Take Project Bernini, the 3D object generator that Autodesk unveiled earlier this year. Seemingly every speech by an Autodesk executive made mention of Bernini, suggesting it demonstrates the potential of AI to revolutionize design and manufacturing. But always with a tantalizing caveat: Bernini is just a proof of concept, not yet ready for commercial use.

Oh well. The most ambitious applications of AI may remain out of reach, but that doesn’t mean it’s not making a difference for engineers today. To prove it, Autodesk unveiled three new AI-based features for Fusion that are already ready (or will be soon): AutoConstrain, Automated Drawings and Autodesk Assistant.

Fusion AutoConstrain

Fusion’s new AutoConstrain feature uses AI to automatically suggest sketch constraints like symmetry, center points and all the other spatial relationships that Fusion users used to have to add manually. AutoConstrain will continuously evaluate the sketch and adapt the constraints to design changes.

Autodesk believes that AutoConstrain will save designers time in two ways. First, it will help them sketch quicker by eliminating the need to manually add constraints. Second, it will make their parametric models more robust, preventing errors and rework. Stephen Hooper, Autodesk’s vice president for design and manufacturing product development, says that it’s easy to overlook minor sketching inconsistencies that cause big problems further in the design process.

“If you’ve created a complex sketch and you don’t apply the constraints accurately, you can drag the sketch and everything turns itself inside out,” Hooper told Engineering.com. He provided the example of a square—or what the designer meant to be a square—that’s actually a sliver of a degree away from a true right angle, preventing proper alignment in an assembly later on.

“These little problems that sound mundane cause huge issues for customers when they’re working later on in the process,” Hooper said. “So automating that, and deriving those constraints for them so they’re 100% accurate every time, should be a big productivity boost for them,” Hooper said.

AutoConstrain will be available to Fusion users by the end of January 2025, according to Hooper.

Fusion Automated Drawings

Automated Drawings has been a feature in Fusion since January of this year, but Hooper says that Autodesk has now made it more intelligent with AI. It does what you’d expect: automatically generate drawings from a 3D model including 2D views, dimensions and other manufacturing details.

“AI doesn’t just generate the drawings; it intelligently decides what details are necessary and what can be left out,” according to the Autodesk blog post announcing the AI update. “For instance, it can identify fasteners or other components that don’t need to be included in the final drawing… The result is a streamlined drawing set that’s ready for manufacturing without the need for excessive manual revisions.”

Autodesk Assistant in Fusion

Autodesk Assistant will debut in Fusion’s manufacturing workspace. It’s a text prompt interface that Hooper describes as “manufacturing aware.”

The assistant can answer user questions like “How can I program my toolpath to avoid slot milling?” or “What manufacturing methods should I consider for this part?” and, according to a blog post written by Autodesk’s Jeff Kinder, executive vice president of product development and manufacturing solutions, “Autodesk Assistant will respond with Fusion-specific answers, or answers specific to manufacturing, and share hyperlinks to original sources.”

But it’s not just text in, text out. Users can give Autodesk Assistant commands relating to their part, and it will be able to call Fusion functions to accomplish the task.

“The output is actually a machining strategy or a 3D piece of geometry, so that’s a little different from a text assistant. It’s actually creating intellectual property for you,” Hooper said.

Like Fusion AutoConstrain, Autodesk Assistant in Fusion will be available by January 2025, according to Hooper. He sees great potential for the technology, which could evolve to accept voice commands and spread to other Fusion workspaces.

“It’s one of these things that looks understated when you see it, but I think the applications for it are quite profound,” Hooper said.

The post 3 new AI features in Autodesk Fusion appeared first on Engineering.com.

Why? In a word: Write.

In slightly more words, courtesy of Autodesk’s director of product management Bankim Charegaonkar: “We’re releasing the ability for people to write custom property data back to Fusion… just like Fusion created it natively.”

Engineering.com spoke with Charegaonkar to learn why that matters, who can benefit from it and what the Manufacturing Data Model API could eventually become.

The write stuff

Autodesk released the original Manufacturing Data Model API as a way for users to access the cloud data underpinning their Fusion projects.

“The data can be multifaceted between design, manufacturing, simulation, generative, etc., but it’s still working off of the same core thing, and that core thing is what we call the Manufacturing Data Model,” Charegaonkar explained.

That core Manufacturing Data Model is what users can access with the new API. Version one of the API offered only read access, allowing users to query their Fusion data without having to access it through the software. But for most who used the API, read access alone wasn’t enough. “The number one request,” Charegaonkar said, was that users wanted to write data back to the Manufacturing Data Model.

And now, with the Manufacturing Data Model API v2, they can. That’s good news for third party developers looking to integrate with Fusion in a bidirectional way.

“It could be a partner building a costing application, another one building supply chain integrations, building apps for integrating to ERP or MRP systems,” Charegaonkar said. “Now all of them can be built and they can react in a live way to what’s happening in Fusion.”

How far does the Manufacturing Data Model API go? Not all the way—yet. But it’s got plenty of power as is.

What can you do with the Manufacturing Data Model API?

The Manufacturing Data Model API gives users read and write access down to the component level in Fusion.

“You get the whole assembly structure, the material of every component, the B-Rep information for it, the mass properties, etc.,” Charegaonkar said. Users can also create custom properties to augment the data model however they like.

That level of detail is enough to facilitate interesting software integrations. Take OpenBOM, for instance, which used a beta of the new API to make its BOM workflows available inside Fusion and, conversely, enable its users to interact with Fusion data directly from OpenBOM.

