Image Entities

Image entities are essentially special groups consisting of a face with an applied bitmap image material. Image Objects can be moved, rotated and scaled. They can also be stretched horizontally or vertically, but they cannot be made non-rectangular. Import Images using the File > Import > 2D Graphic menu item.

Image Formats

SketchUp supports the following formats for import as an Image Object: JPEG, PNG, TGA, BMP, and TIFF. Some formats may be more appropriate than others for certain types of images and applications.

Inserting Image Entities

Images can be added to SketchUp models in one of two ways. First, you can use the File > Import > 2D Graphic  menu item, which will open a File Open dialog allowing you to navigate to the file you want. Alternately, you can simply drag and drop from the File Explorer directly into your drawing area.

Note - Image Objects can also be inserted as textures ( File > Insert > Image as Texture ). For additional information on using images as textures, see the Texture Positioning topic.

Image Proportions

By default, Image Objects retain the proportions of the file from which they are derived. While inserting an image, you can hold down the Shift key to de-constrain the proportions. You can also use the Scale Tool to alter the image object's proportions after it is placed.

Image File Size Versus Quality

When you add an Image Object to your scene, the image file it is based on becomes embedded in your SketchUp document. This allows you to send your SketchUp files to others without any data loss through misplaced linked files, but it also means that your files can quickly balloon to unwieldy sizes. When inserting images, try to keep file size as small as possible:

Resolution

Resolution can have a large impact on image size. Try to use only as much resolution as you need, and no more. You may sometimes find that even a pixilated, low resolution file can be sufficient to provide the information you need from a photograph, sketch, or drawing. You can also cut down on image file size by converting your images to grayscale before inserting them into SketchUp.

Also, the resolution of Image Objects is limited to the largest texture that OpenGL can handle. For most systems this limit is 1024 x 1024 pixels. This should be sufficient for most purposes, but if higher resolution is required, you can always stitch together multiple Image Objects.

Image File Compression

Another way to minimize file size is to use compressed file formats such as JPEG and PNG. These take up far less space both on disk and inside a SketchUp file.