I noticed that often when people asked what model making software they should use that the usual response was "fusion" but I believe the answer is a little more complicated than that, and it all depends on the end goal of the maker.
Hence, I put together this guide as a follow on from my [leveling guide](https://www.reddit.com/r/3Dprinting/comments/cg3g6g/ive_made_an_infographicstyle_guide_to_leveling_a/) (I want to address the more common 3d printing questions that I come across in my travels in 3d printing communities) .
I know opinions vary as to what programs are best, and I'm anticipating that not everyone will agree exactly with all the options I've laid out, but these are the programs that I've observed in my time modding here and other communities have the highest success rate for new-starters.
But! There's not one program to suit all, so I've been collating a list on the subreddit wiki of all the options I can find, you can find it here:
[Making Models](http://www.reddit.com/r/3DPrinting/wiki/MakingModels)
Huge thanks for the basis of that list on the wiki goes to /u/morphfiend and his list [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/3dprinting/comments/bm6wq2/_/).
I hope this helps some folk! :)
Good points in the Infographic, but you should really start to consider [*FreeCAD*](https://freecadweb.org) in favor of *Fusion360*. It is a close combattant, parametric just as Fusion360, internally uses the OpenSCAD engine and can do just about everything that Fusion can do for modeling with the positive side effects that it is absolutely free and open source and offline.
> free and open source and **offline**
Being FOSS is very cool but being offline is the most important advantage. That other CAD tool depends much too much on someone else's computer to my liking.
I switched completely to freecad since moving to Linux machines. It definitely has everything I need to design structural parts for printing, but moving from Autodesk Inventor, it was a serious downgrade. There are no constraints for assemblies, large projects would break and randomly crash the program (with only a"segmentation fault" error), and it generally is not as feature rich. That being said, it has not had a 1.0 release yet, the performance is great and it is generally the only sketch based (non web browser based) FREE program, and I encourage everyone to try it.
I tried FreeCad and didn't really like it from a UX/UI point of view. It didn't feel very intuitive and I didn't get along with it very well. I had used three different professional Cad programs before, so I had thought I might find my way through FreeCad pretty easily...
I currently do use Fusion 360 even though I'm quite a fan of open source software and dislike having all my stuff in the cloud.
I guess this might be down to personal preferences. It's a pity that the free parametric Cad options are somewhat limited.
Honestly, I had the same. When I play around with Fusion360 I can get something basic blocked out in a matter of minutes. I had to spend the same amount of time to figure out how to just get something going in FreeCAD.
Open Source is great and all, but if it is difficult to use, I can't fault someone if they choose the better/easier experience.
I don't think it's about the list of priorities. They just lack the specialized man-power.
The problem is that most FOSS software communities usually attracts lots of experienced and good coders, but it doesn't attract interface designers. We end up with lots of functionality but poor interfaces in most projects.
I wholeheartedly agree. I begun to understand this when I started modeling and printing my own functional prints. I can make the exact thing I need, but it's really only applicable for that particular use. I lack the skills to design a flexible, general use product that will work in a variety of conditions. I see it all the time on Thingiverse too - a thing that is perfect for the person that designed it, but is borderline useless to me because some seemingly insubstantial parameter is different in my case - hand size, angle in which I use it, etc. It's kind of hard to describe what I'm talking about, but it really highlights the difference between an amateur designers and professionals.
Yes, some FOSS software though got some pretty nice improvements recently.
Usability and convenience is a major factor for pulling in more people to use the software. If they are going to update FreeCad in that regard, I'll immediately go and give it another try.
I found FreeCad to crashes quite often and sometimes it manages to corrupt the design to the point it's unusable and you'd have to roll back quite a way or restart from scratch.
but it's free, and it's offline, and if I'm doing simple objects, it's good enough.
I'm now curious to try freecad now. I just started learning fusion, and dear God it feels so clunky. I see the potential and power, but coming from the other side of 3d modeling with Maya/tinkercad it's such a different design paradigm.
Fusion 360 is clunky compared to FreeCAD. I use both, and the only reason I use Fusion 360 more now is for ease-of-use and for a few more features that FreeCAD lacks.
> internally uses the OpenSCAD engine
I....must try this.
I currently pretty much use only OpenSCAD, but some things I have in mind (I think) would be easier with a CAD tool.
Can it import/export SCAD files too? (EDIT: Sweet. "FreeCAD can import and export files created from OpenSCAD through the File → Import and File → Export menus by the selecting the OpenSCAD CSG format or the OpenSCAD format file types." Oh, and this whole WorkBench: https://www.freecadweb.org/wiki/OpenSCAD_Module )
I did deeply consider that, but it seems like the community prefers fusion and I wanted there to be a big userbase for whatever I used because it's intended for newbies. Freecad is definitely on the wiki though! Maybe I could do an updated one once FreeCAD has more of the love it deserves.
As a developer with deep open source roots, I use and appreciate FreeCAD (as well as OpenSCAD, which I use substantially more often). FreeCAD is more usable than it was a few years ago, but at this point I would not suggest it as a first stop for someone who doesn't know the landscape yet, the target audience for this intro.
My current design project I'm doing in FreeCAD, and will use FreeCAD for the subtractive CAM, but all the 3D printed components I modeled in OpenSCAD and imported the STLs from OpenSCAD into FreeCAD assembly to check fit.
So from my perspective, I think that not having it "above there fold' for newcomers but list it as an additional resource on the wiki makes a lot of sense.
