It is Alive in the Lab

Movies and Music as Harbingers of Software as a Service

The world is changing. Products are being replaced by services, transactions are being replaced by relationships, and functions are being replaced by experiences. This is quite evident to me in my dealings with movies and music. Back in the day... Read more →

Autodesk One Market Office: A Window to the Past

"They say dreams are the windows of the soul — take a peek and you can see the inner workings, the nuts and bolts." Henry Brommel Though Autodesk has offices worldwide, I work at our office at One Market in... Read more →

Externally Control Project Geppetto? Good or bad?

Project Geppetto is a research project that explores making it easy, fast, and fun to add crowds to 3ds Max scenes. Project Geppetto is a data-driven animation system that offers high level control of plausible human animation. The free technology... Read more →

oDesk: Is contract employment the new full time employment?

I work for Autodesk. In the past I have worked for other companies like Océ, Buzzsaw.com, GTE, and Honeywell. What all of these jobs have had in common is that they required at least 40 hours per week, included a... Read more →

Act Before It's Too Late: Expiration Dates for Autodesk Labs Technology Previews

I have used this analogy before. Most technology previews are like milk cartons. They have expiration dates on them. When a technology preview expires, the technology preview no longer operates. A preview has a time bomb in it that makes... Read more →

Project Basejump for AutoCAD Map 3D / AutoCAD Civil 3D Now Available Once Again

I said it before. I will say it again. Bada bing. Bada bang. The free technology preview of Project Basejump for AutoCAD Map 3D and AutoCAD Civil 3D software leverages the Bing Mapping service as a base layer into your... Read more →

Electric Vehicle Expo Earlier in the week

On Monday and Tuesday there was an electric vehicle expo at Justin Herman Plaza in San Francisco - right next to our One Market office. I stopped by at lunch on Tuesday. It was funny to see that these vehicles... Read more →

Book Review: Leaders Make the Future by Bob Johansen

I was fortunate enough to be a guest of getAbstract for a dinner with Bob Johansen. Bob is the author of Leaders Make the Future. The premise of the book is that true leaders do not wait for the future... Read more →

Please help with our Inventor Fusion survey

We know you're busy, but the Inventor Fusion team is conducting a survey and could use your input. The survey is only 12 questions and takes 2 minutes to complete. // Complete the survey Thanks for your responses. Assessment is... Read more →

Feedback on Augmented Reality for Showcase

Raise your hand if you have used the augmented reality plug-in for Showcase. Every once in a blue moon I email the people who have downloaded a technology preview and ask them what they think. This month I chose to... Read more →

Project Spark graduates from Autodesk Labs to become Autodesk Revit LT

Project Spark was our free technology preview of a simplified 3D building information modeling (BIM) solution. Using Project Spark, building professionals could create designs efficiently with real-world building objects, produce more reliable documentation faster, and share files with consultants using... Read more →

Book Review: Gipsy Moth Circles The World by Sir Francis Chichester

Years ago my colleague, Director of Strategic Innovation, Maurice Conti, sailed his wife and children (before they started school) around the world. Maurice has stories of his adventures and the generous people they met during their travels. So when my... Read more →

Autodesk in the J.P.Morgan Chase Corporate Challenge

Do I look happy to be there or what? I am not a runner. I am just a good employee. That's why I participated in the J.P.Morgan Chase Corporate challenge on Wednesday night. Recall that I get so little exercise... Read more →

Scheduled Down Time for Autodesk Freewheel in September

This is my once-a-month copy/paste blog posting to let you know when Autodesk Freewheel will be unavailable. Months ago Project Freewheel graduated from Autodesk Labs. Project Freewheel users are now using Autodesk Freewheel - the production version. To check it... Read more →

My Design Night at the Autodesk Gallery

"Today I am a small blue thing like a marble or an eye." -- Suzanne Vega Last Thursday night I attended Design Night at the Autodesk Gallery. This is a new thing for Autodesk. The Gallery team has launched a... Read more →

2D to 3D Tool for Inventor Retires from Autodesk Labs

The 2D to 3D for Autodesk Inventor allowed you to quickly create 3D models of 2D-designed parts. The 2D to 3D add-in automatically transformed drawing views into orthogonal sketches, significantly streamlining the preparation of 2D views for 3D uses. The... Read more →

Welcome Home Lcpl Steven Sheppard

The wife of one of Steven's buddies hung this before our and his arrival. On Saturday, I woke up at 6:30 am out of the excitement of the day. My wife, Sheryl, and I drove our son Steven's pickup truck... Read more →

Interactive Terrain Shaping for AutoCAD Civil 3D / AutoCAD Map 3D Retires from Autodesk Labs

The Interactive Terrain Shaping technology preview provided users with a unique workflow for developing grading proposals in AutoCAD Civil 3D 2012 and AutoCAD Map 3D 2012. The primary goal of this effort was to provide a holistic approach to terrain... Read more →

Book Review: What Got You Here Won't Get You There by Marshall Goldsmith

At Autodesk we are participating in a pilot of getAbstract. The getAbstract service is a web site where members can search for topics or specific titles and find 5 page summaries of books. Their motto centers on delivering condensed knowledge.... Read more →

free technology preview of Project Hydra for Simulation Mechanical / Multiphysics Now Available

Autodesk Simulation Mechanical and Autodesk Simulation Multiphysics are intended for designers, engineers, and analysts who need to accurately predict product behavior, optimize designs, and validate innovative concepts before manufacturing. These design applications provide a range of simulation tools. // Learn... Read more →

Toward Making Facial Recognition As Easy As Pi

Hey that's Carl Bass - let him in (or not). Our CEO has the programming world (Raspberry Pi unit) in his hand. Recall that we had a Raspberry Pi contest: Internal Raspberry Pi Contest: And the winners are... Software Architect... Read more →

Updated Project Falcon wind tunnel simulation on Autodesk Labs

Project Falcon is our free technology preview that simulates air flow around vehicles, consumer products, buildings, or other objects of your choosing in a virtual wind tunnel. You can load one of the included sample models or one of your... Read more →

Check out this simulated augmented reality with Autodesk Infrastructure Modeler

Autodesk Infrastructure Modeler software for urban planning design helps civil engineering, transportation, and urban planning professionals create, evaluate, and communicate infrastructure proposals. Infrastructure Modeler can help to drive stakeholder buy-in and inform decision making with visually rich proposals for transportation,... Read more →

The MotionBuilder Shelf - free ADN Plugin of the Month for September

MotionBuilder is our real-time 3D character editing and animation software that has been embraced by some of the entertainment industry’s most successful studios. It lets you can acquire, aggregate, and refine data with greater reliability and precision; create, edit, and... Read more →

United States employees take Labor Day off

We'll be getting back to the lab. Autodesk employees have the day off in honor of Labor Day. As noted on Wikipedia, Congress enacted the holiday in 1882 as "a day off for working citizens." The holiday signals the end... Read more →