TOP 10 Modeling Software For Product Designers
This article aims to introduce the top 10 standard-used model design software through the analysis of its characteristics to help designers have a clearer idea in terms of software selection.
Content
-Solidworks
-Rhino
-Sketchup
-AutoCad
-ABrush
-3Ds Max
-Maya
-CATIA
-AutoDesk Fusion 360
-Inventor
Solidworks is a most widely used modeling software for industrial designers. So what new features will solidworks release in 2023?
- Expand design horizons with simulation
- Expand horizons with Fluid Dynamics
- Expand Horizons with Integrated Manufacturing
- Expand horizons with electromagnetics
Ideal for Industrial product design
Rhino is a commercial 3D computer graphics and computer-aided design application software available for Mircosoft Windows and IOS.
Rhino is mainly parametric modeling, so when you want to model, it is like solving a math problem step by step, but if there is a small gap or no connection, the entire model may have to be overthrown and restarted. This is also a headache for many people. If you have these small problems, you cannot see them after rendering.
Ideal for: Product design, jewelry design, architectural design, ship design, and even multimedia and graphic design.
SketchUp is a 3D modeling software for drawing applications. The new version of SketchUp on the iPad combines Apple Pencil and is a game changer. This is a brand new experience, but with all the familiarity of a regular desktop version. It spiritually changes the overall feeling of everything. It’s like it opens up a low friction way to imagine ideas and draw them on the screen.
SketchUp supports third-party plug-ins. In addition, it also has an online open source library called Warehouse, where you can download all kinds of materials and models you need.
Ideal for architecture, interior, product design, mechanical engineering, film, and game design.
It has been widely used as a desktop application since 1982, Currently, AutoCAD is refining its features for 2D and 3D design, its interaction with the cloud, and its compatibility with other programs, expanding its functionalities.
AutoCAD works with its own native file type called DWG, which contains all the information about the original file’s designs, geometries, and images.
Ideal for architectural design, industrial design, engineering, and graphic design.
05 ZBrush
In ZBrush’s introduction, there is a sentence: ZBrush software is the world’s first 3D design tool that allows artists to feel unconstrained and free to create!
Its emergence completely overturned the working mode of traditional 3D design tools in the past, liberated the hands and thinking of artists, bid farewell to the clumsy creation mode relying on mice and parameters in the past, and fully respected the creative inspiration and traditional work habits of designers.
06 3Ds Max
As a classic of Autodesk’s 3D modeling software, 3Ds Max is very popular in video game development, art, architectural visualization, and industrial design.
Complex particle and light simulation, cloth simulation engine, and its own script design make it an indispensable software in 3D modeling.
We would like to suggest that you can learn this software, but for the functions of animation and engineering, it may take a certain amount of time to learn to be proficient.
07 Maya
Maya is also the top 3D software produced by Autodesk. Compared with 3Ds Max, Maya is more professional, and powerful, and has a strong sense of rendering.
Ideal for film and television advertisements, character animation, film special effects, and other fields.
08 CATIA
CATIA was founded by a French company, it stands for computer-aided 3D interactive applications. It is not just a CAD (Computer Aided Design) software package. It is a complete software suite that combines CAD, CAE (Computer Aided Engineering), and CAM (Computer Aided Manufacturing).
There are generally three tiers of multi-platform applications inside 3D CDA software first, computer-aided manufacturing (CAM) software second, and computer-aided engineering (CAE) software suites second.
Ideal for: Automobile design, shipbuilding, architectural design, and industrial design,
09 Autodesk Fusion 360
Fusion 360 is a very professional 3D modeling software with powerful parametric and analysis network tools, suitable for industrial and architectural design.
Users need to undergo a lot of training to maximize the functions of this software.
10 Inventor
Inventor is a mechanical design solid modeling software developed by AUTODESK.
You will find it easier using autodeskCAD, which is very close to CAD in drawing plane sketches.
Inventor’s surface modeling function is not very strong, but parametric modeling is its strong point, so errors can be avoided to a large extent when modifying the model.
Ideal for: Mechanical design, product simulation testing, sheet metal design, etc.
