Between the Lines

Big Hearty Autodesk Welcome to Tinkercad

Autodesk announced yesterday at Maker Faire which is essentially the center of the universe event for DIY & Makers our intent to acquire Tinkercad. Tinkercad is an easy-to-use browser-based 3D design tool and will become part of the popular Autodesk 123D family of apps and supports Autodesk’s vision to help anybody imagine, design and create anything..  The addition of Tinkercad to Autodesk will help broaden the  The acquisition will also revive the Tinkercad service and community, despite a previously announced shutdown by its founders and creators.

Tinkercad has been one of the favorite tools of many Makers just wanting a simple web based 3D design tool to create 3D models for 3D printing. With Autodesk as a new parent and placed into 123D Family it is not only not going away as was the case before Autodesk, but it will be improved and given much love and attention.

Tinkercad Blog Post:
Tinkercad has found a new home at Autodesk

Go give Tinkercad a try, its super simple and a fun way to create 3D geometry for 3D printing or just for fun.

http://www.tinkercad.com

 

Autodesk Press Release:
SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May. 18, 2013-- Autodesk, Inc. (NASDAQ: ADSK)

"We are excited to have reached an agreement with Autodesk that will provide a solid home and bright future for Tinkercad," said Kai Backman, founder of Tinkercad. "We found in Autodesk a shared vision for empowering students, makers and designers with accessible and easy to use software, and with their global reach and expertise in democratizing design, we're confident in their ability to introduce Tinkercad to new audiences around the world."

Autodesk intends for the Tinkercad service to remain available as part of its consumer portfolio. The company also intends to incorporate elements of the Tinkercad technology and user experience into the Autodesk 123D family of products as part of its ongoing effort to make 3D design easier and more accessible to everyone. The transaction is expected to close within the next 30 days.

"Tinkercad is a natural extension of the Autodesk 123D family as well as our other apps and services for consumers, as it is already used alongside Autodesk products," said Samir Hanna, Autodesk vice president, consumer products. "We look forward to welcoming the Tinkercad community to Autodesk and to continuing their mission of accessible 3D design for all."

Related articles

TinkerCAD reopens, purchased by AutoDesk

Tinkercad is Back! Autodesk is Buying It

Autodesk Saves Tinkercad from Extinction

Autodesk buys Tinkercad, saving the easy to use Web-based 3D modeling tool from closure

Tinkercad Acquired by Autodesk

Met with @AutodeskHelp This Week

Jessica Thrasher ^JES,Philip Schmelzer ^PHL and Amanda Kinley ^AK, and me (Shaan Hurley) ^PitA

If there was ever a reason to jump on Twitter, @AutodeskHelp is one of them. Autodesk has a team that assists people in social media. They do not avoid a challenge and just take the easy ones but also actively engage those with highly charged tweets as those usually only take some personal assistance and attention to solve their problems, or just point them in the right direction.

I was in San Francisco this Monday and Tuesday and finally met in person with the @AutodeskHelp team’s US members. This team is doing amazing things that more companies should be doing and that is use the power of social media to engage and assist  customers. Simply put they are in the right place, doing the right thing.

I know and have used Delta Airlines Twitter account @DeltaAssist to solve my travel problems before and I know personally the power of that connection. The simple personal attention and assistance certainly improves my perception of those companies that do this type of proactive assistance in social media.

It can be difficult to quantify the value of social media support to a bean counter type, but one can easily make the argument not doing it results in lost opportunities to make people happy and keep customers. It is far cheaper to retain a customer than acquire a new one. Dropping a social media support and engagement connection can be a real negative PR event as well. Just ask Comcast about when they dropped the person behind @ComcastCares Frank Eliason, and how years later they still feel the heat and have resurrected the social media account.

If I get back to visit the Autodesk Singapore office again, I will certainly give the same in-person kudos to the Singapore based members of the @AutodeskHelp team ^JB, ^APB & ^MA (chili crabs mmmm omnomnom.)

Check out the Autodesk Assistance Team’s blog
http://blog.autodeskhelp.com/

Keep up the great work @AutodeskHelp Team!

