Between the Lines

Proud by Design in Portland

What an amazing weekend of Portland Pride, with Autodesk as a sponsor again. We have a booth all weekend and in the parade Sunday. We had or Autodesk soapbox derby car for pride that was designed and built by employees and then will race at Portland Adult Soapbox Derby August 17th. Everyone loved climbing in the derby car for photos and also making bracelets and notebooks at our booth. Read more →

Got My Bags Packed for My Mars Condo!

A great story of smart young minds tackling a challenge put forth by NASA helped AI SpaceFactory Win NASA’s 3D-Printed Habitat Challenge for additive constructed habitats. NASA awarded AI SpaceFactory $500,000 for the successful construction of a 15 foot Mars habitat with three windows named MARSHA. Read more →

Civil Engineers Can Save the World

Here is a great article about thinking about things differently and how engineers can help create a better world and future. 3 Ways Heroic Civil Engineers Can Save the World Through Resilience Planning https://autode.sk/2EFfBAg Read more →

Employee Made Arcade at Autodesk's Portland Office

Our Portland Autodesk office took the Autodesk tagline of “Make Anything” quite literal. We moved into this beautifully restored downtown central eastside Portland office a year ago. So when some of the employees heard we had a game room, they asked about an arcade game. There wasn’t an arcade game or budget – so they decided to make one. It was an organic grassroots volunteer project, but a group of employees decided “hey, lets make our own arcade console.” They... Read more →

Interested in Artificial Intelligence for Engineering– Attend our Engineering Summer School 2019

Autodesk is hosting an immersive event in Toronto to help students and professionals acquire expertise in state-of-the-art AI methods and techniques. autode.sk/2PUKipw Artificial Intelligence (AI) for Engineering Summer School 2019, hosted by Autodesk, is a two-week event that brings together a talented group of engineering graduate students and industry professionals to acquire expertise in state-of-the-art AI methods and techniques, with the focus on deep learning and reinforcement learning. While there has been a significant resurgence of AI technologies, other scientific... Read more →

AEC Hackathon in Seattle was Amazing and Inspiring

The 41st AEC Hackathon event was held in Seattle this past weekend and was great and filled with many smart and inspiring people and several new friends and connections. First, the Seattle weather was amazing and I got in a morning run and flight in South Lake Union area. The AEC Hackathon was held in the University of Washington campus Department of Construction Management CERC. Friday the event began with introductions, speakers including Damon Hernandez the AEC Hackathon Executive Director,... Read more →

Fusion 360 Academy is Coming in August

Happening in Portland Oregon is the largest Autodesk Fusion 360 learning & networking event, the Fusion 360 Academy! The Fusion 360 Academy will offer 25+ classes taught by Autodesk experts and industry pro's, a Design Slam to show off your skills, and plenty of opportunities to network. Sign-up now and save $100 with an early-bird special! https://autode.sk/2Ipkm3I Read more →

AEC Hackathon This Weekend in Seattle

Starting tomorrow, another (41st actually) AEC Hackathon will be held this time in beautiful Seattle Washington and I will be participating. The AEC (Architecture, Engineering, Construction) Hackathon was created to give those designing, building, and maintaining our built environment the opportunity to collaborate with cutting edge technologies and its developers and designers. It has quickly become a community of innovators that include all elements of the built environment, not just AEC all around the world. Please join all of us... Read more →

Shaping the future of construction using BIM tools and an innovative design approach of DfMA

The acronym DfMA stands for Design for Manufacture and Assembly and is a growing in popularity process to make sure that the manufacturing and assembly on site is considered in the design phase to save materials, labor, time, and bottom line costs. DfMA is not really what we have known historically as prefab as it is much more like the growing offsite construction for homes and buildings and considering in the design process how to manufacture and install efficiently and... Read more →

FIRST FRC World Finals Houston

Houston, we have a competition with a lot of smart teens from around the world! Catlin Gabel Team 1540 the Flaming Chickens of Portland are the team I have been a mentor of for a few years are competing this year with their awesome designed, fabricated, and programmed robot named Phineas who was designed using Autodesk Fusion 360! They are the most amazing group of humans I know, and will definitely impact the world in good ways in the future.... Read more →

Autodesk Fusion 360 and Generative Design

An in-depth review of Autodesk Fusion 360 and generative design was just posted by DEVELOP3D, who are also holding their conference DEVELOP3D Live in Sheffield England today. “As we discussed at the outset, topology optimisation refines a singular form to an optimised state, typically using a singular material. Generative design in Fusion 360 is, by contrast, a platform for experimentation on a much grander scale. All in all, what Autodesk has delivered on here, in its first pass, is pretty... Read more →

World’s First Production Chair Imagined by a Human and Co-designed with Artificial Intelligence

This might be called the AI Chair or a fine clean example of cutting edge and clean design chair, but it is also a worlds first. You may remember that Autodesk did the first chair imagined with generative design a few years ago ( Generative Designed Elbo Chair One of 2016s Most Innovative Objects) as a test of what could be re-imagined using generative design. Now there is a beautiful production chair by Phillipe Starck that you could purchase someday... Read more →

