For folks who are new to SketchUp, the new Getting Started application includes self-paced tutorials and some links to key areas on our website. There are also terrific enhancements to our online User's Guide including a concepts section, a glossary, and visual cues letting users know when a companion video tutorial is available on the same topic.

Cool New Tools
Wait until you see what we're calling "The Sandbox." It's a new set of tools for modeling terrain and other organic shapes. When you come to play in our sandbox you can:

* Bring in your survey data and create a surface from contours
* Draw a surface from Scratch
* Build berms and hills with our new SmooveTM Tool (it's a "smooth mover")
* Put roads, building pads, parking lots, etc. in your model with the Stamp Tool
* Project 2D geometry onto any complex 3D surface with the new Drape Tool
* Use the Add Detail Tool to add resolution to any surface

Click here for instructions to enable the Sandbox tools.

Because SketchUp is all about simple yet sophisticated tools, we've made a few key improvements to our existing toolset that give you even more modeling power. You'll want to explore the new capabilities of the Rotate, Walk, Push/Pull, Circle, and Polygon Tools.

Non-Photorealistic Rendering
SketchUp is great for creating those sketchy, loose, and tentative models needed at the front-end of your design process, and they should look sketchy as well. We've expanded on the simple sketch rendering capabilities in SketchUp by adding:

* Depth Cued Edges - make lines in the foreground of your model darker than lines in the background, adding that spatial "pop" to your work that you used to do by hand.
* Endpoints - emphasize the endpoints of a line to highlight the corners of an object.
* Edges Off - turns edges off for a softer look.
* Transparency Maps - supports placed image objects and texture maps with transparency.

Component Improvements
With SketchUp Pro 5, we've added a bunch of new tools to help you organize and manage your model, making it much easier to use components to their fullest advantage.

* The Outliner gives you an entirely new view of your model, exposing complex group and component hierarchies in an easy-to-use outline view.
* Replace Selected allows you to swap in new components, or to modify a general design and make it more detailed on the fly.
* To prevent inadvertent editing operations, you can now lock SketchUp Groups and Components.
* Select All Instances lets you select all in-model instances of a specific component, making it easier to replace them all at once.
* FaceMe Shadows gives you shadows cast as if the object were facing the sun, no matter what view you're in. This makes the shadows much more realistic.

And, there's a ton more! Be sure to check out the many possibilities of the new Component Creation User Interface, the Make Unique option, and Highlight Component Selection.

Import & Export
We've always worked hard to ensure that SketchUp "works and plays well with others." In SketchUp Pro 5, we've significantly improved our 3D model exports and added some new ones to the mix as well.

Our DWG/DXF Import & Export has received a complete revision on both platforms. Using the latest DWG direct libraries, you get access to more DWG/DXF entities for a smoother translation into and out of SketchUp.

After DWG/DXF, our 3DS exporter is probably the most important to our users. As such, we have significantly improved its behavior. Enhancements include:

* Large meshes greater than 65K vertices or faces are split into multiple meshes.
* Smoothing is now supported.
* The "welding of vertices" is now supported.

We hear that OBJ is as important to most folks as 3DS for general data transfer so we've given our OBJ Export full "first-class-citizenship" in SketchUp Pro 5.

With our FBX Export (Filmbox), you can easily get your SketchUp models into the graphics pipeline for previz and special effects planning work, working easily with Alias' Motionbuilder and other applications.

Softimage|XSI is one of the 900lb gorillas in the entertainment industry, and we're proud to say that SketchUp now has an XSI Export.

Our VRML Export has been fully revised too! Among other things, it now supports texture maps on export, especially for "tweaked" textures.

To round out the terrain modeling capabilities of the Sandbox Tools, we added in a DEM Import that lets you work from digital terrain models and point-cloud surveys.

And, last but certainly not least, we've added a 3DS Import. When we asked for advice on picking the next export format, you overwhelmingly asked for a 3DS import instead. We listened, and here it is.

Ruby Scripting
Ruby has been a huge hit! And some of our current users write some amazing code! We've been listening to your requests, and have tried to add a couple of your biggest to SketchUp Pro 5. There's more to talk about in the Ruby Documentation (which has been rewritten completely), but two highlights are Ruby Intellectual Property Protection and Ruby Toolbars.

Performance and Stability
SketchUp is now up to 2x faster on many modeling operations. Data files are kept in good working order with the new Check Validity feature, and Save as Previous Version allows compatibility with users of older versions.

Best of all, it works the way you think. Point. Click. Drag. Move. Push. Pull. Common sense terms and motions, only they yield uncommon results.

Our Patented Push/Pull Tool
Push/Pull, as the name implies, enables you to click on a shape and simply push or pull it to create your desired 3D geometry. Much more than just an extrude tool, it allows you to create complex forms quickly and efficiently.

"Sketchy" Rendering
Sometimes, when you're just working things out at the beginning of a new design, too much precision in your drawings can be a bad thing, slowing down your thought process. SketchUp's realtime renderer lets you visually "soften" your drawings with rendering effects like jitter lines, extended edges and dynamic profiles.

Material Exploration
The relationships between color, texture, form, and light are subtle and cannot simply be inferred from monochromatic models and paint samples. That's why SketchUp makes it possible for you to experiment with color and texture directly on your model. And for those who are more technically savvy, the surface area of any material is always available for material quantity management and cost estimates.

Accurate Realtime Shadows
When designing outdoor structures, SketchUp's real-time shadow casting lets you see exactly where the sun falls as you model, allowing unprecedented dynamic solar planning.

Powerful tools that can take your designs to the next level!
SketchUp is more than simple, it's powerful. And it provides the tools and capabilities that give you incredible design flexibility.

Interactive Sections
Sectional views have been a part of the designer's toolbox since the Renaissance. SketchUp's Section Tool allows you to place cutting planes interactively, and to move them around as you are modeling to dynamically reveal inner details of your model. Once placed, you can export 2D section views of your model in any supported file format for use downstream in your workflow.

Versatile Component Architecture
Quickly organize geometry for convenient selection, while keeping it isolated from other lines and faces in your model. You can also nest components, providing both complex relationship management and double-click access to any geometry you want to edit at any one time. Once placed, you can edit all instances of a component in your scene simultaneously and interactively, without having to explode or redefine them.

Dimensions and Annotation
Design for the real world requires accurate communication, so SketchUp gives you a simple but powerful set of tools to pull out dynamic dimension strings as you work, or call attention to a special feature.

Imports and Exports
No design program works in a vacuum today, and we've worked hard to make sure that you can use your SketchUp models in a wide variety of different workflows. With SketchUp, you can import a DWG/DXF site plan as a starting point for design, work up a quick 3d model, then export back to DWG/DXF to create construction documents. SketchUp also exports 3DS, VRML, PDF, EPS, JPG, TIF, PNG and a variety of other file formats for use in all kinds of projects.