“This integration promises to streamline workflows, enhance productivity, and make life easier for designers, engineers, production planners, supply chain, and procurement people,” said OpenBOM founder Oleg Shivolitsky in Autodesk’s press release.

However, there’s more detail that exists in the Manufacturing Data Model than is currently open to the API. As Charegaonkar looks to the future of the platform, he sees more and more of that detail becoming available. “As we continue to granularize that data further, you’ll see sketches and parameters and features,” he said.

The more detail open to the API, the more Fusion users will be able to take advantage of time-saving automation.

“So if you were cabinet manufacturer and you had your five key driving dimensions… you could interact with this API with a simple app [that] changed the parameters,” Charegaonkar said, suggesting that this could become an automated configurator to showcase customization options.

The future possibilities of the API are exciting. Charegaonkar suggested that it may move beyond design data and into manufacturing and simulation data as well, opening even more automation possibilities.

Accessing the Manufacturing Data Model API

A beta of the Manufacturing Data Model API v2 has been available since earlier this year. Now, the revamped API is available to all Fusion subscribers through Autodesk Platform Services.

“There’s a full framework there for how apps get developed, how they get released,” Charegaonkar said. Users can publish apps on their own or through Autodesk’s App Store. Unlike Fusion add-ins, which are unique to a given user’s Fusion environment, cloud apps are managed across an entire team’s environment. That’s because they handle information, like BOM data, that needs to be consistent across the board.

“This is kind of on a path to making the cloud a true collaborator for you in your design process,” Charegaonkar said.

The post Autodesk releases Manufacturing Data Model API v2 for Fusion users appeared first on Engineering.com.

Engineering.com sat down with Sappin to chat about Catia and how it’s evolving for today’s engineering challenges. He’s got grand plans for AI, a three-pronged approach to sustainable product design and a clear vision of the longstanding Catia brand—it’s no longer just for CAD, but for engineering at large, he says. Here’s why.

The following transcript has been edited for brevity and clarity.

Engineering.com: What excites you most about Catia these days?

Olivier Sappin: When I started it was really an exciting time. We were just working with Boeing to do a full digital aircraft, the 777, which was a complete digital twin. And at that time we decided not only to do engineering, but to expand on full PLM manufacturing. We decided that we would revolutionize the way people are doing product innovation.

Catia v5 was one of the first systems to enable our clients to capitalize their knowledge and know-how. And it resonates a lot today because the companies that work to capitalize all their knowledge will be the ones to take the most advantage of AI.

Without data, you cannot activate AI. ChatGPT works because it can run on billions of pages of text, images. You cannot find 3D assets on the web. You cannot type 777 and get the digital 777 because the IP is at Boeing.

So it’s a real advantage to have capitalized this knowledge and know-how. And that’s the main thing happening in Catia right now, to leverage artificial intelligence having the capacity to elevate our client’s data into real knowledge and know-how.

And by the way, this is why Catia runs on the platform. We are not running on files anymore, because the files are on everyone’s desktop or laptop and you cannot leverage them. So Catia on the 3DExperience platform on the cloud is definitely the way for our clients to get their data elevated to real knowledge and know-how that they can leverage for getting the most advantage of artificial intelligence.

Could you give any examples of how your customers have been able to use AI?

We’re actually working with key clients in the automotive, aerospace and other sectors. I can give you some examples but I cannot mention names at this point.

I’ll give you one typical use case. I’m working with a Japanese client and they want to automatically assemble all car components into a full virtual tree. And believe me, it still takes a lot of time. Let’s say engineers want to assemble a suspension. They need to take the spring of the suspension, the knuckle, the different parts. They need to get the knowledge about where this part is being assembled. They want to check new components, they want to validate the kinematics, they want to validate the NVH durability, they want to do a lot of simulation and it takes a lot of non value added tasks for them to rebuild that.

So with AI, we have been able to basically look after all the components of these clients and learn from past assemblies to automatically identify the functional area of the part, the one that helps to be connected to another part. And the system learns and automatically creates an assembly for the engineer. You can save a lot of time and you can imagine that with that you can potentially explore much more innovative ideas.

So it’s not only a time reduction, cost reduction, which is obviously an objective. But it’s also, within the same amount of time, how much space of possibility can you explore? To imagine, for example, a new car platform, to have an electric motor or battery and so on. And this is extremely helpful to accelerate innovation.

Another use case is to leverage natural language to interact with Catia. We think that asking direct questions to the system will be more and more common, so we are already testing about 50 to 60 different large language models to evaluate what would be the most beneficial to basically talk to Catia in natural language. So you can imagine that in the future you have a kind of assistant that will augment engineers.

How will that work? Instead of clicking and typing will users simply tell Catia to, say, sketch a circle with a diameter of 10 millimeters?

Yes, but not only that. We think that if we want to go to natural language, it’s not only to speak the language of the system. When you say please do me that sketch, it means you’re already a designer, because you know what a sketch is. And maybe some engineers don’t know what a Catia sketch is because they don’t know Catia.

So you potentially ask questions in the Catia language, but you would also be able to ask questions in the automotive language. ‘Please can you propose me a vehicle architecture that fits 5 passengers for a mid-size minivan in Korea?’

And so we will leverage the company know-how, but also what’s on the Internet. So, for example, you can find automotive handbooks, you can find regulations. If you want to develop a car for the U.S. market, for the dimensions of the car there are some boundary conditions to take into account which are declared in norms and regulations.

