Then I started to paint into the prairie areas varying my light and dark values based on where sunlight was coming from. Next, I set the brush to Scatter and played with the Scatter settings a bit to get the results I was looking for. I kept the brush vertical but narrowed it to a thin line.
Within Brush Tip Shape I have the ability to narrow the width of the brush along with tilting it at any angle I would like. I then went into my brush settings and clicked on Brush Tip Shape. To imply a rougher prairie texture in the sketch I initially grabbed a #16 square brush. Generally, buildings, during daytime, will be brighter as they rise up and darker where they meet the ground. On the shelter I applied the burn tool just to the lower portion of the building to darken it. For the canopy I applied the burn tool just to the edges and then added a few warm strokes of yellow to reflect sunlight. You don’t want to get to carried away with this tool but it is a quick way to subtly darken a surface. For the canopy and shelter I created some value change by using the Burn tool. I will usually finish the pavement by adding a couple of vertical strokes to suggest reflections. Don’t be afraid to add more color into the surface such as blues and greens as these opposite hues, applied lightly, create more depth. I am working with a similar hue already on the pavement surface in the model and just adding darker and lighter overlapping values. For the pavement I make very confident strokes both perpendicular and parallel to the surface to just imply pattern. In this drawing the green areas represent a more manicured turf surface and the beige tones represent the less manicured prairie.
I always keep in mind the angle of the sun so I know where to lighten or darken a value. Generally, my first step is to grab a simple round brush, set the opacity to 60%, and start smoothing out the stepped terrain by applying paint strokes in the direction of the slope. Then on the duplicated layer I bumped up the saturation just a bit. Initially, I duplicated this first layer and locked that layer so I can always reference back to where I started. I brought this view into Photoshop by placing it onto an 11 x 17 at 300 dpi and began painting. If I am working directly from SketchUp I always make sure to turn off the edges before I export the view. The terrain is stepped and I have applied just basic color and texture to aid in my painting. This simple export from SketchUp was my starting point. An Intuos tablet will also work for painting. I, again, used a 21″ Cintiq for painting in Photoshop, Photoshop, and SketchUp. In this second tutorial about enhancing basic SketchUp views I want to show how, with minimal effort, you can take a flat, uninspiring, initial 2d export from SketchUp and create a drawing with depth that does more than just sell an idea but also tells a story.