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I was finally able to get a proper live demo of the new “SolidWorks Industrial Design” product at SolidWorks World 2015, and while we still lack some really critical information (Uh, price?), a lot of the fuzz is finally coming into focus. We spread some misinformation on The Twitters yesterday, so today we set the record straight. Here’s what we know so far, and, just as importantly, what we don’t.

Backstory

We’ve been seeing glimpses of a cloud-based industrial design offering from SolidWorks for several years now. It was finally demoed publicly a year ago at SolidWorks World 2014 under the awkward “SolidWorks Industrial Conceptual” moniker with a sticker shock so strong it could knock an angry woolly mammoth flat on his back (over $3k/year). This year it’s back again, albeit renamed “SolidWorks Industrial Design” (SWID), and we’ve learned quite a bit more about the product.

I was able to actually use the product at the booth, and picked the brain of the very knowledgeable Brad Williamson (@MusicCityTTM) about some juicy deets. I’m hoping that just maybe I can drive it in front of a camera at some point before we leave. We’ll see.

What we know:

Brad not only clicked through a little demo of his own, he also let me drive the product and click around the various workbenches tool sets. I peppered him with questions, and he gave respectably frank, honest answers, supporting them with video demos wherever necessary. My overall impression of the product itself was quite positive, and while I have misgivings about some of the sales model decisions, it will ultimately come down to brass tacks. Pricing is critical this time given last year’s debacle.

Summary

SWID is a very early-stage product that shows enormous potential. It’s beautifully designed, has a carefully considered UI, and will feel very natural and familiar to existing SW users, while making adoption much less painful for newer or less frequent users. Its feature set goes far beyond the mere SubD modeling tools they’ve been showing, and could actually be a quite capable stand-alone design tool for many designers. It’s also quite early days, and many of the limitations that exist now (see below) seem to be known issues that will be fixed over time.

That said, it was quite slow and laggy on the demo machine. It is unclear whether this was due to the machine itself needing a reboot, a bad network connection, or something inherent with the software/hardware configuration on the demo floor. Brad assured me that the lag was not normal, and that he has not experienced it on his office workstation. But still. I was also disappointed that it is still a Windows-only product.

Overall it seems like a formidable product. I hope it is priced to sell.

Basics

• Name: SolidWorks Industrial Design
• Release Date: April, 2015
• Windows only. No Mac version anywhere on the immediate horizon.
• Prefers Windows 8. Win7 is supported, but may have drawbacks, apparently. (Unclear.)
• Includes freestyle tablet sketching, SubD modeling, a full parametric feature based modeling, and direct modeling.

Sales Model

• Will only be sold through existing regional VAR channels.
• Pure subscription (aka “rentalware”) model, actual pricing TBA.
• There will be a published price, but they are explicitly reserving the right for VARs to cut deals on a per-client basis.

data & i/o

• CATIA geometry kernel, not Parasolid.
• All data is stored on Dassault’s cloud servers. Local storage is NOT an option.
• “Internal cloud” is NOT available for this product, despite previous tweets to the contrary. CATIA products can be installed on internal clouds, but not SWID. In other words, it’s all on Dassault’s servers, end of story.
• “Documents” are called “Products”, and there is no folder structure for “files” of any kind. All data management is achieved through a combination of search and tag filtering.
• There is no distinction between an “assembly” file and a “part” file. All Products are essentially single-part assemblies by default, and new parts can be added in as needed.
• In the “Armageddon scenario” in which a user wants to entirely bail from the 3DExperience platform, I am told there will be export utilities for a mass exodus. In other words, if you want to download all your data and take it to another ecosystem, it will be possible, but ugly. Details are very hazy on this, and it seems like something that’s yet to be worked out.
• Export to SolidWorks is via dumb solid (their marketing spin is “body export”, but the fact is simple: SWID is exactly as compatible with SW as it is with CREO, Edge, Rhino, or Bob’s Pretty Good CAD).
• Contrary to early appearances, feature data does NOT come over from SWID to SW in any way during export.
• Import from SolidWorks is also dumb solid. Feature data is NOT retained.
• SubD cage data CANNOT be imported from other systems like MODO or T-Splines.
• There is NOT a way of importing 2D curve data from vector art files like EPS, DXF, PDF, etc. In other words, your client logo cannot be imported. At all.
• Sharing with clients is possible, but for a separate fee based on the number of extra users brought into the project. The additional friction added by charging for read-only users seems an odd choice for a cloud product, but there it is.
• Switching between the “Industrial Design” product and the “Conceptual Design” products is really just a change of workbench toolbar. The “files” (or whatever you call them) are not SWID files or SWCD files, they’re just Products, and either tool set can work at any time in any Product. It was quite seamless.

Sketching

• Uncannily similar to CATIA Natural Sketch, albeit apparently without pressure sensitivity for Wacom users.
• Allows for free sketching on a 2D plane or 3D surface equally easily with identical tools.
• Two sketch tools: one creates “raster-like” sketches for fast, fluid napkin-style sketching, the other creates usable sketch curves.
• All sketches in SWID are actually 3D sketches! We can, for example, draw all three views (front, top, side) of a product in a single sketch. Presumably this means they are using a fully 3D sketch solver as well. (Which makes sense, given that CATIA has always done this.)
• Hold Shift key to draw straight lines, and Alt key to draw arcs.
• Controls are available for brush size and color, but the appearance of the resulting line is utilitarian, not artistic. Brushes are always circular, hard-edged, and do not appear to have pressure sensitivity for Wacom users (unconfirmed). No airbrushes, fill tool, or other more “art” style tools.
• Full parametric sketch solvers are available in every sketch. Any sketch can contain any mixture of the “raster-like” hand-sketching, sketched curves, and traditional constraint-based sketch entities.
• Sketching directly on a surface can create usable feature curves.

SubD Modeling

• Largely similar in interaction to equivalent SubD packages like Fusion360, CREO Freestyle, T-Splines, Power Surfacing, or VFX modelers like MODO.
• Manipulation gnomon is called the “robot”, and looks very similar to the one in Fusion360, with move/rotate/scale build into a single gizmo.
• Gestural tools allow you to massage the form with strokes of a pen, more like sketching than traditional CV pulling. I was unconvinced of its relevance, but they seem proud of it.
• Resulting surface guarantees C2 continuity across the entire surface–including poles–but is of course C3+ on continuous grids of quads. This is similar to other SubD > NURBS conversion tools, though my understanding is that they hold some fundamental patents that allow the quality to be better with the CATIA SWID algorithm than with competitive tools. Not sure how.
• SubD cages cannot be constrained or driven associatively in any way.
• Edge matching tools allow a SubD cage to be temporally matched to the edge of an adjacent surface, but no boundary condition forces it to stay that way, and my understanding is that the fit will only be as close as the cage density allows. In other words, it will not be a watertight match.
• When SubD is converted to NURBS, conversion is one BREP per SubD face. With dense meshes, this will mean equally dense patch layouts in the final geometry. (The same is true of CREO Freestyle, but not of Power Surfacing or T-Splines, as the latter two federate continuous cages into larger faces wherever possible.)
• Edge weighting and creasing are available, but cannot be faded: a given edge can only have one weight value, and that weight cannot vary from one side to the other. This means that fading creases are not really possible.

Feature-based and Direct Modeling

• Seems to be a reasonably complete feature set, quite similar to SolidWorks. All of the typical tools are there.
• Feature patterning is all there as expected.
• Direct modeling tools appear very similar to SolidWorks, though I haven’t seen much in this area.

Rendering

• Built-in rendering is essentially CATIA’s built-in renderer at the moment.
• I was told that Bunkspeed will trickle down and eventually be available in the product.

What we don’t know:

Well, a lot, actually. We really need to sit down with this thing and give it a proper run-through in order to really understand what it can and can’t be expected to do. In the meantime, the consensus is basically this: it’s a very cool product that does very cool things, and it really just comes down to price at this point. If the price is right, it’s a contender. If not, well, we’ll see.