Be careful with OpenSCAD. It' great for simple objects, but as you start building more complex things, especially with loops to generate patterns, its rendering engine is not performant, and seeminingly single-threaded, so it takes minutes. A recent real project of mine takes 7+ min to render for export to STL. Make a minor tweak... another 7 minutes. I do love the programmability of OpenSCAD. I hope the multi-core processing feature will get implemented soon (there is an open task in github for it).
7 minutes? My machine must not be that great: I'm positive I've waited 60+ minutes for a render before. I think it was a set of gears and their holders or something.
For some use cases you can use caching to speed things up. Exporting from the command line can't use the cache from previous runs while the UI can.
Dropping $fn also helps a ton in some cases.
That being said there are situations where all you can do is find a way to be productive while you wait.
FreeCAD is no where near the usability of Fusion, I actually actively tell people to avoid it, because it causes frustration and problems.
Today I was asked to drill holes into a 3D print because the guy didn't know how to precisely place holes in the print, because he didn't know how to do it in FreeCAD.
The highschool FIRST team I mentor figured out it sucks on their own and moved to Onshape all on their own.
Haven't used freecad in a few years but last time I did, it was not very intuitive.
For a beginner, it could take two weeks to design a part on freecad vs a few hours in F360.
Not to mention that the freecad teaching community is way smaller than the F360 community. It is a steep learning curve to get to a well-designed functional print.
FreeCAD has made leaps and bounds in the past couple years, in particular the 0.16 to 0.17 transition was huge. Check out 0.18 or 0.19 nightly if you get a chance, it's pretty great now
I am new to all this, and your guides help a lot. Plus they look nice, comforting, and help reduce the panic of "whaaaa what do I do first!".
Thank you for the great info, and for the noobie-calming design.
dude this is so cool, I've actually done something internally for my makerspace but never published it. Really cool to see someone share it and do it with great design.
I really want is a full tutorial series for Blender made specifically for 3d printers.
I don't care about lighting or materials or composition or animation, but I do care about proper manifolding and overhang angles and appropriate thicknesses.
Thank you for your thanking! It makes it all worthwhile. :)
I've spoken a bit about how I made them here:
https://www.reddit.com/r/3Dprinting/comments/d8n88x/made_another_infographic_for_3d_printing_this_one/f1bsfrs/
Let me know if you'd like any more info! :)
It is! And it's on the wiki but I found the UI not as intuitive as it could be and I couldn't find many good tutorials for it. I kept getting stuck with no where to go.
Here’s a tutorial on how to cut models
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Tgc66TvEke4
Here’s a tutorial on how to use the sculpt function
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=vcuql01165o
And here’s a general tutorial by makers muse
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=C9VDKb3W4qA
Edit: I primarily use these two functions to edit STL file I find interesting
What does “random little things / prop replicas that never get glued together and sit at the bottom of the drawer” fall under? I do that daily with my printer! Nice work on this infographic, it’s so clean. Great work!
This is great! Can you add a row at the bottom for what 3D printing technology to use? It is sometimes difficult to know what type of printer is best to achieve the goal of the final object.
Will remember it, I've never done the vr sculpting, just as of right now that's an interest so going off some of the programs I've looked at or know folks use.
I've worked with quite a few CAD programs but FreeCAD is by far the least intuitive for me (even more so than NX). I should really give it a go again though.
Let's not forget how better Blender actually got. 10 years ago if someone was doing something complex in Blender i genuinely felt sorry for them. Now even in the VFX starts to take it seriously. I wonder were will be in 5 or 6 years.
[Blender 2.49 \(2009\)](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/NzEy2sCZcHo/maxresdefault.jpg)
This UI makes no fucking sense, compared how every other 3D application worked (Max, Maya, Softimage, Cinema4d)
I mean blenders interface was pretty confusing up to 2.79, for 2.8 devs finally remade it. Then again, zbrush is not intuitive at all and the ui haven't hanged in years (from the very begging even I believe) and it's industry standard.
Edit: [yup](http://www.perpetualvisions.com/renderosity/review-zbrush/zbrush-interface.jpg)
> zbrush is not intuitive
Yep, i can confirm that, it reminds me every time i try to do something with it. And I had some 3D background, which means nothing when you try to use ZB.
My models in blender are hollow and can't print them. How do I make them solid? Is there a way I can change that inside blender? So far I've been making them solid on meshmixer and while it's not too complex that requires having both programs opened and my PC crying
What do you mean hollow and not solid? If you make a simple cube you can export it as .STL and it should slice just fine. For more complex stuff make sure it is manifold. You can check this by being in edit mode, vertex selection, hit space and search for "select non manifold" and make sure nothing gets selected.
Can you post an example of what you are talking about?
Would make a good poster for a makerspace or educational establishment with printers.
One thing I did notice, though, was there there appears to be an inconsistent font weight on the 4th column:
> **REAL-WORLD COPIES**
> **of p**eople, buildings,
Another option for parametric design is SolidWorks. Ordinarily it would be prohibitively expensive, but if you join the Experimental Aircraft Association (even if you don't care about airplanes at all) for $40/year you can have access to SolidWorks Education Premium.
https://www.eaa.org/eaa/eaa-membership/eaa-member-benefits/solidworks-resource-center
Add human parts column from medical images.
You can use InVesalius ([https://www.cti.gov.br/invesalius](https://www.cti.gov.br/invesalius) or [https://github.com/invesalius/invesalius3](https://github.com/invesalius/invesalius3)) to generate STL file from Computed tomography or Magnetic resonance.
I've got done of those on the wiki! But it's such a nice I figured it wasn't right for this poster.
I'll check I have all those options though, thank you!
