Imagine being able to interact with virtual objects that are tangible in any given 3D space. For instance, designing a building using hovering 3D geometry that can be manipulated and positioned into a myriad of configurations. Got that?

With so many cool things coming out each week, it can be hard to wade through all the rock-awesomeness. With ‘Cool Tools’, we’ve done the hard work for you. This week we saw everything from an updated take on the modern survival kit, a new app for turning your spare iPad into a second display, how to create the “Sugar Spoon of Death”, the return of Crystal Pepsi, and more… Ready? Let’s go! This week we look at: DESIGN Jackfish Survival Kit “Jackfish is an indestructible super slim card holder containing essential everyday tools…” The Vagabund BMW R100R “An updated take on the BMW R-Series from the Austrian custom motorcycle…

It was only a couple of weeks ago when Sketchfab announced that they had put together the world’s first directory for industrial 3D scanning services – The Sketchfab Community 3D Scanning Services – yet, the crew has yet another milestone announcement to make before the close of 2015. Starting today, users of the fully embeddable 3D viewer can now give motion to characters, illustrate educational concepts and tell better stories around product features through their all–new 3D Animation support. According to the announcement posted to the company’s blog on Tuesday, the new feature “will support different types of animations, such as skeleton-based animation (model rigged with bones), solid animation (translation,…

It was just last week when we saw the “How to Draw a Lightsaber” video from ID Sketching and Sketch-a-Day founder Spencer Nugent. With the upcoming release of Star Wars: The Force Awakens, Nugent has been feeling the Star Wars fever and has released not one but TWO more videos that both teach us the fundamentals of ID sketching while throwing a little entertainment design and nostalgia into the mix. “I grew up loving the movies and concept art of Star Wars,” Nugent recently told SolidSmack. “You could say in large part it’s expanded my imagination and been a source of inspiration for many years. One of my favorite things…

Time for another round of apps that cover the spectrum of your beloved mobile device, be it iPhone, Android or Windows! The Weekly App Smack is the best of new or updated design and productivity apps (and maybe a couple of fun ones, too) for the busy design or engineering professional and this week we have a list sure to make you more efficient. Do you have an app suggestion that has made your life easier or changed up your workflow? Let us know in the comments below or send it into tips@www.solidsmack.com. Hit it! Listomatic “Listomatic automatically helps you create and manage Twitter lists.” Slash Keyboard “Slash is a…

Inspired by a phenomenon called emergence, a process whereby larger entities, patterns, and regularities arise through interactions among smaller or simpler entities that themselves do not exhibit such properties, artist Thomas Medicus recently turned his attention to creating a hand painted anamorphic sculpture that he calls the “Emergence Lab”. “On each side of the cube there is one anamorphic painting that can always only be seen from one point,” he explains. “Since every figure fills the exact same surface as its counterpart on the opposite side, the rear image is covered while looking at one figure.” To create the mesmerizing cube, Medicus uses a total of 216 laser cut acrylic…