I guess that’s why they just offered me a 50% discount on a 3-year subscription!
All we need now is for our old friend Jon to come out of the woodwork.
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You might find out at As has been pointed out, it is definitely not ‘presidential’.
-Pascal
They do have some pretty amazing offers from time to time. Usually it’s a one day event where you can save a lot of money. I found it quite interesting that at this year’s IMTS in Chicago, the Autodesk display was all about CAM and manufacturing. Certainly a major shift from the days of 2D Autocad.
Dan
Yep, this is AutoDesk’s new strategy. DOMINATE anything having to do with CAD/CAM for manufacturing. That’s why they’re buying up companies left and right that have anything to do with manufacturing (including 3D printing) such as Delcam, HSMWorks, NetFabb etc…
While in the short term users may benefit from their low-cost offerings - based on their “let’s either put the others out of business or we’ll just buy them out” strategies - you know you’re still selling your soul to you-know-who… 
Sooner or later it will be time to pay up… 
–Mitch
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heh, that’s how they got me… i use fusion360 for CAM… i don’t really have much of a choice if maintaining an osx based setup.
autodesk brought/are bringing legit CAM to the mac platform.
Yep. I was hoping that Mecsoft would capitalize on that first, but they weren’t interested. Actually, considering where they are positioning their products and pricing, Autodesk, Fusion CAM and all the rest are probably more than a bit worrisome…
–Mitch
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Autodesk Inventor Professional price: $5105 for 3 years
Autodesk Fusion 360 Ultimate price: $4500 for 3 years
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My two cents are that McNeel is in a much better position to know how they are doing than anyone else is.
Andrew, it seems like your main interest in starting this thread is around trying to bring new geometric modeling tech to market. I have some experience with this, and am happy to answer questions if you’re interested.
Here are a few things off the top of my head:
- There are new surface formulations invented every year. For example, every siggraph has 3 or 4 at least that passed peer review. Yet in industry, there are essentially 4: Meshes, Nurbs, Subds, and Voxels. So, almost everything gets culled.
- In order to get investment interest, it helps to have an implementation of the surface as well as some tools. For a commercial product, expect that implementing useful tools will take much longer than the surface math.
- The benefit to the user has to be substantial, because there are always lots of disadvantages. For example, existing tools might not work with the new geometry, it might not be compatible with downstream operations, and it might require the user to learn new things. A 10% improvement isn’t likely going to cut it.
- Rhino in general is a great place to do an implementaion. Not only is the SDK very open (you can subclass their object classes, add your own grip types, etc) but the community is great. It seems like there is a high concentration of early adopters here, and they will happily give you positive and negative feedback, both of which are helpful.
- It took us about 10 years before I’d say we were commercially successful.
- Complaining publicly that McNeel isn’t funding your idea probably isn’t going to increase your chances of them funding your idea. Building a compelling prototype/example is probably a better use of your time.
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Always good to hear from you Tom.
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I did not ask them for funding because I understand that they are a shoestring organization. (This is my impression from a few emails I exchanged with Mr. McNeel, who, by the way, is a nice guy.) I do not hate Rhino, but I am high-caliber inventor, so I have to be critical of everything. If I cease to be critical, I will cease to invent new ideas. I agree with the rest of your opinions. It is extremely hard to replace NURBS with something better because CAD programming is based on geometric modeling kernel. If you throw away NURBS, you throw away all mainstream CAD programs. On the other hand, there is nothing wrong with criticizing NURBS and proposing new geometric modeling kernels. I no longer follow scientific papers about new kernels, because everything I have seen so far is mediocre - the authors could not explain how their inventions work and why they are better than NURBS. I am former AutoCAD user, but I have nothing good (or even printable) to say about Autodesk.
Rhino is a surface program, not a solid program. Its main advantage is its ability to edit control points directly. Many other CAD programs are more suitable for editing solids and for handling large files.
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Hi Andrew
Is this you?
“Prisoners of gravity, escape to outer space. Become
cosmic nomads, the hunters of comets and the gatherers
of asteroids. Spin cocoons of steel for your new forests
and seas. And when you visit the Earth, step lightly, lest
you destroy its fragile beauty.” - Andrew Nowicki
@Andrew_Nowicki How much have you worked out the mathematical details and formulas of your new geometric modeling kernel? Have you tried using it to model any geometry? Any efficient algorithms to implement the kernel? Is there more to it than illustrations and words?
I was surprised by the latest comments and I do not know how to respond. My best guess is that I should keep my big mouth shut because this is not good venue for totally unrestricted debate.
???
As far as I can tell Jody was seriously asking whether you were the same Andrew Nowicki who authored the quote, and David was seriously asking how far you had progressed in implementing your idea.
I’m curious too.
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McNeel is not in Decline and here is why in one word “Grasshopper”. That was the one thing that got McNeel back into the market and will keep it funded. That’s why McNeel shoves money into code development for interaction instead of 3dmodeling tools, these last releases from 3 up have been more to make code available for 3rd parties and now a python port than embracing new modeling tools and math kernels even it would make for far better 3dmodeling there’s just not enough money in it. There’s more money catering to larger companies who can develop their own in house solutions using Rhinos code and Gh then in developing new 3d modeling tools that work for the average Joe.
When I see what Andrew of 3dcoat has done I wonder how anyone can compete with a genius like that. If Rhino want’s to grow as a 3d modeling program and not just remain stagnant they do need to embrace a better modeling paradigm and maybe hire other people to help. I have said this since version 3. I am really saddened by McNeels failure to embrace new and different 3d modeling tools and modeling paradigms.
RM
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Interesting discussion -
Andrew, if your new idea is superior I assume it also has to be simpler,
so why is it so hard to prove it as a working alternative ? I think Kickstarter
is a good idea.
I don’t think it’s fair you are saying this is not the forum for an unrestricted debate -
most of us are very open-minded.
I think Grasshopper is such a great toolbox that whatever new ways of defining geometry
are being developed, I would only be interested if the ‘Grasshopper approach’ of extracting
and manipulating data would work with that as well.
I am sure this has been asked a million times, but if both Clayoo and T-Splines are using a
similar sub-d approach, what aspect of it is copyrighted to stop McNeel writing their own version ?
Nothing. In fact they are developing this - albeit somewhat slowly. Some basic sub-d stuff is available in the WIP. It will not be included in V6 though, too early in its development. The problem is that it takes quite a bit of time and effort to develop this stuff.
–Mitch
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The Dassault guys have cracked it already, looks really nice, a subd approach but fully nurbs.
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