Ellipsis

Visualization Autodesk Inventor vs. SolidWorks

Oh Yeah! Chicazah...Beau bomp bomp! Ferris Bueller is one of the greatest movies of all time. You may disagree with me on the rest of this post, but Ferris is a classic. 

Topic number three in our Autodesk Inventor vs. Dassault SolidWorks comparison - Visualization. Deelip is doing a head to head comparison with 3D CAD packages and I tried to make the point that he wasn't exactly showing off Inventor in his first video. So I polished his model up a bit, rather than re-hashing what he wrote about it, read it here: Visual Styles in Inventor The comments really speak well of the work that we did with Inventor 2011, but I'm not going to rah, rah it too much more than I already have. 

I'd rather take this post to talk about what makes visualization inside of Inventor different from not only SolidWroks, but many other MCAD applications. I'll be frank here man, before Inventor 2011 the visualization tools inside of Inventor in my opinion were just... eh. Nothing to write home about. Again, just my opinion - many people like it, but after seeing Showcase I knew we could do better.

To make improvements on the visualization side of things we started with a now unified material library. One material library that is used with AutoCAD, Max, Maya, Revit, and Showcase - all the applications that could re-purpose your Digital Prototype for something else. And with the unified material library, the next user down the road won't have to re-apply materials to parts that were already applied from Inventor - super simple, genius. 

Those materials are hot too! I can add the texture of a weld bead to a fillet weld if I so choose. But, those hot materials don't show well if you can't get light to them in the model. We added explicit control to lights, reflections, and even ambient shadows. All of which can be adjusted in real time so you can see the impact of changes without having to wait for a renderer. 

Explicit control wasn't enough. We took it a step further with HDR backgrounds and image based lighting schemes. This allows users to create photo-realistic scenes of their products and see the effect of direct sunlight, florescent lights, or light coming through a window.

Oh, I almost forgot the best part (not really, it's all about the build up) It's all in REAL TIME! Inside the modeling application, not a separate environment, add-on, hokey pokey plug-in that looks like it's designed for graphic artists instead of engineers. Ambient shadows, surface textures, reflections, ground shadows - all without a render! I'm not sure I'm getting this across so watch the video:

Oh, I forgot to mention the multiple visual styles too. Wire frame with ambient shadows? Dude...

Beautiful. Have a great weekend.
-Rob

It's in the Cloud Man

In my last post I questioned whether or not FEA was "above your pay grade". The response was interesting, and oddly enough Deelip Menezes posted a blog about analysis that stoke the fire a bit http://www.deelip.com/?p=2673. Well, poured gasoline on it really...[grin] I love how he gets people all fired up. Here's the excerpt that I think got everyone talking:

"When I say that today’s simulation solutions do not solve users problems I am referring to the fact that these solutions merely report the problem and quantify it, but leave the fixing to be done by the user. For example, take a FEA analysis on a part. A user sets up loads, defines boundary conditions, assigns material properties, etc. and then tells the simulation software to do its thing. The thing that the simulation software actually does is it that it tells the user whether the part will fail or not, where and how it will fail and gives him a host of other data which the user is left to study and decide what to do next. The software does not automatically tweak the geometry of the model for the user and reanalyze for failure and continue to do so till a fail safe design has been reached."

Here's my take for what it's worth. Technology will never (nor should it) take the engineering out of the engineer or designing out of the designer. What it can do is make the engineering process faster and more accurate before you cut the first physical part. Could you physically manufacture as many different configurations of a design as quickly as you can run through all the variations in an optimization analysis? Of course not. So is it worth the time to setup the range of possibilities so that the technology will return to you a list of results and provide input as to the optimum design given the parameters? Yes. Especially when you can run through an incredible amount of variation by tapping into the power of cloud based computing.

That's where the Inventor Optimization Technology Preview from Autodesk LABS comes into play. Parametric optimization that's easy to setup, push to the cloud and pick the lightest configuration that still meets your goals for strength and safety factor. While its up in the cloud doing its thing, you can keep on with other work, making drawings, other parts, surfing the web, Facebooking - you know the important stuff. When it's done, you get a nice email telling you that the analysis is complete. Load up the results and it will tell you which one is the optimized configuration. Couldn't possibly be easier than that. 

Check out the video and let me know what you think.

Happy Friday.
-Rob

Is Simulation Above Your Pay Grade?

