Follow Me in SketchUp - Complete Guide and 7 Mistakes That Ruin Geometry

Publication date: 29-09-2026  |  Update date: 11-09-2026  | Author: Mateusz Ciećwierz

Follow Me (Extrude Along) is a SketchUp tool that pulls a flat profile along a specified path and turns it into a solid. Use it to create moldings, cornices, railings, pipes, edge chamfers, and also rotational solids: from a vase to a baluster. The principle is simple, but there are a few nuances that few talk about, and they are responsible for many failed attempts. In this article, I walk through the complete operation and the seven mistakes that cause incorrect geometry.

How does Follow Me work in SketchUp?

The closest real-world equivalent of this tool is an extrusion die for aluminum profiles. Material passes through a hole of a specific shape and comes out on the other side as a bar with that cross-section, as long as you want. Follow Me does the same, but instead of a straight line, the material follows the path you specify.

So you need two things: profile, which is a single closed face in the shape of the cross-section, and path, which is a series of connected edges. The result is always a solid created by sweeping the first along the second.

Two ways to specify the path when creating moldings in SketchUp

The first (and my recommended) method is to select the path before activating the tool. Using the Select tool, click on the edges that the profile should follow, then pick the Follow Me tool and click on the face of the profile. The operation is performed instantly along the entire length, without manually dragging the mouse.

Instead of selecting edges one by one, triple-click the path with the left mouse button. SketchUp will activate the entire connected geometry, saving you dozens of Ctrl (or Shift) clicks.

The second way is to manually guide the profile. Activate the Follow Me tool, click on the profile, and drag the cursor along the path, touching each segment as it highlights in red. It works, but on longer paths it's easy to miss a segment or pull the profile off course. I use this method only when I want to stop the solid halfway along the path.

How to prepare the profile so that the Follow Me operation produces a correct result?

The profile must be a single face. It cannot consist of two abutting pieces. It also cannot be a contour with an open perimeter. If an extra edge dividing the shape in half was created while drawing the cross-section, delete it before running the tool.

It must also stand perpendicular to the start of the path. SketchUp tolerates some deviation, but the greater the angle, the more the molding deforms.

For paths running parallel to an axis, it’s convenient to draw a helper rectangle perpendicular to the path and draw the cross-section on it, then delete the unnecessary helper edges. For angled paths, another trick works: draw a short “tail” on the profile—a perpendicular segment that serves as a handle when moving and rotating the cross-section into place. After positioning, delete the segment.

One last thing—trivial but nerve-saving. Copy the profile and set the copy aside before running the tool. The original face disappears after the operation because it becomes the start of the solid, and you'll need the cross-section again for the next room or wall.

Revolved solids, or using Follow Me on a closed circle

The same principle, applied to a circle instead of an open path, turns Follow Me into a lathe. A vase, a lamp shade, a baluster, a table leg, a goblet, a sphere or a cone (which we also wrote about in the article: SketchUp – how to make a cone?), all of these are created by revolving half a cross-section around an axis.

The procedure goes like this. Draw a circle to serve as the path. Next to it, draw half of the cross-section of the future object as a closed face, positioned perpendicular to the circle. The bottom edge of the profile must hit exactly the center of the circle, as this defines the axis of rotation (the lathe’s headstock). Select the circle, activate Follow Me, then click on the profile.

With complex profiles the operation can take several seconds, and that’s normal. However, if nothing happens or the result is full of holes, the problem is usually in the profile.

Follow Me can also subtract geometry

Few people know this, but it’s one of the tool’s more interesting capabilities. If you draw a profile directly on the surface of an existing solid and run it along its edge, Follow Me will not add material but remove it.

This works wherever you need an edge fillet or a groove. Chamfering a tabletop edge at a 45° angle, carving a groove in a table leg, a bevel around a box, a channel for a window seal, a niche for LED strip in a suspended ceiling. Draw the cross-section of the cut in the corner of the solid, select the edge it should follow, and click Follow Me. The material along that path disappears.

Segments, or why models created with Follow Me can become heavy

Arcs and circles in SketchUp are not bezier curves but polylines made up of smaller segments. The number of polygons in the finished molding is roughly the product of the number of profile edges and the number of path segments. So it grows very quickly!

So how many segments do you really need? Usually fewer than the default setting suggests. Rounding a 1 cm corner with a 12-segment arc can cause a lot of trouble, and on a render nobody will notice the difference. One detail is no problem. Fifty balusters in a railing can make the model almost impossible to rotate!

