Google SketchUp® 7 For Dummies®

Chapter 11. Working with Google Earth and the 3D Warehouse

In This Chapter

• Tying together all of Google's 3D software

• Poking around Google Earth

• Building a model in SketchUp and sending it to Google Earth

• Contributing to the 3D Warehouse

If you've ever used Google Earth, you know what it's like to look up from your computer and realize you just have no idea what time it is. There is no better way to spend several hours than to travel to Paris, Cairo, and the South Pole while checking out the peak of Mount Everest and looking at your old elementary school along the way. I love Google Earth because it does what Star Trek said computers are supposed to let us do — forget we're using technology and explore information in a way we never could before.

What if you could see 3D models of buildings and other man-made structures in Google Earth the same way that you can see aerial images and 3D topography? You can. What if you could build your own models, in SketchUp, and see them in Google Earth? You can do that, too. What if you could allow everyone who uses Google Earth — there are hundreds of millions of them — to see your models in their copies of Google Earth, no matter where they are? Now you're getting the idea. . . .

In this chapter, I talk about making SketchUp models that you and (if you want) anyone else can see on Google Earth. I also talk about the Google 3D Warehouse: a great big, online repository of free 3D models that anyone (including you) can contribute to or borrow from. It's ...