There’s a multi-touch rash starting to spread across the butt-checks of CAD that no penetrating ointment will cure. So, when SolidWorks demonstrated their future platform independent MCAD platform it was no surprise to see some multi-touch features thrown into the mix. However, what’s supremely interesting is not the multi-touch, but the device being multi-touched. It’s…

I know, the last post clearly stated (with images) that SolidWorks and your precious models would get sucked up into ‘the Cloud.’ So, while we’re all getting comfy with that idea, I’d like to destroy it. The concept of it. We won’t use SolidWorks (or any other program) on the cloud. We will simply use…

If only we all had buckets and buckets and buckets of paint in our possession and a powerful paint canon for occasions such as this. We have 3D color palettes people. Lock, load and FIRE. ColoRotate is on the web app scene serving up a new way to use and abuse color. Their online 3D…

Just as I was preparing the most delectable post on the HP + Stratasys 3D Printer deal that went down last week, I saw this news pop up in my inbox. Harness your excitement and then start making of pile of the knick-knacks you want to photocopy… IN GLORIOUS 3D. Yes, Ortery Technologies has a…

I’ve been holding my breath in a muscle tensing fright for the past day, looking at the images below and imagining being curdled cradled by a skinless baby robot with the head the size of a large bear. Seriously, if this thing crawled up to me, you would hear the highest pitch scream of your…

So, I’m sitting here throwing make-shift tablet styluseseseses at my face waiting for a massive Cintiq 21″ tablet to arrive so I can test it out, when I see Jordan Tadic from 3D Vision showing off how he used SolidWorks on a Wacom Cintiq. It’s tablet pickin’ fun of the highest caliber… or next to…

What if you could stick suction cups on your oculars and move models around on the screen with your eyeballs? Yeah, and, what if you could stick suction cups on your chest, hands, neck and elbows to do the same thing? Oh yeah. Well, what if… you didn’t need suction cups… BOO.YAH. We’ve talked about…

CES 2010 just blew the doors off sales tax revenue out in Las Vegas this past week and at the same time blew our minds with some juicy new tech headed our way. Tech that could very easily find it’s application, or even it’s perfect fit in 3D product design and development. While there was…

For shame!! You have two wide screen displays, a wireless keyboard, a wireless mouse, a 3D mouse, stereo surround speakers, a photo of Joan Rivers, a USB missile launcher, an iPod and a chair massager you use to heat oatmeal, BUT you don’t have a USB powered triple foot switch? Wow. really, wow. It’s time…

Quick, while nobody’s looking, slip those goggles on that make you look as if you’ve slipped through time to warn yourself about reading this post. “DON’T READ IT!” your future self says, but curiosity grasped your eyelids and pulls them clear over your freshly shaved hairline. You just can’t start a new decade without throwing…

If you woke up this morning wondering what the new decade is going to offer you after your merry stroll into work, SolidWorks has some ideas that include having hands, a very large interface, and a couple friend that are as giddy about new tech as you are. Put your future hats on and… just…

Prepare your light sensitive skins with ointments and lotions. You WILL be scanned with LIGHT. Don’t worry, it’s more a threat more than a warning. I’ll do it… and so will Kyle McDonald. But not only will he scan you, he’ll show you how to scan everybody and everything you want with pure, radiant light.…

2010. It’s here… or almost here. Which means it’s time to reflect on all the fun innovations that we ran screaming towards, or away from, over the past decade. Over the past ten years I went from storing data on a CD to storing data online. I also went from emailing someone a couple times…

If this update of tech to be birthed from the womb of Microsoft Project Natal is meant to fool us into believing it’s real, we’re totally going to fall for it and cuddle it in our arms. It’s highly possible that this video shows a product developer looking a bit silly flicking his booger fingers…

If you get the fever and shakes just thinking about moving to new technology, I’m with you. (I’m totally not with you) I’d much prefer to just stick my finger in my throat and vomit magnificent cad data all over a glass office table. Can you imagine?… you SO know that would be awesome. People…

Alright, I have a big ol’ plug for my friends at Vuuch. They have a chance to get into the technological fray at the Mass Innovations nights coming up on January 13th. You can tip them over the edge and allow them to present their collaboration-kickin’ ideas at this poll. Last I checked they were…

Well, it snuck up on us, but once again it’s the time of year we wish everyone would stop being so selfish and buy us a sweet piece of tech we can become completely absorbed in. A high-end laptop for crankin’ SolidWorks and other 3D goodness would be just fine. Where do you start? At…

