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Plasticity Is CAD for Artists

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Re: Plasticity Is CAD for Artists

#2
I find this to be a very cool NURBS-based CAD project, can't wait to play with it more. From what I can see it borrows a lot of concepts from solid modeling CAD tools like Solidworks, but also has UX similarities to other common surface modeling tools like Blender. Here is a video of how it works:

Plasticity - Fresh NURBS Modeler for Everyone! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l16YkZnT5zM

Re: Plasticity Is CAD for Artists

#3

I find this to be a very cool NURBS-based CAD project, can't wait to play with it more. From what I can see it borrows a lot of concepts from solid modeling CAD tools like Solidworks, but also has UX similarities to other common surface modeling tools like Blender. Here is a video of how it works: Plasticity - Fresh NURBS Modeler for Everyone! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l16YkZnT5zM

This is really cool, both in terms of what it can do, the approachable pricing model and the video that shows it off.

(Since I’m not aware of the details…) Is this similar to using NURBS as the representation in Blender?

As in what makes this more CAD-ey?

Re: Plasticity Is CAD for Artists

#4
Exports both to STEP and OBJ out of the box, they did get that part right.

But ... what's a "nupkg" ?

[EDIT]: looks like you'll have to pull in all of mono just to install and try this :-( [1]

[1] https://stackoverflow.com/questions/38118548/how-to-install-...

[EDIT 2]: my bad, there is a .deb in release 0.5.27

https://github.com/nkallen/plasticity/releases/tag/v0.5.27

[EDIT 3]: now that I've been able to install try it on Linux: this is really nice, very pleasant UI, and for those familiar with blender, the interaction style will be familiar. I will definitely be keeping an eye on this.

Re: Plasticity Is CAD for Artists

#7
> Plasticity is mostly Open Source. When Plasticity reaches 1.0, it will cost $25 to use (no subscription).

I'm curious how this will be implemented. According to the LICENSE file in the repo, the current source is available under LGPL.

What will cost $25? Will the repo be taken off-line after 1.0 release? Or will further updates after 1.0 be binary only?

Re: Plasticity Is CAD for Artists

#8

For those of us who are not familiar with the domain, what differentiates this from Blender? Does Blender not support NURBS? If not, why is that the case?

Blender supports NURBS. What differentiates this from Blender? Blender is a full fledged pipeline of tools, not to CAD, extensive modeling tools, texturing, rigged animation, post production, multiple rendering engines. It's like comparing a specific photo editor that say focuses on filters and color adjustments, with Photoshop.

Re: Plasticity Is CAD for Artists

#9

I find this to be a very cool NURBS-based CAD project, can't wait to play with it more. From what I can see it borrows a lot of concepts from solid modeling CAD tools like Solidworks, but also has UX similarities to other common surface modeling tools like Blender. Here is a video of how it works: Plasticity - Fresh NURBS Modeler for Everyone! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l16YkZnT5zM

This is really cool, both in terms of what it can do, the approachable pricing model and the video that shows it off. (Since I’m not aware of the details…) Is this similar to using NURBS as the representation in Blender? As in what makes this more CAD-ey?

Blender as a tool is very far from CAD-ey, in the sense that precision work - this should be 120 mm and that should be 1.41 times this - is not really a supported workflow. There isn't even a constraint solver in Blender.

You can make Blender work as a CAD-ish tool with practice and self-discipline and lots of keyboard shortcuts. But e.g. Fusion360 or even SketchUp is what a CAD-oriented workflow feels like. There is a big difference.

Haven't tried this yet, but I expect it to retain enough of the CAD-oriented approach that the workflow still feels quite different from Blender.

Re: Plasticity Is CAD for Artists

#10

For those of us who are not familiar with the domain, what differentiates this from Blender? Does Blender not support NURBS? If not, why is that the case?

Blender has supported NURBS (Non-uniform rational B-spline) modeling since 2.9 (fairly recent). https://www.makeuseof.com/nurbs-curves-3d-modeling-blender-t...
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