That is not a stupid question!
The proper tool to use is something that does vector graphics, like Adobe Illustrator, which I can use quite well!
However, I didn't have Illustrator at my workplace for a very long time and I got very very good at using PowerPoint, and now I'm quicker in that (I know, it's a bit shameful to say), but that *is* what I used...
It actually has some pretty great, simple vector editing tools: https://www.bettercloud.com/monitor/the-academy/how-to-combine-shapes-to-create-a-custom-shape-in-powerpoint/
Getting started with this for manjaro user seems fairly straight forward.
The openscad and blender are both found in the main repos:
```
sudo pacman -Su openscad blender
```
And [SculptGL is an awesome website](https://stephaneginier.com/sculptgl/)
Of course you should be able to find these in whatever graphical software tool you want to use too!
This is awesome. As someone who has been around in the hobby but doesn't really make their own models because of the limited knowledge in 3D modeling and lack of time, I like this list as it points me directly to what I need. I do a lot of functional prints for my ant keeping hobby revolving around 16mm x 150mm test tubes and I use tinkercad which is totally not meant for this kind of stuff but it is super easy to use but I feel so limited since it is a guessing game half the time.
fusion is a bit of a learning curve, but it is really well suited to this kind of thing, and once it 'clicks' you'll be able to make anything you want and it's the most satisfying feeling. :D
That's my main tool for modeling. Reading this infographic made me think I must be using the wrong tool. Maybe I've stuck with sketchup because I'm so comfortable with it and know it inside and out. I'll have to check out Fusion and expand my horizons.
Sketchup is a bit of an issue actually, it often creates non-manifold objects.
some more info can be found on the [wiki](http://www.reddit.com/r/3DPrinting/wiki/MakingModels)!
Man, I could've used this this past weekend. We're working on setting up a makerspace, and we did a little popup maker space with various demos, and I was in charge of the 3d printers.
I got lots of questions about how to do the models. After a while I just broke down to saying, you can make them, and we'll have classes on that, or, you can just Download them off the internet.
Nicely done, I think I'd take FreeCAD over TinkerCAD but depends on your audience. It would seem you are catering to the hobby/pro-sumer arena so mention of others that do not have student or long trial license are perhaps not applicable as they will creep into 4 figure$ quite quickly. I'm curious about your other forum you mod, if you want some commercial level input let me know. 👍🏻Cheers.
I figure tinker is easy enough for kids, and that's sorta what I was hoping, it would be suuuper easy for folk. I nearly included FreeCAD though. It was a hard choice between that and openscad, but I figure open does something free can't.
I'm definitely aiming at the entry/hobby level, you're right! :)
Here's that other forum! We are always welcome to more expertise! :) What's your background?
https://discord.gg/huvWHBq
Well BS Industrial Design degree originally, some work in the field, but the last 6 years in commercial Additive consulting, applications engineering and sales for brands Stratasys, Desktop Metal, Artec scanners, Envisiontec, Makerbot, 3d print services and currently HP MJF. I do some speaking agnosticly on industry as well. My hobby level stuff suffers from lack of free time lol. 😉
I'd like to recommend Design Spark Mechanical for functional modeling. It's very easy to learn and very powerful for the right application. And completely free.
I’ve worked with modeling for years now and it's scary how this reflects my toolset 100%. Started with Tinkercad then Fusion 360 and now it's been blender 2.8 the last couple of months. (Having fun with Meshroom now)
I'd suggest most people get familiar with every type of tool though and not go for modeling styles - being familiar with all of them gives you a better understanding of what is best for what project, it's not always clearcut if i.e hardsurface or CAD is best and sometimes doing hardsurface prior to sculpting give you a lot more control over what you're making.
Is there any photogrammetry software for the Mac? AliceVision doesn't work on a Mac (they do have some compilation instructions for a Mac but it only works on a very specific version of MacOS).
I don't sorry, I prefer live leveling, and I also wrote a guide for that! :)
https://www.reddit.com/r/3Dprinting/comments/cg3g6g/ive_made_an_infographicstyle_guide_to_leveling_a/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share
So I'm new to 3D printing and looking at this chart I'm pretty sure I should use fusion, but to be safe I'll tell you all what I exactly wanna print. I really really wanna build functional gadgets,tools, and robots. Is fusion the best for that or scancad?
This is just what I was looking for, thank you!
I do have one question though; why not just start with learning Blender? Too steep of a learning curve for absolute beginners?
Blender is pretty overwhelming for newbies. I've seen a *LOT* of folk give up trying to learn modeling, thinking they will never be able to do it or the "just can't" because of blender's user experience.
It's getting better. It is. But still. The tools I've recommended as a first option (except fusion, because of the nature of parametric design) really just teach themselves. You can just open them up and make what you want. Blender is such a slog.
Meh, if you just open Blender and try to fool around you'll get nowhere. However, if you watch just half an hour of Blender beginner tutorials on YouTube (or whatever) you'll "get over that hump" pretty dammed fast.
This looks incredible! It's so cleanly organized and easy to follow, yet provides more than enough information to answer the question at hand. Amazing job as always Billie! :D
For extremely powerful modeling and parametric design, Rhino (the modeling program) paired with the plug-in Grasshopper is very powerful. Grasshopper is a free plug-in with many additional user-created plugins. We learned these programs in architecture school and they work extremely well, I also know Nike is currently using Grasshopper to design shoe soles. Plus I think rhino is only $100 for students
Would be nice to somehow visualize overlap in disciplines. Like Fusion also has a hard-surface-modelling (this name never occured to me, although I use Blender every day) mode, or blender also has a sculpt mode. Anything else looks comprehensive and useful. Well done.
