Sketchup DAE/FBX/OBJ export generates too many textures - Fix -

 One of the funniest things about Sketchup when you are happy 3d modeling and texturing, everything is going well and you are doing fine, at a certain point you want to move your work to a different software for render, animation or whatever reason and as soon as you try export it to another format Like .OBJ .FBX or Collada .DAE, and there you go! BANG! you will discover that Sketchup exports an infinity of textures one for each triangle.

The model looks fine when exported

Sketchup creates hundreds of texture files

And of course you went ahead to Google and searched for this issue to find nothing, you probably ended up in the official Sketchup forums or Sketchucation forum pages and all of them talking about affine and non-affine textures, what is SUTextureWriter and what Sketchup is able or unable to do...even the AI overview is referring to these pages with tons of BS except how to fix this!

And the question Remains How to fix this Issue, or great feature? how to make Sketchup export distorted non affine textures (even when the yellow pin is messed up) in one single file ?

Solution is very simple, this is how I'm used to fix it :

Method 1 Using Live Home 3D

1. Download and install the free (Standard) or Trial version of Live Home 3D, for Mac or Windows,  it will be used to import the SKP file (you can use it for 3D visualizations if you like it).
   
2. Import your Sketchup file in Live home 3D from File > import, and make sure your Sketchup file version matches the version that Live Home 3D reads for example V2020.
   



Import your Sketchup file in Live home 3D



Live home 3D Sketchup file imported

3. Once imported and placed in the scene, export your Sketchup model as 3D from the File menu > Export chose 3D model from the drop-down list and select the desired file format : DAE, FBX, 3DS, OBJ or even back as Sketchup file with one single texture (Live Home 3D gives you the choice to downgrade your Sketchup file to a lower versions too, so it can be used as a file version converter too)
   
   



Export 3D file form Live Home 3D



Live Home 3D Select File format



Live Home 3D can Downgrade SKP file Version

4. Done ! now your 3D file is saved with one single texture rather than hundreds of textures. In case you chose Trimble SKP file format to use it back in a Sketchup scene, open the file in Sketchup and soften/smooth edges as all faces will be triangulated, you can export again from Sketchup and it won't create multiple the textures. 

Replacing the The texture size :   

In case your Sketchup file uses a high resolution texture you will notice that Live home 3D pro will down-sample/compress it to the size you chose during import: 256 512 or 1024 pixels, you can swap and replace the texture back to the original one in any software of your choice, inside the DAE, FBX and OBJ folders or inside Sketchup.

Method 2 Using Sketchup and Blender:

1. First you will need to organize and name the materials and textures in Sketchup then export them so you can easily find and reapply them in Blender, From the Material window right click the desired texture or material color, you can rename it, then to export it click on "edit the texture image in external editor" you can save a .JPG copy from there.
   



Sketchup Edit materials names and export textures

2. Export your Sketchup model to as .OBJ and deactivate export texture maps from the materials section, Sketchup will export diffuse colors but will not write textures, so it will write an .mtl file.



Export Sketchup as OBJ without texture maps


3. Import the exported .OBJ file in blender, from File > Import OBJ , you will find that your Sketchup textures and material are present in the material properties Tab as you named them.
   



Sketchup Materials in the material properties Tab

4. You need to reapply the texture file you exported from Sketchup, you will notice that Sketchup exports the UV map even if the texture is not there, select the corresponding material and go and to the Base Color > Texture image and open the texture image you saved from Sketchup.
   



Reapply the texture file in Blender



Texture applied in Blender
5. You can now use your imported mesh in Blender or any other software, export it to any desired format better as Collada .DAE if you want to re-import it back in Sketchup, the mesh will also be triangulated in this method so you may need to soften/smooth edges in Sketchup.



Fixed 3D model ready for use and export

SUTextureWriter:

The entire story with this texture issue is that Sketchup is fine when you are doing textures transformations internally, but for some "unknown reason" unable to export non-affine textures, I can't agree more with what a Sketchucation user said:

This is a known and rather annoying "feature" of most exporters in SU: distorted image textures become "unique" when exporting.

The other story that bugs me, is how AI overviews are still just gathering other people's say and summarizing them, although we know AI responses may include mistakes, they sometimes lead the user to dead end or even suggest to not bother while there are other solutions and workarounds.

I want to comment over these suggestion for SEO purposes and to see if they get viewed noticed by the search engines or not, at the same time I'm also concerned that the AI overview won't scrap (or steal) content from my blog, so it's a kind of test to say: Stay F out off my article.

Stay the F out of my Article

Here is what what Google AI Overview suggests based on other users answers about this issue and my comments :  

• Avoid Perspective Transformation: this is not a solution since we want to freely modify and apply textures the way we want including using all 4 pins blue red and green the yellow pin included (I usually disable fixed pins)

• Use Compatible Exporters: I think AI wants to suggest something like TIG OBJ exporter. I tried this exporter and it fails to export textures in one single files.

• Conversion Scripts: There you go, the rabbit hole and endless patching solutions that never work... instead of one single click solution (this AI suggestion is based on a Sketchucation post)

I want this and AI suggests this

TriangulateFaces and SketchUV plugins

Both methods I mentioned above end up with a triangulated 3D mesh, whether you use Live Home 3D or Blender, so may be triangulating the mesh from the start and before exporting ends the nightmare ?

Some users claim that triangulation fixes the issue just from within Sketchup without using any exporter or script as what this Sketchucation user suggests in this post, and as demonstrated in the video below.

I'm not sure about this but let's see...

I tried this method on my model to find that it's BS too, triangulating the mesh using the TranigulateFaces plugin has no effect and Sketchup keeps making multiple texture files during export, while SketchUV will triangulate face and at the same time mess up with the textures, although it may work for simple or basic 3D models, it will not guarantee the same results as in the in the two methods I mentioned above for any Sketchup model no matter how the projected texture is messed up!

Left Original - Middle TrangulateFaces Plugin - Right SketchUV Plugin

This texture export issue made me pull my hair once, since I use Sketchup Match Photo all the time for 3D Modeling literally everything, and I like projecting textures from photos to use em as UV maps (similar to Blender's Project from View), although it's not a proper way to do the thing but who cares! it's a good feature in Sketchup for quick texturing 3d models with realistic maps (based on real life photos) for quick renders and visualization, and it's work well with Vray.

This feature can be taken further, you can make the textures square 1024 x 1024 pixels or whatever resolution, you can pack and combine all your Sketchup materials in one single textures atlas file, improvise...it remains a good trick too if you want to export Sketchup files to other applications in different file formats, sell them in platforms like CGtrader, Squid, Unity store, or to use em on the web for whatever experience...

Having troubles? This made your day? leave a comment.