Last week I knocked out another live USTREAM show. This one was all about utilizing the simulation tools inside of Autodesk Inventor Professional. So (of course) I killed it - Dynamic Simulation to FEA, to Parametric Optimization. My goal was to demonstrate how Inventor is so much more than a 3D modeling tool. We always talk about Digital Prototyping, but what does it mean to have/do/be a Digital Prototype? What a better example, right?

Then a voice from the grandstands that I've been thinking about all weekend. "FEA is above my pay grade." I know the guy that said it, and I think he was joking - but it made me think. If a power user sees FEA as something that somebody else does or is concerned about, am I talking about what our engineering tools can do for our users in the right way? It's a good question, how can Dynamic Simulation and FEA help our users make better products? What's holding back power users from using the tools? How does a posi-track on a '48 Plymouth work? I don't know, it just does... (movie?)

But seriously, I brought this up about six months ago on a blog - Do you use CAD as a documentation tool or as a design and engineering tool? What I mean is that are you simply modeling a design that has already been worked out, or just moving something from 2D to 3D? Alternatively, as you design are you concerned about the strength, weight, or safety factor and genuinely take that into account while you are modeling? Full of questions today aren't I... Yes, this was the stuff floating around in my head all weekend.

So here was the situation - I had an assembly that somebody had modeled up and I wanted to put this thing in motion. While in motion I wanted to find the peak stresses that were applied to it, then export those into FEA. Within FEA, I wanted to run several different sizes to make sure I'm getting the lightest, and strongest, configuration of the part that I'm applying the force to. This is a process that I see can repeat itself over and over - if I'm updating an existing design or even creating new. Check out the episode:

Live Streaming by Ustream.TV

Not so hard is it? So I ask you - Is simulation above your pay grade?

-Rob

Center Point Rectangle Tool

This is what I love about our users. Build a solid platform in which you can allow your users to customize, tweak, and make awesome additions to. That's just what my man Brian Hall did with his Center Point Rectangle (CPR for short) add-in for Autodesk Inventor.

Check out the demo.

So how do you get a hold of this gem? Per his comment on http://www.mcadforums.com -  C# source code will be provided with this add-in as a Visual Studio 2010 Solution when the

July/August issue of "The Creative Inventor" online magazine has been issued. To subscribe
to "The Creative Inventor" online magazine, please go to http://www.teknigroup.com/ and
click on the magazine icon button in the lower left corner.

This magazine is really getting a lot of attention lately and is becoming a really nice resource for Autodesk Inventor users, plus it's free - check it out.

Nice work Brian!
-Rob

Here Comes the Sun

Doo unt dew dew... This week Jay Tedeschi, Dan Brown, Seth Hindman, and myself are headed down to San Jose, CA for an extremely unique opportunity to do our part in shaping the future of solar energy. 

The Rocky Mountain Institute and partners Delta/DelSolar, the DOE, Rio Tinto, National Postcode Lottery, and Fred and Alice Stanback are hosting a design charrette June 22-24 in San Jose, Calif., to rethink and re-design the installation processes for large-scale commercial/utility rooftop and ground-mounted PV systems. 

Autodesk has been invited to help facilitate the break out design sessions and capture the design in real time, while decisions are being made. The intention is to allow the participants to visualize the designs, sparking new ideas for manufacturing, installation, tracking, and mounting design alternatives. I personally can't think of a better, and more important application of our Digital Prototyping technology. I'll be reporting from the event all week as will Jay. So be sure to follow us on twitter @robcohee and @ProphetPVD.

Read more about the event from RMI's blog here: http://www.greenbiz.com/blog/2010/06/17/getting-solar-power-sidelines-and-game

Hope the weather is nice in San Jose. Portland is getting pretty dreary.

-Rob

Where's My Big Piece of Chicken?

Ah the sale. Man I miss that sometimes. The chase, perceptions destroyed and new ones created. Today was fun, I went to an Inventor customer today and went old school freestyle. I didn't have anything planned to show them, just wanted to listen. Grandpa always likes to remind me that we have two ears, two eyes and one mouth; use proportionally. 