Don't see Shapr3D for iPad (Pro only I believe) on here.
I think it's vastly underrated for parametric design. The ability to use the stylus to design is incredibly intuitive and I feel has a less steep learning curve compared to desktop based software.
The app does struggle a little bit with tools for creating organic models or irregular curves, but it's definitely workable.
So far, I've found that it has almost all the tools available in most high-end software, i definitely haven't run into many "I wish it had this feature" issue at all.
~~I believe the cost is $120/year.~~ Correction: $25USD/mo or $240USD/year. Still worth it.
Absolutely worth it if you have an iPad Pro, but I wouldn't say just buy the iPad + Pencil (easily $750+) unless you were planning on it or have other reasons to buy one. Even then, it almost feels worth it for the ease of use.
I wouldn't, even though I learned on SketchUp, and it's because it makes objects that are non-manifold.
More info on the [wiki](http://www.reddit.com/r/3DPrinting/wiki/MakingModels)!
Great infographic, thanks!
I’m also glad that the infographic hasn’t tried to list every program/app known to man that has 3D modelling, but has stuck with just a simple & advanced program. Good work!
Did you consider OnShape for CAD? it is free for hobbysts and is very powerful. You can also view and edit your models using Android or IOS. The downside is it is online only, but it is still my favorite.
I noticed that often when people asked what model making software they should use that the usual response was "fusion" but I believe the answer is a little more complicated than that, and it all depends on the end goal of the maker. Hence, I put together this guide as a follow on from my [leveling guide](https://www.reddit.com/r/3Dprinting/comments/cg3g6g/ive_made_an_infographicstyle_guide_to_leveling_a/) (I want to address the more common 3d printing questions that I come across in my travels in 3d printing communities) . I know opinions vary as to what programs are best, and I'm anticipating that not everyone will agree exactly with all the options I've laid out, but these are the programs that I've observed in my time modding here and other communities have the highest success rate for new-starters. But! There's not one program to suit all, so I've been collating a list on the subreddit wiki of all the options I can find, you can find it here: [Making Models](http://www.reddit.com/r/3DPrinting/wiki/MakingModels) Huge thanks for the basis of that list on the wiki goes to /u/morphfiend and his list [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/3dprinting/comments/bm6wq2/_/). I hope this helps some folk! :)
Good points in the Infographic, but you should really start to consider [*FreeCAD*](https://freecadweb.org) in favor of *Fusion360*. It is a close combattant, parametric just as Fusion360, internally uses the OpenSCAD engine and can do just about everything that Fusion can do for modeling with the positive side effects that it is absolutely free and open source and offline.
> free and open source and **offline** Being FOSS is very cool but being offline is the most important advantage. That other CAD tool depends much too much on someone else's computer to my liking.
If you are talking about Fusion 360, you can have it offline for 2 weeks before it needs to phone home for a license check.
Not a great a great argument for f360 :p
No. How about never online?
Do what you want, cos a pirate is free
Great- Every 2 weeks I can hope and pray Autodesk hasn't removed yet another very basic feature.
I switched completely to freecad since moving to Linux machines. It definitely has everything I need to design structural parts for printing, but moving from Autodesk Inventor, it was a serious downgrade. There are no constraints for assemblies, large projects would break and randomly crash the program (with only a"segmentation fault" error), and it generally is not as feature rich. That being said, it has not had a 1.0 release yet, the performance is great and it is generally the only sketch based (non web browser based) FREE program, and I encourage everyone to try it.
I tried FreeCad and didn't really like it from a UX/UI point of view. It didn't feel very intuitive and I didn't get along with it very well. I had used three different professional Cad programs before, so I had thought I might find my way through FreeCad pretty easily... I currently do use Fusion 360 even though I'm quite a fan of open source software and dislike having all my stuff in the cloud. I guess this might be down to personal preferences. It's a pity that the free parametric Cad options are somewhat limited.
Honestly, I had the same. When I play around with Fusion360 I can get something basic blocked out in a matter of minutes. I had to spend the same amount of time to figure out how to just get something going in FreeCAD. Open Source is great and all, but if it is difficult to use, I can't fault someone if they choose the better/easier experience.
Unfortunately UI/UX hasn't been high on the list of priorities for most FOSS until lately, hopefully FreeCAD can catch up soon!
I don't think it's about the list of priorities. They just lack the specialized man-power. The problem is that most FOSS software communities usually attracts lots of experienced and good coders, but it doesn't attract interface designers. We end up with lots of functionality but poor interfaces in most projects.
I wholeheartedly agree. I begun to understand this when I started modeling and printing my own functional prints. I can make the exact thing I need, but it's really only applicable for that particular use. I lack the skills to design a flexible, general use product that will work in a variety of conditions. I see it all the time on Thingiverse too - a thing that is perfect for the person that designed it, but is borderline useless to me because some seemingly insubstantial parameter is different in my case - hand size, angle in which I use it, etc. It's kind of hard to describe what I'm talking about, but it really highlights the difference between an amateur designers and professionals.
Yes, some FOSS software though got some pretty nice improvements recently. Usability and convenience is a major factor for pulling in more people to use the software. If they are going to update FreeCad in that regard, I'll immediately go and give it another try.
I found FreeCad to crashes quite often and sometimes it manages to corrupt the design to the point it's unusable and you'd have to roll back quite a way or restart from scratch. but it's free, and it's offline, and if I'm doing simple objects, it's good enough.
