Got this email from Autodesk that Fusion is increasing their annual price by a huge amount. I subbed for 1 year a couple years ago for I think $380. Then I was able to get an educational sub after that. Fusion is still the cheapest CAD software out there, not including the free stuff like FreeCAD, but still, this price increase is massive.
It should be noted that it’s still free to use for personal use minus the extra features.
It’s one of the biggest problems of the whole 3d printing ecosystem that so many people are relying on software like fusion or tinkercad that could shut down, lose its free option, and see massive price increases on subscription software.
I wish I could wrap my head around freecad, but we’re just not there yet and we may never be. I feel like it or something like it must be our future because until we have a full libre software chain we’re living on borrowed time.
May I ask why it is that you say this?
I also have this question. What is so different about the workflow between FreeCAD and other 3D CAD software? If you can do one, you can do the others.
FreeCAD is a strange mix of over-designed and unfinished.
There’s like three different workflows for doing parametric CAD, plus a drafting workflow for an AutoCAD architectural experience, plus workbenches for meshes, NURBS, etc. Occasionally a tool you need will be in another workbench. There is no official assembly workbench included. It’s not exactly obvious how workbenches work together. A lot of shortcuts which have become Just How You Do Things in other CAD software aren’t present, so you have to do things an awkward long way. Add-ons and macros can help…but are poorly documented if at all.
The learning curve is steeper mostly due to tools not having as intuitive names and ui layout.
I dove into fusion 360 last year and was making functional and nice parts within the first couple of hours. Since moving to Linux I’ve tried freecad and while I can eventually find the tools that do the same things, it is less intuitive to get there.
Additionally, when I run into a roadblock in fusion 360, I can usually find quick and easy explanations or tutorials for it, and just have not had the same luck with freecad. I can usually get the hurdle crossed with the tutorials but I find I have to look up the same stuff often as it doesn’t stick.
This is all nebulous as all hell, I admit. And I can vaguely tell that it does all the same things similarly to fusion 360, but it’s just different and obscured enough that I feel useless and obtuse using it and spend more time searching for tutorials and answers than I do designing.
I want to learn it. I want to use it. But I still find myself in fusion 360 when I need to get a part designed sooner rather than later - it took less effort and faffing around to get fusion 360 working in proton ge than getting to a stable point using freecad.
Uhm, what about Blender?
blender can be used as cad software, but for any practical application, you want parametric design.
Blender is not designed as a CAD software. It is for 3d modeling. So you would use Blender to make graphics for a video game, or a 3d movie.
CAD is more for designing things to be made outside of a computer, so 3d printing, CNC or stuff like that.
Blender doesn’t consider the object as a whole, and can leave holes that a CAD setup would handle.
You can still use blender though if you know how to model in it already. Just don’t leave holes and you will be fine. I use that for a lot of 3d prints I make just because I am already comfortable with it.