Tom Arah investigates Google’s acquisition of SketchUp and what it might mean for browser-based 3D.

I've long been a big fan of a little program created by @Last Software called SketchUp which is designed to make producing 3D models as easy as 2D drawing – “3D for everyone” as their mission statement puts it...
I’ve long sung the program’s praises and argued that it deserved to be better-known and now it most certainly will be as @Last recently announced that it had been bought up by none other than Google. It’s a jaw-dropping development for such a niche operator and immediately raises major questions: why did it happen, and what does it mean for SketchUp and Google - and for you?
Anything that Google does is automatically of interest, but a move into 3D is especially noteworthy. There’s just something about the combination of the internet and 3D that gets people excited. The potential is undeniable but realising it is an entirely different matter as two examples from recent history amply demonstrate. In late 1999 Metacreations gave up its entire roster of design applications - Painter, KPT, Poser, Ray Dream, Infini-D, Carrara and more – to concentrate all its efforts on its recently acquired Viewpoint technology which was designed to enable objects for sale on the web to be showcased in 3D. At the same time the biggest design player of all, Adobe, acquired 3D Anarchy, which enabled the creation and display of immersive virtual 3D worlds, and spent five years developing both the builder application and browser player under the Adobe Atmosphere brand. In both cases the platforms worked well and the results were and still are impressive, but neither company could reach the critical mass or find the necessary business model to make the technology deliver on its promise.
Bearing this in mind, I have to admit that my first thoughts on hearing the SketchUp news were skeptical, even cynical. If major 3D and internet developers such as Metacreations and Adobe can’t make browser-based 3D deliver what chance do Google and SketchUp have? After all, SketchUp isn’t one of the big 3D players, it’s a niche application designed primarily for architects conceptualizing their designs. And while Google can claim to dominate the internet, its strengths aren’t in browsers or application development but rather in search and advertising. In short: what can a search engine company possibly gain from an idiosyncratic architectural modeler?
More worryingly, if it doesn’t gain, the lessons of Viewpoint and especially Atmosphere are clear: virtual reality has to produce actual profits. If SketchUp fails to deliver, Google will simply move on and its 3D adventure will soon be forgotten - and Sketchup with it. Google’s acquisition of SketchUp will be judged in the long term, but in the short term there’s one undeniable and immediate benefit. Just six weeks after the takeover, Google announced the launch of a new and completely free version: Google Sketchup (sketchup.google.com). That’s a price drop of no less than $495 compared to the previous SketchUp 5 release, and if you’ve any interest in 3D modeling I strongly recommend that you take a look at.
So what do you get for your money (or rather download time)? SketchUp is all about simplicity and making the move into 3D as natural as possible. As such, the interface is uncluttered and the toolset is deliberately pared down. Crucially, the main shape tools SketchUp offers are resolutely 2D with options for adding straight lines, arcs, rectangles, polygons, circles and for drawing freehand. Alongside these drawing tools are manipulation tools that let you move, rotate, scale and offset the lines that you add and the intuitive Push/Pull and Follow Me tools that let you simply drag your shapes into the third dimension.