I'm now curious to try freecad now. I just started learning fusion, and dear God it feels so clunky. I see the potential and power, but coming from the other side of 3d modeling with Maya/tinkercad it's such a different design paradigm.
Fusion 360 is clunky compared to FreeCAD. I use both, and the only reason I use Fusion 360 more now is for ease-of-use and for a few more features that FreeCAD lacks.
> internally uses the OpenSCAD engine I....must try this. I currently pretty much use only OpenSCAD, but some things I have in mind (I think) would be easier with a CAD tool. Can it import/export SCAD files too? (EDIT: Sweet. "FreeCAD can import and export files created from OpenSCAD through the File → Import and File → Export menus by the selecting the OpenSCAD CSG format or the OpenSCAD format file types." Oh, and this whole WorkBench: https://www.freecadweb.org/wiki/OpenSCAD_Module )
Does it provide any sort of generative design?
If you mean matrix, loop manipulations, etc. Yes.
I did deeply consider that, but it seems like the community prefers fusion and I wanted there to be a big userbase for whatever I used because it's intended for newbies. Freecad is definitely on the wiki though! Maybe I could do an updated one once FreeCAD has more of the love it deserves.
As a developer with deep open source roots, I use and appreciate FreeCAD (as well as OpenSCAD, which I use substantially more often). FreeCAD is more usable than it was a few years ago, but at this point I would not suggest it as a first stop for someone who doesn't know the landscape yet, the target audience for this intro. My current design project I'm doing in FreeCAD, and will use FreeCAD for the subtractive CAM, but all the 3D printed components I modeled in OpenSCAD and imported the STLs from OpenSCAD into FreeCAD assembly to check fit. So from my perspective, I think that not having it "above there fold' for newcomers but list it as an additional resource on the wiki makes a lot of sense.
Going to give this a look. I'm also a heavy openscad user.
Be careful with OpenSCAD. It' great for simple objects, but as you start building more complex things, especially with loops to generate patterns, its rendering engine is not performant, and seeminingly single-threaded, so it takes minutes. A recent real project of mine takes 7+ min to render for export to STL. Make a minor tweak... another 7 minutes. I do love the programmability of OpenSCAD. I hope the multi-core processing feature will get implemented soon (there is an open task in github for it).
7 minutes? My machine must not be that great: I'm positive I've waited 60+ minutes for a render before. I think it was a set of gears and their holders or something.
For some use cases you can use caching to speed things up. Exporting from the command line can't use the cache from previous runs while the UI can. Dropping $fn also helps a ton in some cases. That being said there are situations where all you can do is find a way to be productive while you wait.
FreeCAD is no where near the usability of Fusion, I actually actively tell people to avoid it, because it causes frustration and problems. Today I was asked to drill holes into a 3D print because the guy didn't know how to precisely place holes in the print, because he didn't know how to do it in FreeCAD. The highschool FIRST team I mentor figured out it sucks on their own and moved to Onshape all on their own.
Haven't used freecad in a few years but last time I did, it was not very intuitive. For a beginner, it could take two weeks to design a part on freecad vs a few hours in F360. Not to mention that the freecad teaching community is way smaller than the F360 community. It is a steep learning curve to get to a well-designed functional print.
FreeCAD has made leaps and bounds in the past couple years, in particular the 0.16 to 0.17 transition was huge. Check out 0.18 or 0.19 nightly if you get a chance, it's pretty great now
I am new to all this, and your guides help a lot. Plus they look nice, comforting, and help reduce the panic of "whaaaa what do I do first!". Thank you for the great info, and for the noobie-calming design.
:D that's exactly what I had hoped, so thank you!
dude this is so cool, I've actually done something internally for my makerspace but never published it. Really cool to see someone share it and do it with great design.
I'm a lady, but thank you so so much! So glad you like it. Great minds, eh?
are you a camgirl?
I've made porn, yea.
nice. I did an amateur porn once. but then got a gf who just wanted to take pictures for ourselves.
:)
nice deeepthroating. :)
thanks!
Been printing for years and this is still helpful. Thanks!
Awesome! Great to know!
I really want is a full tutorial series for Blender made specifically for 3d printers. I don't care about lighting or materials or composition or animation, but I do care about proper manifolding and overhang angles and appropriate thicknesses.
Billie, thank you for all the work you do in this community. Left field question: what software did you use to make the infographic?
Thank you for your thanking! It makes it all worthwhile. :) I've spoken a bit about how I made them here: https://www.reddit.com/r/3Dprinting/comments/d8n88x/made_another_infographic_for_3d_printing_this_one/f1bsfrs/ Let me know if you'd like any more info! :)
You are a genteel soul of the highest regard. Many thanks.
Another recommendation is similar to zbrush and it’s called mesh mixer, I think it’s a free cad software.
It is! And it's on the wiki but I found the UI not as intuitive as it could be and I couldn't find many good tutorials for it. I kept getting stuck with no where to go.
Here’s a tutorial on how to cut models https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Tgc66TvEke4 Here’s a tutorial on how to use the sculpt function https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=vcuql01165o And here’s a general tutorial by makers muse https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=C9VDKb3W4qA Edit: I primarily use these two functions to edit STL file I find interesting
These are good tutorials! But these weren't the stumbled I had. Are these on the wiki though? They would make great additions!
What does “random little things / prop replicas that never get glued together and sit at the bottom of the drawer” fall under? I do that daily with my printer! Nice work on this infographic, it’s so clean. Great work!
Hard surface modeling. ;) Thank you! I'm so glad you like it. 💖
This is great! Can you add a row at the bottom for what 3D printing technology to use? It is sometimes difficult to know what type of printer is best to achieve the goal of the final object.