So AI will both use this type of regulation and academic knowledge plus the knowledge of the company, because each automotive OEM has developed cars for many years. So they also have their own expertise written in text, Excel spreadsheets or whatever. We will leverage both academic knowledge and client knowledge to give an answer into Catia in natural language.

We are not going to replace engineers, because the point is we are going to augment engineers. The differentiating point will be in the way people are looking at the answers, exploring different alternatives and making the right decisions. So we are not going to design cars with robots. We are going to augment the capacity of engineers to find the best innovation for the next vehicle.

What’s the projected timeline on the capabilities you’re describing?

We already have many AI technologies in our platform and solution. And I think progressively we are going to implement different capabilities starting next year.

Is Catia doing anything to aid sustainable product design?

Yes. There are three axes to this.

Sustainability for us starts with a very simple thing: improving product performance to get less emissions. For example, you reduce the weight of an aircraft, you reduce emissions. You improve the aerodynamics of a car, you reduce emissions. So the first thing we have done for many years is that we are helping our clients to improve sustainability goals by improving product performance.

That’s number one. Number two is we have introduced a specific dedicated product into Catia for LCA, lifecycle analysis. So it means that if you are an engineer, you can use this product to automatically generate the scorecard for where you are against sustainability goals.

We have been partnering with a company called Ecoinvent, which has the library of human activity that generates things that need to be reduced—so CO₂ emissions, water consumption, greenhouse gas, whatever.

So if you are a Catia designer, you know the product, you have a geometry, you have the material. So we are automatically able to compute a set of parameters to help clients to produce a lifecycle assessment of their product.

And it’s important to do this in Catia. If you do it after the fact in an Excel spreadsheet, it’s good you are reporting, but what we want is not to do reporting. It’s to be able to assess the lifecycle analysis early enough, at the concept stage, so that when you find that there is a problem, you can still solve it. If you discover it too late, maybe you will not be able to change the product or it will be so costly that you will never do it. So the more we can take that upfront, the more you can influence.

So that’s the second axis. The third axis is very interesting. When you do design for circularity, it’s a whole new approach. It’s a completely new way to do innovation. Because you really need to have in mind not only that the product will fit to the client or will be aesthetic or will have the right performance, you have to take into account how much it is circular.

And so we have put together a systematic approach, which means that even before you start creating 3D, you think about the requirement of the product, you think about the function, you think about the logical architecture of that product so that it’s circular from day one.

The system approach is very key in the future of Catia in what we do right now. Catia for many years has been seen as a CAD system to do parts in 3D. But the reality is that now products are more and more complex, the mix of mechanical, electrical, software. So if you want to be able to design such a system, you need to have a system approach. The market is calling it model based systems engineering, MBSE.

So Catia is not only a CAD system anymore. Catia is a tool for engineering at large that combines what we do best on 3D for the last 40 years plus the system approach. And this system approach is very clear for all. It is very critical for sustainability and circularity.

Thank you for taking the time to speak with us today.

My pleasure. There is a real revolution in our sector. The passion for engineering is in our DNA, and this is why we want to serve this market in the best way.

The post Catching up on Catia: AI and the three axes of sustainable product design appeared first on Engineering.com.

Siemens Digital Industries Software announced updates to Simcenter Testlab that the company says will enhance testing efficiency and reduce reliance on physical prototypes. Among other updates, Simcenter Testlab will get new Virtual Prototype Assembly tools that Siemens says “bring together physical test and simulation data to create virtual prototypes with a focus on enabling performance evaluation of different configurations and variants before building physical prototypes.”

In other news from Siemens Digital Industries Software, the company announced that Global Foundries has certified Siemens’ Analog FastSPICE platform for Global Foundries’ 22FDX, 22FDX+,12LP, and 12LP+ Process Design Kits.

Ansys, TSMC and Microsoft speed up photonics simulation

Ansys has collaborated with TSMC and Microsoft in a pilot project that they say successfully accelerated photonic component simulation by over 10x. Using Ansys Lumerical FDTD software, the companies ran the simulations on Microsoft Azure virtual machines with Nvidia GPUs.

“The size and complexity of our multiphysics silicon solutions makes the process of simulating all possible parameter combinations challenging,” said Stefan Rusu, head of silicon photonics system design at TSMC, in the press release. “This latest collaboration again highlights that Ansys effectively harnesses the latest cloud infrastructure and techniques to deliver powerful, predictively accurate solutions that produce results in a fraction of the time.”

FEATool Multiphysics updated to v1.17

Precise Simulation announced version 1.17 of its FEATool Multiphysics software. The developer says that the new release adds support for turbulent and compressible flow simulations to both the OpenFOAM and SU2 Code solver interfaces, adds a dedicated OpenFOAM API, and provides performance improvements for the toolbox GUI, among other enhancements. CFDTool, a “simplified sister toolbox” to FEATool Multiphysics, has also been updated to version 1.10.

VI-grade partners with Applus+ IDIADA for virtual vehicle development

VI-grade announced an expanded collaboration with Applus+ IDIADA that it says represents “a significant step forward in virtual vehicle development.” The partnership will see IDIADA’s vehicle models, which are based on real-world test data, incorporated into VI-grade’s VI-CarRealTime software for simulation and testing.

“By offering vehicle models based on real-world data from IDIADA’s testing facilities, our customers can achieve more accurate simulations and faster development times,” said Guido Bairati, managing director at VI-grade, in the company’s press release. “This strengthened partnership will greatly enhance their ability to prepare, validate, and refine their vehicle designs in a virtual environment before moving to physical tests.”

