You asked. We listened! The wait is over for our Android customers. The free Autodesk Design Review mobile app is now available on the Android Market!
Similar to its IOs cousin, the Android version of the Design Review mobile app lets you work with your 2D and 3D design files on your Android phone or tablet.
We're very interested in hearing about your feedback about the app and cloud experience! Please send us your comments using http://feedback.autodesk.com/cloudservices.
Design Review Mobile, Autodesk Cloud, and now Android...just a few more examples of helping you go beyond the paper.
Update My Feed PreferencesYou asked. We listened! The wait is over for our Android customers. The free Autodesk Design Review mobile app is now available on the Android Market!
Similar to its IOs cousin, the Android version of the Design Review mobile app lets you work with your 2D and 3D design files on your Android phone or tablet.
We're very interested in hearing about your feedback about the app and cloud experience! Please send us your comments using http://feedback.autodesk.com/cloudservices.
Design Review Mobile, Autodesk Cloud, and now Android...just a few more examples of helping you go beyond the paper.
Update My Feed PreferencesFree Autodesk API/SDK Webcast Trainings
The Autodesk Developer Network (ADN) is offering free Maya API, 3ds Max SDK, MotionBuilder SDK and FBX SDK webcast trainings. This unique opportunity allows you to dive into the inner workings of our software, and come out with a strong fundamental knowledge of the architecture. You will see and understand how you can utilize and benefit from the API’s/SDK’s of these powerful software’s.
To register and view the course schedule, please look here:
http://www.adskconsulting.com/adn/cs/api_course_sched.php
For specific course agenda’s go here:
http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/index?siteID=123112&id=785271
Update My Feed PreferencesMontreal, Canada – February 20th, 2012 –Audiokinetic Inc. and iZotope, Inc. announce a partnership for Audiokinetic to distribute iZotope effects adapted for Audiokinetic’s Wwise product. Starting with version 2012.1 of Wwise available in March 2012, this release will include a modeled reverb combining convolution and algorithmic reverberation technologies, and six effects from the Trash plug-in: box modeler, delay, distortion, dynamics, filters and a multiband distortion.
Today is President's Day. Autodesk employees in the United States have the day off, so if we don't immediately respond to your feedback via email, discussion forums, or social media, that is why. We will be back tomorrow as we only get one day off. Many years ago the United States celebrated President George Washington's birthday. We also celebrated President Abraham Lincoln's birthday on a second holiday. Years ago the government decided to combine these two celebrations into one day - President's Day - to have one less day that people get paid for not working. It's the American way.
// If you have some time off, educate yourself about technology previews on Autodesk Labs
Speaking of Abraham Lincoln,, I recently saw a great quote on Facebook.
"The problem with quotes found on the internet is that one can never tell if they are genuine or not."
-- Abraham Lincoln
Nonwork is alive in the lab.
Update My Feed PreferencesI'm happy to share with you that this week CSC, a leading structural engineering software developer announced the formation of a new industry strategic business relationship with Autodesk to further promote the adoption of Building Information Modeling (BIM) within the global structural engineering community. Thanks to this both companies will provide customers more closely integrated solutions that support a more efficient structural engineering workflow for BIM.
Read more: http://www.cscworld.com/
The ADN Plugin of the Month exists to show would-be developers how easy it is to personally extend the functionality of our design applications. That's why all of the plugins of the month come with the source code. You can see a complete list of past and current plugins in the catalog.
ADN Plugin of the Month Catalog on Autodesk Labs
In addition to providing getting-started training material for would-be-developers, many Autodesk customers download these simply for their utility. That's why it is quite common for the ADN team to make updates to these plugins in response to customer requests. The latest update is BrowsePhotosynth for AutoCAD. These plugin changes were made in response to service URL changes to PhotoSynth by Microsoft.
The ADN Plugin of the Month catalog page has plugins for AutoCAD, Inventor, and Revit. Within each section per design application, the plugins are listed from newest to oldest. You will find the BrowsePhotosynth plugin under the AutoCAD section in the October 2010 slot.
Responding to feedback is alive in the lab.
Update My Feed PreferencesIn previous version of Revit Structure, if you enabled worksharing for your project, but then you want to change it back to a non-workshared project, there is no function to change it back directly.
In Revit Structure 2012, you can disable worksharing.
1.Click [R]>Open>Project (or click Open icon in Quick Access Toolbar), browse to the central file or local file
2.Check “Detach from Central”，click Open
3.In “Detach from Central” dialog, select “Detach and discard worksets”, the file will be opened
4.Click Collaborate tab>Worksets panel, you will see worksharing is not enabled currently.
So the project you opened now has changed back to normal file without worksharing enabled. You can save this project, or click Collaborate tab>Worksets panel>Worksets to re-enable worksharing again.