So that's just what I did - sales call without the sales guy (sales guy set it up, give him props there) those trips are easy. Our sales guys kick ass, I'm not trying to say anything but to point out how sometimes customers really seem to loosen up when the guy getting the commission check isn't in the room. It's a sense from the customer that we don't have an alternative motive, just there to listen, learn, and make suggestions. When you have a number tied to you, no matter your intentions - that perception is there and props to our sales guys for working through that and proving that we genuinely care about the success of our customers. Ok, CYA part of blog done. Sales is king, nobody pisses off the king... [grin] 

This customer was interested in having a peek at Inventor Publisher. Same story as any other manufacturer, tech pubs is always behind. They used digital pictures pasted into a Word document for assembly and packaging instructions. Needless to say, a physical prototype has to exist before you can photograph something. Engineering was done with the model weeks ago, yet no tech pubs..? To quote the parlance of our times: "Prez is all WTF, yo why u trippin' " The Big Lebowski is one of the best movies ever, I will not debate you on that. Very un-dude of me, right? 

Another example they gave me was the change order process, the epitome of a catch 22. Tech pubs has to sign off on the ECO, yet they can't update the tech pubs without the new physical prototype, shop can't build the prototype until the ECO is signed off by tech pubs... Sound familiar to any of you? Yep, you the one that's laughing. And you thought you were the only ones. 

So alright, clearly these guys needed Inventor Publisher. But why show them my guitar hero set or my race car disc brake? Nah, they have Inventor, throw something on a memory stick for me while I setup the projector. "Really?" the customer seemed a little surprised. Why not... No sales guy in here right now, nobody to have a heart attack for jumping without a net, so what the H. E. double hockey sticks. 

And of course, dude brings me a big 'ol honkin' dataset. Not huge, but bigger than anything I've loaded into Publisher. Side note: I have never actually demonstrated Publisher on a customer call before today. (sales guy reading this is now breathing into a brown paper bag) But here's the deal. If you know how to work a mouse and you have any semblance of a tech pub creation or design background, you can use Publisher. I whipped up a couple of snapshops, changed backgrounds, added callouts, then the big one... Auto-Explode! This is the point where Evil Knevil is standing in front of the jump... He knows he "can" do it, but will he succeed? Because if not, he's gonna feel it in the morning, right? This was a completely untested never do this in a demo dataset that I had never seen, on a first version software app. A little inside scoop - that's a big no no in the software biz people. (sales guy reading this has passed out) 

Sure as schnapps the whole thing exploded. Took a minute or two, but that's when I heard it: "Ha! Cut that man a check!". Winner, Winner Chicken Dinner! I then commenced to dazzle them by animating the re-assembly as well as opening and closing the door, ghosting out parts so you could see them and see the working parts behind the sheet metal. Money. All this happened in a span of 35 minutes or so, explanation of problem to solution. I spent the rest of the trip on a plant tour, chomping on a cup full of never touched by humans ice pellets straight out of one of their machines. Anyone else grossed out by fast food kid carrying the bucket of ice to the soda dispenser? None of that with these guys! Man that ice is the shizzle. 

-Rob 

P.S. Thanks sales guys for letting me (even though I didn't ask...) To let you be the butt of my poorly written jokes. You can buy next time... every time, anytime.

 

A Moo'ving Experience...

Well, here I sit, United flight 1194, Vancouver to San Francisco. We left almost an hour and a half late, but at least we are on our way… someone is going to have to explain to me sometime how Bay Area “low lying cloud cover” or “marine layer” (aka “fog”) can cause such massive delays. I mean, maybe in the days before IFR I can see how that would be a problem, but the lack of visual on final just does not seem like it should add all that much additional time for spacing between flights. In any case…

I am on my way home from attending the ShipConstructor Super User Group meeting in Victoria, BC. As I am not sure of the total number of SC users worldwide in totality, I am not sure what kind of cross section this represents, but the 40 or so who attended most definitely seemed to be the cream of the crop. Hence the prefix of “Super” I suppose…

In any case, as ShipConstructor is an AutoCAD based product, all of these users are familiar with it, so we wanted to show them something really flashy. Fortunately we have just the right products on hand to both support and show a compelling Industrial Design story, that is also quite visually appealing. While a large portion of the SC community do in fact design larger utilitarian vessels, e.g. Ice-Breakers, Ferries, tankers, support vessels, etc. etc., there is a good sized group that does large luxury yachts.  This is our sweet spot…

The workflow which was demonstrated centered around the use of AliasStudio/Sketchbook Pro as the conceptual design tool best suited to perform the type of design they require.  Reference Manager, new to 2009, was used to show the integration of previously created hull, deck and superstructure model data. A rendering of this data was used as a sketch environment, and background for the proposed new cabin interior. Technical surfaces were then created on the sketches and trimmed to existing cabin geometry.