I’m telling you, there’s no end to the carnage… or virtual carnage… or inane thoughts I get when I see pretty lights shooting out of a robot. But that just goes to show how naivety will bleed us dry in a fit of flashy brilliance. What is this I speak of? An experiment from Chris…

It’s odd.You see a crowd of people gathered around an iPhone and you automatically think… head down, ramming speed… and it all goes fairly well, until you run smack dab into cool tech that may very well help you explain away piles of paper. This week, Autodesk Labs released the Inventor Publisher Tech Preview which…

I think it’s about time to leave the table-top to coffee spills and action movie fight scenes. Why? Because who needs to interact with a table-top multi-touch surface when you can interact with any surface… anywhere. Pranav Mistry has his own idea on what it means to fully utilize your environment and all the objects…

I know. It’s dinner conversation that goes right along with slamming your hand in the potatoes of the person right next to you. POTATO HAND SLAM… “So, What in the world is Qi Pan up to these days at the ol’ Cambridge University Engineering Department?” One word for ya. Rowdiness. The boy has spun out…

Out of the millions of things in the world to get really, really embarrassingly excited about, storage read/write speeds are UP there. Are ya with me? YEEEEEEAH. Start giving your bandwith brothers high-fives, because Fusion-io knows what you want and the latest ioXtreme SSD is setting the standard, at least for the next week, for…

Of course a small, kid-like robot wouldn’t go berserk, run and jump onto your face while screaming “YOUR SOUL, YOUR SOUL” in a cold, electronic voice. That, is RIDICULOUS. Almost as ridiculous as robot cockroaches that survive impacts. Even if it actually wouldn’t attack you, that hasn’t stopped, Tomotaka Takahashi, CEO of Robot Garage from…

So, what happens when I go offline for a couple days to clean the charred remains of spiders out of my displays? A ton of news about displays… 3D displays, multi-touch displays, holographic displays, the future of displays, display gumbo… It’s absolutely uncalled for and also pleasant to see that there’s much development going on…

So , it’s no surprise the last post was asking about your software/hardware upgrade habits. Windows 7 launches today. What does that mean? Well, besides the likelihood that you’re wondering if you should upgrade, you’re probably also wondering where you can get a 7 layer Burger King Whopper. Well, you can stop wondering, because it’s…

Well, heavens ta Betsy! There are software and hardware updates exploding from every pore of the hairless cat of technology and you’ve just now realized your software and hardware are about 5 years old. Time does fly. However, I’m bettin’ a bag of chips that several of you out there, or your savvy IT groups,…

I know, you see it there… on the screen, but then you look on the table… and it’s not there, IT’S NOT THERE. Ya know why, huh? huh? Because it’s Augmented Reality (AR), and your neural pathways are about to be re-myelinated with 3D augmented goodness. ISMAR 2009 (International Symposium on Mixed and Augmented Reality)…

Your weekends as a Thief, Cleric or Paladin are about to get really cool and immersive and I’m not talking about the late night meeting with the board of trustees. Using Microsoft Surface, Carnegie Melon’s Entertainment Technology Center has descended into the realms of touchscreen gaming with the development of SurfaceScape. The game, if you…

Yes, it’s all fun and games until… someone jabs an elfin creature in the eye, gets a gnarly infection and start projectile vomiting all over the place. Fortunately, it’s a virtual elfin creatures we’re talking about. The people behind it… 3DVia. Last week at the Dassault Customer Conference, I found out some top secret (totally-not-top-secret)…

I abhor oversize images of cuddly cats as much as the next person, so having them on a 155″ OLED display doesn’t do much for me. However, having the option of taking that 155″ display and turning it into a 155,000 bajillion inch OLED display of a cuddly cat is a whole different story. Last…

You could put one finger on a 3D mouse, stick another finger down your throat and blast a pile of 3D geometry onto any screen of any time-saving product development program with ease. However, it’s still just a pile, perhaps a well thought out pile, but still, a pile… on a screen. It’s a conversation…

Just look at those happy digits going at it with pure multi-touch tappin’ delight. Cool desktop UI’s are great fun to play with, but with Windows 7 launching October 22nd and many already using it, multi-touch and UI’s are about to converge. Bumptop is on it. Version 1.2, you can download right now, has all…

So, a spider was crawling across the roof of my car yesterday. Fast and very poisonous looking. Considering what you’re about to see, I’m fortunate it didn’t hop across the hood, onto my face and start drilling another face into my head bone. This video has been around a while, but I’d never seen it,…

Aaaccck! Yeah, forget the fact that the bug you just swallowed was, oh, say the size of your palm. It also happens to have the newest in remote radio control gadgetry, and probably the diseases of a hundred generations, strapped to it’s muscly exoskeleton. As if we didn’t have enough to make us cringe with…

