Autodesk
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On Saturday I gave a couple of VR presentations at Micro16, an exhibition and conference held at Microcity, a (relatively) new technical hub in Neuchatel that houses part of EPFL. [I always pronounce Microcity with stress on the second syllable, much as Will Ferrel does when pronouncing "Metrocity" in the movie Megamind (so that it rhymes with "atrocity"). Anyway – it's just a (formerly) private joke shared with my wife and kids.] I'd been invited by a local organisation called Enigma & Indicium, which organises vocational workshops for young adults. The two sessions were attended by people aged from about…
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After the fun of participating in last week's Hackathon, I headed across to Bern for SINDEX 2016. SINDEX is a biannual exhibition focused on industrial automation. I went to the last one and found it really interesting – well worth going back to, especially given my involvement in IoT and my interest in robotics. The event is probably a smaller, Swiss version of the Hannover Messe, although I'm only really guessing as I've never been there. It was also a good chance to meet with a few companies who will be exhibiting their products at the upcoming Design Night Switzerland…
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Hot on the heels of our own, internal Hackathon (although, strictly speaking, this one started before it) there's another external Hackathon running until the end of October. This one's about developing apps using Forge or Fusion 360 and submitting said apps to the Autodesk App Store. The event really has two distinct parts: A series of webinars and Q&A sessions where you can learn about Forge and Fusion 360 development These are free and open to all: there's absolutely no commitment needed to attend An online Hackathon with a financial incentive for you to submit your Forge or Fusion 360…
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Over the last few days we've held Autodesk's first internal, global Hackathon. I started off by not wanting to join a team – I did sign up as an "evangelist", which it turns out means I'm also a judge – but in the end I decided to create a simple HoloLens application. And then Jeremy Tammik suggested we join forces, so we actually were a team, all of a sudden. From my side I focused on creating the HoloLens application – which receives path information from somewhere and displays that to the user – as well as the 2D AutoCAD…
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As mentioned yesterday, on Saturday my second son and I got up at the crack of dawn to drive across to the Alpine town of Grindelwald. It's the third time I've made this particular pilgrimage in the last four years (last year I had a conflicting event in the UK) and it's become something of a rite of passage for my kids: as they turn 10 they come with their Dad and his silly car to meet lots of other people with silly cars. The event is the M3W Jungfrau Treffen, organised by Laurens and Rineke, a Dutch couple based…
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There's a new WebGL-based technology being developed by Autodesk and it's completely awesome. And you can request access to it today. Project Play has been in development for some time. It has some shared lineage with the Smithsonian X 3D Explorer – although I'm not sure to what extent, if any, they share code – and it's the viewing technology used by millions (?) around the world to explore the ReCapped Apollo 11 Command Module. But this technology is about way more than just viewing static models. It's a full node-based editor that allows you to create rich 3D experiences…
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I was a little surprised when LinkedIn reported my 21st anniversary at Autodesk, a couple of weeks' ago. I eventually realised it was because the middle of my month of starting had been chosen to notify my connections of this particular anniversary (LinkedIn doesn't have the specific date, I suppose). Anyway, it turns out today's the actual anniversary. 21 short years' ago, I joined Autodesk Ltd. in Guildford, Surrey. Since then I've worked for Autodesk Development S.à.r.l. (Neuchâtel, Switzerland), Autodesk India Private Ltd. (Bangalore, India), and Autodesk, Inc. (San Rafael, California). But all within the umbrella of life at the…
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This week has been a little hectic, once again. Yesterday I spent the morning back across at ETH Zurich, speaking with members of the Block Research Group about Forge, Dynamo and HoloLens. They've just moved into a brand new building labelled HIB – where the various schools at ETH focusing on architecture from a technological perspective will be co-located – but as it's so new it's yet to be sign-posted. I eventually did find it, but not without asking for directions from 5 different people. Inside the ceiling is pretty cool: they've used a combination of skylights for natural light…
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We have an internal company Hackathon being held at Autodesk locations around the world on September 6th and 7th. The theme for the event is "What's Next?" and there are variety of sub-themes under which the hacks can fall: Computer as collaborator Future of product interfaces Internet of Things Social good / Sustainability The future of anything else I signed up some time ago to be an "evangelist" for the event, which means I'm a resource for people in the local Neuchatel office should they have questions about VR/AR and IoT (which fall under the second and third sub-themes, respectively),…
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Some of you may have heard about the launch of a new Autodesk product, last week, that's focused on generating interactive 3D environments from Revit models. It's called Autodesk LIVE and is part of the Autodesk LIVE Design umbrella (at least I think I have that the right way around). Autodesk LIVE Design is all about making it easier to apply best-in-class visualization technology from our Media & Entertainment division – who collectively know a few things about high-end rendering and animation, admittedly – to the world of design and engineering. Here's a video describing how Autodesk LIVE –…