Cheers,
Shaan

Autodesk Beta Programs - What is it, and How Does it Work

Last week Autodesk hosted some of the Autodesk Expert Elite group members in our sunny San Francisco office. This  group of customers are top nominated participants (Expert Elite Nomination Form) in their product assistance to their peers in the Autodesk discussion forums. Scott Sheppard presented to the group on Autodesk Labs and Autodesk Beta and promised to follow up on the topics in blog posts.  Scott is posting a blog post on Autodesk Labs (Autodesk Labs versus Beta: Experts Elite Presentation), and I am posting on Autodesk Beta. Beta has long been a passion and responsibility of mine, and is once again a responsibility of mine along with my other Office of the CTO role responsibilities. I was even a Autodesk beta participant for several years as a customer before joining Autodesk.

Autodesk Beta or the Autodesk Feedback Community is pre-release testing community for most every Autodesk product from desktop to mobile and cloud applications. Autodesk Feedback Community is where people can get involved in testing the pre-release products and provide feedback and help us identify the defects before final release. The more people test pre-release betas on different hardware and software configurations as well as test unique workflows to expose issues and feedback, the better the product will be when we ship it.

The Autodesk Feedback Community is also home to some of the future research projects where the product teams can speak confidentially under a non-disclosure with a group of users on possible concepts and ideas to solve user needs and work flows. The members of the community are even used by some teams to recruit for customer visits and in person gunslingers of early versions of software.

Autodesk is rare among large software companies in respect to beta testing engagement and involving it as a vital process across all our products. We could use beta for pre-release marketing activities, but instead we use it to better understand how our products are used, where defects are, and our developers, QA and management personally engage our customers as extended members of our product teams. We want to be as close to the customer as possible to fully understand their needs. After all we are not designing and developing the products for ourselves, but you our customers.

If you want to make a difference in the Autodesk software you use, the Autodesk Feedback Community is the place to be heard & have the potential to affect the software before it is released.

Autodesk IDEA Studio Research Proposals Due May 15

We're looking for the best, the brightest, and the most innovative and creative faculty, students, and researchers that you know, and we need your assistance in encouraging them to apply to the IDEA Studio - Autodesk's unique scholar-in-residence program.  The IDEA Studio is now accepting proposals for residencies that will take place in November 2013 through January 2014, and proposals are due May 15.

Located in San Francisco in the Autodesk Gallery at One Market, the IDEA Studio supports faculty and students from around the world who use Autodesk software in advanced, imaginative ways to solve real-life problems. In addition to grants of up to $30,000 USD, residents are given an inspirational workspace and are connected with a tailored network of Autodesk advisors to help them reach their research goals. 

Applicants can submit a brief proposal directly via the online Proposal Submission Form.

Autodesk 2014 Products Available to Students & Faculty 3 Years Free

Hey students and faculty, are you aware Autodesk pretty much gives all Autodesk products for free to you? Autodesk is is not only committed to our amazing current professional customers, but we are equally committed to helping build the future architects, engineers, and 3D vfx and visualization professionals. All you need to have is a valid educational email, register at the link to the Autodesk Student Community,  and you can download most any Autodesk product for free right now. There are also extra benefits such as some increased Autodesk 360 storage and some Autodesk product curriculum to assist you in learning the products.

So students, go get your free Autodesk software at the Student Community now and start using the best professional design and 3D software out there for 3 years. This will help you be the top skilled when you graduate and begin looking for that job. You will be able to demonstrate your mastering of the software in addition to your degree as a distinct advantage to that dream employer.

http://students.autodesk.com/?nd=download_center

Autodesk 31st Corporate Birthday

Autodesk has two birthdays one for the company founding and the other for when it was legally incorporated. These are in addition to the big product anniversary dates like AutoCAD, 3ds Max, Maya, Autodesk Inventor etc. So many significant Autodesk historical dates to keep track of.

Autodesk was founded on January 30th, 1982. Today April 26, 2013 marks the 31st birthday of Autodesk becoming a legal U.S. corporation.