Read What we learned at #SWW15 about SolidWorks Industrial Design at SolidSmack.

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I was sipping a hot coffee and Ding! An email from GrabCAD pops into my email this morning. A very unexpected email. “I have some great news – Workbench is now free!” Hardi Meybaum, CEO of GrabCAD says in the email. Workbench is GrabCAD’s highly rated, browser-based model management and collaboration software that was selling at US $70/user/month and US $107/user/month for unlimited storage. It’s now completely free–Free as in ‘Free Beer’ and ‘Free Backrubs’–A surprising move considering they were acquired by Stratasys last September for $100M whose stock just nosedived last week. Although GrabCAD is an operationally distinct subsidiary, it makes us think, “What was their reasoning behind this?”

According to Hardi, the reason is a focus on growing the community. “Our goal with this change is to reach more people. Returning to the free model of Workbench will increase the speed of adoption and support uninhibited product design collaboration.”

I remember fondly the last time Workbench was free–It was two years ago during beta. Its name wasn’t even certain at that time. It was a dynamic product changing daily.

Getting Workbench into the hands of every Engineer and Designer is a return to form according to Hardi. He says, “We are excited to supply every engineer with a free solution that enables rapid iteration on design concepts, mobile access to designs, and generally increases the speed and quality of the design process.”

Stratasys acquired a large community and a potentially disruptive force in 3D modeling and management software, so we’ve been waiting to see their next move. Now they’re making it by knocking down the barrier to use and likely sparking interest from professionals. One thought is that Stratasys would help in continuing to build the community and make all GrabCAD products free. They in turn have immediate access to a wider pool of users who would user 3D Printers and services. Later, making a premium offering with a version of Workbench that adds much more functionality.

Regardless, GrabCAD still intends to develop Workbench, with Hardi saying, “GrabCAD will continue to invest in Workbench and develop it as the tool of choice for CAD collaboration.” Many already love using it and if the response on Twitter is any evidence, people are very excited about what this means. Keep an eye on GrabCAD. This is certainly going to be interesting.

Read GrabCAD Workbench Is Now Free For All at SolidSmack.

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The newly announced SolidWorks Industrial Design product is ostensibly similar to Autodesk’s popular Fusion360 product. Like, really similar. And at $2280 per annum, the confusing mish-mash of overpriced and overlapping subscriptions in the new SolidWorks offering have us asking hard questions.

Here’s why.

Before we get into details, our hats are off to the good folks at SolidWorks for putting on one heck of a show this year. So…

The much-hyped, little-seen, semi-cloud CATIA-like SolidWorks Industrial Design (SWID) tool has been controversial ever since its first official announcement one year ago at SolidWorks World 2014. An attractive tool set, yes, but pegged at an over $3600/year ad infinitum subscription model, the ensuing PR confusion should have been predictable. Amortized over five years, a bare bones seat of SolidWorks runs for about $2300/year. Selling a “companion product” with nothing better than STEP compatibility and a price that is fully double that of the supposed companion is a serious head scratcher.

This year’s pricing retreat to $2280/year–which just so happens to be almost exactly 2/3 of the original price–begs the question of what drove these prices in the first place. Furthermore, we have now separate pricing for SolidWorks, SolidWorks Conceptual Design, SolidWorks Industrial Design, and–get this–sharing content with clients via the 3DExperience platform. That’s right: if you want to take advantage of the cloud to show your work to a client on a read-only basis, I’m told you’ll need to buy a five-pack of special licenses for a three-month access pass. Nickels and dimes, friends. Nickels. And. Dimes.

Apples to Apples

But we digress. The fact that SolidWorks Industrial Design holds little practical advantage over the $300/year Autodesk Fusion 360 for typical end-users should be a clear sign that something is seriously amiss. At the current pricing, we could buy 7.6 licenses of Fusion 360 for the price of a single seat of SWID, and it’s hard to see the down side.

First of all, SWID is very similar to Fusion 360. Even the look and feel of the “robot” gnomon in the SubD tools is uncanny in its resemblance. Not only are these tools similar in substance, they’re similar in presentation. The single tabbed toolbar, the minimal icon-based UI, the retina-singeing whiteness of the UI, the selection methodology, the combination of SubD, direct modeling, and parametric feature-based modeling, these products are clearly born of a very specific industry mood. Both are early products with lots (and lots) of development left yet to do, and both are racing the clock to add that missing functionality as soon as their dev’s weary fingers can manage it.

To be clear, these products are not entirely equivalent. There are plenty of subtle ways in which each would edge out the other in ostensibly similar functions. Still, take a look at the chart below and tell me which product seems like a better value?

But that’s not all!

Don’t forget that SWID is not the only product on the 3DExperience platform. There’s also SolidWorks Conceptual Design (previously SolidWorks Mechanical Conceptual), which, we’ve been told, is priced similarly to SWID on a per-seat basis. And, lets not forget, these are “companion” products; they are not intended to work on their own, but in combination with a traditional SolidWorks install. Given that, add up SolidWorks, SWID, and SWCD and you’re looking at dropping nearly seven G’s each year for the privilege of using SolidWorks–and that doesn’t include FEA, serious rendering, etc.

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Pricing is more than money.

Now lets be clear: the long-term ambitions of the 3DExperience platform go far beyond what Fusion360 represents today. But then again, the long-term ambitions of Fusion360 go far beyond what Fusion360 represents today. We can talk all day long about what features SolidWorks wants to add to SWID over time, but the only fair comparison is the present moment: what value are you offering me today?

It’s also important to note that we aren’t talking about things needing to be “cheaper” per se. Powerful technologies like SolidWorks are incredibly expensive to produce, and it’s only right that we each pay our fair share to support that effort. This isn’t about merely lowering prices, it’s about the brand message that pricing carries.

This isn’t about merely lowering prices, it’s about giving us a clear and reliable roadmap for a successful transition to a new way of doing business. There is still hope. All SolidWorks has to do is embrace the simple, straightforward, customer-centered ethos that’s served them so well. Simply explaining how users will be shepherded gradually to the new and better products could assuage fears and allow us to focus on what matters: great new product innovations. Instead we’re squabbling over conspiracy theories and patchy guesswork.

Pure Speculation

Are people going to go dropping SolidWorks in droves to adopt Fusion360? Hardly. SolidWorks is a huge, mature product with a huge, mature install base. These things don’t change overnight, and SolidWorks still offers an impressive value to customers given its current competition. Fusion360 is not a viable alternative to SolidWorks for most serious engineering teams today, so SolidWorks needn’t fear a mass exodus in the immediate term.

The real problem Dassault faces is not an immediate exodus in favor of less-mature technologies like Fusion360 or even–dare we say it?–the ever-mysterious OnShape. What they need to fear is the same thing that PTC should have seen coming in the late 90s: all it takes is a small, nimble, hungry new comer in industry to upset even the mightiest MCAD empire. SolidWorks was that newcomer then, and are in serious danger of getting a taste of their own medicine.

Tough Love?

We love SolidWorks, and, more importantly, the hard-working human beings who make it possible. The problems we’re pointing out here have little bearing on the skills, talent, or hard work and dedication those people pour into each new SolidWorks product.

All of this could be solved with some simple, straight talk from Dassault: as customers, our businesses rely on SolidWorks every single day, and as this much loved 20 year old product reaches its inevitable EOL, we need to be assured that Dassault will help us make the transition as painless as possible. The new products look beautiful, exciting, and powerful, and we want desperately to love them! Just give us that opportunity.

Perhaps most importantly – is what you think?

How do you feel as a SolidWorks user in 2015 and are you benefiting from any of this?

Read Pricing Next-Gen CAD: Has Dassault Systèmes Lost the Plot with 3DExperience? at SolidSmack.

