Outsourcing CAD Services

With a Jobs-less MacWorld now underway, we are reminded of two things: how much we yearn for the sweet, clean surfaces and brilliant interfaces of Apple's progeny; and how the need to do serious 3D CAD keeps them away from us. Unless you pursue the solution of one studio we saw, and keep both a Mac and a PC on every desk, the 3D modelers among you have probably gotten resigned to an unfair bargain: use Parallels to run your CAD in a half-assed way on your sexy Mac, or proclaim "I'm a PC" whether you like it or not.

Developers of 3D CAD packages have been listening, though, and while not nearly to the level of their PC-based counterparts, a number of options exist for Mac-native modeling. Here's a quick rundown of what's out there now (along with some general impressions based on what little we've seen), and what's on its way:

Form Z - Self-described as a "general purpose solid and surface modeler," Form Z has a definite entry-level look and feel to it, and most of the sample projects in the gallery bear this out. That said, many of those projects are visualizations rather than production data, and for this application it it seems well-suited, with lots of users praising its flexibility and ease of use.

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