It was still expensive and had its flaws, such as warping of materials during printing. That same year another machine came out with its own version which used powder instead of liquid and was dubbed as SLS for selective laser sintering.Īt this point in the history of 3D modeling, all this was very new and companies were only realizing the potential of such technology.
It gets hit with a UV laser to turn it into solid plastic. This SLA machine used an acrylic-based material named photopolymer. It was thought up in 1984 although the first machine that utilized it came out in 1992. These industries were also helped by the introduction of IGES, a vendor neutral file format, letting users transfer 3D design between different CAD software.Ī separate part of the history of 3D modeling is the invention of SLA or stereolithography, the production parts in a layer by layer fashion. But they were not dominating the market for long because commercial CAD systems were showing up in aerospace, automotive, and other industries throughout the rest of the decade. It was the first significant CAD program in the history of 3D modeling for the IBM PC, as it offered almost as much functionality of other CAD programs to date but at 20% of their cost. Later, In 1983, the 2D system AutoCAD was released.
Solid 3D modeling then developed and became mainstream with the development of software such as Unigraphics’ UniSolids CAD. This was also boosted by the introduction of the UNIX workstations which were cheaper, highly productive and required less maintenance.
The introduction of the first IBM PC in 1981 caused a widespread use of CAD in not only aerospace and automotive industries but also in commercial engineering businesses. He shared the details with his fellow researchers who immediately started to use the teapot too. He found the 3D teapot model ideal for testing because of its structure, variety of surfaces it possessed and the item’s ability to cast shadows on itself. It appeared in history as the symbol for 3D computer graphics after it was used by Martin Newell to test his graphical research. Gouraud and Phong discovered techniques for shading at the University of Utah which sped up processing by simplifying the original algorithms for rendering and delivered better visual results in light, reflection and shading.Īn item of interest was the Utah teapot model. While companies such as MAGI, who introduced solid 3D modeling, were creating new demand for CAD, universities were hard at work to advance the history of 3D modeling and discover newer and more efficient technologies to visualize 3D models. ADAM was designed to work on as many machines as possible, thus creating a huge spike in the availability of CAD which continued as computers and software grew more sophisticated. ADAM, a CAD system released in 1971, was one of those. Their appearance and success in the market inspired others to start up their own companies and work on developing the technology.Īt this point in the history of 3D modeling, new companies began to offer automated design and drafting systems. They started the company to produce hardware to run the systems that were being developed but were soon also developing software. It demonstrated that computer design visualization can cut down workloads which would’ve taken forever if the drawing boards were used.Īt the end of the decade, in 1968, Ivan Sutherland and David Evans founded the first 3D graphics company, “Evans & Sutherland”. In the same year, the General Motors and IBM partnership created the DAC-1, Design Augmented by Computer, which was publicly presented in 1964 and used by General Motors for the rest of the decade to speed up their car production workflow. Sketchpad established that computers can be used not only for engineering or repetitive drafting but interactively by Designers and potentially Artists. The biggest breakthrough came from Ivan Sutherland who introduced Sketchpad, also known as “Robot Draftsman,” in 1963 with its revolutionary interface. The first advancements in the history of 3D modeling came when the first commercially available CAD or Computer Aided Design systems started coming out in the 1960s.