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Yes, we have a fancy new website and a kick-butt new end-to-end MODO modeling course with over seven hours of ooey-gooey hard-surface SubD goodness. But that’s not all folks, no way no how. From now on, friends, cadjunkie has no memberships and no recurring payments. Download and enjoy anywhere, on any device, forever. What were we thinking?

MODO S76 Part 1: Modeling

First of all we have this new course. And it’s awesome.

The new ‘MODO S76 Part 1: Modeling‘ course rockets fledgling modonauts into the stratosphere with everything you wanted to know about poly modeling, retopology (as a modeling tool!), and even a hint of sculpting.

It’s the most comprehensive design-specific MODO modeling course we’ve attempted so far, and we’re pretty stoked with the results. It’s available now for a cheap $118.

A few excerpts from the series:

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No memberships

Now for the big news: no more memberships, no more recurring payments.

By popular request, from now on you can buy your cadjunkie training outright and view it anywhere*, on any device, forever. (*Just so long as you’re the only one watching.) We’ve wanted to make this change for a long time, and we’re ecstatic that the time has finally come.

Now, if you get our cadjunkie email updates, of course, you already know about this stuff. We’ve been working on this for quite a while. I’ll include relevant quotes from our email announcement below for those who’re curious about the reasoning behind the shift.

This is a super exciting time for us. It means that from now on we can focus on making great content rather than designing complicated paywall systems and tiered sales models. I’m very hopeful.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have some Twinkies to not eat, and they’re not gonna not eat themselves! (Wait…)

Truly, Sincerely, Forever And Always Yours And Yours Alone,
Adam Bobadum III (aka @adam_ohern aka @theCadjunkie)

From the cadjunkie newsletter on 2 Feb, 2015

There are lots of reasons we’re making this transition, but here are the main ones:

• Purchases are easier for users. Buy it. Watch it. Any device, any time.
• Purchases are easier for sellers. We can focus on making great content instead of paywall software and complicated custom web development.
• We can bring on new authors. For years we’ve wanted to bring more voices into cadjunkie, and with a purchase-based system we can easily do the revenue sharing agreements that will make it possible. This model means more great content from more great voices.
• We can make new kinds of products. There are lots of products we’d like to make that just make more sense with a purchase model: scripts, plugins, presets, and other stock content.

…

Will my favorite content still be there?
Yes, it will all be available for purchase. And not only will our entire existing library be available on the new site, we’ll also be publishing some older stuff by popular request. That old Rhino and NX stuff you guys have been asking for ever since we took it down? It’ll be there. Buy, download, and enjoy.

…

Wait, purchasing downloads? That’s soooo 2003.
Yeah, we know. At a time when most industries are ditching the purchase model in favor of the subscription model, we’re doing the opposite. What can I say? Well, first of all, I’m excited for all of the reasons listed above. To be quite transparent, there is a very real possibility that we will actually make less money in the short term by switching to purchases. But believe it or not, cadjunkie was never about making money: our goal has always been to make this content accessible to as many people as possible. We only charge because we need the money to stay afloat. By changing our business model we may make less money in the near term, but we’ll also have lower overhead, more time to focus on content, and the ability to bring on more authors.

In other words, this change means we’ll be able to build a bigger, broader, more versatile content library, and that’s what really matters.

Stay tuned! It’s gonna be fun.

Oh, and we have no idea where the “cat-riding-a-fire-breathing-unicorn” meme started, otherwise we would totally give major cred where it’s due. If it’s your image, let us know so we can give you mad props.

Read the new cadjunkie: no membership required at SolidSmack.

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If we were all being honest here, there has to be at least one time where we have all hoped for that never ending supply of LEGO bricks of choice. Thankfully, there is now a virtual option for owning thousands upon thousands of the iconic bricks without the need for physical storage space and the inevitable stepped-on-brick foot pain. Oh yeah – it’s also free!

Meca Bricks is a web-based LEGO CAD app that lets users create virtual 3D LEGO models using bricks and options from a wide library of parts.

The models can be built either entirely within the virtual experience or enthusiasts could use Meca Bricks to plan complex LEGO model project blueprints before recreating them using actual bricks and parts – perfect for those LEGO Architecture projects.

The fact that the free Cloud-based app offers a high quality 3D software experience in your browser without requiring an install of any downloadable files or plugins is clearly a nice touch. The WebGL-based interface is efficient and feature-rich, yet intuitive and easy to get started in. Navigation is simple: users can smoothly move around the LEGO parts in all 3 axes similar to existing CAD view navigators. As for those who want to create large-scale projects, the brick inventory is exhaustive and users gets the choice of using a wide variety of bricks in various sizes, types and colors.

Perhaps one of the most impressive features however, is that Meca Bricks allows users export and download the 3D files they created in .STP and .OBJ formats so that the models can be either 3D printed or rendered in a third party software environment. The Software also has an active community of LEGO model enthusiasts where they exchange ideas and knowledge in the field. Also available are sample models shared by the community members to be used as a tutorial and reference to build beautiful and complex Lego sculptures.

Try it for yourself over at Meca Bricks.

Read Meca Bricks Brings an Unlimited Supply of LEGO to Your Browser at SolidSmack.

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Parasolid-based Mechanical CAD, for free. You read that right. Unfettered use of the entire Onshape system for up to 5GB and five private documents at a time is completely free, and a mere $1200/yr for unlimited documents. That’s right folks, the much ballyhooed Onshape just stepped into the ring swinging, and they are poised to cause a shake-up the likes of which haven’t been seen since Gangsta’s Paradise was a number one hit.

Disclaimer:
I’ve worked as a consultant for Onshape a few times. Given that the views expressed here are consistent with articles I wrote before I knew about Onshape, however, Josh and I thought it was fair to publish.

Onshape’s beginnings

Since stepping down as co-founder and CEO of SolidWorks in 2011, the venerable Jon Hirschtick (aka The J-Hirsch) has been oddly quiet. We always envisioned him living in a smoke-filled yurt two hundred miles outside Ulaanbataar milking goats and living off the land. We were way off. As it turns out, he’d been amassing an Dream Team of MCAD and cloud tech elite under the intriguingly nondescript “Belmont Technologies” moniker. Fast forward a couple of years and Belmont becomes Onshape, suddenly revealing that they’ve built a team of over forty engineers, an army of interns, and six of the eight top leadership slots filled with SolidWorks top brass from years gone by.

Their project: a collaborative, 100% browser-based, parametric MCAD system, built from the ground up to run on any platform or device. No installs, service packs or registration codes.

It’s hard to overstate what a monumental accomplishment this is. Parasolid was architected for workstation computing, not distributed cloud computing, so the mere act of adapting the kernel for efficient use across a server rack is an eye opener in itself. Add to that the fact that they’ve built a surprisingly responsive MCAD UI around it that’s cross-browser and mobile compatible from day one, and what they’ve achieved in such a comparatively short time is truly humbling. (Cue the pitter-patter of a thousand face-palms echoing across a Boston suburb.)

Cool technology, no doubt, but the real kicker? Brass tacks.

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Onshape pricing

First of all, you can use every feature Onshape offers for free. Full Parasolid based parametric mechanical CAD. Unhindered import/export. Unlimited team size and unlimited sharing. Version control, branching, merging, 5GB of storage. Zero Dollars. Zilch. Free as in Beer.

Students and classrooms? Zero dollars, zero installation required, zero IT overhead. No license servers, no node locks, no dongle-berries. Works on any machine in any lab or classroom on any platform in any building on any campus. Oh, and it works on your iPhone, too.

Then, for $1200/yr, professional engineering teams can frolic unfettered in the flower-laden fields of Onshape. We’ve been assured by persons in the know that the $1200/yr price will continue be all-inclusive even as new functionality is added. That’s it.

Compare that with the new SOLIDWORKS 3DEXPERIENCE applications around $2800/yr per product, not to mention extra charges for showing your work to a client or colleague, and (a) we get kinda excited in ways we don’t discuss in public, and (b) we’re likely to receive some concerned emails with thick accents in the next few hours. (Duck and cover.)