Faraday embraces Ansys RaptorX

Faraday, a provider of application specific integrated circuit (ASIC) design services, announced that it’s expanding its use of Ansys simulation software to include Ansys’ RaptorX electromagnetic solver.

“Fabrication is exceptionally expensive and there is no room for error. So, keeping the overall project cost low is paramount, and it starts with the initial design. With the addition of RaptorX in this phase, we can offer customers an efficient workflow that includes design verification and signoff as well as access to top-tier test and fabrication services, removing doubts about the chip’s performance and longevity,” said C.H. Chien, vice president of R&D at Faraday, in the company’s press release.

SimOps launches Simulation Operations Automation initiative

SimOps announced the official launch of the Simulation Operations Automation initiative, which it says is “poised to redefine the way organizations manage and optimize their engineering simulations and the operation of the underlying infrastructures.” Part of the launch includes structured training that SimOps says will provide the skills to master simulation operations.

The post Siemens updates Simcenter Testlab to bolster virtual prototypes appeared first on Engineering.com.

An engineering drawing is revealed on screen. It shows several views of a simple connector arm, dotted with dimensions and a few helpful annotations known as “Toby notes.” The drawing has a Tier 3 complexity rating.

On opposite sides of the planet, two CAD modelers instantly start making a 3D model of the part. One is using Alibre, the other Solidworks. For these seasoned experts, the modeling is easy. It’s the pressure that’s hard. They’re live on stream before an audience of CAD enthusiasts, trying to tune out their host’s play-by-play commentary and finish the 3D model as fast as they can.

Not even two and a half minutes later, one of them is done.

“ChrisBCo coming in with an answer… 0.654…” The voice belongs to Toby Schnaars, known to his audience as Too Tall Toby. A charismatic CAD expert, he’ll determine who wins the battle by correctly providing the model’s mass. The model, like the competition itself, is his creation.

A dramatic pause, and then, “That is not correct!”

The Australian Solidworks user named ChrisBCo gets only one more chance to answer. He can see that his opponent, an Alibre user from Greece named ExMachina, is nearly finished the part. One way or another, this will be over soon.

Suddenly, ChrisBCo spots the mistake in his model—one wrong dimension. He makes the change and stabs 0.687 into the chat just seconds before ExMachina enters his guess.

“And that is correct!” Schnaars announces to the sound effects of a cheering crowd. With this win, ChrisBCo takes the set of three CAD battles and secures his spot in the quarterfinals. He’s one step closer to winning the 2024 World Championship of 3D CAD Speed Modeling.

***

How fast can you CAD?

Maybe you’ve never thought of it, or cared. Perhaps the idea of speed modeling seems silly for a professional 3D modeler. Or worse—perhaps you think focusing on CAD speed would promote bad habits and sloppy design.

You wouldn’t be alone in thinking those things, but you wouldn’t be right, either. The truth is that speed modeling can greatly benefit your 3D design skills, even if you’re already an experienced modeler.

To see how, look no further than TooTallToby.com. Founded by Toby Schnaars in 2022, the site unites CAD modelers from around the world, using dozens of different CAD systems, around an intriguing premise: the gamification of 3D CAD.

There are challenges, livestreams and competitions. There are points, leaderboards and prizes. But even though it looks like a game of speed, TooTallToby.com isn’t really about being fast. By turning CAD into a game, Schnaars aims to make the players better designers. And you’d be surprised how well it’s working.

The gamification of 3D CAD

Schnaars has deep CAD experience. He’s a Solidworks master, certified at the highest level with both a CSWE and Elite AE. Before founding TooTallToby.com, Schnaars supported Solidworks users both for reseller Prism Engineering and developer Dassault Systèmes. In those roles he resolved over 10,000 support cases and taught more than 200 classes.

As an instructor, there was one question Schnaars heard over and over. Which CAD system was the best? 3D modelers certainly have a long list of options. Was Solidworks more efficient than Inventor? Did Catia have an edge over Solid Edge? Was Fusion or NX the key to success?

The question, Schnaars felt, was misguided. He believes the CAD program is much less important than the person using it. Being a master modeler is about honing the fundamentals, such as building a robust feature tree and effectively navigating a user interface.

“The users who are able to really master those workflows are going to be able to go from a napkin sketch to a 3D model faster than anybody else,” Schnaars said. “Regardless of what CAD system they’re using.”

Schnaars envisioned a “Royal Rumble” of CAD, a race among a group of designers to make the same 3D model at the same time using whatever CAD system they preferred. Not only would this showcase that the designer, not the CAD program, was the important variable—it also sounded like good fun.

That vision meshed with another problem Schnaars had noticed with CAD education. If you want to develop CAD skills, you have a few options. You could take a structured training class, such as the kind Schnaars himself had taught. Or you could take a DIY approach, sifting through YouTube videos piecemeal to build up a repertoire of skills.

Schnaars felt there was a missing piece in CAD pedagogy. He discussed his ideas with Guy Rotheram, a colleague and fellow CAD expert who shared Schnaars’ passion for gaming and technology.

“Toby and I… thought that if we could introduce the concept of gamification into the education process for CAD, then we probably had something that would really spark an interest and provide a valuable service to the broader community… all the way from hobbyists to professional engineers,” Rotheram said.

In 2022, Schnaars, Rotheram, and Schnaars’ wife Vicki Chong launched TooTallToby.com. It would test their ideas for gamifying CAD education while building on Schnaars’ existing online presence as a CAD instructor.

They didn’t have to wait long for interest to be sparked.

The game of speed modeling

So how does it work? TooTallToby’s system-agnostic approach turns CAD into a game of speed, rewarding users based on how quickly they can create 3D models from 2D drawings.