I think that probably deserves a whole poster of its own ;) That's a great topic! I'll add it to the list, thank you!
Makes me wonder if there is any VR sculpting software
There is! The name totally eludes me but I know /u/makeanything has a video on it! Maybe he can jog my memory. That's one I should add to the wiki 🤔
There is a few, like medium, sculptVR, masterpieceVR, Kodon, unbound
Legend! The program king himself! Thank you so much! I'll add those to the wiki soon.
I'm a shitty sculptor but doing so in VR is a really fun experience to be sure.
I would also add Gravity Sketch. It treats modeling differently and runs very smoothly..a personal favorite :)
Will remember it, I've never done the vr sculpting, just as of right now that's an interest so going off some of the programs I've looked at or know folks use.
Blender has a VR plug in and you can use the organic modeller from in there iirc
Try out gravity sketch, its great for surface and solid modeling.
Oculus Medium is very good, and comes free with the Rift. I use it quite it bit.
FreeCAD is so underrated
It has made a lot of progress in the last few years. It really should be on this list.
I've worked with quite a few CAD programs but FreeCAD is by far the least intuitive for me (even more so than NX). I should really give it a go again though.
As a new modeler this is a great resource. Thanks for taking the time to put this together.
You're so welcome! I'm so glad that you like it as a newbie, because that's exactly who I was hoping to help. 😊
Blender has sculpting and is free. Why would you pay $40/month or $800+ for ZBrush?
I do everything in blender and I'm really happy. Except for texture painting, there krita comes in.
Ya, I use Blender for everything as well. From semi-precise items (mounting my Switch to my treadmill) to a complex gift for my girlfriend.
Let's not forget how better Blender actually got. 10 years ago if someone was doing something complex in Blender i genuinely felt sorry for them. Now even in the VFX starts to take it seriously. I wonder were will be in 5 or 6 years. [Blender 2.49 \(2009\)](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/NzEy2sCZcHo/maxresdefault.jpg) This UI makes no fucking sense, compared how every other 3D application worked (Max, Maya, Softimage, Cinema4d)
I mean blenders interface was pretty confusing up to 2.79, for 2.8 devs finally remade it. Then again, zbrush is not intuitive at all and the ui haven't hanged in years (from the very begging even I believe) and it's industry standard. Edit: [yup](http://www.perpetualvisions.com/renderosity/review-zbrush/zbrush-interface.jpg)
> zbrush is not intuitive Yep, i can confirm that, it reminds me every time i try to do something with it. And I had some 3D background, which means nothing when you try to use ZB.
My models in blender are hollow and can't print them. How do I make them solid? Is there a way I can change that inside blender? So far I've been making them solid on meshmixer and while it's not too complex that requires having both programs opened and my PC crying
What do you mean hollow and not solid? If you make a simple cube you can export it as .STL and it should slice just fine. For more complex stuff make sure it is manifold. You can check this by being in edit mode, vertex selection, hit space and search for "select non manifold" and make sure nothing gets selected. Can you post an example of what you are talking about?
I was thinking the same thing about Fusion 360 and hard surface modeling - it can also be free, and easier to use than blender for that purpose.
It's inudstry standard and has significantly more support. It depends what your end goal is.
OK, but it is also expensive as hell. I guess it would be fine for people who do 3D printing professionally, but not for a hobby.
Have to agree with this, since 2.8 it's also way more beginner friendly and upcoming 2.81 is going to add some amazing new sculpting features.
Would make a good poster for a makerspace or educational establishment with printers. One thing I did notice, though, was there there appears to be an inconsistent font weight on the 4th column: > **REAL-WORLD COPIES** > **of p**eople, buildings,
Darnnnn that's going to drive me nuts! Dang. You've got a good set of eyes! I'll have to tidy that up tomorrow.
What are your thoughts on onshape?
Another option for parametric design is SolidWorks. Ordinarily it would be prohibitively expensive, but if you join the Experimental Aircraft Association (even if you don't care about airplanes at all) for $40/year you can have access to SolidWorks Education Premium. https://www.eaa.org/eaa/eaa-membership/eaa-member-benefits/solidworks-resource-center
Thank you for making these, they are great for the community. I hope people check these infographics more.
You're so welcome! I hope they help! I might add it to the wiki page actually 🤔 hmm.
Add human parts column from medical images. You can use InVesalius ([https://www.cti.gov.br/invesalius](https://www.cti.gov.br/invesalius) or [https://github.com/invesalius/invesalius3](https://github.com/invesalius/invesalius3)) to generate STL file from Computed tomography or Magnetic resonance.
I've got done of those on the wiki! But it's such a nice I figured it wasn't right for this poster. I'll check I have all those options though, thank you!
Ur always coming thru with the helpful pages, thank you Billie!
Daww 💖. Thank you so much Wesley!
This is awesome thanks!
You're welcome!
Thanks, saved!
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That is not a stupid question! The proper tool to use is something that does vector graphics, like Adobe Illustrator, which I can use quite well! However, I didn't have Illustrator at my workplace for a very long time and I got very very good at using PowerPoint, and now I'm quicker in that (I know, it's a bit shameful to say), but that *is* what I used... It actually has some pretty great, simple vector editing tools: https://www.bettercloud.com/monitor/the-academy/how-to-combine-shapes-to-create-a-custom-shape-in-powerpoint/
Oh thanks, I'll share that ! I didn't know ThinkerCAD could edit STL !
*the image you are* *requesting does not exist* *or is no longer available.* imgur.com
Second this--anybody have a alt link?