Autodesk Flying founders From left to right: Rudolf Künzli, Mike Ford, Dan Drake, Mauri Laitinen, Greg Lutz, David Kalish, Lars Moureau, Richard Handyside,Kern Sibbald, Hal Royaltey, Duff Kurland, John Walker, Keith Marcelius

I last met with Autodesk founder John Walker in 2007 at his home in Switzerland. What an amazing experience and discussion on the past and future of Autodesk and technology.

Cheers,
Shaan

Autodesk’s 3D Printed Speakers Project - Behind the Scenes

A month ago I wrote about the wildly unique & creative 3D printed speakers and their built in LED lighting “The Coolest 3D Printed Speakers in the World”. Now a new video going behind the scenes on the inspiration, goals, design and creation of the 3D printed speaker enclosures has just been published on YouTube.

The team for this project was:

Maurice Conti: Director, Strategic Innovation, Autodesk
Evan Atherton: Engineer, Applied Innovation, Autodesk
Arthur Harsuvanakit: Technical Assistant to the CEO, Autodesk

I am really honored that I am on the same team as these creative guys.

Video: 3D Printing - Behind the Scenes With Autodesk
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sSaa4ltocI4)

Related articles

Autodesk's 3D Printed Speakers Project - Behind the Scenes

The Coolest 3D Printed Speakers in the World

3D printed light speakers

Autodesk FormIt 3.0 Released

Autodesk just released the 3rd version of the iPad App Autodesk FormIt after launching it at Autodesk University just a couple months ago at Autodesk University 2012. The team has been rapidly adding features and addressing requests based on users feedback. FormIt is the easy to use 3D conceptual modeler for the Apple iPad Tablet. You can create shapes and forms, and then later refine them in the auto-magically created Revit .RVT file or in another application using the SAT file.

While FormIt is great for architectural design, there really are no limits and you can just as easily model a robot or any other 3D concept model. It is just plain fun, oh and it is also FREE.

What’s new in FormIt 3.0

• New visual styles that include sketchy lines, hidden lines, and line extensions
• Import and manage multiple images on the ground plane
• Multiple images translate to the Revit file created in the cloud
• Apply bitmap textures to faces and objects
• View your sketch from an orthographic plan view
• Synchronize all sketches to the cloud by pulling down on the Gallery page
• Toggle the ground plane grid display on and off
• New icon and branding
• Bug fixes and minor improvements

For a great overview of FormIt 3.0, check out David Light’s blog post: FormIT 3.0

Autodesk Design Night Event "Making It!"

Join the next Autodesk Design Night event "Making It!". Tuesday evening May 2, 2013  located in the amazing Autodesk Gallery in San Francisco. Past Design Nights have been huge hits and the tickets sell out.

Meet the Maker in You

It’s a brave new world, and everything is changing. The oily machines of manufacturing are being joined by squeaky-clean computers, 3D printers, and digital fabrication services. Creativity is rampant and people (like you and me) are saying “see ya” to mass-produced, no individuality goods. Turns out, making exactly what you want is something anyone can do. And maker types obviously learned their kindergarten lessons because they love to share. That means one idea spawns hundreds more and innovation is running amok.

So make your way over to Design Night and: 

• Hear a talk from Mark Hatch, CEO of TechShop 
• Make your own creature (don’t worry, we’ll leave the lights on)
• Build a birdhouse (bird not included)
• Eat! Drink! Make! Learn!

Get Your Tickets Now
http://designnight_maker.eventbrite.com/

Feedback on Using Math in CAD

Math and design go hand in hand like cream in a Twinkie. Autodesk is conducting research about how CAD designers and engineers use mathematical software and tools in their design workflows. We are especially interested in hearing from people who use tools like Mathematica, Maple, Matlab, Excel or QuickCalc. Perhaps you calculate electrical capacity, material weight, center of gravity, required tube count and pitch in a heat exchanger tubesheet, or heat transfer loads, and we want to know what tools you are you currently using. We are also interested in hearing about other types mathematics software tools support the design process.