You set the number of segments before drawing: activate the Circle or Arc tool, type for example 4s and press Enter. SketchUp will remember that value until you change it again.

After the operation, there’s still smoothing. Remove visible continuous lines on curves with the Eraser while holding Ctrl (Option on Mac). The edge doesn’t disappear from the model, it just stops being drawn, and adjacent faces start shading smoothly. If you’re interested in this topic, read our article on rounding edges in SketchUp.

Seven Follow Me mistakes that spoil geometry

The list below is based on observations of real user stumbling blocks. The order reflects how frequently each problem occurs.

1. Path not selected before activating the tool.

You click the profile and nothing happens, or a solid appears in a random direction. SketchUp doesn’t know where to lead the sweep. Always select the path first, then Follow Me.

2. Profile is not a single face.

Two touching faces instead of one, leftover construction line dividing the shape, an open contour without a fill. The operation only goes through part of the cross-section or doesn’t run at all. Click the profile once and check if it highlights correctly.

3. Profile and path are in different groups.

It’s best when both elements are in the same context. A profile drawn outside the group containing the path will be handled incorrectly. The simplest fix is to cut the profile, enter the group, and paste it in place.

4. Profile is not perpendicular to the path.

The symptom is characteristic: the molding follows the path but gradually twists or changes its original size. For non-perpendicular paths, use the mentioned “tail” to position the cross-section precisely instead of by eye.

5. The path is broken.

Edges that look connected can miss by a fraction of a millimeter, especially when created by intersecting walls at unusual angles or imported from a DWG file. Follow Me will stop exactly at that point or throw an invalid path error. Check for gaps between lines and close them with the Line tool.

6. Geometry too small to generate.

SketchUp stops creating faces when edges fall below certain lengths. Tiny cuts in a decorative profile can hit that threshold, and part of the solid simply won’t appear. You can enclose the profile in a component, create a copy scaled up by, say, 100x, run Follow Me inside that enlarged copy, and the changes will transfer back to the original scale because components in SketchUp share their contents. Finally, delete the enlarged copy.

7. Working outside a group.

The new solid sticks to any geometry it touches.

A molding generated directly in the model can divide the floor plane into a dozen pieces and cut into the wall. Close the existing model in a group or work inside the group designated for the profile. This is one of those habits that determine the pace of work in SketchUp.

What to do after completing the Follow Me operation in SketchUp?

The solid has been created, but it's not over yet! There are three things worth checking right away while you still remember.

The first is plane orientation. If the profile plane was facing the wrong way, the entire solid will come out inverted. In the working view, you'll see the characteristic bluish-gray shade. In a rendering engine, such faces can disappear or take on the wrong material. The fix is simple: right-click and reverse the faces.

Next, take care of smoothing the curves, as described in more detail in the article on Softening Edges. Also consider enclosing the result in a group or component before you continue modeling. And if you're concerned about model weight, check the model statistics afterward to see how many polygons were added. It can be quite eye-opening.

Where Follow Me fails and how you can replace it?

Follow Me doesn’t always maintain the vertical orientation of the profile along the curve, causing a cornice or handrail to twist. On the SketchUp forum, threads describing this problem usually end with a recommendation of the free extension Eneroth Upright Extruder, which keeps the profile upright.

Follow Me handles one path at a time, so in an apartment with seven rooms you go through the entire procedure seven times, each time ensuring perpendicularity, continuity, and orientation. On top of that, there's the texturing, which is exceptionally hard to master.

Besides that, you have to draw each profile yourself, every single time from scratch.

It's for these three reasons that it's worth using the Magic Molding plugin, which wraps up the entire procedure in three steps, provides nearly a hundred ready-made profiles, and lays out the texture along the molding. If you're interested in this topic, we've covered it in detail in the article on how to make baseboards and ceiling cornices in SketchUp.

CHECK OUT THE MAGIC MOLDING PLUGIN

If you're just laying down the basics of working in the program, and Follow Me is one of the first tools you've paused at, you'll find all these habits organized in the SketchUp Pro 2026 from Scratch for Beginners course.

Summary

Follow Me can be mastered. It requires one closed face, a continuous path, a shared group context, and the profile set perpendicular. If any of these conditions is not met, it refuses to cooperate. Knowing these four requirements and remembering the segments, you can handle everything with it: from cornices to piping to a turned table leg. However, if you want to automate this process and forget about all those technical details, go for Magic Molding :)