I think only the Beta is for free.

When it comes to release, it is over with free.

Rudl

"To be fair, the logic behind this free product isn’t completely altruistic. Autodesk is, after all, a business — and a large one at that. (The company had sales of nearly $2 billion last year.)

Bass said he hopes that some 123D users will “graduate” up to Autodesk’s more professionally-oriented products."

Maybe it will be free after all ;)

Is there any text facility in it, 'cos I can't find one?

Martin

I'm kind of getting the hang of it, and there's a bunch of cool stuff in there but one big problem is that on my machine anyway the selection mechanism is laggy, there's kind of a lull or something before an edge or face will highlight.

Then various little widgets that pop up get activated automatically just by moving the mouse over them and I'm often getting a whole bunch of little mini menus and sometimes even big help panes trying to load videos popping up right in my face when I'm actually just trying to go and select something different...

- Michael

It's kind of a pet peeve of mine to have too much stuff popping up right in your face, and here's an example why - here I am trying to draw a longer and more complex curve:



There's a command prompt and 2 input boxes floating right over top of the curve that I'm right now trying to draw, making it hard for me to actually see it...

It's the kind of thing that can work ok if you're only drawing something simple like only a line or an arc at a time, but can easily get in the way in other circumstances like the above.

Another thing that I really don't understand is why so many solid modeling programs only have an interpolated (through points) type freeform curve and not a control point curve which is really the main way to draw curvy shapes, particularly because with a control point curve you have inherent control over the end tangents because the first 2 and last 2 points of the control hull define the start and end tangents.

- Michael

Autodesk is a crap. Nothing is free.

For this one, I believe you are not right ;)
Now more than one hour install and not sure of the final works !
So Suspense :)

Installation was more then half an hour for this few functions.

Rudl

one hour and half for me! :) (slow connection I suppose )
But working at the end: a miracle!
Now it's a game aventure :)
Not yet a diff boolean operation realised ???
Selection is some curious ???

Hi Im back ....123 D

very slow not usable ,



Interaction to draw a line you have to enter the sketch mode and select a plane and come out, to many process
Tools I like the Hole Tool MOI could the with one (cylinder and balloon-diff), Edge edit tool is nice but you can’t use it very very slow.

score:
123D=3/10
MOI=8/10

downloaded, installed and now whenever I want to start it I get an error message that I can send to AutoDesk. Very promising start. :D

(Guess I really have to make a restart even though there was nothing mentioned like this as it is the case with other programs.)


What I really want to give a try - is it capable of filleting corners with a different radius on both sides? (say I have a cube and one edge should be filleted but the fillet getting narrower starting with R=x and ending with R=1/2x)

Not yet seen variable fillet but not all seen :)
videos without sound
Arche
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZc_fj8xJOc

Guitare
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QcFX3IcAk3M

Chair
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jGYPrEfG4no&feature=related

@Andras - There's always at least one Autodesk hater in the crowd... :-)


"There's a command prompt and 2 input boxes floating right over top of the curve that I'm right now trying to draw, making it hard for me to actually see it...

It's the kind of thing that can work ok if you're only drawing something simple like only a line or an arc at a time, but can easily get in the way in other circumstances like the above." ~M. Gibson


That's one of my dislikes about MoI. It's actually the more complex sketches where I appreciate the HUD more. I don't draw at the bottom or upper corner of the screen, I draw in the middle-ish of the screen. I want and like the info right where the mouse is so I don't have to switch focus between the mouse and info center. I find that incredibly distracting. For me the HUD rarely gets in the way of what I am doing and if it does, a zoom and/or pan moves it out of the way usually.

The pop-up stuff would be less distracting if there was no lag/delay. This is a "beta" so I am hoping for better speed eventually. MoI is definitely way faster.

As far as the Shift+middle mouse button... it's second nature to me and is one of the first things I try with a new modeling program, but I think, in the arena of 3D navigation with a mouse Alibre has absolutely nailed it. Bar-none the best system I have ever used. A 3D mouse (3D connexion) doesn't really add much functionality/speed. They just haven't fully realized the extra uses/functions their setup can open up (time sensitive click being a major one).