Next up, we showed how Inventor/Inventor Pro can be used by all ShipConstructor users as a component creation tool.  A pump assembly was opened with Inventor, but the motor for the pump was imported from a vendor’s site via STEP.  Once imported, Feature Recognition was used to convert some of the base geometry into sketch based parametric features that could be leveraged by the designer.

Justin Pacquin of SSI then gave an excellent presentation showing how Autodesk Vault can be best used by ShipConstructor customers for managing the output sheet sets created to document the design in ShipConstructor.  I followed things up with a brief but compelling look at Showcase, and it’s value for both design validation and presentation graphics.

All in all, a very enjoyable presentation, and the users on hand were certainly enthusiastic. A quick drive up to the airport where my fanbase was on hand to see me off… aren’t they cute?  There was not a dry eye in the place.

Russ Wicks Breaks the World Fastest Stock Car Record

Russ Wicks Breaks the World Fastest Stock Car Record Going 222 Miles Per Hour

Entering the Bonneville Speedway off I-80, just over an hour outside of Salt Lake City is like leaving the earth and heading to the moon. The landscape is surreal - barren and white with mountain peaks in the distance. The crunch of the salt as you drive over the flats is feels like driving in snow. It sounded the same, felt the same and looked the same. As we headed the 3 miles to the security checkpoint we weren't sure there was anything out there but then glimmering in the distance was a small group of vehicles.



As we got closer we could pick out the transfer trailer truck that hauls the car and the assorted trucks you need on site for an event of this size. A pit area was set up along side the trucks - equipment and tools, tarps to provide shade and of course - the Autodesk stock car.



The car itself is a Taurus V8 with 800 horsepower and a 4 speed transmission.



When my colleagues arrived on July 3rd the engineers and crew pit were really busy all day, prepping the car - working on the engine and strategizing with Russ. After each run, in which the goal was to edge closer to the record, the crew cleaned the piles of salt out of the engine block, from the wheel wells and the tires.



You can't believe the heat out there on the course. It's blazing and coming down on the white salt it's blinding. As Russ preps for the car he puts on his fire suit which protects him if the car were to catch on fire, fire shoes and wraps fire protection around his neck before putting his helmet on. With 110 degree heat on the Salt Flats it's got to be 130 in the car with all his gear on. Inside the car there are four cameras that are capturing all the action inside and outside as he hurtles down the track. The track itself is nine miles long and marked in one mile segments to make it easy for the timers to verify the record. Mike Cook is the official time keeper on site - he's the Chairman of Bonneville Nationals Inc.

Before daylight on the crew gathered to start prep for the day. The engineers were on site along with crew pit and the camera crew was getting into position for all the shots. News station camera crews started gathering around 9am along with media who had been on site for two days watching the activities. Leslie Gordon from Machine Design was there as was a freelance journalist from Popular Mechanics and daily print media. Leslie was blogging about her experience on site with the American Challenge and Autodesk team.



The lead up to the record run was intense. Tons of activity around the car and Russ - getting him prepped - physically and mentally. You can really feel the tension. A big truck gets the car started down the track by pushing a back row bar and then Russ pops the engine into gear and you can hear the car but pretty soon, you can't see him - he's gone. You can hear his communication with the team crackling on the radios all around the pit and then the long wait for Mike Cook to call the official time. And it is official - by early afternoon, it's confirmed that Russ Wicks has broken the world Stock Car speed record and now holds the world's fastest stock car speed record at 222 miles per hour. The crew is screaming and congratulating each other. Months and months of works have been just been rewarded. The talented engineers and the motor sport professionals who help make up the American Challenge team got to see their own fireworks on the July 4th weekend at the Salt Flats and Autodesk is proud to be part of the team.

UPDATE! - Read more at MachineDesign

Tokyo

Last week I had the priveldge of visiting the Japan team. I was invited to present at the Japan Inventor User Group meeting and to attend the DMS trade show, both happening in Tokyo.