In the Stage One article, we introduced our Castlemania Series about mastering 3DVIA Shape and building an incredible castle at the same time. This time we’re going to cover some 3DVIA Shape basics you really need to know about, and one method of making the terrain that will help your castle become a safe place to live and easy to defend.
First, we need to cover some basic concepts you need to know about 3D modeling:
1 – The size of your model file matters! It’s better to know the limitations at the beginning instead of spending a lot of time making a model and realizing you can’t do what you want. The maximum 3DVIA Shape model size you can make is a hefty 25 MB, but most of your models will be much smaller than that.
It is a good idea when building a complex scene, like a castle, to keep checking the size of your model and any models that you want to insert into it. It’s a bit like a bowl of fruit. The bowl (the biggest model) takes up space itself and will only hold so many pieces of fruit (inserted models). An apple will probably be a smaller file than a bunch of grapes, which is much more complicated.
Figure out which model will be your most complicated and make it your “bowl”. The models which will be added will be the “fruit”. The “bowl” can’t be any bigger than 25 MB once you’ve added all of the “fruit”, and each piece of “fruit” can’t be bigger than 2 MB.
You can find the size of any model by clicking on the “Stats” tab on the model page over to the right of the model image.
We at 3DVIA encourage you to build complex scenes more easily by re-using models in the 3DVIA content library that allow it. Each model you select will show whether it can be inserted into your Shape model or not. Just click on the same “Stats” tab on the model page and look farther down in the list.
If it says that you cannot use the file in 3DVIA Shape:
…click on the “(?)” to find out why. This can be important with your own models too. You may just need to change your licensing or re-mix setting to fix it. The model does not need to be a 3DVIA Shape mode for you to be able to insert it. It may have been made in one of many other formats.
Once you have inserted a model (even a 3DVIA Shape model), you will only be able to change its size, its position and make copies of it. Making copies of already inserted models will keep your overall model size smaller than if you insert multiple copies of the same model. The examples below helps demonstrate this.
You can see the first image shows an inserted house all by itself. Then I added one inserted man and the file size went down slightly because of the 3DVIA processing routine. Then I added 50 more men, and the file size only went up by 1 KB!
Another big factor is that all 3DVIA Shape models are constructed from triangles. Even what appear to be curves are actually line segments connected into triangles. This means models that are made of all straight lines and flat surfaces will be smaller than files with lots of rounded surfaces and edges.
You can clearly see this in any model by selecting the “Wireframe Mode”. You can also select the “Vertex Mode” or the default “Smooth Mode” by clicking on the button in the player that looks like a globe.
Bear this flat-vs-round factor in mind when you need to make your file just a little smaller to get under the file size limits. You may be able to simplify your model a little bit or make some of the rounded parts as separate models, which you can then insert.
When you look at a model this way it is easier to understand why we collectively refer to the lines and shapes we create as “geometry”. Everything we model is controlled by the rules of geometry.
If you need a refresher on how to insert/remix models watch this video: Remixing Models a Quick Tutorial.
2 – The scale of each part of the entire the model is also important. If you want it to look realistic, each part of the castle should be the right size when compared with other parts. Our castle is built using an average medieval man as the basic unit of size. A man needs to be able to fit through the doors, ride his horse though the gates and to fit on the walkways without falling off.
If you insert a model and the scale is wrong, you can select it and then use the white handles on the corners of the box to make it bigger or smaller, as illustrated below:
I made the man using real dimensions, so I know he is 5′ 8″ tall. That means that this inserted house needs to be bigger to fit the man.
Left click on the house and then on one of the white dots (handles), hold the left mouse button down and drag it to make the house bigger (or smaller if you want a doll house).
The house is the now right size. You can see the man will fit in the doorway. Exact scale is not as important as relative scale, so just getting close is fine.
Now you know how to scale your models so they look right together!
3 – Being able to select the object or a line in your model is vital for both making and erasing parts of your models. Depending on how you choose to do it, you can select part of the model, the whole model or just a single line or point. As you’ll see in the videos and as you work, whenever you select something in 3DVIA Shape, it turns blue so you know what you’ve selected.
These are two excellent and quick (about 30 seconds each) videos that explain the basic concepts of selection in 3DVIA Shape:
How to Box Select – shows how you can “box select” part of a model or the whole model.
How to Select an Entire Component – shows another way to select a whole component in your model.
When you are building a model there will be probably be more occasions when you want to simply select a line or a sketch point and not large parts of the model or the whole thing. As you use the various drawing tools they will show your results in either white lines or white surfaces.
Once you have several white surfaces it is hard to see the white construction lines, like in the left hand image below. I like to add a simple gray color to my model as I make it so that I can see those construction lines more easily.
Selection is also important when you are trimming lines or erasing them completely. You can select single items with the left mouse button or you can hold down the “Ctrl” key and use the left mouse button to select multiple points, lines or surfaces at the same time.