Apples and Oranges

Granted, Onshape is a brand spankin’ new product still wet behind the ears, and that comes with limitations. Its feature offering is impressive for a first-gen MCAD platform, and it’s growing at a break-neck pace. That said, even casual CAD pushers will find its modeling feature set quite limiting at present. Give it a test drive, and you’ll find that it’s, well, very much a work-in-progress.

Given that Onshape is still in its infancy, it’s not really fair to compare its pricing with more established engineering platforms. Or is it?

Go back to the classroom example: why bother with the IT overhead of a traditional CAD system–not to mention spending a few hundred bucks per seat–when I could just point my students to onshape.com and get going on day one? What about all those folks buying ShopBots, OtherMills, Carveys, Form 1’s, and those love-to-hate Makerbots? Every stinkin’ one of ‘em just signed up for Onshape. What about the rapidly increasing number of engineering contractors, freelancers, and boutique design shops all over the world, Dads with too many power tools, kids who take things apart, or anyone currently using Sketchup?

Why wouldn’t you sign up for OnShape, even if only to use it occasionally?

Apples and Apples

“Now wait” you’re thinking (I’m talkin’ to you, @ScottMoyse), “what about Fusion 360?” Well said, Scott. Just where we were headed.

Fusion 360 has a free version too. It’s also got a $300/yr product that is more capable than Onshape at this stage, and a $1200/yr product (same exact price as Onshape… hmmm….) that is far, far more capable. One can only assume that Onshape’s pricing is a stake in the ground rather than a realistic valuation of its current capabilities. We won’t do a feature comparison chart just yet, but suffice it to say that Onshape wouldn’t stack up well against Fusion if we were to compare them today.

One might point out that F360 requires an installed app on your OS of choice, while Onshape requires only a browser. Most people don’t remember that Fusion 360 was originally, like Onshape, an entirely browser-based product. Users pushed back due largely to performance and graphics limitations inherent to WebGL, not to mention the near-constant stream of data IP data required to keep an in-browser tool running means that any little blip in connectivity causes serious problems. The fact that F360 is an installed product today is not because Autodesk couldn’t build a browser version, but because users demanded a level of performance that the browser simply couldn’t provide.

So why, one wonders, is Onshape a bigger deal than F360? It’s not, really. Fusion 360 was exciting when it came out, and we’ve been watching it eagerly over the last couple of years. The difference is that now there are two players in the cloud CAD space. The addition of Onshape means that cloud CAD is no longer just a little experiment in Autodesk Labs. Fusion 360 was a huge step forward, but one little product does not an industry revolution make. With Onshape in the ring, things get interesting.

Fight The Power

I can’t stress enough what a big deal this is. Forget about features, workflow, and the normal bla bla bla about cloud, collaboration, multi-CAD compatibility, etc. It’s all about The Benjamins. Even if Onshape itself turns out to be a dud (it won’t), mark my words: the game has changed.

It’s no longer enough for The MCAD Syndicates to sell CAD by the “seat” with complex bundling restrictions, bizarre and arbitrary licensing schemes, and pricing that was dreamed up in a backroom sales negotiation at Boeing or GM. Even if Onshape is only moderately successful as a product in itself, it will force the industry to re-examine regressive revenue models in favor of simpler, more straightforward, customer-oriented value propositions.

Adobe was first with Creative Cloud, offering their entire product line for a single, simple price. It’s easy, affordable, and a no-brainer for customers like me. Autodesk was second with Fusion 360, offering an impressively feature rich CAD platform with a dead-simple two-tier pricing model, another no-brainer for small and medium businesses who need Mechanical CAD without the overhead of a full PLM system. Now it’s Onshape. It will take a good long while for bigger players to change course, but rest assured, they will.

And, I need to re-emphasize a crucial point: this isn’t about merely cheaper pricing for its own sake. My point is not egalitarian so much as good practical business sense: with the explosion of interest in extruder nozzles and mill bits in the public consciousness, the potential market for 3D creation tools just went bananas, b-a-n-a-n-a-s.

Is this a race to the bottom of the Feature Tree? Is advanced MCAD about to become a cheap commodity in a price-driven push market? Not a chance. There will always be a need for costly high-end systems that are only supported by an elite niche, and therefor demand a premium. But as the need for competent 3D design tools becomes mainstream, those tools will get cheaper. High end simulation and manufacturing tools will probably always the expensive prerogative of serious engineering businesses customers, but geometry creation and assembly design tools will not.

Sometimes industries have to be “dragged kicking and screaming to the money tree, and have it shaken for them.” Onshape is doing just that.

A nuanced debate

I’ve always said that if a CAD tool makes me twice as productive in a business context, that tool is worth my salary. If I can get $160k worth of work out of a $80k engineer by using XYZ CAD system, then I should be willing to pay XYZ CAD Systems Inc as much as $80k for it. Anything less than that, and they’re making me money. If they charge $40k, suddenly they just made me $40k. If they charge $5k for it, buying XYZ CAD just made me $75k. Hell yes.

That’s why it’s so important to understand that what I’m saying here is not about mere “affordability” or “democratization” or any such Utopian fluff. Professional MCAD systems are valuable. Good tools not only pay for themselves, they make me money. And I like making money. Dassault, PTC, or Siemens can promise to double my output, I’m willing to pay handsomely for that. But the market for 3D tools like these has fundamentally changed, and that’s the real point here. 3D design tools aren’t just for professional engineering firms anymore, so the entire value proposition is shifting.

If I told you I could sell a million seats of XYZ CAD over the next year, would you be willing to sell it for $100? Of course you would. And that’s what’s happening. It’s an exciting time to be in this industry.

Beware, Ye Cloud Deniers

On a slight tangent, I can’t end this article without a word to those of you–you know who you are–still holding steadfast to your little LAN-locked utopias, pining for the days when Men were Men and Computers were Big Beige Boxes.

CAD in the Cloud has arrived. It’s real, it’s here, and everybody’s doing it. Haters hate and nay-sayers say nay, but whether you like it or not, over the next decade desktop CAD users will become increasingly lonely, frustrated, passed over for slices of cake at office birthday parties, and bizarrely obsessed with Swingline staplers. As with any industry transition, there are problems-a-plenty with the Cloudy Thinking that’s pervaded the MCAD world in recent years, but the trajectory is clear: desktop CAD is sooooo Y2K. (Oh Mighty Interwebs, flex thy bulging quadriceps!)

What about the evil PLM Dragons hoarding your Precious Data at the heart of the mountain, sending you daily email reminders that “All Your Data Are Belong To Us?” It’s a big topic. Lets have that conversation over a glass of pure grain alcohol (“Our precious bodily fluids!”) and binge on moon landing conspiracy documentaries afterwards.

Oh, and what happens to your Cloud CAD when the internet is down? Hold that thought, I need to go refuel my backyard generator and restock the shelves in the bomb shelter downstairs.

It doesn’t matter whether you stand up, wave your fists around and scream about Cloud this or Rentalware that. If you want to live off MRE’s while working in a locked basement with nothing more than a telegraph, a stack of acid-free paper napkins, and your favorite archival India Ink rollerball, that won’t change the fact that the industry is changing. It will happen whether you’re along for the ride or not. And that’s a good thing.

What do you think?

I’ve never been accused of having too few opinions, or for holding them too loosely. That said, I don’t hazard public prognostications lightly. It’s true that I’ve done some consulting for OnShape, just as I have for lots of other companies over the last six or seven years. I’m a consultant. It’s what I do.

But what I’ve written here isn’t really about OnShape per se. This article, along with the last few I’ve written, is really about a changing industry. As loth as I am to give credence to grandiose claims about a so-called 3D printing “revolution,” (exasperated eye roll) one has to admit that the public exposure the 3D CAD industry has seen as a result has already been a force for change, and one that my daughter will benefit from.