We want to find out:

1. Do you use mathematics software or tools
2. If so, which mathematics software or tools do you currently use
3. How you incorporate the results of mathematical calculations in your design workflows
   

The survey only you a paltry 5 minutes but go towards improving future Autodesk products.

https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/QDTCPR7

The Coolest 3D Printed Speakers in the World

3D printing is now a viable technique for manufacturing highly customized, consumer-ready products. Designers can now go from concept to reality 100% digitally.

My Autodesk teammates Arthur Harsuvanakit and Evan Atherton are an amazing dynamic duo (3Duo) researching digital design, fabrication, and 3D printing technologies. They have developed some 3D printed speaker enclosures after Maurice Conti said “Hey, this would make a cool speaker” and then determined the project goals. The first speaker appeared on the cable channel Current TV with Autodesk CEO Carl Bass as well as featured in my Autodesk University 2012 session.

Now the 3Duo Arthur and Evan have taken the 3D printed speaker concept much further. They designed and 3D printed a new set of speakers in multiple materials using a Stratasys Objet Connex 500 printer and then incorporate LED lighting by startup LumiGeek.  If you are going to have a one of a kind set of speakers, why not really challenge what can be done and make them really wild and not only play cool music but light up LED lights in patterns synchronized to the music.

YouTube video of the speaker pulsing to the beat of music. http://youtu.be/50TBPeu560U

From Evan:
The main goal was not about making something wicked cool, although it was a factor but  more down to earth goals were established for this project.

• Demonstrate 3D printing as viable Manufacturing tool.
• Create something unique, but also useful.
• What can we print vs. what should we print.
• Now that we can print just about anything. We need to take a closer look at what we should be printing.
• In order to understand we must participate (in 3D printing)

How did digital design tools enable this project?

• Combined surface and solid modeling to create a unique design and product.
• Using 3ds Max we were able to pattern in an organic surface modeling environment to allow form exploration. The form exploration in 3ds Max gave us complex shapes and patterns that would be hard in a solid modeling environment.
• Using the Autodesk Labs plugin Mesh Enabler for Autodesk Inventor, the solid model was created from the .STL exported mesh from 3ds Max.
• Using Autodesk Inventor parametric features were created. Working on a solid model parametrically in Inventor is much more accurate for creating the necessary mounting geometry for the speakers and cables, etc.

Note from Shaan:
Now that we are starting to beta test the upcoming Autodesk Fusion 360 product, this might be a great one place to design the entire project. With the freeform sculpting powered by the T-Splines technology and also a top notch parametric design mode. Its like the reeses peanut butter cup of industrial and mechanical design software combining the best of both worlds.

Here are two screenshots showing the larger speaker enclosure design in 3ds Max.

 
3D renderings of the speaker designs.

 

The completed speaker set in the Autodesk Gallery all ready to rock and put on a trance inducing LED light show.

Wired Article on the speakers:
http://www.wired.com/design/2013/04/lumigeek/

Thanks to the mad speaker scientists Arthur & Evan for designing and creating the speakers, and Maurice for challenging and focusing them on this wicked cool project.

Here is the Instructable to create them from Evan:
http://www.instructables.com/id/3D-Printed-Speaker-Enclosures-With-Lights/

I would like to challenge them to create the ultimate stereo enclosure to make this a complete uniquely styled and created music experience. I would love to bring the cool set to Autodesk University 2013 to show off what can be done with a complete digital design to manufacturing process.

Cheers,
Shaan

How to Get Autodesk 2014 Products, No Funny Stuff

On this April Fools day, I am shooting straight and no silly stuff for once in my 10 years of blogging. No offering a 3D printable DVD of Autodesk products like last year, or a hacked blog. This year, I almost went with a post explaining I was finally changing my name “Shaan” to a more standard spelling so people would stop calling me "shan” pronouncing it like “man” instead of Shaan pronounced like “shawn”, but I did not.  Scott Sheppard already posted a great internal Autodesk April Fools. Organizational Announcement: Welcome, Everybody, to CEO Staff

Last week Autodesk announced several new Autodesk 2014 products and most want to know how to get them, so here is the latest.

Check out the great video “How to Upgrade your Autodesk Product from the Autodesk Subscription Center” from the @AutodeskHelp team making Twitter so much more helpful and happy by providing Autodesk support on Twitter.

