Fredoscale Plugin Sketchup [ Quick — Summary ]

Want a pyramid? A rocket nose cone? Tapering scales one end of an object while leaving the other end untouched.

Enter Fredo Leroy, known in the SketchUp community simply as Fredo6. He wasn't an employee of SketchUp; he was a civil engineer and a virtuoso of Ruby scripting. He looked at the SketchUp interface and saw not limitations, but opportunities for surgery.

He didn't want to just add a button; he wanted to rewrite the laws of physics within the digital sandbox. Thus, FredoScale was born.

SketchUp, renowned for its intuitive push-pull mechanics, has long been the architect’s trusted sketchpad. However, for years, its native toolset harbored a significant limitation: the inability to perform complex, non-uniform transformations on groups and components without breaking their geometry. Enter FredoScale, a plugin by the French developer Fredo6. More than a simple add-on, FredoScale acts as a digital chisel, transforming SketchUp from a massing tool into a precise, organic modeling environment. fredoscale plugin sketchup

At its core, FredoScale addresses a fundamental frustration in base SketchUp: the "Scale" tool. The native tool scales uniformly on axes, distorting textures and rounding dimensions. FredoScale, however, introduces the concept of Box Morphing. Through tools like Radial Bending, Twist, and Stretch, users can bend a straight tower into a curved spine, twist a rectangular column into a helical stair core, or stretch a window component to fit an irregular facade—all while maintaining the object’s parametric integrity.

The most transformative features are arguably the Tapering and Shearing tools. In traditional modeling, creating a pyramidal volume or an oblique parallelogram requires destructive boolean operations or manual vertex editing. With FredoScale, a single click allows the user to grab a bounding box corner and pull it laterally, instantly creating dynamic perspectives or slanted walls. This non-destructive workflow preserves the object as a single component, allowing for late-stage design changes without collapsing the entire model.

Furthermore, FredoScale introduces Soft Transform, a feature that mimics the influence of a magnetic field. Instead of moving an entire object, the user defines a falloff radius; the transformation is applied intensely at the center and fades to zero at the edges. This is invaluable for landscape architects sculpting terrain or product designers creating ergonomic grips. It brings a level of sculptural freedom typically reserved for mesh-based programs like Blender or ZBrush into the precision-oriented world of SketchUp. Want a pyramid

In conclusion, FredoScale does not merely add buttons to the toolbar; it expands the language of SketchUp. By enabling proportional editing, non-uniform scaling, and geometric bending, it bridges the gap between architectural drafting and organic form-finding. For professionals who feel constrained by the rigidity of standard transforms, FredoScale offers liberation. It is, without hyperbole, the plugin that turns SketchUp from a sketchpad into a sculptor’s studio.

Upon installation (via SketchUcation or the Extension Warehouse), you will see a toolbar with several icons. Here is what each does and when to use it.

Consider this scenario: You have modeled a detailed chair leg with intricate turnings. You need to taper it so it gets thinner at the top. Using the native Scale tool while holding Ctrl (to scale from center) will squash the details irregularly. With FredoScale’s Tapering tool, you set a pivot point and drag; the plugin intelligently interpolates the transformation, keeping cross-sections proportional while expanding the top. Enter Fredo Leroy, known in the SketchUp community

Another example: You need a spiral ramp for a parking garage. Doing this manually requires complex follow-me operations and rotating copies. With FredoScale’s Twist and Radial Bend, you can model a flat slab, group it, and bend it 360 degrees in seconds.

Need a classical column that gets thinner at the top? Use Tapering. Need a spiral staircase handrail? Use Twisting. These tools apply non-uniform scaling. Unlike the native scale tool (which only changes X/Y/Z uniformly), FredoScale lets you grab the top of a box and twist it 45 degrees while keeping the bottom perfectly square.

This feels like the native Move tool on steroids. You select a portion of a group and pull it. FredoScale stretches the selected area but smooths the transition zone.

What made FredoScale legendary wasn't just that it bent things. It was the Ghost Mode and Project on Plane features.

FredoScale allowed users to manipulate objects in "Ghost Mode"—a transparent preview of the transformation—so you could see exactly where the geometry would land before committing. This moved the plugin from a "party trick" to a professional-grade engineering tool. You could take a curved roof and flatten it to analyze its surface area, or take a flat terrain and project it onto a curved surface, all while maintaining the mathematical integrity of the group.