Although existing cutaway and section view tools that exist in today’s CAD tools are incredibly reliable, they pale in comparison to the hand drawn detailed cutaway drawings that were – at one time- the most advanced form of communication for designers, engineers and manufacturers. Although cutaway illustrations have been used for centuries for everything from clock mechanisms to steam engines, it’s the mesmerizing full-color automotive cutaway illustrations from illustrators such as Yoshiro Inomoto that helped move the cutaways from something you’d expect to see in a blueprint to something you would want on your wall. More recently, Madrid ad agency espadaysantacruz took the concept of ‘cutaway’ quite literally when they…
Between the Evolution Door from Klemens Torggler to the Fletcher Capstan Table from Fletcher Burwell-Taylor, kinetic furniture designs have been slowly finding their way into the mainstream thanks to their mesmerizing shape-shifting characteristics that are the result of some tedious engineering. More recently, New York-based kinetic artist Ian Stell has created what is likely to be one of the more useful kinetic designs for those living in small urban dwellings: a shape-shifting coffee table design that is based on the accordion motion of a pantograph. To create the hinged lattice system for his Sinan table, Stell started by mapping out the internal lattice pattern using a 3D model in order…
Don your favorite bath robe, cream that coffee and get comfortable with this weekend’s SolidSmack Weekend Reader. This week we saw everything from a new interface that wants to make CAD modeling feel like a DJ booth, five tips towards getting that design engineer job, Dell’s first all-weather, impact-resistant tablet for shop environments and more … So lay back, relax and take a load off while reading the top ten stories on SolidSmack this past week. Oh and uh…don’t forget to shed some much-needed sunlight on your face, too.
We threw it hard, like we had five arms each and the strength of a cattle-prodded meglephant. It was only a small asteroid, mostly ore, filled with holes growing the orange fungii we could no longer harvest. With the atmosphere decaying and a lack of constant moisture, it had completely succumbed to these links. Kelly Airo – Beautiful texture and line work using water and colored pencil. And she likes the word ‘fantastical’. Siberian Hitch Knot – Woopa, up and over and inside, woop and reindeer tied! Learn the knot to beat all knots, then put mittens on and astound your friends. Goldrush – Are we obsessed with everything golden?…
It’s no secret that SolidWorks is still among the most widely-used CAD applications in the product design industry. Yet despite its widespread use and popularity, a number of alternative CAD offerings have been coming out of the woodwork within the past few years that leverage cost (oftentimes in a freemium or monthly subscription business model) as one of their top selling points. Needless to say, when it comes to bootstrap startups who are counting each and every penny to get their product to market, SolidWorks (which can cost anywhere from the mid to high four-figures) isn’t always a feasible choice. In an effort to help ease this process for hardware…
As is the case for many architects, 77-year-old Renzo Piano’s career started while building sandcastles near his childhood home on the shores of Genoa, Italy. Since the days of his earliest structure designs, Piano has gone on to design some of the world’s most famous buildings including Paris’ Centre Pompidou, London’s Shard, and more recently, the new Whitney Museum building in New York City. “Making things has always been a pleasure for me – happy hands, happy mind – and making sandcastles was my training in fantasy,” explains Piano. “Now, as an architect constructing buildings like the Shard, I have to think about the final result, but as a child…