“From logging in to the Subscription Center to downloading, installing and activating your product, our brand new instructional guide will ensure a quick and seamless upgrade transition.
And just in case you have any questions, concerns or issues along the way, we’ll be patiently waiting to assist @Autodesk on Twitter!”

http://blog.autodeskhelp.com/post/46328142611/its-that-time-of-the-year-again-the-2014

Several of the new 2014 products are currently available for download on the ADN, and product pages like AutoCAD trial download page. I expect the 2014 products to appear soon for download by subscription customers on the Autodesk Subscription website and to students on the Autodesk Student Community which if you are a student or faculty you can get most Autodesk products free for 3 years.

Cheers,
Shaan

Todays Autodesk 2014 Webcast & Autodesk Official Show Reel 2013 Now Available on YouTube

You can watch the recording of the event that was broadcast live from the Autodesk Gallery at One Market in San Francisco just an hour ago. Autodesk’s Amar Hanspal Senior Vice President, Information Modeling & Platform Products Group announced and showed some of the new Autodesk 2014 product & suites. http://youtu.be/w-kxV8C4xro

The focus of the webcast was the Suite spots.

The 2014 family of Autodesk Design and Creation Suites includes:

• Autodesk AutoCAD Design Suite
• Autodesk Building Design Suite
• Autodesk Entertainment Creation Suite
• Autodesk Factory Design Suite
• Autodesk Infrastructure Design Suite
• Autodesk Plant Design Suite
• Autodesk Product Design Suite

A key addition to the 2014 portfolio of suites is Autodesk ReCap, a family of new reality capture software and cloud services that simplify the process of creating intelligent 3D data of physical objects and environments using laser scans and photos, allowing customers to bring the actual job site or physical objects into their design and engineering process.

Check out the new Autodesk Official Show Reel 2013 that was seen at the start of the webcast: http://youtu.be/-YS2J-OIGcU

The new Autodesk website went live www.autodesk.com

So much more news coming today including a post with links to Autodesk 2014 product related posts from the blogosphere. Stay tuned to this blog for all the Autodesk news Between the Lines.

Cheers,
Shaan

Special Autodesk Live Events and You Are Invited

Please join us for the special live events on Facebook, LiveStream, and the Autodesk Area.

http://autode.sk/webcast, http://autode.sk/webcast_ls and http://area.autodesk.com/2014unfold

“It is often the arrival of a new tool that opens our minds to new opportunities we would have never imagined before. New tools not only make it possible to do new things, they also expand our vision of what could be. We will soon be announcing our 2014 portfolio of tools for design, engineering and entertainment and we invite you to join us for a special webcast on March 26, 2013 at 8am Pacific, 11am Eastern, 3pm UK and 4pm Europe to learn more and see the impact that Autodesk software is having across the industries we serve.”

- The Role of Tools in Design blog post

Also check out the 2 day celebration with the Unfold event featuring Autodesk’s 2014 Animation Software tools.
http://area.autodesk.com/2014unfold

MakerBot and Autodesk Partner Up for 3D

The announcement was just made by MakerBot CEO Bre Pettis in speaking at SXSW 2013 and the Autodesk press release just went live announcing Autodesk and MakerBot will be partnering to provide 3D design software and 3D printing hardware to engineers, designers, architects, makers, creators, and artists.

Autodesk and MakerBot have been working together for awhile now on many projects including MakerBot’s Hackathon using Autodesk 123D Catch to capture models of the New York Metropolitan Museum exhibits and 3D print them. There was also the infamous horsehead captured and 3D printed and even larger Bay Bridge lights project. Beyond just capturing 3D geometry using 123D Catch there are many people that use Autodesk software to design in 3D and send their designs to a MakerBot 3D printer myself included.You can use everything from the Autodesk 123D family including 123D Catch, 123D Creature, 123D Design, and 123D Sculpt to the professional Autodesk design software to create 3D models and 3D print them on MakerBot 3D printers.

