I’m sure you’ve all been at the point where you’re trying to decide what detail to model and what detail to leave out. Should I model the five layers of paneling, plate and paint flakes? Do I really need to show how the stitching on this knitted sweater vest tucks around my armpits? YES, and…

It has been sad and somewhat awkward times with the camera-enabled iPad. Left to nothing but holding up the massive tablet to capture the memories of your great-aunt’s 90th birthday or facetiming with your friends from the hospital bed after that near-fatal fence-jumping accident. Now, you can capture that and so much more, then turn…

Last month, Fujitsu Laboratories along with Fujitsu’s Research and Development Centre announced that they’ve developed a potent way for CAD designers to search through a CAD library. Just like you can use Google Image Search to look for similar images, you can look for any CAD model based on a keyword, yes, but also a desired…

What do you do in the morning when you have a hankering for a fried doughy foods and a massive glass of SolidWorks API knowledge? Stop by your nearest doughnut shop? Unfortunately, they know nothing of SolidWorks API and you may not get your doughnuts if you mention anything of it. So, after you’ve grabbed…

Do you remember that idea about viewing SolidWorks files on an iPhone or iPad? You dreamt of it years ago. Then experienced the disappointment. Then, last week, SolidWorks taunted you about a new mobile app. This week, today, they’re releasing it. eDrawings for iPad. It’s priced at US $1.99 and available now on iTunes. Here’s…

There were rumors floating around about the acquisition of Google SketchUp. It was thought the buyer may be Dassault Systemes. SpaceClaim was even in there at one point. Turns out that the acquisition rumor was true, but speculation on the buyer? Waaaaaay off. Today, Trimble, producers of advanced location-based hardware and software, announced they have…

If you guessed it was coming, you were right. GrabCAD has launched a new iPad app that puts the glory of GrabCAD right on your lap. Now, tearing yourself away from that 3D model addiction, stopping excessive model downloading and creating temporary tattoos of your favorite CAD model images is even more difficult than ever.

You’ve likely been gnawing the multi-touch off your Magic Mouse in anticipation of it, but no longer. Autodesk Inventor Fusion is now available for the Mac. You can download it from Autodesk Labs immediately and you don’t even need Autodesk Inventor installed to run it. If you’ve used Autodesk Inventor Fusion on Windows, you’ll notice…

Have you ever felt the burning compulsion to export an OBJ file from SolidWorks, only to find out it’s not possible? Well, now it is. Neil Larsen and macro-maker Karpena have released a macro to make it happen. Absolutely free and exports both .obj and .mtl files.

The 10th app is imminent. It beckons from the ashes… ahem, PTC has formally announced the release of Creo 2.0. For those still clinging to Pro/ENGINEER Wildfire 5, it may have just the right gleam to get you past the rebranding/restructuring brought out with Creo 1.0. With it, PTC brings you the 10th app to…

Unhappiness Alert: The models don’t actually pop out of the screen. I know, it’s hard to believe you’ve been without 3D viewing in AutoCAD WS all these years, but turn those tears of sorrows into finger slaps of joy. You can now view your 3D AutocCAD files on AutoCAD WS in… 3D (granted Turboviewer did…

Besides enjoying the warmth of freshly molten plastic against their skin, plastic part designer and mold makers appreciate parts that don’t shrink unevenly or have an excessive amount of undercuts. SolidWorks has launched an addon to help part designers of the world catch and ‘predict’ issues that may come up during manufacturing with a new…

We have a raging debate here at EvD Media. Harsh words have been spoken. Tears have been shed. And nameless individuals have found themselves sleeping in doghouses and whipping themselves in penitence for “being a meany-head”. The madness must stop, and in order for that to happen, we’re going to have to come to terms…

Yes, you must. You must get your 3D Kung Fu on. One way to do that, in the least harmful and most efficient way possible, is through the viewing of videos. One in particular that will give you the chops to create endless variations of radial intensity not fit for the pudgy, weak wills of…

This week, SolidSmack was out at One Market Street in San Francisco, California for two days. One Market Street is the home of Autodesk corporate where they invited a slew of Press/bloggers out to get waylaid by the news and features of the Autodesk 2013 product line. The updates span the mechanical, construction and entertainment…

CAD Simulation just got a dose of direct modeling simplicity. Kubotek has launched KeyCreator Analysis which provides a new multiphysics solution for users of KeyCreator Direct Modeling application. They’re slating it as ‘CAD Analysis for Designers and Analysts’ and have the full analysis workflow embedded within the KeyCreator interface.