Be very careful that you are selecting what you think you are. If you have drawn a rectangle and only want to erase one line, hover over the line until you see it is the only line selected before you click to erase it. When a line is selected it will be blue and dashed. The same is true for single points on a line. If you’re not sure – zoom in closer. The “Undo” button or “Ctrl z” will help you fix a mistake.
Now we can start working on our castle plan again!
4 – There are lots of ways to make terrain. I’ll show you one way this time and you can use that, or you can experiment and make up your own way! In later stages of the series, I’ll show you more ways to create the ups and downs and ins and outs that make your model look more realistic.
Open the basic model of the 700′ x 800′ x 80′ Land Block With One House in 3DVIA Shape. Insert the model Castle – Basic Plan (yellow arrows) to make sure you have room for your castle while you lay out the cliff tops. The castle layout represents the general size and shape of the castle as planned by the master engineer, but without all of the details. It is about 1′ thick so it can be seen more easily.
With “Snap Behavior” off (so you can draw the lines you want more easily)…
…use simple straight lines (red arrows) to lay out your cliff top edges. After making sure “Snap Behavior” is back on (so the measurement is exact)…
…use the “Push n Pull” tool…
…select the surface with the left mouse button, hold it down and start pushing the surface down.
You can see it indicates a depth (30′) for the cut as you move the surface. In this case, we want to cut all the way to the bottom of the cliff (80′).
It should snap right to the bottom surface, then let go of the mouse button. Notice the color of the existing geometry is automatically applied to the new geometry as it is created. This could save a lot of time if we wanted to keep our cliffs green.
Now turn off “Snap Behavior” and draw the bottom edges of your cliffs (red arrows).
Use the “Erase” tool…
…and click on the land outside your cliff edges to delete it.
Then draw connecting lines from the bottom of the cliffs to the tops. To keep things simple, draw from the end of one line to the end of another line, but when you need to – like in the right hand circled example above – just pick a spot you like on the line and end it there instead.
Now you have a lot of four-sided polygons that would require curved surfaces to fill them in. This is where the triangles we talked about earlier come in handy…
…just draw lines that divide the four-sided polygons into triangles, and you’ll get nice flat surfaces instead! The direction you draw the line in will affect how the triangular surfaces are oriented, but in this case it doesn’t matter.
After you paint your new cliffs, you can do the cliffs on the other side the same way and have a nearly impregnable projection of land to build your castle on. Notice I’ve inserted another man in two places, in addition to the existing house and man, to help remind me of the overall scale of what we’re making.
With these changes and the inserted models, the size of this model file – 700′ x 800′ x 80′ Land Block With One House – has gone from 661 KB to 819 KB. That’s almost half of the maximum size allowable for an inserted model, so I better plan my next additions carefully. After the king, queen or lord approves the castle layout in the next stage of the series, I’ll probably delete the Castle – Basic Plan model to get back some model size. I’ll leave the master engineer’s house, since he’ll need to be close by throughout construction.
I made sure that I did a “Publish As” so the original model is still available for you to open and make changes. You can also open this new model – 700′ X 800′ X 80′ Land Block With Cliffs – and use it to help with your castle if you want to.
That’s it for this stage of construction. Next time we”ll talk more about how to draw the layout that you want for your castle. Thanks for following along and making your own land and castles too!
This is my once-a-month copy/paste blog posting to let you know when Freewheel will be unavailable.
As with last year, and again this year, several times during the year, new functionality is released into Autodesk’s Enterprise Information Systems to enhance the company’s services to partners / customers and help the organization run more efficiently. The next update is scheduled for three hours on February 18, 2011.
To implement these changes, Autodesk Freewheel will experience planned downtime from 2:00 p.m. PDT on Saturday, February 18 through 5:00 p.m. PDT on Saturday, February 18. In Greenwich, this would be 12:00 a.m. UDT on Sunday, February 19 through 3:00 a.m. UDT on Sunday, February 19.
2012 should be much like 2011 in terms of server maintenance.
We realize that any systems outage impacts the operations of Autodesk, our partners, and our customers. We work diligently to minimize the duration of downtime and appreciate your understanding. So take a three hour break and enjoy the down time.
Updating servers is routinely alive in the lab.
Update My Feed PreferencesSpace is limited.
Reserve your Webinar seat now at:
https://www2.gotomeeting.com/register/890749050
A joint presentation with Autodesk and Faro, sharing best practice in taking surveyed and point cloud data into BIM design applications such as AutoCAD Civil 3D, Revit and Plant 3D and sharing with Navisworks.
Title: Faro and Autodesk – Point Cloud Technology
Date: Friday, February 17, 2012, Time: 12:00 PM - 1:30 PM GMT
Jack Strongitharm
Update My Feed Preferences
