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Sketchup Smooth, Soft, and Hidden

By A Mystery Man Writer

Have you ever been confused about the differences between Smooth, Soft and Hidden Edges? So have I! This article will give you a complete explanation of each edge type, and some examples of places to use them. Sketchup Edges An edge is any line segment in Sketchup. It can exist as a single element in a model, or it can be connected to other edges at intersecting points. When you have at least three edges connecting on the same plane, you can have a face. These are the core building blocks of every model in Sketchup. Everything in Sketchup is either an edge or a face (Except for extra stuff like construction guides, floating text, dimensions, etc). I'm just talking about the geometry here. Even circles and arcs are actually made up of segmented lines (edges). There are no curved surfaces in Sketchup. But Sketchup does provide a few clever tools to give the illusion of a curved or smooth surface. An edge can be in either one of three states Visible - This is the regular state of every edge. Self explanitory. Hidden - You can't see the edge, and no edge styles will be applied to it while hidden. Soft - Same as Hidden, but adjoining faces will be selected as one (If an edge is selected to be both Hidden and Soft, it will act as if it's soft.) But what about Smooth?? Smoothing technically doesn't do anything to the edge, it affects the appearance of faces that are connected to the edge. We'll talk about that in a little bit.