Looking for a quick and easy (and free!) way to turn your SketchUp models into high quality, photo-realistic renders? Try Kerkythea!
Use Cases and Deployment Scope
Kerkythea is our go-to rendering software for turning SketchUp models into life-like renders. As one of 4 employees in a family owned and operated real-estate development company, it is critical to our business that potential customers and clients are able to clearly visualize a proposed project without the high cost of procuring renders from an external consultant. With Kerkythea, we are able turn a decent looking 3D model into a photo-realistic image, allowing the client to see the finished product before construction begins. Design issues can be addressed prior to engineering, reducing time and cost overall.
Pros
- Kerkythea seamlessly integrates with SketchUp, eliminating the need for costly and complex 3D modeling software.
- Kerkythea has a simple to use interface and does not require extensive training to learn how to use.
- Despite being easy to use out of the box, Kerkythea is also very powerful for advanced users. This allowed us to achieve fast results, but also to constantly improve the quality of our rendered images as we have gained knowledge and experience
- The Kerkythea plug-in for SketchUp has an incredibly easy to use lighting feature. Spot lights and flood lights can be added, adjusted and manipulated easily, giving a much more professional looking end product.
- The user community support for Kerkythea is vast. From tips and tricks to free, downloadable materials packages, there are an incredible number of peer-to-peer assistance options available.
Cons
- The default viewing mode for Kerkythea is wireframe. This makes it hard to view the model upon opening, however it is easily changed using "View/Adjust/Solid Rendering" in the menu bar. My preference would be for the software to default to Solid Rendering from startup, or to have a way to save the interface settings (If that option exists, I am not aware of it).
- When exporting a model to Kerkythea from SketchUp, it usually takes a very long time to open the Kerkythea software. This only happens when selecting "Yes" in the dialog box that asks, "Open exported model in Kerkythea?" The quickest way I've found is to answer "No", open Kerkythea manually and then open the desired file from Kerkythea.
- While there are many free, user contributed materials packages available online, it would be nice to have a larger materials library pre-installed in the software.
Likelihood to Recommend
Kerkythea is a powerful, yet simple to use rendering package that integrates seamlessly into SketchUp and other modeling programs. My experience is only with SketchUp, but the combination of these two packages (I bought SketchUp Pro and use Kerkythea for free!) is the best bang-for-your-buck way that I have found to produce high quality images of 3D models. I have seen some extremely photo-realistic images online, but I am not sure if a paid rendering engine would be able to produce higher quality or be easier to use. If you are looking for a free way to get higher quality images from your SketchUp models I would highly recommend Kerkythea.