This idea manifests in different ways on TooTallToby.com. One way—gamers might think of it as the solo campaign—is a set of exercises called practice models. Users are given a 2D drawing to turn into a 3D model, with a complexity rating based on the number of features involved (Tier 1 is the simplest, and it goes up from there).

It’s easy to play. Just pick a practice model—there are 78 and counting—and hit the start button. The drawing is revealed and the clock starts ticking. Make the 3D model in whatever CAD system you like, and when you think you’ve got it, enter the mass of your part (each drawing specifies a unit system and material density). If the mass is correct, you’ve won the game and the timer stops. You’re then shown some stats to see how your time compares to other users, and how your speed is (hopefully) improving over time.

Here’s an example of a practice model:

The average solve time for this model is just over 15 minutes. Can you beat it? Try it and check your answer at TooTallToby.com.

Practice models have only been on TooTallToby.com since the start of the year, and they were launched without fanfare. “We just wanted to beta it with whoever would show up,” Rotheram explained. “And it’s taken off like a rocket ship.” Over 15,000 practice models have been successfully completed so far, Rotheram said.

Online CAD competitions

If practice models are a solo campaign, then online competition is represented by Too Tall Toby’s Model Monday Live. Every Monday at 1:00 PM Eastern Schnaars hosts an hour-long livestream in which viewers compete to solve two new models. Whoever types the correct mass first wins a point. Enough points will get you a spot on the leaderboard at TooTallToby.com.

And if you really crave the thrill of competition, you can try your mouse at Toby’s flagship tournament: the World Championship of 3D CAD Speed Modeling.

The 2024 tournament is already well underway, pitting 16 pre-qualified modelers one-on-one in a livestreamed competition taking place over six weeks. The finals are scheduled for October 18, 2024 at 6:00 PM Eastern, with Schnaars providing play-by-play commentary. The winner will walk away with a 3Dconnexion SpaceMouse Enterprise Kit, a 3Dconnexion Keyboard Pro and, of course, ultimate bragging rights.

The TooTallToby community may get a kick out of quick CAD, but it’s more than just a game—it’s a path to being a better modeler.

The fun path to CAD mastery

Schnaars likens the exercise of speed modeling to a musician practicing scales. No one turns on the radio to hear their favorite band play an A major scale, and no designer prioritizes CAD speed over quality. But musical scales, like speedy 3D models, aren’t the destination—they’re the steps on the path.

“Practicing the fundamentals and learning the fundamentals is always valuable if you’re learning a skilled trade,” Schnaars said. “We’re giving people a platform where they can practice repetition.”

You don’t have to take Schnaars’ word for it. The most ardent users of TooTallToby.com are emphatic about how much the site has helped them advance their CAD skills.

ChrisBCo, known in the real world as Chris Buerckner, was initially a skeptic of TooTallToby.com. Speed modelers, he thought, were “using all kinds of techniques that would never work in a real project setting.” But after months of Schnaars’ YouTube videos popping up in his feed, the Australian product design engineer said he eventually came around.

“If you take a step back and consider what you are seeing… there is actually some world-class decision-making and efficiency taking place,” Buerckner said. “All that has to be done for this knowledge to be implemented in real projects is for the user to remove the speed element and add in the detail and organizational considerations (how is the model being used, manufacturing processes, etc.).”

Buerckner is now a devoted user of the site and a current quarter finalist in the 2024 World Championship of 3D CAD Speed Modeling.

Has TooTallToby.com improved his CAD skills? “100% yes,” Buerckner said. He’s not alone in that feeling.

“I think that this site is a gold mine,” said Aleksandar Mihajlovski, who goes by the username acesvaba.

A Solidworks user from North Macedonia, Mihajlovski has been hooked on TooTallToby.com since he stumbled upon it in May 2024. He’s completed almost all of the practice models, regularly tunes into Model Monday Live and will soon compete in the quarter finals of this year’s World Championship.

“It’s fun,” Mihajlovski said, needing no other reason to explain his dedication to the site. But there is another reason: TooTallToby.com has helped him become a better CAD modeler.

“I think I doubled my speed,” Mihajlovski said.

It’s a similar story for TooTallToby user MrAlex, aka Aleksejs Babkins. An engineering unit manager at Kronus, a wooden packaging manufacturer in Latvia, Babkins has been using TooTallToby.com since January 2024 and says it has “definitely” improved his CAD skills.

“I rebinded almost all the hot keys on the keyboard, set up many new mouse gestures to speed up work, and also mastered new modes of work in Solidworks,” Babkins said.

None of these passionate TooTallToby users are CAD novices. Buerckner has been using Solidworks for over 14 years as a product designer and consultant. Mihajlovski has been using Solidworks for 16 years as a product engineer, both as a freelancer and supervisor. Babkins has been using CAD for over two decades.

“It’s a pity that in the late 90s, when I began to design in Solidworks, there were no such sites. Then my development would have been much faster,” Babkins said.

The current generation of CAD learners won’t have any such laments. Astoundingly, the number one seed for the 2024 World Championship, an American Fusion user named greatnate08, is a high schooler. He bested the veteran Babkins in a 2–0 set to qualify for the semifinals.

The future of CAD speed modeling

TooTallToby.com has found a unique niche in the CAD world. There’s a devoted core of users who are active in the community, and Schnaars has seen that core steadily grow. He’s excited to continue improving the site, speaking of plans to revamp the practice models app and introduce a new training platform.

The site may evolve, but Schnaars is still motivated by the same goal he started with.

