CAD, BIM & 3D

According to a mailing I received from AECCafe, Belgian CAD developer, Bricsys, announced that their Bricscad software, an alternative to AutoCAD to produce DWG files, has been rewritten to be completely independent of the IntelliCAD source from which they started. They are not a member of the IntelliCAD Technology Consortium anymore. An important aspect of the Bricscad platform, is the possibility for extensions through the API , and of course, AutoCAD DWG compatibility , through the ODA libraries, but without the price-tag of AutoCAD. As a result of this transition, future versions of BricsCAD will also be ported to Linux (currently in testing) and OSX (end 2010). But until then, the software only runs on Windows . Info on http://www10.aeccafe.com/nbc/articles/view_article.php?section=CorpNews&articleid=786652 and of course on the Bricsys website.

I have tested the Unity Game Engine and it is quite interesting for architectural visualization. This engine works on Windows and on Mac OSX, can create standalone or web-applications and you can even create WII and iPhone games, but then you need the Pro-version + additional (non-free) modules. I have been playing with the OSX version and it takes some (not that much) learning to get started. Try the help files and the video tutorials on the Unity site and you are ready to go. The free version, which is very complete, misses realtime shadows, which is quite frustrating. You could try baking in your shadows using Lightmaps, which is possible in must up-to-date DCC programs, such as 3ds Max, Maya, Cinema4D and even Blender. The following part is a small example (provided you have installed the Unity player for your browser. The whole scene was modeled in ArchiCAD 12, exported to Cinema4D 11.5, exported into FBX and loaded into a simple Unity Scene. After some attempts I got it working ...

New site with resources for digital procedural modeling, focusing on Grasshopper and Generative Components. http://www.digitaltoolbox.info

As discussed on the AREA website , there are plans at Autodesk to redesign and restructure 3ds Max over the course of three "phases" (don't read releases). As these plans were leaked from AU2009, they have now been officially mentioned. No word on platform-support, which probably means that it stays a Windows-only application.

A nice freeware application, which allows you to mix and match mesh geometry from different models. The video displays it better than I could in a short text. Maybe the mesh topology (the clean edges and aligned series of edges) will suffer from it, but as a sculptural approach to modeling with library objects, it seems to function really well and smart. Freely available but Windows-only. Or to use the description from the owner: meshmixer is an experimental 3D modeling tool developed by Ryan Schmidt, a computer graphics researcher at the University of Toronto who is also responsible for ShapeShop and some other stuff .

If you like to test unreleased applications, you can apply for the free beta-test of "Shark" by Punch! Available for Windows and OSX. Shark is the "professional" CAD application while ViaCAD is a much cheaper "consumer" version. Check both as you might have enough tools at your disposal with ViaCAD. And if you are on OSX, it is good to know, since not too many CAD applications run on this OS. Apply on the punchcad blog .

If you have interest in using a professional game engine freely, at least in a non-commercial context, you can try the Unreal Development Kit . This is the Unreal 3 Engine and the kit is complete with the runtime engine and the editors required to make levels and interaction. PC-only and ensure you have a decent graphics adapter with support for shaders.