Technology is changing and growing faster than your mangy hair. And like the hair, it’s time to think about a little trim and a wee bit o’ style. Not so long ago, many ‘CAD technicians’ used a tablet menu to pick and click their way to 2-dimensional, layer switchin’ bliss. We’ve seen a transition, moving…

It’s that intense chill of power you feel when you run screaming through a gypsum-board wall right before you throw-up and pass out from a mild concussion. If only you had implements of destruction better suited to your surly demeanor. Christian Ristow has just what you’re looking for. A three-fingered claw. Made out of Aluminum.…

Cruuuunch. Remember the sound, because it’s likely to be the last thing you hear as you see the contents of your body somehow digested through the visible Endoskeleton support structure of the latest in robo-gadgetry, the Eccerobot. If the name isn’t enough to make you contemplate full, electro-conductive body armor options, the clunky movement of…

Gather round the coffee table family. You’re about to see one of the most gut-grabbin’, practical applications of touchscreen tech yet. Your coffee table serves a lot of purposes, but Media Interaction Lab has one more to make your odd-looking neighbors peer in amazement, through the back window.. The premise is simple. Make the coffee…

Can you even imagine? No OS? No compatibility issues with this system or that system. Pure 3D CAD applications delivered to your screen regardless of what you ‘boot up’ at your desk, or on the road, or on the plane? Could it happen? While visiting SolidWorks, Jon Hirshtick addressed a question about SolidWorks on a…

Well now. While you’re sitting around waiting for the 3DVia iPhone App or throwing your vote in for an eDrawings app, a relatively small band of developers has slammed 3D model viewing right into your sleek smartphone. Dan Halabe and Chuck Han have release NaviCAD, currently the only way to get silly with 3D viewing…

Don’t ya just get warm fuzzies all over when you hear of new over-priced, high-capacity storage options? Well, prepare to tell your coworkers once again the story of how much 6MB cost 20 years ago, cause Western Digital is dropping the single terabyte beat on your face. Today, Western Digital ships the first 2.5″ 1TB…

After seeing the snazzy video showing future multi-touch support for SpaceClaim, I went on the hunt to find out a little bit more. Fortunately, I had the email of Blake Courter, Co-founder of SpaceClaim. Great chap, hung out with him at SolidWorks World 2009, of all places. He answered some questions about MT capabilities, gives…

Multi-touch will never happen with 3D CAD… OH, except it has… or will be, this fall. The company showing the potential? SpaceClaim. There’s no announcement out of the company yet, but a video surfaced on YouTube over the weekend showing the future of what we’re assuming will be the next release of SpaceClaim. We’ll gather…

Yes, materials, by nature, are 3D, but this one is the thinnest of them all. It’s also super-conductive, super flexible and makes steel look like a 90-lb weakling. At one atom thick, Graphene is the newest in materials being studied for applications in high-speed computers and other nanotechnology. It’s a material that was first discovered…

How many of you would like to take a dip in a pool of GPU’s? No? Something about pain? No worries. Greg Corke from Devlop3D takes a look at How to Buy a Graphics Card for SolidWorks in the next issue of Develop3D. Instead of feeling like your jumping into deep, unknown waters, he lays…

Ok, it’s just too much to take. As if robots partaking of live flesh wasn’t bad enough, now we have robots with the autonomous foresight to continue their steam-powered existence by means of consuming the DEAD. Robotic Technologies Inc. is sending us out with the creation of a proper robot predator – the EATR. That…

For the somber souls chained to 5 minute boot times and 100% CPU usage, take heart. Early yesterday morning, Google announcment Chrome OS. Yes, another OS, but this time one with all the characteristics you would expect from a product put out by Google, namely, speed, simplicity and yeah, totally open-source. An open-source OS. That…

Oh now behave yourself. It’s a simple question, but one we can throw a truckload of speculation at and shake it vigorously to come up with all sorts of outlandish ideas. ya down? Mozilla Labs launched their Open Web Tools Directory today. It’s the new central repository mish-mash of design and coding tools to aid…

Son: But Ma, I can draw my own photo! Ma: Nope son, you attach robo arm to you. The last drawing you did of yourself was hideous and misrepresented. Besides, the robot captures your best features dear. Thomas Ricker states it best, it’s “a device that snaps your photo and then forces you to draw…

Have you ever sat at your table staring into a pile of peas wondering just how a multi-touch workflow would work? Would it be practical for editing 3D content or video content? Oblong Industries (creators of G-speak) and supreme futurist John Underkloffer unveiled TAMPER at Sundance Film Fesitval this year as part of the New…