A new player in the 3D collaboration space is on the scene with a site that steps up sharing, syncing and neck slappin’ your project management effort with the blazing efficiency of a web-based collaborative environment. TeamPlatform it’s much more than meets the eye. We had a chance to use it and talk with Scott…

Low and behold. SpaceClaim, the company slapping the history out 3D modeling just launched SpaceClaim Engineer 2012. As the name implies it’s for Engineers only. Just kidding, it also works for people who write ‘Engineer’ on a piece of paper with crayon and tape it to their chest. Features? We talked with Blake Courter, co-founder…

Founders and TEDfellows of web-based collaborative design solution Sunglass.io, Nitin Rao and Kaustuv DeBiswas, have raised US $1.7 million in seed funding from from top tier investors. We’ve got a pipin’ hot, fairly fresh interview with the founders of Sunglass.io with all the details web-based collaboration platform and a look at how the future of…

Do Samurais kick? I’m pretty sure they do. Especially after getting an arm or two sliced off. Sensable is taking the sword to 3D Geometry launching the new version of it’s flagship modeling software Freeform, slapping a big ol’ Version 12 on the box and shipping out an app that can take on anything from…

The 3D Mouse. Quite the visage of refinement in the 3D CAD World. Sitting slightly to left of your keyboard in all its glory, carried in its padded case to and fro, even securing a special place on the nightstand next to your bed… ahem. The 3D Mouse. People love’em or… don’t use them. We’re…

KeyShot 3 came out a mere three months ago. Now, KeyShot 3.1 is here. It’s a mere point release later, but they’re slamming out a slew of new features and improvements with the update. Features like Environment Editing, Material Templates and Network Rendering. They’re adding supprt for 3DConnexion devices and improving the animation debuted with…

If the whole industry that PLM has been built on was a massive bear mama, Autodesk just grabbed it and gave its jowls a good shaking, then proceeded to mount and ride it. On February 29th, Autodesk launched their PLM product announced last year at Autodesk University, Autodesk PLM360. It’s a completely web-accessible, highly customizable…

That’s right, friends: modo 601 is here, and to say we are ‘excited’ would be an understatement. In fact, we burnt ourselves on some celebratory, half-baked brownies we cooked up for the occasion while feasting our fingers on new modeling and rendering tools, a slew of new shaders and – oh yes – character animation…

If you were enjoying a mustard salad sandwich last week while watching our SolidWorks World Coverage and choked, we were not able to help you. As you gasped for air though, you probably saw the new features to come in SolidWorks 2013, which in all likelihood dislodged said sandwich from your windpipe, shooting it into your…

Day three of SolidWorks World 2012! It came and went with a quickness. Then the travel and the catching up. But not to worry, we’ve got the final overview video and some more details coming at you. As you may know, the Day 3 General Session is the day when the top ten enhancement requests…

Intense! SolidWorks World Day Two is always the craziest. Announcements, interview, lots of technical sessions and the off-site event that probably has people feeling a little shaky the next morning. We’ve got the highlights for ya and guess what… there’s one more day to go!

Day one at SolidWorks World 2012. If there was such a thing as a firehose of flaming CAD vodka, this would be it. Attendees have been drenched with inspiration in the keynote, getting their geek on in the tech sessions and livin’ it up at the evening parties. One product, 5,300+ people, insanity. We caught…

Robots!! YES. You’ll see some like that cute little guy up above at SolidWorks World 2012. We’re on the scene at SolidWorks World and the show is in full effect with the Welcome Recpetion kicking things off Sunday night in the Partner Pavilion. We’re taking loads of video as well and will be blasting coverage…

We’ve stretched back the jowls and have devoured our share of 3D viewing tech lately, but it’s not over. There’s sunglass.io, a web-based 3D viewer, and Maide Cotrol that brings 3d model interaction to the iPhone and iPad. Now, we have another viewer that allows import, smooth 3D viewing and sharing.

Have you ever been sitting in a presentation of a product you designed, screaming inside your head at the person giving the presentation as they fumble through moving your model about? Those days are at an end, my friend. Maide has released the CadRemote iPhone app that gives you (and anyone else you deem worthy)…

I’m sure you have been tempted to switch from your iPhone to an Android, but are saddened by the lack of 3D CAD apps on the market, yes? Me? I’m happy with 1982 Motorola DynaTAC 8000X, but now that TurboViewer Pro is available, I’m thinking of taking the open platform plunge. IMSI design launched the…

If there was ever any 3D cad app that could be compared with smooth, silky melted butter, TinkerCAD would be the one. If you’ve not experienced it yet, you must. You simply must. The web-based, 3D modeling app is out with a new version and it’s just about everything you would want and expect in…

This week on Engineer vs Designer we have a little chat with Matt Sederberg, co-founder of T-Splines, recently acquired by Autodesk. Matt dishes the goods on how T-Splines came about and takes evasive maneuvers when we pry on the future of T-Splines.