Tap Handle Competition and I Want You To Help

In our Autodesk Portland office we are all nearing our 1 year in this beautiful historic and renovated building, and have a internal design contest. Employees are encouraged to design and 3D printed tap handles for our beer taps in the office game room named after the Portland neighborhood of Slabtown. The Slabtown game room is used for events like user groups, receptions, training, and more. I know our customers and my readers are the most skilled and talented designers... Read more →

FIRST Robotics PNW Finals

Last week and finishing up Saturday was the Pacific Northwest FIRST District Championship 2019 where 68 Pacific Northwest FIRST FRC Teams competed for invites to the World Finals in Houston to be held April 17-20th. I drove up to Tacoma Washington for the PNW Finals to see the team 1540 that I mentor compete and see the other 67 regional teams. Team 1540 Flaming Chickens designed their competition robot named “Phineas” using Autodesk Fusion 360. These events are always inspiring.... Read more →

Design Week Portland - Ultimaker+ Autodesk

Design Week Portland is right around the corner, and this year we’re partnering up with Ultimaker to help you level up your design-to-make game. Come see the latest from Ultimaker and Autodesk in Autodesk’s renovated new Portland office (renovated Towne Storage Building) just off East Burnside by the bridge in the central eastside industrial district. Look for the water tower with our logo and you can’t miss us. Parking can be a bit of a challenge at times so choose... Read more →

Autodesk Technology Center in Boston is Holding a Design Night March 28th

Are you a design and make enthusiast in the Boston area? Join the Autodesk Technology Center for Design Night on 3/28! Get your tickets: https://autode.sk/DNboston Read more →

FIRST FRC PNW District Clackamas Academy Event 2019

FIRST Robotics FRC Team 1540 the Flaming Chickens placed 1st ranking again this weekend in Oregon City, but lost out in the quarter final alliance competition match. They are heading to the Pacific Northwest FIRST District Championship in Tacoma Washington April 3-6 and then hopefully onto the FIRST FRC World Finals in Houston Texas. I am so inspired and impressed by team 1540 and their design created using Autodesk’s own Portland non-GMO, organic, free range mechanical design software Autodesk Fusion... Read more →

PIE Demo Day

What a great and inspiring event where local Portland startups presented on their products with passion and energy. It was also nice to see such an inclusive and diverse event with most of the presenters being women founders and Latina and people of color represented. One of the nice things is all of the early stage presenters are using the PIE Shop incubator in Autodesk’s Portland office and we are so lucky and grateful for them. PIE Demo Day 2019... Read more →

See Some Portland Startup Pitches Today on Pi and PIE Day

On this Pi day (3.14 etc.) I hope you will join us on the PIE (Portland Incubator Experiment) Demo Day livestream at 2PM Pacific Time on March 14, 2019. Tell everyone there is plenty of room on our livestream from Aladdin Theater in sunny Portland Oregon. https://bit.ly/PIEDD2019 We love Pi and PIE! Update: PIE Demo Day 2019 replay is already available. Just in time for some weekend binge watching. https://bit.ly/PIEDD2019 Read more →

AUGIWorld March 2019 Issue with Autodesk Portland on the Cover

Look what made the cover of Autodesk User Group Intl “AUGIWorld” magazine for March 2019! The photo on the cover is of the Autodesk Portland office stairs constructed of reclaimed lumber and the design by MacKenzie that was inspired by CAM cutting paths that some of our software generates. In addition to the awesome Autodesk Portland office on the cover, there is some great content. https://www.augi.com/augiworld/issue/march-2019 Tips ‘n’ Tricks – Shawn Herring uncovers some AutoCAD Civil 3D tools that are... Read more →

Autodesk AEC 2019 Showreel

Are you ready for some AEC design and construction inspiration? Look no further than this link for a showreel highlighting some of our amazing customers and partners. https://youtu.be/vBJX5e2NEkQ Read more →

Startups in Autodesk's Portland Office

Autodesk has provided space and resources to a local Portland startup incubator organization named PIE (Portland Incubator Experiment) to run a startup incubator in our Portland office named PIE Shop. Read more →

Autodesk Design & Manufacturing Official Show Reel 2019

Autodesk just published a new video showing some amazing and inspiring highlights for our Design and Manufacturing industry products, partners, and customers. Enjoy! Read more →

Interested in AEC Space Analysis for Dynamo and Refinery – Meet Project Discover

Kean Walmsley from our Autodesk Research Team wrote a great blog post on space analysis using Dynamo and Refinery. “For Project Discover we used 2D space analysis to calculate various metrics that scored the individual layouts: Adjacency Buzz Productivity Views to outside Daylight The first two are largely about calculating paths between various locations, while the last three are implemented by ray-casting. These approaches are definitely connected, though: you need to specify boundaries (and barriers) that the various algorithms will... Read more →

Robots by High School Students

For the past 3 years I have been mentoring a high school robotics Team 1540 Flaming Chickens in Portland at Catlin Gabel who compete in the FIRST Robotics FRC. For the past 6 weeks the students have been designing in Autodesk Fusion 360, fabricating, and programming this years competition robot and just released their reveal video for their robot named Phineas that will compete in this years competition Destination Deep Space. Pretty amazing robot and design. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HQ7DZsimjpo Read more →