Designing STK arenas in Sketchup

[cheesebrother]

Recently i've been toying around with ideas for stk arenas. I can't stand making 3d things in blender so i use google sketchup. Quickly i found out that you can export collada files from sketchup and import them into blender. This is where i've been having a problem. For some reason it works sometimes but crashes most of the time (you know, the windows "Send error report" dialog). Has anybody else had this problem or know how to fix it? I've got google sketchup 8, free version, blender 2.6, python 3.2, and windows xp. I would really like to know why this thing won't import. I've got some ideas for arenas in sketchup but will have to see if they're any good in STK. Cheesebrother

[Auria]

Who crashes? Sketchup or blender?

[machrider14]

Not mine, I've been working on Lincity Towers on SketchUp and mine didn't crash.

[cheesebrother]

Blender it where i'm having problems. I can export the .dae fine from sketchup and then i open up blender. The split second i double click to import the file, Blender crashes.

[Kinsu]

Maybe you can try with another version of Blender ?

[cheesebrother]

Maybe you can try with another version of Blender ?

Do you have a version which you know works? I could try that.

[Kinsu]

I don't know which version of Blender has this collada bug, but you can download and try some of the old official versions : http://download.blender.org/release/

[Auria]

Hmm I guess you should report the bug to blender then

[cheesebrother]

try some of the old official versions

Wahooo! I picked a random old one (!!!Mistake!!! It's actually 2.47 to be exact (python is 2.5.2)), got the correct version of python and the import now works! So now i can do the most critical step, sketchup to blender. Now i need to figure out the old track making stuff (was working with new before). Will take a crack at that tomorrow. (you may see me asking questions about that soon )

[Kinsu]

Well done ! And if you want to work on the latest blender version, what you can do is just use the 2.5.2 to convert the .dae to a .blend (for instance), and then re-use the latest Blender version.

Oh, and as Auria said, it would be nice to report the bug to Blender developers

[jpenguin]

https://www.babel3d.com

[cheesebrother]

And if you want to work on the latest blender version, what you can do is just use the 2.5.2 to convert the .dae to a .blend (for instance), and then re-use the latest Blender version.

That really appeals to me! One problem that i see is how to have both old and new versions of blender on my pc. Do you know a trick to have two versions at once? If not i'll just use somebody else's computer or uninstall/reinstall them. Would it just be easier to just use the old to make the arenas completely? Maybe that would be the best solution.

Sorry, i got the wrong version! PYTHON is the 2.5.2. The version of blender which works on the import is 2.47.

[cheesebrother]

Oh, and as Auria said, it would be nice to report the bug to Blender developers

Taken care of!

http://projects.blender.org/tracker/index.php?func=detail&aid=29471&group_id=9&atid=498

[cheesebrother]

Haha, I've answered my own question. I returned to the old bender versions downloads site and got the .zip version. Right now as i'm typing this message blender 2.6a and 2.47 are BOTH running! From here i should be able to work everything out as i already know how to make arenas in 2.6a. Thanks for all you help guys!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Funto]

Blender is not one of those crappy, big and ugly proprietary softwares where you can't easily install two different versions of the same one without having problems with collisions of keys in the Windows registry or whatever.
It's a small, cross-platform package made by people the way they want it to be, no need to install you can even directly execute the .exe file

Sorry, just Blender & open source fan here who is bothered everyday with crappy proprietary software ^^