“Bre Pettis, CEO of MakerBot, announced the partnership during his Opening Remarks for SXSW 2013, and the companies showcased creatures designed with Autodesk’s new 123D Creature iPad app, which were printed on a MakerBot Replicator 2 Desktop 3D Printer at SXSW Create Presented by Autodesk.

“Software is key in showcasing the capabilities of 3D printing, and Autodesk’s 123D Creature iPad app is an awesome way to highlight how you can customize a design, make it your own, and print it in 3D on a MakerBot Replicator 2 Desktop 3D Printer,” noted Bre Pettis, CEO of MakerBot. “MakerBot prides itself on setting the standard in desktop 3D printing, and now in working with Autodesk, we are also together, setting the standard in providing the leading 3D design software that is optimized for printing on a MakerBot.“

“Our goal is to continue making 3D printing from our applications simpler and more straightforward, and optimizing the Autodesk 123D family to work with MakerBot printers delivers on this promise by enabling our community to print their creations with greater ease,” said Samir Hanna, vice president of Consumer Products at Autodesk. “Our collaboration will help accelerate the next industrial revolution, and we are excited to work with MakerBot to make this happen.”

This might be bigger than a Kardashian wedding, and certainly last longer and be more meaningful.

Autodesk T-Splines Plug-in for Rhino

The reintroduction of Autodesk T-Splines Plug-in for Rhino and discussion on a new version 4 coming was discussed in a recent live webcast and now available to watch on YouTube. You may remember T-Splines (my friends in nearby Provo Utah) were acquired back in November of 2011, and Autodesk stated at the time they would continue supporting non-Autodesk products which T-Splines was developed for. Since that time updates have been released and a renewed effort for new versions has been announced.

Catch up on T-Splines with the recent webcast by Autodesk T-Splines Product Manager Matt Sederberg and Autodesk CEO Carl Bass. This is another frank and honest discussion by Carl on design software tools and his actual use of the tools.
http://youtu.be/wjXS1oD0sY8

“T-Splines is a technology used by industrial designers, jewelers, and architects to easily create and edit freeform, organic designs.

A few months ago, Autodesk CEO Carl Bass delighted the T-Splines community by announcing on the T-Splines forum that T-Splines for Rhino development would resume actively. Watch this webinar to listen to Carl talk with Matt Sederberg, former T-Splines CEO and current Autodesk product manager, about what has happened with T-Splines over the past year, why Autodesk has decided to resume more active development, and what this means for the future. There will be live Q&A at the end.”

Even more exciting to me is T-Splines being integrated in the upcoming Autodesk Fusion 360 which is in beta currently at http://www.autodesk.com/Fusion360. I love Fusion 360 as you can do both complex organic product industrial design and solid modeling workflows on both Mac and Windows. Autodesk Fusion 360 is like a design tool that makes you a one man wolf pack of design.

Cheers,
Shaan

What is the Role of Design in Creating a Better World?

Autodesk has released a short video on the role of design from the perspective of some visionaries:

• Mickey McManus - CEO of MAYA design
• Eve Blossom - Founder Lulan Artisans
• Christine Furstoss - Global Technology Director, Manufacturing & Materials Technologies. GE Global Research
• Peter Diamandis - founder and chairman of the X PRIZE Foundation and the co-founder and chairman of Singularity University
• Schuyler St. Leger - 3D printing enthusiast and Autodesk University 2012 keynote speaker

Link to the YouTube hosted video http://autode.sk/YZZBvd

Kairos Society Summit & Some 3Doodling

Last Friday and Saturday Autodesk participated as a sponsor in the Kairos Society Summit in New York City. The Kairos Society is a non-profit organization founded to foster innovation and entrepreneurship by students.

“Founded in 2008, the Kairos Society is a non-profit 501(c)3 organization based in the United States. We work to find and empower the young pioneers who will push the world forward through entrepreneurship and innovation - we do so with the support of the top universities, mentors, and corporations across the globe. At the Kairos Society, we view today’s global problems as opportunities for entrepreneurs to focus on the meaningful businesses and innovations that will radically change the world for the better. Not only for our generation, but for the generations to come.”