“What we’re trying to do is help engineers practice doing 3D CAD so that they can get better at the fundamentals,” he said. “So they can focus on the engineering—cause I think that’s the more fun part of it.”

One burning question remains. Just how tall is Too Tall Toby?

“I hit my head on many, many things,” Schnaars said. At least he can dodge a question.

The post The fastest 3D CAD modelers in the world appeared first on Engineering.com.

SimScale GmbH unveiled several updates to its automotive simulation platform that will “help [customers] unlock next-generation engineering techniques,” according to Jon Wilde, VP of product management at SimScale, in the company’s press release. The updates include improvements to SimScale’s AI simulation feature, enhancements to its electromagnetics solver and conjugate heat transfer solver, various improvements to structural analysis and better enterprise collaboration features. SimScale capped the announcement with the news that more than 600,000 registered users have now signed up for the cloud simulation platform.

Matlab and Simulink updated to release 2024b

MathWorks, developer of Matlab and Simulink, has announced Release 2024b of its flagship products. According to the developer, the new release includes “major updates that streamline the workflows of engineers and researchers working on wireless communications systems, control systems, and digital signal processing applications.” Among those updates are the addition of 6G waveform generation to 5G Toolbox, the ability to design nonlinear data-driven control techniques in Simulink Control Design, and a new interactive app to configure digital signal processing (DSP) algorithms and generate hardware definition language (HDL) code.

Keysight introduces quantum circuit simulation tool

Keysight Technologies has introduced a new EDA tool for designing and simulating quantum circuits called Quantum Ckt Sim. Developed in partnership with Google Quantum AI, Quantum Ckt Sim incorporates frequency-domain flux quantization in its circuit solvers, which Keysight claims as an industry first.

“This significant milestone leverages EDA capabilities to streamline the design of superconducting microwave circuits for quantum applications and beyond. We anticipate this advancement will empower quantum engineers to enhance the performance of parametric quantum circuits, particularly in terms of power handling and bandwidth, which are crucial for the readout of qubits in quantum computers,” said Mohamed Hassan, quantum solutions planning lead at Keysight EDA, in the company’s announcement.

Makersite now available in Autodesk Inventor

Makersite announced that it has expanded its strategic partnership with Autodesk to bring sustainability data to Autodesk Inventor. Makersite, which offers carbon, cost and compliance data to product designers, is already available as an add-on in Autodesk Fusion. The new Makersite Inventor add-on will be available on the Autodesk App Store soon, according to Makersite, and will cost $770 per user and $7,000 per 100 materials from the custom materials library.

“Enabling Inventor customers to uncover sustainability insights right in the product they’re already using, leveraging Makersite’s market-leading supply chain intelligence and material analysis data to do so, is exactly the kind of workflow efficiency we’re building into all our tools,” said Stephen Hooper, Autodesk’s vice president of design and manufacturing product development, in Makersite’s press release.

SDC Verifier 2024 R2 released

SDC Verifier announced its 2024 R2 release, which now supports the latest versions of FEA software including Ansys, Siemens Femap and Siemens Simcenter 3D. SDC Verifier 2024 R2 also adds support for new standards and codes including ASME BTH-1:2023 (a standard for below-the-hook lifting devices) and DNV CG-01-28 (a standard for plate buckling). Other new features of SDC Verifier, according to the developer, include a streamlined process for generating load combinations, a new parameter search feature, improvements to the Panel Finder tool and a redesigned online help page.

The post Simulation updates abound: SimScale, Simulink, quantum and more appeared first on Engineering.com.

If that doesn’t sound all that interesting, it’s probably because you’re so used to the modern world of software-as-a-service (SaaS). You can subscribe to almost any SaaS app simply by clicking a button on the developer’s website. How else would you do it?

For almost 30 years, the only way to buy Solidworks—or even see its price—was through a Solidworks reseller, also known as a value-added reseller or VAR. Now, as of September 10, Solidworks has modernized its approach to software sales: you can just go online and buy it yourself.

“There is full transparency of the price. You can go and buy these licenses and it gets delivered to you right away without any wait whatsoever,” Manish Kumar, Solidworks CEO, told Engineering.com.

It’s a welcome change, but there are some important caveats.

Solidworks 2025: Versions, tiers and pricing

If you’re not one of the 7.5 million existing Solidworks users, or you haven’t upgraded in a while, you may be dazed by the variety of packages you can buy. There are three main versions of Solidworks, which allow you to access the software in different ways: 3DExperience Solidworks, Solidworks with Cloud Services, and Solidworks Cloud Offer.

Both 3DExperience Solidworks and Solidworks with Cloud Services are further divided into tiers of functionality: Standard, Professional and Premium. Solidworks 2025 will introduce yet another tier, Ultimate. We’ve crunched the numbers, and that’s a total of nine variants (not even counting the special versions on offer for students, academics and hobbyists).

The good news is that you can now easily buy all of these variants online, and see comparisons between them at a glance.

But all these variants have one thing in common. Kumar describes two main flavors of the CAD software: Solidworks with the platform, and Solidworks on the platform—the platform being Dassault Systèmes’ 3DExperience. Whichever Solidworks package you buy, 3DExperience is a constant.

“The beauty is that any of these applications, they save the data on the platform,” Kumar explained. “And any other application that is connected to the 3DExperience platform will be able to open that data.”

But what about the VARs?

Kumar is quick to emphasize that Solidworks resellers, of which there are more than 400 worldwide, aren’t going anywhere.