By the time my daughter is in middle school, she’ll be using tools like OnShape to design things for STEM projects as a matter of course. And that, friends, really gets me excited.

Read Onshape Comes Out Swinging, Changes MCAD Pricing Forever at SolidSmack.

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When they officially went live at 11 AM EST yesterday, Onshape sent ripples through the product design community as being the first true parametric 3D CAD solution for the browser.

The web app, which is able to be used on nearly any device including tablets and smartphones, is not only setting a new standard for collaboration functionalities and accessibility, but also in how CAD tools are priced. While many users of CAD tools have been reluctantly paying for upgrades year in and year out to stay relevant with clients and colleagues, Onshape’s free access and simple pricing structure for a Professional subscription seems like a no-brainer for most.

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But just like any other new piece of software kit, a slight learning curve is to be expected. Thankfully, the Onshape devs took this into consideration when designing the look and feel of the browser-based parametric CAD experience and most people with previous experience in other parametric tools are likely to shift over onto the Onshape platform with ease.

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For those looking for a quick primer, EvD Media’s very own Adam O’Hern (AKA the Cadjunkie) has taken the platform for a 14-minute spin to give new users the rundown on the Onshape interface and some unique features:

Overview Topics:

• Onshape Project Directory
• Rotate, Drag, Pan on Desktop
• Rotate, Drag, Pan on Mobile
• Keyboard Shortcuts
• Changing Views
• Navigating Between Documents
• Navigating the Assembly Tree
• File Versions and Branches
• Workspace History
• Restoring Previous Design Iterations
• Set Default Units
• Onshape Feedback
• Part Studio Overview
• File Sharing
• Data privacy
• Onshape Tutorial and Sample Files

While Onshape is currently still in a beta stage, they are inviting new users each day on a first-come, first-served basis. For immediate access, users can sign up for the $100/month Professional subscription.

Be sure to check back to find out more about the first cadjunkie Onshape tutorial series! In the meantime, be sure to check out the rest of the existing industrial design training videos over at cadjunkie.com.

Read Onshape in Action: A Quick 14-Minute Overview of Parametric 3D CAD in the Cloud at SolidSmack.

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We managed to wrangle Jon Hirschtick (Founder and Chairman, Onshape) and Carl Bass (CEO, Autodesk) into answering the same six questions about CAD in the Cloud, including the ultimate, whiz-bang question of the year at the end: “How do Fusion 360, Onshape, and 3DEXPERIENCE differ?” You saw it here first, folks. A SolidSmack exclusive, side-by-side interview with two of the biggest names in MCAD today.

We are seriously bummed that we can’t make it to Develop3D Live this year, not least because Carl, Jon, and Gian Paulo Bassi (CEO, SolidWorks) will all be speaking… at the same time. (That last bit’s not true, but we wish it were.) Since we can’t make it to D3D, we figured we’d get the party started early by asking Carl and Jon a few questions about their respective cloud services, Fusion 360 and Onshape.

You’ll notice we put a strict word count on these questions. We did that for three main reasons: 1) to keep it a readable Q&A format, 2) to keep the content on point, and 3) because we are lazy, and reading long articles makes us sleepy. Word count bumps up the thought octane–that’s what we were going for, at least. Carl and Jon each have plenty of long-form stuff to say on their corporate blogs, so if you want depth, that’s the place to look.

Neither participant saw the other’s answers before today. We expect there may be further clarification in the comments over time.

Lets rumble.

Read Carl Bass + Jon Hirschtick = CAD in The Cloud Interview of the Year at SolidSmack.

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Innocent automobile drivers out for their Sunday drive in London in the fall of 2013 may have felt the noticeable increase in temperature, the sudden blinding windshield glare and continued motoring down Eastcheap Street with little more than an automatic brief adjustment of the climate control. If they were to stop and peer upward through their sunroofs, a reflection as bright as the day was beaming from the skyscraper affectionately known as the Walkie Talkie.

This was no reflection, good natured citizens of the world; this was a death ray emitted by the evil skyscraper now known as FRYSCRAPER. 

The evil villain-building set its sights on an innocent Jaguar and switched the death ray to melt. Various parts of the automobile instantly began melting. To the uninquisitive eye seeing a melted Jaguar on the street might look like a case of “they don’t make’em like they used to.” Well we can’t speak for Jaguar’s electrical systems but this was no electrical malfunction on this particular day.

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Just for fun, NVIDIA recreated the FRYSCRAPER’s hood ornament-melting fury in Autodesk’s 3ds Max to demo their Iray rendering solution at the recent GPU Technology Conference. They built a digital city of London, added materials to the FRYSCRAPER and watched in horror as it produced a bright reflection ready to fry any innocent digital Jaguar that dared to park on digital Eastcheap Street. Since Iray is truly a physically-based rendering engine, it simulated the physical effects of the sun at different times of day reproducing the FRYSCRAPER phenomenon with ease.

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Physically-based rendering engines like NVIDIA’s IRAY are getting very real; these tools are thought of as more than just pretty picture-generators these days. With realistic lighting and true-to-life materials, our rendering tools are more like real world simulators perfect for evaluating designs pre-production. And like any good tool worth its weight in gold, they can be used for both good or evil.

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“NVIDIA is putting these tools within reach of every designer with plug-ins that will build this capability into the most popular design tools,” said the company during their presentation.

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While FRYSCRAPER’s death ray were unintentional, their purpose was to highlight how future death rays may be avoided by first building simulations in tools like these. Current real-world examples include London’s NBBJ, who are using simulations like these to create shadowless skyscrapers. 
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It is said that before the renovations, FRYSCRAPER’s reflections were hot enough to fry eggs. In the future, maybe the power of these so-called “death rays” could be harnessed for good – such as focusing the rays on public grills during lunch hours for solar barbecues and corporate marshmallow toasting sing-a-long sessions.

Read NVIDIA Melts Jaguar Cars with Death Rays to Show off Rendering Power at SolidSmack.

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With all of the recent developments between OnShape, Autodesk’s 360 cloud offerings and even DS’ 3DEXPERIENCE, this truly is an exciting time for MCAD and ultimately, what the near-future holds for millions of users who depend on the software to bring their product designs to life.

But as discussions surrounding what the best offering is or who was first to the Cloud continue to bubble-up, it’s become quite clear that all that really matters is which platform can do it the best while also considering existing and future workflows.

But what if you could run any existing Windows app that currently works for you from within any browser?

Yes – this means that Solid Edge, SolidWorks, Rhino, MODO, Keyshot, Office, the Adobe suite of apps and many others can be ran from nearly any device with more GPU power than most existing laptops and workstations are even capable of.

This level of multi-device capabilities and processor-freeing power is exactly what Frame (previously called Mainframe2) is gearing up to release and – needless to say – they’re about to launch with a Cloud-bursting bang, starting with an appearance at Develop3D Live on March 26th.

We had the chance to chat with Frame’s founder and CEO Nikola Bozinovic about everything from who the platform is for, to why – unlike existing virtualization software – the platform “just works“.

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Clik here to view.“This a screenshot of what we call Frame Launchpad — it’s a page from where you start any app you (or your admin) installed on Frame. This account has apps like Photoshop or Office installed already (for example, I do almost all of my work on it currently).”

SS: Thanks for taking the time today Nikola! First, who are you and how did you become interested in the Cloud?

NB: Great talking to you! I’m a founder and CEO of Frame (previously called Mainframe2). I split my time between building our platform and listening to what our customers are telling us about incorporating the Cloud into their work processes. I’m also an engineer myself – I spent 15 years on video research and building software companies.

“Frame is the only platform that puts all compute AND graphics resources into the cloud. This enables true device independence.”

SS: Where did the idea for Frame come from?

NB: Before Frame, I was a chief technologist at MotionDSP where we built some great video solutions using new GPU APIs, like CUDA and OpenCL.