Autodesk CEO Carl Bass and Autodesk CTO Jeff Kowalski were at the event as were about 6 Autodesk employees including myself presenting on the subjects of 3D design and 3D Printing. Many of our 3D printing friends like Stratasys and Shapeways were also at the event.

 

During our panel session on 3D Printing where we spoke of Autodesk role in developing software and technologies used in design and also supporting 3D printing. We covered a great deal of ground in a short amount of time to 350 students broken up into 3 groups. I absolutely love discussing technology with students as they come up with the greatest questions and ideas since they don’t know the boundaries or set in their ways. During the session I brought up the hot topic of the 3D Printing pen “3Doodler” on Kickstarter that was trying to raise $30,000 and are now OVER 1.8 million dollars and causing a buzz all over in social media and even among researchers in the 3D printing space. In fact there was a long email thread I was involved in the evening before the Kairos event discussing what it really was and if it was really 3D printing, or really a free form 3D sketching tool. When I brought up the 3Doodler topic a gentlemen in the back of the session pointed to himself and so I asked what he wanted to add to the discussion, it was none other than the co-founder of WobbleWorks and the 3Doodler pen Maxwell Bogue.
3Doodler: The World's First 3D Printing Pen

 

On Saturday we were invited to participate in the launching of the Kairos 50 on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. What a surreal and interesting venue where many of the startups in the Kairos 50 were presenting their projects.We were all dressed up in suits and I even had a tie on.

I also met Anybot a virtual presence robot that allows people to attend remote locations even attend meetings while away over the Internet.  One cool thing was the ability to attach a mobile device running Google Hangouts and that could then be used to allow people to join a Hangout session and experience an event or place remotely. Would love to have some of these at AU.

Cheers,
Shaan

New Autodesk Logo Unveiled

 

Today the new Autodesk logo has been revealed at the TED conference. The logo is not just a text font but something that can actually be constructed using origami methods. Many more changes to the Autodesk brand and products are coming very soon including the new logo being used in other places and website re-design.

Dramatic shifts are happening in the world of design, our business, and our look, are keeping pace: http://autode.sk/adsk

Also check out the Design & Motion blog post: Autodesk | The New Brand and Origami Logo

 

Raar! Autodesk Releases 123D Creature

Now you can be a monster Maker creating your own 3D creatures on your iPad for only $1.99 limited time pricing. The designs can be shared as well as 3D printed.  Autodesk 123D Creature app.

From Techcrunch:
Autodesk Releases 123D Creature, A Tool To Design, Paint, And Print Your Own 3D Monster stcrn.ch/Uftj0P

Go create your own and don’t forget to tell young kids with access to an iPad to create their own creatures.If robots are more your style check out designing your own robots in 3D using Autodesk 123D Design which there is an iPad version available.

Cheers,
Shaan

Carl Bass on Engineer vs. Designer

I thoroughly enjoyed the return of the Engineer vs. Designer podcast, especially this one featuring Autodesk’s own CEO and chief Maker Carl Bass. The entertaining interview by Josh Mings and Adam OHern was great as it felt almost like I shoulder surfed in on a candid conversation about design software at a lounge somewhere in Brooklyn.

• Who are you, Carl Bass?
• What is up with all the iOS apps? Where are they taking us?
• Where is Autodesk today and where are they going?
• Why CAD in the Cloud? (Fusion 360)
• When can we expect Autodesk hardware?

After the podcast I was left thinking that we Autodesk employees have the most candid, coolest, down to earth, straight talking CEO ever.

Check out the podcast:
http://engineervsdesigner.com/61-autodesk-carl-bass/

Happy 31st Birthday Autodesk

On this day January 30th, 1982, 31 years ago a small group of people held an initial meeting in Marin County California to organize what became Autodesk. They risked it all including all the money they cold scrape together and it paid off for millions of people from employees, customers, partners, and investors.

A sincere thank you to John Walker and all the ‘deskers’ that followed in the founders and pioneers footsteps to this day as you literally changed the world!

Take a moment to sit back and reflect at all the history in the past 31 years and be damn proud, then get back to work.