“For clients who need consultative selling, we are going to engage with them using our reseller channel,” Kumar said. Furthermore, everyone who buys Solidworks online will still be connected with a VAR for “onboarding and lasting support,” according to a Solidworks FAQ on how to buy the software.

And despite the new way to buy Solidworks, some users still won’t have a choice. If you need more than three licenses, you’ll have to go through a reseller. If you want any additional Dassault Systèmes software to go along with Solidworks, you’ll have to go through a reseller.

“They are our strength,” Kumar said of the VARs. “We are counting on them in order to ensure that while we serve the lowest possible end of the market, they help us serve the mid and high end.”

What’s new in Solidworks 2025

What else is in store for Solidworks? Kumar described his favorite features of the upcoming Solidworks 2025 release in a recent Solidworks blog post.

Kumar is particularly excited about collaboration and performance improvements, such as new multi-approval timestamps that will automatically appear on drawings, and new real-time notifications of status updates. Kumar also says that Solidworks 2025 will include part and assembly performance improvements, such as a faster way to select edges for the chamfer command and the ability to copy assembly components with their associated mates.

Solidworks 2025 will also include what Kumar describes as “hundreds of user-driven enhancements” that have been delivered throughout 2024, such as a new history tab that lists all the actions performed on a model and the ability to pattern reference geometry like planes and axes.

Another update is that every seat of Solidworks 2025 will also include NC Shop Floor Programmer, a recently-launched app for CNC machine simulation and programming.

The new Solidworks Ultimate tier, launching with Solidworks 2025, will add “cloud-based design, simulation, product lifecycle management, marketing, documentation, and manufacturing tools” on top of the features of Solidworks Premium, according to Kumar, all “at an affordable price.”

Solidworks has not yet revealed what that Ultimate price will be, but soon enough you’ll be able to see it, click it and buy it online. Finally.

The post Finally, you can buy Solidworks online appeared first on Engineering.com.

Revolution in Simulation (Rev-Sim) has launched a free learning program focused on the role of AI in simulation and product development. In a press release announcing the new program, Rev-Sim says it will provide an expert-curated curriculum, best practices and a community discussion forum.

The new learning program will be supported by Founding Steering Committee members Malcolm Panthaki of Aras and Rev-Sim, Justin Hodges of Siemens, Cenk Feridunoglu of EmpowerOps and Sandeepak Natu of CIMdata, according to Rev-Sim.

MapleSim update promises more robust machine design

Maplesoft has released the latest version of its MapleSim simulation platform. According to Maplesoft, the new update will help engineers quickly evaluate the designs of manufacturing equipment and machines.

“The new results management options make it easy to compare different simulation results in side-by-side views, so decision-making in the early product development stages becomes faster – and that leads to the launch of more robust final machines,” said Chris Harduwar, VP of strategic solutions at Maplesoft, in the company’s press release.

Other updates to MapleSim include new modeling components in the MapleSim Web-Handling Library, support for recent CAD software releases in the MapleSim CAD Toolbox, and new options to import and export FMI 3.0 files in the MapleSim Connector for FMI.

Autodesk revenue up 6.2%

Autodesk has released financial results for the second quarter of its fiscal 2025. The company reported revenue of $1,505 million, a 6.2% increase from the previous quarter, with a profit of $282 million.

Autodesk CEO Andrew Anagnost attributed the successful results to “[Autodesk’s] ability to capitalize on the attractive long term-growth trends we’re seeing, including increases in global reconstruction and infrastructure,” among other factors, according to the company’s press release.

Altair acquires KSK Analytics

Altair has acquired Japanese consulting firm KSK Analytics. Specializing in the manufacturing sector, KSK has been a reseller of Altair’s RapidMiner data analytics platform for more than a decade.

“Altair has had a presence in Japan for nearly thirty years and this acquisition expands our reach and technical depth in data science to better serve the growing AI market in Asia Pacific,” said James R. Scapa, founder and CEO of Altair, in the company’s announcement.

In other RapidMiner news, Altair announced a partnership with the Faculty of Data and Decisions Science at the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology that will give faculty, students and researchers access to the analytics platform.

Asahi Kasei launches CAE Solution Platform for polymers

Asahi Kasei Engineering Corp. has launched a cloud-based simulation platform to predict the crash and impact behavior of polymers. The “CAE Solution Platform” will provide users with downloadable apps, including a polymer material fracture prediction model called i-LUPE as well as an i-LUPE mapping tool.

Tech Soft 3D appoints new president

Tech Soft 3D announced that Antonio Parisse will join the company as president of its Industrial Applications Group. Parisse, who has more than 20 years of experience in the business of CAD, CAM and simulation software, will report directly to Tech Soft 3D CEO Ron Fritz.

The post A new (free!) guide to AI in simulation, and more CAE updates appeared first on Engineering.com.

Altair and Oasys announced they’re developing an integrated solution for automotive crash safety analysis. That solution will entail “a seamless workflow” between Altair’s HyperWorks simulation platform and Oasys’s Primer software for preparing and modifying crash safety analysis models. The integrated solution will be available through Altair HyperWorks, according to Altair.

BeyondMath gets $8.5M for AI simulation

Simulation startup BeyondMath announced that it has secured $8.5 million in seed funding. The cash will support BeyondMath’s AI-based multiphysics simulation platform, which the startup claims “accelerates engineering iterations by a factor of 1,000 compared to current solutions.” The seed funding was led by UP.Partners with participation from Insight Partners and InMotion Ventures.