The problem was that a large number of people couldn’t run our Windows software because they wanted access from Macs or tablets (that can’t run Windows software easily). Users on underpowered Windows PCs without solid GPUs were left out too.

So naturally, we looked at existing virtualization options, like Citrix or VMware. We found them to be surprisingly low-performing, very expensive, complex and clunky. Some innovative companies, like OnLive, showed that you can get really good graphics performance from the cloud, but their focus was on gaming and not on professional apps.

So we saw this as an obvious gap in the market. From our own experience, we knew that there would be a massive demand to use the cloud for interactive graphics apps. I knew I could assemble the elite team to solve this problem, since we knew a lot about both graphics and low-latency video encoding. That’s how Frame was born.

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Clik here to view.“This is how the launchpad looks like when an ISVs (in this case it’s Siemens) has customized Launchpad for their users.”

SS: What exactly is Frame?

NB: Frame is a cloud service that lets you install any Windows software in the cloud and use it from any device. All you need is a browser, and there are no plugins required. Because it’s a horizontal platform and not an app itself, Frame is very flexible and it can support many different use-cases to meet the needs of software vendors, businesses, schools and even individuals.

SS: Are browser and mobile specific apps even necessary? What benefits does Frame have over browser/mobile specific development?

NB: Frame is the only platform that puts all compute AND graphics resources into the cloud. This enables true device independence.

There are some recent browser and mobile specific apps that claim you can run them anywhere, but in reality, their graphics workloads are bound by what the local GPU can do.

With Frame, you can access a super-powerful GPU in the cloud, which is tens of times more powerful than what you’ll find in a standard laptop or tablet. When you can turn any screen with input controls into a terminal, everything is easier to manage and also more secure. And unlike with many browser- or mobile-specific apps that are watered down versions of their desktop app counterparts, with Frame, users run the same, feature-complete software regardless of device.

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Clik here to view.“This is a screenshot of Solid Edge running in a browser (on a Mac).”

SS: What are the business models you’re seeing with different clients?

NB: Our first customers were software vendors – many of them are now using Frame as a platform to deliver their apps. With Frame, they can remain focused on their apps. We become their cloud experts and their app delivery backend, and that is what we monetize.

We’re now expanding the audience. In fact, at Develop3D LIVE this week, we’re unveiling the public beta of our first end-user product. Our goal is to enable anyone — individuals, businesses, schools — to install their apps to Frame in just a few clicks. We think that Frame is the most accessible personal cloud computing experience.

People can sign up for our free beta at fra.me/signup. We’ll have more details to share around the business model later this spring.

SS: What differentiates Frame from other Windows desktop virtualization offerings?

NB: The biggest difference is that Frame just works. It’s fun to use and it’s easy to learn — if you know how to use a PC, you can run your apps on Frame. It’s built from the ground up for the cloud. None of these apply to old-school VDI solutions, like Citrix and VMware.

SS: Why are we not seeing more CAD software companies using this yet?

NB: You will, shortly! We’ve been working behind the scenes with many ISVs for more than a year, and they are now starting to use it. For example, Siemens just went live last week with Solid Edge, powered by Frame. There’s a lot of work that we do for Adobe and other companies in design and desktop publishing. Expect to see much more soon.

“Look at Dropbox, for example. They didn’t re-invent the file system. They simply added a folder that you can use just like any other folder.”

SS: How would you say that Frame compares to existing Cloud-based apps?

NB: One big difference is that Frame is an app platform, not an app itself. This gives you enormous freedom to make what you want out of it. We call this “Cloud with a Choice.”

Cloud-based apps, like Autodesk360 or OnShape, are single vendor solutions that you can’t easily extend or modify. Some of them don’t have a “backup” offline plan. With Frame, your “backup” is what you’re already doing today on a PC. And again, since we enable using the full-featured desktop version of an app to run in the cloud, there are no compromises.

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Clik here to view.Is Frame powering Adobe’s new in-browser interactive application experiences?

SS: How do you think that Frame will change existing workflows for designers and engineers who use MCAD, Adobe, etc on a daily basis?

NB: We have enormous respect for engineers and designers and their existing workflows. We understand that these workflows are sophisticated for a reason and that’s why we don’t ask anyone to give up on what they’re doing today.

In fact, our goal is to get you the best of the cloud, without forcing you to give up reliable tools you use today. Most people will still likely spend 30 hours a week at a desk, using their workstation. We want to be there when they need the same (or greater) power and reliability – at home, on the road or at a customer’s site.

Additionally, Frame is so open and flexible, users can design their own workflows easily. For example – if you run a simulation and need lots of RAM, you can do that on Frame for a few hours. It’s as if your workstation can change its size on the fly! We think people will find great new uses will all this flexibility.

(note: the company was previously called Mainframe2 and has since been renamed to Frame)

SS: What does the near future of the Cloud look like to you and where does Frame fit in?

NB: We believe in users’ choice and the freedom to use whatever works best for them. We also love solutions that fit into what people are doing now and that can enhance your life instantly. Look at Dropbox, for example. They didn’t re-invent the file system. They simply added a folder that you can use just like any other folder. But without any hassle, your files are now accessible from anywhere. You don’t use Dropbox 100% of the time, probably not even 10% of the time, but it’s there for you when you need it.

Near-term, we see people using Frame in a similar way – accessing apps when they need them. Some segments, like education, will see faster adoption, especially driven by the rise of Chromebooks. And larger companies will take more time and be more cautious, as they are with everything else.

We’re still in the very early days of this whole “Cloud” thing. It’s very exciting and humbling at the same time to be a part of this amazing transformation.

To find out more about what the near-future of Cloud computing looks like – and sign up for early-access – be sure to head over to Frame.

Read Frame Is About to Put All of Your CAD Apps in the Cloud: Our Interview with CEO Nikola Bozinovic at SolidSmack.

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If creating big budget animated films such as those produced by Pixar and Dreamworks has been on your bucket list, we have good news for you, friends. Pixar has just announced that they have released their RenderMan software into the wild for non-commercial use.

Although the software isn’t an all-in-one modeling, rendering and animation package such as MODO, it has been used by Pixar as an add-on to existing 3D modeling programs to create Render Everything You’ve Ever Seen (REYES)-based photorealistic 3D renderings. As a matter of fact, the software is responsible for more than a few Academy Awards including those won by Pixar as well as other Hollywood blockbusters including James Cameron’s Titanic.

Its creators, Ed Catmull, Loren Carpenter and Rob Cook are considered renegades in the 3D industry and have even won an award from the Academy for “significant advancements to the field of motion picture rendering as exemplified in Pixar’s RenderMan”. It is the first software package to be awarded for an Academy award.

Currently, RenderMan is shipping with artist-friendly plugins for Autodesk’s Maya and The Foundry’s Katana with Cinema4D and Houdini support on the way. While they don’t have an estimated time frame, the company is also working towards developing plugins for 3DS Max, MODO, Mcneel’s Rhino, Lightwave, Blender and Nuke.

While the software is free for non-commercial use, those who choose to use it for commercial-based work have the option to purchase a license for $500 before releasing their final products. Additionally, the company has provided over five hours of training material to get new users up and running in a day.

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Clik here to view.Click to see the history of RenderMan in Pixar films

Try it for yourself by downloading it over at Pixar.

Read Pixar Releases RenderMan Software Used for Toy Story and Other Films…for Free at SolidSmack.

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Ever since they hit the block with their Pixologic partnership in late January earlier this year, Luxion has showed no signs of slowing down the KeyShot awesome train for 2015. The KeyShot for ZBrush + Bridge was – and still is – one of the company’s biggest announcements to date and effectively opened up their 3D model rendering platform for a new generation of world-class 3D artists including Liz Kirby, Richie Jon Mason and Nick Hiatt, among many others.