The User group meeting was Thursday, June 22nd. Beginning in the early evening the user group meeting began with a through review by the board of the group's status since its inception this time last year. Progress on local user group resources was given. This included an update on a dedicated Japanese discussion form for user group members to connect.

Key members of Autodesk Japan kicked off the event and thanked everyone for joining. Here Tetsuya Shiga, Vice President, Autodesk Japan, starts the event.


The board, made up of 8 users from local Tokyo companies, outlined the group's next initiatives. These included:
Get more users from each company to attend. Today most companies only send one user and they are expected to return from meetings and share what they learn with their peers. The user group board would like to get multiple, if not all users, from the company to attend and connect thereby increasing the speed and quality of information shared within the community.
Increase awareness about the user group and Increase awareness about Inventor
Collect thoughts on how Inventor could be a better product for the Japanese market and prioritize these. The board would then work with Autodesk to champion these improvements.


I presented an hour of tips and tricks or best practices to the audience of about 60.
* Part Modeling and sketching
* Assembly modeling
* Drawing production

After this session there was a break and group photo.


Following the break the user group meeting opened up to non-members, prospective members, and prospective Inventor customer who were just curious.

Several presentations were given talking about the Autodesk Community in Japan and I was able to show a 45 minute presentation and demonstration of Autodesk Inventor 11.
This was a fun event and had 100+ attendees!

We then made for the ballroom next door where food and drinks were available. If you have never been to an after business "Cocktail hour" in Japan, let me tell you that this is where most of the action happens! I had the opportunity to answer many enthusiastic questions.

These are not glasses of iced-tea! That is a whole lot of Whisky.


A raffle was then held to give out gifts to user group members. The evening ended with a private meeting with the board to discuss future events and support. I was very impressed with the organized and professional nature of the group. The users were engaged, excited an interested in sharing information. All of this makes for what I hope will continue as a strong vibrant user group.

The next day I attended the DMS show. This, large manufacturing trade show highlights technology from around the world. Jump to the Japan Team's site to read more about DMS (in Japanese)

I saw rapidprotyping machine creating full body panes in multiple colors, Machining centers and virtually displays!

Autodesk was on had with a large booth covering our complete manufacturing solution.
Autodesk AliasStudio, Autodesk, Intent, AutoCAD Electrical, AutoCAD Mechanical, Autodesk Inventor, Autodesk Productstream, and DWF were all featured on kiosks and the main stage. Check out the crowd!


It was a great show and I enjoyed seeing the Autodesk Japan team and meeting with many, many many trade show attendees!

I wrapped up my trip with a fun walk around the city and the Emperial Palace. I look forward to my next trip back. I just hop it will be a little less humid!

Trip - EMEA Tech-camp 06

Last week, I was fortunate to attend a week long event where EMEA held their annual tech-camp to train Autodesk Manufacturing Solutions distributors and reseller technical sales teams. EMEA stands for the Autodesk sales teams in Europe Middle East, and Affrica. The event was in the Salzburg Congress center in Salzburg Austria. Attendees spent Tuesday listening to a full day of main-stage presentations that included:

Opening - Mozart Music
Jordi Portella - Welcome and event objectives
Larry Peck - Manufacturing division overview and Functional design vision
Eric Strassheim -AutoCAD based solutions
Break
Simon Bosley, Pete Lord and Kevin Schneider - 11 reasons why Inventor is the best choice
Brian Mathews - DWF Solutions
Brian Roepke - Data management Solutions
Lynn Alen - Demo skills
Jordi Portella -Wrap up

An unprecedented 679 attendees arrived representing all corners of the EMEA region. During the evening party this group set a new record and consumed 500 liters of beer in 45 minutes!

After the main-stage events the teams were separated into 5 language tracks:
- English
- German
- French
- Italian
- Spanish

Each track was run by the appropriate regional AE's and covered the full suite of products and sales tools that make up the MSD solution in this year's launch.

I took a little time to see the city as well. It a great city and I suggest spending some time there should you get the chance.

All in All a great event!

Images:

The crowd


Jordi starts the event


Larry on the division and functional design


Eric on MSD AutoCAD Solutions


Simon and the 11 reasons Inventor is the best choice


Pete and the lebovac


Inventor 11 Demo Time


Brian and DWF Solutions


Brian and Data Management


Lynn's Demo Skilz


Partner booths


Dinner With the some of the EMEA team

Looking forward to next year!