Let Mr. Imagination Make You Laugh—And Show You How to Design for Sustainability

Did you know that 2 to 4 percent of GDP is lost to friction? Or that it takes 85 pounds of material to make a pound of aluminum? These are just some of the fun facts you’ll learn in a series of entertaining videos on sustainable design strategies offered by Autodesk.

Primarily for students, the series of 20 videos was created to address the lack of courses on sustainability in most college-level design and engineering programs. But they’re worth watching for anyone interested in designing high-performance products that last longer and use less energy.  Read full article »

AutoCAD Weekly Blog Round-Up

Aerial Capture of 3D Geometry
Originally Posted by Shaan Hurley
In a technology research project Autodesk employee Gonzalo Martinez Director of Strategic Research in the office of the CTO has built and modified an Octo-Copter UAV (Unmanned Aerial Vehicle) to capture both video and photos to generate a 3D model using 123D Catch.
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Open AutoCAD with a Specific Template
Originally Posted by AutoCAD Tips Blog
You can launch AutoCAD with a specific template of your choice. You do this with a command line switch. When you double-click the icon on your desktop or start AutoCAD from the Start menu, you are executing a statement. You can customize this statement by adding parameters, also called switches.
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Annotative Objects in Different Locations?
Originally Posted by rkmcswain
Annotative objects have been part of AutoCAD now since the 2008 release, but if you use them infrequently you may have some questions on how certain things work. One question that I see frequently is related to the ability for annotative objects to have different locations based on the scale. In the example shown here, I have an annotative Mleader, shown in magenta in each viewport.
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AutoCAD and AutoCAD LT Sheet Set Video
Originally Posted by Edwin Prakoso
If you are an AutoCAD LT user, you should notice that in 2012 version you have Sheet Set Manager. Kate Morrical published a tutorial video series on her blog, LT Unlimited.
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Why CAD Users Should Run A Workstation Rather Than PC

Many engineers and designers are running their 3D design and 2D design software on a regular PC.  However, with a low cost workstation software performance can be significantly improved.  In this video Lynn Allen discusses the reasons why CAD users should run workstations instead of PCs.

If you have used both PCs and workstations to run your design software share your experience on our CAD/CAM Performance LinkedIn discussion group.

AutoCAD WS Gives You Freedom—But Is It Safe?

Happy New Year! 2012 is sure to be a time when more and more CAD professionals go mobile, continuing a trend I explored a few weeks ago. In today’s post, I’ll address some of the ways AutoCAD WS ensures the safety of your drawings in the cloud.

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Autodesk Is High on Cloud Computing

At Autodesk University 2011 in Las Vegas, company executives from the CEO on down were forecasting great things for the cloud in general and for Autodesk Cloud in particular.  Read full article »