The release was so great, in fact, that it helped propel the KeyShot team into a brand new office in the heart of Orange County earlier this month that features over 5,000 sq. ft. of new creative space for helping inspire the next generation of artists and designers.

Now, the company that has embedded its rendering workflow into nearly every 3D modeling application has released a new series that focuses on different workflows for creating jaw-dropping renders quickly and efficiently.

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Simply titled the “KeyShot Workflow Series“, the company (and more specifically, Luxion’s Global Training Specialist Richard Funnell) is kicking it off with a product design workflow that highlights the rendering process for a portable stylus tablet similar to a Wacom Cintiq Companion:

“In this first Episode, Richard works on a tablet and shows different techniques you can use in your product renderings. He will cover everything, from model prep in your CAD software, to your fine tuning your materials and environment in KeyShot.”

…and if that’s not enough to whet your palette, the company is also releasing three new KeyShot tips each week over on the KeyShot Blog in the case that you need to add another bookmark to your weekly reading list.

As for what’s next for KeyShot – if history is any indication – we can expect a new product release later this year. In the meantime, the new Workflow Series is a nice touch – expect a jewelry design workflow tutorial for Episode 2 coming up soon!

Read KeyShot Launches New Product Design Workflow Tutorial Series at SolidSmack.

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As if the release of Onshape back in March of this year didn’t spin the CAD world into a frenzy, things are only about to get a little more crazy up in here.

Yesterday, Autodesk slipped a little message onto their Fusion 360 homepage to notify users (both new and existing) that they are rolling all of the features of their more robust Fusion 360 Ultimate package into their regular pricing structure for Fusion 360.

“With the latest release of Fusion 360, we are including all the features of Fusion 360 Ultimate in Fusion 360,” the company states on their updated Fusion 360 website. “Features previously available only in Ultimate are now available to all current users of Fusion 360.”

Just to clear things up a little, Autodesk only announced Fusion 360 Ultimate late last year for the price of $150/month or $1200/year – which was significantly more expensive than the $40/month or $300/year cost of Fusion 360. Now, the San Francisco-based company is pushing all of those additional Fusion 360 Ultimate features into the latest update of Fusion 360, which will still continue to sell for $300 annually or $40 month-to-month.

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While the additional features – which range from additional sketching and modeling tools to built-in CAM solutions – are a welcome surprise, perhaps what’s most interesting is what Autodesk plans on doing down the road – such as partnerships with companies to allow designers and engineers to get their designs made that much faster with or without their own machining equipment.

Suffice to say – the next few years are going to get a lot more interesting for CAD users; Autodesk is also currently developing a holographic CAD solution for the upcoming Microsoft HoloLens.

Check out the new release for yourself by heading over to Autodesk’s Fusion 360 site.

Read Autodesk Bundles Fusion 360 Ultimate Features Into Much Cheaper Fusion 360 at SolidSmack.

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Used by everyone from concept artists to industrial designers and architects to mechanical engineers, Luxion’s KeyShot has been a go-to rendering package for thousands of 3D modelers for good reason – it just works.

While the release of KeyShot 5 last year brought us dozens of new bells and whistles to play with ranging from the introduction of KeyShot Cloud to the super-useful Perspective Matching tool, will Luxion be able to top themselves with KeyShot 6?

If a video that was quietly released over the weekend by the California-based company is any indication, then yes – they most certainly will. Among other reasons, it looks like Luxion is starting the process of closing the gap between KeyShot and more robust rendering packages.

While KeyShot has been spending the past few years focusing on making their platform work with a variety of CAD packages through a variety of plug-ins and partnerships, KeyShot 6 appears to be bringing in more material and camera customizations similar to what’s offered in more complex rendering software – all the while remaining bundled into the easy-to-use KeyShot UI, of course.

Here’s a rundown of the new features in KeyShot 6 as seen in the video:

• Interior lighting mode
• Materials on labels
• Material graph (nodes)
• Material animation
• Geometry splitting
• Realtime region render
• Panorama camera animation
• Shift lens with estimate vertical shift

…of course, this is just a sneak-peek so expect more to be announced when the product is officially launched.

For those who are considering getting started with KeyShot on the ground floor, this workflow example featuring a SolidWorks model of an iPhone 6 getting processed in KeyShot 5 is a great place to start:

Leading up to the release of KeyShot 6, Luxion is offering anybody who purchases KeyShot 5 a free upgrade to KeyShot 6. Find out more by heading over to Luxion.

Read KeyShot 6 Will Give Users Even More Control Over Materials and Camera Setups at SolidSmack.

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Since announcing that they would be bundling the premium features of Fusion 360 Ultimate into the significantly cheaper Fusion 360 offering, many in the CAD community have deemed Fusion 360 as a true “next-generation contender” and “the (CAD) program to beat these days”.

Although many existing design studios and firms may still be plugged into SolidWorks or experimenting with Onshape, Autodesk’s relentless movement towards creating the ultimate end-to-end design tool has kept them agile and attractive in an ever-changing CAD landscape.

While there are plenty of reasons why Fusion 360 is gaining traction, one particular reason why the program has been able to stay loose in the game is their developer-friendly API, which has helped enable the development of more sophisticated third-party add-ins and scripts for the program to extend its functionality.

Those who have already taken advantage of the API include Luxion, makers of the popular KeyShot rendering and animation package as well as avid Fusion 360 users who have created their own scripts for automating common workflows – many of whom have generously shared with the rest of the Fusion 360 community.

Among others who have more recently taken advantage of the API is Tri-D Technologies, who are today announcing the introduction of their ExactFlat Online plugin for Fusion 360.

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While some CAD users may already be familiar with the company’s ExactFlat plugin – which has previously been implemented into other CAD packages including SolidWorks – the company’s new ExactFlat Online runs entirely in the Cloud and allows Fusion 360 users to upload 3D surface models directly to the ExactFlat SaaS engine for the flattening process.

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Once these parts have been flattened, the patterned pieces can then be downloaded directly back into Fusion 360 or AutoCAD for any necessary finishing steps including adding seams and notches or for creating communicative assembly drawings and cut files.

Among others who have been beta testing the new program include Predator Cycling, a California-based company that focuses on the design and manufacturing of high quality custom carbon fiber frames and components.

“We’ve been evaluating Fusion 360 because of the functionality and the fact that it runs on the Cloud.” Said Aram Goganian, President of Predator Cycling. “Automated flattening is incredibly important to us as well and once we found out that there was a Cloud-based ExactFlat Plugin the decision to use Fusion 360 was a no-brainer.”

The new extended functionality of Fusion 360 is certainly going to be appealing for those that do frequent patterning work – including many soft goods designers who are used to more antiquated soft good pattern design programs.

At this time, there is no cost for uploading and flattening 3D files from directly within Fusion 360, however fees are charged for downloads of the 2D patterns on a per-job basis or for an unlimited amount at a cost of $695 USD annually.

Read New ExactFlat for Fusion 360 Streamlines the Path from CAD to Cutter via the Cloud at SolidSmack.

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For many of those that count McNeel’s Rhino among the tools in their toolset (and there’s a lot of you), having a native Mac app without the need to run Bootcamp or a virtual machine has been on the wishlist for quite a few years now.

While McNeel has been actively developing a Rhino for Mac solution and opened users up to various beta builds, the near-weekly updates became a cumbersome user experience for many and resulted in just hanging up the program until an official app was shipped.

Well, the time has finally come.

Announced by Bob McNeel himself this morning, the company will be officially announcing Rhino 5 for Mac, including introductory pricing and where to buy within the next few weeks.

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In the meantime, interested users can sample the most updated iteration of their Rhino for Mac software, Release Candidate 1 (RC1), with both commercial and educational license keys that offer a full 90-day evaluation period.

Just be sure to head over to the Rhino for Mac RC1 download page before June 3rd, 2015 and you should be all set.