 

Autodesk Flying founders

From left to right:
Rudolf Künzli, Mike Ford, Dan Drake, Mauri Laitinen, Greg Lutz, David Kalish, Lars Moureau, Richard Handyside,Kern Sibbald, Hal Royaltey, Duff Kurland, John Walker, Keith Marcelius

John Walker’s quote.

“We should shoot for having the company in operation by mid-March. We cannot dawdle, but we also are going to do it right this time. We're just going to do it fast! “

 

Onward and Upward!
-Shaan
Autodesk’s 4087 employee hired in 1998 and unofficial historian.

Mother Nature Celebrity Designer

While Mother Nature has been busy piling up snow and today shutting down Salt Lake City including the major airport with freezing rain and causing my power to go out, she is also a very talented designer. Just look around you at what Mother Nature has designed from terrain, plants, animals and more. We can use bio mimicry for radical designs inspired by nature.

Consider joining us at the beautiful Autodesk Gallery in San Francisco for Design Night Thursday February 7th 2013. Tickets and more information is available at: http://autode.sk/nature

Autodesk Gallery at One Market Street in San Francisco is open free to the public. See the Gallery and the exhibits every Wednesday. http://www.autodesk.com/thegallery

Autodesk Gallery at One Market

One Market, Floor 2
San Francisco, CA 94105
map

Autodesk Help on Twitter

If you are on Twitter and looking for a product related question from Autodesk then you are in luck. For about a year or so there has been a Twitter account by Autodesk Customer Service and Support team at @AutodeskHelp (formerly they were @autodeskcare.) They are available 24 hours a day 5 days a week in English.

The team also has a blog “Autodesk Help blog” at blog.autodeskhelp.com.

Here are the friendly faces behind the helpful tweet replies and they always seem so happy to help and cheerful in their replies.

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So next time you are on Twitter and have an Autodesk question remember to say hi or just follow the friendly Autodesk Help @AutodeskHelp crew as you may learn from their answers to others or need to ask them something in the future. Tell them Shaan sent you.

Cheers,
Shan

Autodesk Formit 2.0, then Revit

Autodesk Formit is a free iPad app launched on iTunes as a version 1.0 during Autodesk University 2012 in December and just updated this past weekend to version 2.0.

Autodesk FormIt Version 2.0 has just been launched on iTunes, and it is completely free. This latest update includes some great improvements including metric units, automatic Revit file creation (with Autodesk 360), grid and snap settings adapt to zoom level, and some great user experience enhancements.
Download or update today: http://autode.sk/TjO5Hj

Autodesk Formit provides a simple iPad based 3D modeling tool for you to conceptually model architectural designs, building massing models, or a conceptual master plan. Formit is a very basic and intuitive 3D tool where you use your fingers to create the designs. When you have the conceptual design you want you can then refine it into an accurate design model by logging into your Autodesk 360 account for the Revit .rvt file that is placed along with the Autodesk Formit .axm file.

It is just plain fun to explore architecture design concepts on the iPad tablet. For those mechanically inclined, check out the free Autodesk 123D Design.

What's new in version 2.0

• Support for metric units (a hot user request)
• Cloud conversion to Autodesk Revit: supports Metric or Imperial, depending on sketch setting
• Imprint closed shapes on faces and push them in to make solid cuts
• Grid and snap settings adapt to current zoom level
• Rectangles can be drawn at angles to the grid
• Satellite images can be reloaded
• Redesigned sun-study popover takes up less space
• Gallery is a single scrollable page and can be sorted by name or date
• Sketches now display their name in the Gallery
• Fit to view has option to include a loaded image
• Help button now has an option to go to the Autodesk Formit GetSatisfaction support site
• We are now gathering anonymous usage data. This can be disabled from the About page
• Crash recovery: If there is a crash, you will be able to retrieve data on next load
• Various stability and bug fixes

Here is a existing retail mall created in Formit by Angel Espinoza after he had only been using Formit for a couple hours. Angel started by just using a location which imported the Map or satellite background (you can even use a photo from of a site plan). He then created primitives and then modified those to create the 3D Formit model.

So if you have an iPad, go download or update today: http://autode.sk/TjO5Hj