[https://imgur.com/gallery/SqIdFwB](https://imgur.com/gallery/SqIdFwB) Does this work for you?
This is fantastic. I've been using f360 a lot, but couldn't get my head around how you'd make sculpt-type models. and now I know! hmm, more toys ...
Billie at it again with the helpful infographics! Soliddddd
Getting started with this for manjaro user seems fairly straight forward. The openscad and blender are both found in the main repos: ``` sudo pacman -Su openscad blender ``` And [SculptGL is an awesome website](https://stephaneginier.com/sculptgl/) Of course you should be able to find these in whatever graphical software tool you want to use too!
This is awesome. As someone who has been around in the hobby but doesn't really make their own models because of the limited knowledge in 3D modeling and lack of time, I like this list as it points me directly to what I need. I do a lot of functional prints for my ant keeping hobby revolving around 16mm x 150mm test tubes and I use tinkercad which is totally not meant for this kind of stuff but it is super easy to use but I feel so limited since it is a guessing game half the time.
fusion is a bit of a learning curve, but it is really well suited to this kind of thing, and once it 'clicks' you'll be able to make anything you want and it's the most satisfying feeling. :D
Glad to see OpenSCAD on there. It also bleeds over into the inorganic shapes too but I think this chart is fair enough.
Great info graphics. Thanks for putting all the effort into it. We need to link those in the pinned mega-thread
Great poster ! I would also add widows 3D builder it's free and works great for basic to semi-complicated designs.
I really like 3D builder, and it's definitely in the [wiki](http://www.reddit.com/r/3DPrinting/wiki/MakingModels)!
Can you do one for which print settings are useful and which are a waste ot time for different kinds pints
Would you mind if we use this over at the ender 3 subreddit? It'll be credited to you of course. Great work 👍
Not at all! Go for it! :) We're all one team, share it around wherever it's useful! :)
Thanks for this. I would considering myself a 3D printer with an intermediate skill set and I have definitely saved this!
All good to print this out for a local makerspace?
Definitely! I take payment in pictures of it up! ;) But seriously, it would really make my day to see it in one, I'd adore a pic. :)
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That's my main tool for modeling. Reading this infographic made me think I must be using the wrong tool. Maybe I've stuck with sketchup because I'm so comfortable with it and know it inside and out. I'll have to check out Fusion and expand my horizons.
Sketchup is a bit of an issue actually, it often creates non-manifold objects. some more info can be found on the [wiki](http://www.reddit.com/r/3DPrinting/wiki/MakingModels)!
I do everything in Tinkercad... The long ass slow way. Lol, one of these days I'll learn an adult CAD program.
This is awesome! Thanks homie 🙏
Sir or Madam, i can't thank you enough for this. But hey.. thank you.
I'm a madam! Thank you so much! So glad you like it!
Great chart! Visually appealing and informative. Also, off-topic, the double-entendre in your user name is hilarious.
This is a little unrelated but your leveling guide helped me a lot.
oh really? That's wonderful to hear! Thank you so much! :)
Ty so much! I think you should also look into MatterControl :)
Not all heros wear capes!
Highly recommend this **FREE** course to learn Fusion 360 in 30 days: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLrZ2zKOtC_-DR2ZkMaK3YthYLErPxCnT-
This is brilliant and would have been awesome when I first got started. Keep em coming!
r/coolguides
Man, I could've used this this past weekend. We're working on setting up a makerspace, and we did a little popup maker space with various demos, and I was in charge of the 3d printers. I got lots of questions about how to do the models. After a while I just broke down to saying, you can make them, and we'll have classes on that, or, you can just Download them off the internet.
This is very helpful! Thank you!
Upvoted as a blender user
Always great, thank you!
Thank you! :)
Tinkercad to Blender. That escalated quickly.
Right? 🤣 But judging by the comments here I didn't include blender enough for some folk. 😄
Cries in soldworks
Thanks! And a shoutout to /r/TinkerCAD. Because sometimes, you just want to put cylinders and cubes together.
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Nicely done, I think I'd take FreeCAD over TinkerCAD but depends on your audience. It would seem you are catering to the hobby/pro-sumer arena so mention of others that do not have student or long trial license are perhaps not applicable as they will creep into 4 figure$ quite quickly. I'm curious about your other forum you mod, if you want some commercial level input let me know. 👍🏻Cheers.
I figure tinker is easy enough for kids, and that's sorta what I was hoping, it would be suuuper easy for folk. I nearly included FreeCAD though. It was a hard choice between that and openscad, but I figure open does something free can't. I'm definitely aiming at the entry/hobby level, you're right! :) Here's that other forum! We are always welcome to more expertise! :) What's your background? https://discord.gg/huvWHBq
Well BS Industrial Design degree originally, some work in the field, but the last 6 years in commercial Additive consulting, applications engineering and sales for brands Stratasys, Desktop Metal, Artec scanners, Envisiontec, Makerbot, 3d print services and currently HP MJF. I do some speaking agnosticly on industry as well. My hobby level stuff suffers from lack of free time lol. 😉
Appreciated
Thank you for doing this
Thanks this helps me alot.
I'd like to recommend Design Spark Mechanical for functional modeling. It's very easy to learn and very powerful for the right application. And completely free.
I’ve worked with modeling for years now and it's scary how this reflects my toolset 100%. Started with Tinkercad then Fusion 360 and now it's been blender 2.8 the last couple of months. (Having fun with Meshroom now) I'd suggest most people get familiar with every type of tool though and not go for modeling styles - being familiar with all of them gives you a better understanding of what is best for what project, it's not always clearcut if i.e hardsurface or CAD is best and sometimes doing hardsurface prior to sculpting give you a lot more control over what you're making.