According to the company, RC1 will be shipped as the official Rhino for Mac unless a user tells the company about a significant problem. Even so, the company has been relentless in squashing bugs the past few years and would likely have something fixed within a matter of days – so the release timeframe still likely holds true even if significant problems are found.

Check it out for yourself by heading over to Rhino for Mac 5 Evaluation download page before June 3rd, 2015.

Read McNeel Gears Up to Officially Release Rhino 5 for Mac (Finally!!) at SolidSmack.

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For just over a decade now, MODO has been defying expectations time and time again with their full-featured, all-in-one 3D modeling, animation and rendering package that’s been used by everybody from Pixar to Microsoft for applications ranging from animation shorts to product design renderings and more.

Disclosure: We at SolidSmack have a soft spot for MODO, since Adam (the ‘D’ in EvD Media) offers deep training for MODO on cadjunkie, including his latest modeling series, the S76 Beast of Turin modeling tutorial, pictured above.

Spearheaded by Brad Peebler and his newly-established company Luxology in 2001, MODO was introduced to the public after three years in development at Siggraph 2004. Over the next ten years, the company further refined the program into what is arguably on of the most powerful 3D modeling applications on the market – and was picked up by UK’s 3D software powerhouse The Foundry along the way in 2012.

Now, MODO is less than a week away from seeing its biggest release yet. Next Wednesday, May 27th, The Foundry will be releasing MODO 901 as both an upgrade for existing users or as a complete package for new users.

“MODO 901 lets you take on more challenging projects than ever before, with powerful new features in every discipline from modeling to texturing, and from animation to rendering—not to mention accelerated performance, new pipeline integration options, and complexity management tools,” says The Foundry.

MODO 901 MeshFusion Overview

“With MeshFusion now an integrated feature, a new advanced photorealistic viewport, progressive texture baking and vector-based graphics support representing just a few of the highlights, MODO 901 is our most significant update so far.”

…and they’re not kidding.

MODO 901 Enhanced Modeling Overview

The inclusion of MeshFusion alone is a pretty big deal; previously MeshFusion was available as an add-on feature for $395 (£259 / €309). The feature, which removes the challenge of creating complex and frustrating Boolean operations, makes it much easier to produce high-quality and complex models. Combined with new features including topological symmetry, Slice and Cap, Quad Fill, and Align tools, it becomes clear that MODO 901 is clearly the most modeler-friendly release to date.

MODO 901 Sculpting Overview

“MODO 901 is serious about helping you take on more challenging projects, with new options to extend, customize and integrate tools into your pipeline, and better ways to handle complex scenes and rigs.”

To see all of the new updates and features (there are many), head over to the newly-launched MODO 901 website.

Those interested can buy ($1,495) or upgrade to MODO 801 now and qualify for a free upgrade to MODO 901 when it ships next week.

Read MODO 901 is Set to Be Released Next Week on May 27th – Will Include MeshFusion at SolidSmack.

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When it comes to speculating about what a user experience might be like in the future, it’s only natural to look towards the big screen to see what millions of dollars and a team of professional designers developed to make their vision of the future believable. Of course – just like a Rotten Tomatoes score – there’s going to be hits and misses, but the underlying entertainment value is usually good enough to let those futuristic tech inaccuracies slide.

But as we move closer into the future of augmented and virtual realities – particularly the Microsoft HoloLens, which Autodesk is already working on augmented CAD software for – the needs for a different user experience become more apparent – something that goes beyond just the color scheme of a toolbar or how a history tree branches out.

Among the more modern films that come up often in conversations about the future of tech and interactions include Minority Report, Iron Man and Oblivion – and for good reason. All three of these movies feature user interfaces and hardware that were designed by actual, real-world designers who develop these interactions and experiences on a daily basis for real-world applications and understand the usability component. More recently, the new Avengers: Age of Ultron movie is the latest to illustrate what this futuristic CAD experience might look like.

Created by London-based Territory Studio, the UI designs that are displayed in holograms and computer screens in Tony Stark’s Lab during shots in the movie total more than 200 screens with 80 minutes of animation across 11 sets, which makes it one of Marvel’s most ambitious projects of its type to date. To create the designs, the studio sourced inspiration from a range of existing user interfaces from the fields of industrial engineering, mechanical engineering, medical imagery and cellular biology to develop a 3D design solution that was suitable for a billionaire superhero:

“Tasked to bring an unprecedented level of realism to the beleaguered heroes and their technology, Territory created new visual identities and UI for the technology seen in Avengers Tower, including Stark lab and Banner’s research lab, the Quinjet aircraft and newly introduced characters the evil Baron Von Strucker and his Fortress stronghold, and Dr Cho, whose advanced medical lab supports the Avengers in the story,” said the studio.

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“With a creative approach that brings emotive depth to their work, Territory crafted technology, UI and tools that expressed each individual’s unique characteristics in digital form. And, by referencing research into state of the art clinical diagnostic technology, and the latest thinking in military, robotics and avionics technology, the team was able to bring a fresh level of authenticity to the Marvel universe.”

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In addition to their recent work with Marvel, the rest of Territory’s impressive portfolio spans a range of both film and real-world designs, including designing ‘near future’ interface designs and schematics for the recent sci-fi thriller Ex Machina and a range of product demonstration videos for Land Rover.

Read A Closer Look at the CAD User Interface Design in the New Avengers: Age of Ultron Movie at SolidSmack.

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With the recent announcement that they will finally be releasing their Rhino for Mac after years in development, Rhino developers McNeel have been showing no signs of slowing down their launch.

The company’s European branch presented a user event in London yesterday that, along with presentations from Marc Newson’s studio design director and a bevy of other 3D industry heavyweights, presented more information about what both Mac and Windows Rhino users can expect with the company’s upcoming releases.

Among other announcements, the company revealed what many had been wondering: will the Mac release of Rhino 5 support Grasshopper and other plugins? Sadly, the answer is no – however, the Mac offering will include nearly every other modeling feature that users have previously used on Windows at a price that is reasonable when compared to today’s existing CAD offerings: $460 for a commercial license for new users and $150 for existing users.

Additionally, the company announced that they are likely to bundle Grasshopper into their Rhino 6 release for Windows as well – meaning that Rhino 6 for Mac may also have Grasshopper included.

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In addition to the Rhino 5 for Mac updates – the program is expected to officially launch anytime now – the company has also announced a new app platform for existing plug-in-happy Windows users to get the most out of their Rhino experience.

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Called “Food4Rhino“, the platform allows for both Mcneel as well as developers to share and sell their plug-ins, add-ons, textures, backgrounds and other meaty Rhino accessories with the ability to comment, rate and discuss the tools with both other users as well as the developers themselves. For active plug-in users, there is even a downloadable remote that allows for you to search for the Food4Rhino inventory directly within Rhino, too.

Read McNeel Announces New App Platform for Rhino and Rhino 5 for Mac Pricing at SolidSmack.

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As design customization, 3D printing and wearable technology each continue to rise in popularity, experimental design collective Madlab has developed a solution that converges all three into a seamless user experience with no CAD skills required.

Designed by Madlab director Madeline Gannon, Tactum was done in collaboration with Autodesk Research and uses projection mapping and Microsoft Kinect cameras to allow users to see designs on their body in real-time.

Since of the main goals for the project was to get CAD out of the traditional computer screen and onto the body, the result is an entirely new way of thinking about designing customized objects that nearly any user can custom design to their own likeness without the need for understanding CAD.

In order to ensure that the wearables fit properly, a 3D scan is taken of a user’s body part (in this case an arm) and parameters of the design are locked in to ensure that a user is designing within the constraints of what is possible for both fit and manufacturing. When the user has finished designing their wearable, the file is sent directly to a 3D printer.

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Although Tactum is currently in a prototype stage at the moment, it raises some interesting questions about not only the future of customized products – but also the future of CAD itself.

Read The Future of Designing Wearables Could Include Projecting CAD Directly onto Your Body at SolidSmack.