars they’re not going to contain every single tool you have at your disposal in this amazing program. So once you get more familiar with these then you can move on up to some of the other fun tools.
Setting the Foundations for Mastering SketchUp
Most of the tools on these two intro toolbars are going to be the ones that really set the foundation for working in this program. This is true whether your goal is to design a piece of furniture or a piece of lighting. Or maybe your goal is all the way up there into designing an entire house and building it in 3D. Then documenting it in Layout, so that you can turn your SketchUp model into construction documents with elevations and sections. These are the tools that you need for your foundation. These are what you build on to make those goals happen.
The first course that I have coming out soon in my online learning portal is going to dig into these foundations for mastering SketchUp. We’re going to look into the introductory tools and several more elements that I’ve found to really be the foundations to mastering this program and doing whatever you want with it. So make sure that if you haven’t signed up for updates about these courses that I have coming out, sign up below so that you can stay in the know.