Noesis launches democratized SimApps

Noesis Solutions, developer of the cloud-based id8 engineering platform, launched a new feature that it calls SimApps. According to Noesis, SimApps automate recurring simulation tasks to enable “designers and engineers of all experience levels and functional expertise to perform reliable and efficient analysis of their engineering designs.”

“SimApps enable simulation-driven design and the democratization of simulation, allowing many more designers and engineers to access the value of simulation technologies with confidence and reliability,” said Georgios Papantonakis, chief product officer of Noesis Solutions, in the company’s announcement.

ModuleWorks puts GPUs to work

ModuleWorks GmbH is introducing GPU-based machining simulation in its upcoming ModuleWorks 2024.12 software release. The developer says that GPU-based simulation is up to ten times faster than CPU-based simulation, based on internal benchmarks of ModuleWorks’ toolpath simulation software using an AMD Ryzen 7 3700X CPU and Nvidia GeForce RTX 4070 GPU.

Esteco acquires Optimad Engineering

Engineering software developer Esteco has completed its acquisition of simulation provider Optimad Engineering. Optimad’s computational fluid dynamics (CFD) and reduced order modeling (ROM) products will complement Esteco’s suite of digital engineering software to “empower engineers and designers with the tools they need to innovate and excel,” according to Carlo Poloni, president of Esteco, in the company’s press release.

The post Altair and Oasys team up for safety modeling, and more simulation news appeared first on Engineering.com.

No more tedious setups, fiddling with virtual cameras and specifying shaders. No more setting the scene and getting the lighting just right. No more ray tracing. Just one click, and seconds later, a gorgeous render.

It wouldn’t work with traditional rendering techniques. But with generative AI, Depix claims to have made one-click rendering a reality.

“It’s so easy it’s almost frightening,” Lunn, CEO of Depix Technologies, told Engineering.com.

Here’s a look at the emerging world of AI rendering.

Generative rendering

Some applications of generative AI are obviously in their early stages. AI can write, but not well. It can create 3D models, but they’re painfully rough. AI can run simulations, but only in narrow cases.

Image generation is different. While AI images vary in quality, the best can be incredibly convincing. And even if you can tell that an image is AI-generated, it often doesn’t matter; it does the job well enough. (For a case in point, go to any blog and look at the thumbnail images.)

Given that rendering is nothing more than creating an image, it should come as no surprise that AI is now doing the job. And it’s doing it so well that Lunn, who’s been in the rendering software industry since 1997, calls it “revolutionary rendering.”

After seeing a demo of the process, it’s hard to disagree.

You don’t even need a CAD model to create a fantastic render: a screenshot of a CAD model will do the trick. So will a pencil sketch. Depix has developed an AI image generator specialized in product renders, with an image of your design as the prompt.

Take a look. The image pair below is from CADviz, one of Depix’s products, which takes a CAD screenshot (Solidworks, in this case, but it could be any CAD program) and outputs a product render:

The user doesn’t have to specify any details about the render—no materials, no scene info, nothing. CADviz takes about 8 seconds to generate a render from a CAD screenshot.

Here are a few more examples using screenshots from Solidworks, SketchUp and Revit, respectively:

You can try CADviz yourself—it’s free, but limited. A paid version with more features will be available soon, according to Lunn, allowing high-resolution renders with control over the output.

That’s just the first turn of the rendering revolution.

How to make designers cry

Another Depix product, SceneShift, is “blowing up” in preview, according to Lunn. “Everybody wants it,” he says.

SceneShift merges text prompting with the crucial constraint of product rendering: shape preservation. Give it a product image, plus a text prompt for a new background, wait a few seconds, and you have a brand new render: new scene, new lighting, same product. Lunn boasts that the results are “better than any CG expert.”

Here’s an example of a SceneShifted car:

Then there’s StyleDrive, another Depix tool that’s struck a chord with early testers. Or, as Lunn puts it: “This makes designers cry.”

In StyleDrive, users upload two images, a base image and a style image. The style image drives a change to the base image. For example:

There are no restrictions on what either image can be. A designer could sketch a car and apply the style of a diamond, as in this example:

In the time it takes a designer to scribble on a napkin, plus 8 seconds, StyleDrive generates a completed render. Even if it’s not strictly photorealistic, Lunn views StyleDrive as a conceptualizing superpower.

“It can just spit out infinite variations,” Lunn said. “It’s a little disturbing, but exciting at the same time.”

Some are already excited about it. Lunn says Depix already has a number of paying customers in the automotive industry (though to respect their privacy, he declined to name any).

How to try AI rendering

Though Depix has initially focused on the automotive industry, its technology is not limited to vehicles. Depix’s AI model is based on Stable Diffusion, an open source model trained on 5 billion images, so it works with many subjects.

Here’s an example of SceneShift applied to a fashion model:

Lunn says users will be able to “personalize” the rendering AI with custom training data, up to 1000 images. They could include sketches, CAD models, renders or any other images that could tune the model in the desired direction. With the ability to specify the weight (or “influence”) of this training set, users will notice an appreciable difference in the output, according to Lunn.

Depix’s AI tools are available as individual APIs and together in an interface called Depix Design Lab. Right now, anybody can test the technology on Depix’s Discord server (warning: it’s addictive).

Someday Lunn hopes to see Depix tools integrated in professional software such as CAD and PLM. He says the company is having discussions with several developers, noting specifically that his team is working on a plug-in for Autodesk VRed.

“We’re taking the rendering world by storm,” Lunn says.

The inhabitants of that world may want to reach for an umbrella—or perhaps a lifeboat.

The post The AI rendering revolution: “This makes designers cry” appeared first on Engineering.com.