Which of these two tools will work best to add woodcraft related design sketches for to my WordPress site. Over time I will search for other tools, but these are the ones I am most familiar. I will be using Visio 2016 Pro and Sketchup Make (2017).
Considerations
Cost: I have a an inexpensive copy of Visio Pro 2016 from my work HUP program. It is expensive, but having a copy predisposes me to try to use it. I do not have a Sketchup Pro copy, but have put together some detailed dimensional drawings of a radiator cover and used an extension to create a cut-list.
WordPress: I will use my WordPress site my-woodcraft.com site to display this work. This means in part that I want the content to be ON my site, not linked to another site for performance reasons as well as independence.
Goals: A good preview of the finished product. It would be nice to use images of actual materials so that I can get a good preview of the final result. A cut-list should be available to detail set of dimensions for use in construction.
Usability: I expect a pretty steep learning curve, but in the end I want this to be quick and easy. I will be dependent upon what I can learn on the Internet about using these two tools. The effort required to get up to speed on these tools on the specifics of my goals is a major concern.
Other tools: What other tools?
First Some Homework
I do not wish to start off from scratch with these tools for my simple designs and I’m not that familiar with either tool. Visio is certainly a good tool for architecture, network, flowchart and org charts. I was not able to find any templates for woodcraft projects.
Visio
With Visio I created a floor diagram for my study which I them want to put into a format I can use in WordPress. Exporting to a pdf or xls file are the options. So I went looking for Viso Addin options. This HTML Export tool creates a static HTML file it does not seem very hand for WordPress. So the best option is to publish as a pdf and a pdf viewer plugin.
Next I a searched for Woodcraft related templates so I would not need to start from scratch. Perhaps I will try again, but I could not find anything.
Sketchup
First my Sketchup 8 was old. I installed Sketchup Make 2017 even though the current tool is Sketchup Free, a web based product. I did not want to need to be online to use the tool, but the cost Sketchup Pro for a hobby is prohibitive. SO Sketchup Make is the choice.
There are two good Shop Class DVDs on Sketchup for Woodworkers by Robert Lang readwatchdo.com. Long ago I used these to put together some radiator drawings with Sketchup 8. But now he has some pdf courses specific to woodworking. I should look into the new tutorial PDF. This makes Sketchup a good choice, if only I can get good images for my website? From what I have seen Sketchup animations are large files and not very suitable for hosting. I suppose I can always take screen shots. He even has instruction on how to import images to get started with and ways to add woodgrain. How can you beat that?
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