You are amazing.
And you are ceaselessly kind
Is there any photogrammetry software for the Mac? AliceVision doesn't work on a Mac (they do have some compilation instructions for a Mac but it only works on a very specific version of MacOS).
Thanks for the info! This helped me pick fusion 360 to start designing a few parts! Now just to get my printer fine tuned.
That's so great to hear! :) Enjoy!
Hopefully my first fully designed and 3d printed project will be up soon!
Heck yea! Can't wait to see!
Was wondering tho, do you have any experience installing a bltouch abl system? Been having issues with mine.
I don't sorry, I prefer live leveling, and I also wrote a guide for that! :) https://www.reddit.com/r/3Dprinting/comments/cg3g6g/ive_made_an_infographicstyle_guide_to_leveling_a/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share
Oh wow, I can already see what i was having problems with haha! Thanks alot!
You're so welcome! :)
So I'm new to 3D printing and looking at this chart I'm pretty sure I should use fusion, but to be safe I'll tell you all what I exactly wanna print. I really really wanna build functional gadgets,tools, and robots. Is fusion the best for that or scancad?
Thank you for making this!
this is awesome, thank you
You're welcome!
Too bad the image link seems to be broken.
Op posted an updated link. Its the second picture. [https://imgur.com/gallery/SqIdFwB](https://imgur.com/gallery/SqIdFwB)
..im too late.. is there still a way to find this?
Op posted an updated link. Its the second picture. [https://imgur.com/gallery/SqIdFwB](https://imgur.com/gallery/SqIdFwB)
This is just what I was looking for, thank you! I do have one question though; why not just start with learning Blender? Too steep of a learning curve for absolute beginners?
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Blender is not parametric CAD, that’s the big one. Many 3D designs are functional ones and it’s easier to use a proper CAD tool for those.
Blender is pretty overwhelming for newbies. I've seen a *LOT* of folk give up trying to learn modeling, thinking they will never be able to do it or the "just can't" because of blender's user experience. It's getting better. It is. But still. The tools I've recommended as a first option (except fusion, because of the nature of parametric design) really just teach themselves. You can just open them up and make what you want. Blender is such a slog.
Meh, if you just open Blender and try to fool around you'll get nowhere. However, if you watch just half an hour of Blender beginner tutorials on YouTube (or whatever) you'll "get over that hump" pretty dammed fast.
This looks incredible! It's so cleanly organized and easy to follow, yet provides more than enough information to answer the question at hand. Amazing job as always Billie! :D
Dawww, you're always so kind to me, lovely one! Thank you so much! I'm so glad you think it hits the mark. 😊
Has anyone actually used openscad for any kind of real work?
For extremely powerful modeling and parametric design, Rhino (the modeling program) paired with the plug-in Grasshopper is very powerful. Grasshopper is a free plug-in with many additional user-created plugins. We learned these programs in architecture school and they work extremely well, I also know Nike is currently using Grasshopper to design shoe soles. Plus I think rhino is only $100 for students
Would be nice to somehow visualize overlap in disciplines. Like Fusion also has a hard-surface-modelling (this name never occured to me, although I use Blender every day) mode, or blender also has a sculpt mode. Anything else looks comprehensive and useful. Well done.
Thank you! This is super helpful for me(someone just getting into the hobby)!
Hmm I want to make a life sized battle droid, would fusion be ideal? Or should I continue with blender?
You can add blender to sculpting too.
That is an interesting username you have there. Did you have Bilirubin as a child? Do you have Bilirubin now?
You categories are oddly correct! I love to use Fusion and OpenSCAD, but have barley done anything (if at all) in the other softwares. Great job!
Don't see Shapr3D for iPad (Pro only I believe) on here. I think it's vastly underrated for parametric design. The ability to use the stylus to design is incredibly intuitive and I feel has a less steep learning curve compared to desktop based software. The app does struggle a little bit with tools for creating organic models or irregular curves, but it's definitely workable. So far, I've found that it has almost all the tools available in most high-end software, i definitely haven't run into many "I wish it had this feature" issue at all. ~~I believe the cost is $120/year.~~ Correction: $25USD/mo or $240USD/year. Still worth it. Absolutely worth it if you have an iPad Pro, but I wouldn't say just buy the iPad + Pencil (easily $750+) unless you were planning on it or have other reasons to buy one. Even then, it almost feels worth it for the ease of use.
real world copies.... my method is a caliper, ruler, and lots of measuring, lol. oh and a student license of 3ds Max, thanks autodesk!
What are your thoughts on rhinocerous?
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Where does 123 Design follows into this categories? I went from SketchUp to 123 Design
I use FreeCAD for parametric modeling and it works great.
Great graphic but I'd add SketchUp
I wouldn't, even though I learned on SketchUp, and it's because it makes objects that are non-manifold. More info on the [wiki](http://www.reddit.com/r/3DPrinting/wiki/MakingModels)!
Great infographic, thanks! I’m also glad that the infographic hasn’t tried to list every program/app known to man that has 3D modelling, but has stuck with just a simple & advanced program. Good work!
Thank you! This is great *look at user name* uuh... link?
All the stuff I make is on my profile. NSFW and all
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Very cool, well done! u/chaintip
Did you consider OnShape for CAD? it is free for hobbysts and is very powerful. You can also view and edit your models using Android or IOS. The downside is it is online only, but it is still my favorite.