Using the Follow Me Tool in Grouped Objects – SketchUp Quick Tips
In today’s SketchUp quick tip video, I want to talk about a tip for using the follow me tool with objects within groups!
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I always thought that the follow me tool only worked whenever your path and your geometry to extrude were in the same group. However, I was watching a tutorial from Box and I noticed that he was able to extrude an object within a group using a path that wasn’t in the group.
I may be the only person that didn’t know about this.
The way this works is fairly simple – I always thought you couldn’t do this because when you use the follow me tool, you have to select a path, then select the face that you’d like to extrude. You can’t double click on the face to access the geometry, so what you have to do instead is to right click on your object, then select the option for “edit group,” then once you’re inside the group, click on the face you’d like to extrude.
Note that this will work for nested objects as well, meaning you can extrude profiles that are several levels deep in your model organization.
This could be especially useful for times when you download profiles from the 3D warehouse and they come in as groups. Instead of having to explode them, you can simply draw your path, import the profiles, then use this method to extrude the profiles along paths!
About Justin Geis
Hi, I'm Justin Geis, and I'm the founder of The SketchUp Essentials. I started using SketchUp as part of my work as a general contractor in 2008. I quickly realized the power of the software and started using it for personal projects. I started The SketchUp Essentials as a place to share easy to follow SketchUp tutorials and tips to help everyone harness the power of 3D Modeling in their lives. When not working with SketchUp, I enjoy playing soccer and spending time with my wife and our two dogs.