AutoDesSys is peeling back the flexible underbelly of form-Z 7 and stuffing in a slew of new features. Form-Z has been around a while. It’s always had great features for architectural modeling, but this new version brings even more to the freeform table. New features increase the options you have for dynamic modeling of roofs…

Tony Fadell. You may have heard of him. At the very least, you’e seen, or let sweet sound emanate from the device he is know as the father of. Tony was Apple’s senior vice president of the iPod division as well as adviser to Steve Jobs. He’s now CEO of NEST, a company that reinventing…

Quick, while everyone is distracted with the aftermath of CES, drop what you’re doing right now and have a look at sunglass.io immediately. Sunglass.io is a venture-backed MIT startup, based out of San Francisco, co-founded by Kaustuv DeBiswas and Nitin Rao. Today, they’ve launched Sunglass.io, a browser-based environment for seamless collaboration and soon, a suite…

How does jet setting over to San Diego sound? What if it involved sitting inside a conference center all day, absorbing vast amounts of knowledge about SolidWorks? I know my pasty white skin would appreciate that. SolidWorks World 2012 is coming up in a few weeks, and SolidWorks is interested in launching one of you…

What do you do after growing an engineering community to 70,000 users and 20,000 models? You snag a massive 4 million in series A funding to add to the 1.1 million seed round previously achieved. The GrabCAD engineer and design community did just that to kick off the new year, with plans to grow the…

Have a few of these laying around the house? If you’re a fan of Portal or Portal 2, the teleporting escape game from Steam, you’ll probably wish you did. Logan Siahaan and Stephen Hess are a couple of portal jumping fiends and wanted to do just that, so they see out to make their own…

I bet if you ground the pulpy goodness of a SolidWorks training manual into mash, mixed it with raw eggs and downed it in front of a group of SolidWorks Certified Professionals, you still wouldn’t absorb all the knowledge you could in a step-by-step tutorial. Particularly, an F-16, an Audi and a Lamborghini surfacing tutorial…

I don’t know why attempting to move your model by jabbing a dead mole into your screen doesn’t work, but you’ll be interested to know about Maide control while you work out the details. When Maide first debuted, it was only avaialable for SketchUp and Rhino 4. Two months later and that has completely changed.…

Sometimes you take a look at 3D software and go mad trying to figure out what eye to puncture first. Not the case with TopSolid 7. This review has been a long time coming. At first I was afraid, then I was excited, then slightly afraid again, then really excited. Why? Because Top Solid 7…

I tore the tender gristle from my wrist joint last week and sent my loose appendage into the Exhibition hall of Autodesk University 2011, straight down to the 3DConnexion booth. Before the blood completely drained, I (or rather, my hand) was able to twitch uncontrollably on top of the new product from 3DConnexion, the SpaceMouse…

Dassault Systemes sure isn’t afraid to launch a cool, new product… then hide in the back corner next to the prosthetic leg design for their cat. Thing is, it may not actually be ready for prime-time, even though it is part of the currently available CATIA V6R2012 release. CATIA Natural Sketch was announced at ECF2011,…

This is a special guest post from Sky Greenawalt of School Street Design who writes about CAD/CAM tools and the process he goes through in the quest to create high-quality composite parts at BetterLivingThroughCNC.com. Catch his webinar on T-Splines V3.3 retopo tools and applying T-Spline surfaces to mesh data, November 29th. Register here. Well folks,…

Hear that noise? No? That’s because it’s the sound of stunned silence emanating from all those who’ve been waiting and clamoring for their favorite real-time rendering program to bring the simplicity and ease of photo-rendering to their world of… animation. Well, prepare for the shock-wave that’s about to peel your keyframin’ fingers right off… Luxion…

This morning, the Local Motors website got a little bit of an update. As speculated yesterday, the automotive-centric design community is getting some software lovin’ from Siemens PLM in the form of a new software release. Solid Edge Design1. This new iteration of Solid Edge is a scaled down version of the full-blown synchronous modeling…

The Rally Fighter by Local Motors. Image via SiemensPLM Collaborative innovation is the name of the game and both Seimens PLM and Dassualt are knocking at the door of co-creating possibility. Except it’s less possibility and more actuality. This week both companies have revealed their plans to take collaboration to another a place where you…

Who cares about the Cloud, when the ability to grab our models is out there? Virtually, that is, in a very awkward, ‘why is this sneeze guard in front of me’, ‘dangit I spilled the ranch dressing on the sunflower seeds’ type of way. Yet, as we fall down the rocky gorge of 3D software…