Sorry no text fields (besides dimensions) that I am aware of. There is something to add "tags," but I have no idea what it actually does. I tried it, but the tag disappears when the dialog is closed. Perhaps something like photo tags? (it's still there if I re-open the tags dialog)

Sorry macray no variable arc radius. The only programs I am aware of that are capable of that are the parametric modelers (Solidworks, Inventor, Alibre, etc.).

Seems that for make boolean operations objects must be first components ! ?


From the video of the guitare at the end seems we can modify measures from enter numeric text
Is that history ?

Hi Pilou,

> Seems that for make boolean operations objects
> must be first components ! ?

A lot of "Mechanical CAD" programs don't really rely on booleans so much as you might use in MoI - instead they're generally more focused on creating a mechanical part by drawing some 2D sketches on different faces of the model and then creating a "feature" like an extrusion or a revolve that adds or removes material from the base part.

Some of these kinds of programs actually only focus on building 1 single object at a time in a "part modeler" and then you go to a separate "assembly modeler" program to bring all the parts together (although that's not the case with this particular program).


> From the video of the guitare at the end seems we can
> modify measures from enter numeric text
> Is that history ?

In this case it's not exactly history - it's more what is called a "constraint", although history can be used to make similar kinds of edits as well.

History is about maintaining the sequence of operations that went into building the model, and then when you change something those operations are recalculated to rebuild the model.

A "history free" or direct modeler like this Autodesk app works kind of differently - it makes modifications by directly analyzing the current model state (like figuring out how to extend surfaces and trim off pieces of the current model), instead of using the sequence of modeling operations.

- Michael

Hi lyes,

> Interaction to draw a line you have to enter the sketch
> mode and select a plane and come out, to many process

Yeah, that kind of more formalized process with extra steps to specifically set up which plane you're drawing in is pretty normal with Mechanical CAD programs.

Another problem with it is not just extra steps but that you are not so free to just draw a line anywhere in 3D space that you might want it, for example in MoI you can go to the 3D view and draw in lines between any points that you want like this:





But that other kind of more formalized process is well suited for a different style of modeling, where you're more focused on having every aspect of the result controlled by specific dimensions and spacing from elements and stuff like that.

- Michael

Exploring more the boolean operations can be made with or without components :)
In direct or after.

http://www.123dnews.com/storage/documents/Designing_in_Autodesk_123D_Overview.pdf

Hi Pilou - it looks like there is a "combine" command for doing booleans I guess?

- Michael

yes it was that :)

Hi Nick,

> I want and like the info right where the mouse is so
> I don't have to switch focus between the mouse and
> info center. I find that incredibly distracting.

The problem with that is that if you are just trying to draw something where you're focused just on its shape and not wanting to enter in any numeric coordinates, having all those coordinate boxes floating around by your mouse doesn't give you any benefit and instead they actually detract from being able to clearly see the object's shape on the screen.

I mean I don't see how you could not consider this to be distracting and getting in the way:



It's pretty easy for HUD "Heads Up Display" to become more like IYF "In Your Face" in this way - in MoI there is generally an emphasis on not getting into the IYF level of stuff. This helps make MoI more friendly for the kinds of uses where someone just wants to draw and not even type in any coordinates - the type in stuff is available if you need it but doesn't overwhelm the UI.

What's the point of having the "Specify next point" text floating around next to your mouse when you're drawing a curve like that, anyway? Surely there isn't any confusion that you are picking the next point in the curve...


The other thing is that kind of inputs floating around with the mouse mechanism is kind of limited to pretty simple input types because trying to put something like 5 or 6 controls floating around there would make it really bad - so it can't quite "scale up" very naturally for situations where additional options or inputs could be useful...


I can see how you could like it if you are more often drawing lines and arcs by entering in numeric input though. But to me that comes with some pretty negative side effects for the "just drawing and looking at shape" type workflow, and it just doesn't make very much sense when you're drawing freeform curves.

- Michael