It’s hard to believe that it’s nearly been a month since we were lucky enough to attend SOLIDWORKS World 2018, out in sunny Los Angeles!

A particular highlight for us was seeing an SSG customer, Gilo Industries, make waves on the main stage. Founder Gilo Cardoza introduced the Mako Slingshot: a lightweight, motorized surfboard. With its 12-horsepower engine, the Mako is able to reach 35 mph in an impressive 2.8 seconds! Cardoza explained that, thanks to SOLIDWORKS, the company was able to move from their initial design stage through to the completed product in just 12 months. 

Speakers – who stood out?

As expected, there were a number of exciting speakers who graced the stage during the three-day conference. Some speakers that particularly stood out to us include:

Brent Bushnell, CEO of Two Bit Circus 

Their most recent project is STEAM Carnival, “a travelling showcase of high-tech entertainment and workshops to inspire invention”.

Joe Hiura and Robert Andrew Johnson, Art Directors and Set Designers from the Film Industry

With an impressive credit list between them - including blockbusters such as Avatar (2009), Passengers (2016) and Marvel’s latest success: Black Panther (2018) - Hiura and Johnson shared how they utilise SOLIDWORKS on the silver screen.

Kyoungchul Kong, CEO of SG Robotics and Professor at Sogang University

Kong shared the development story of two  inspirational projects: ‘WalkON Suit’, which is a wearable robot designed to be worn by people whose legs are paralyzed and ‘ANGELEGS’, which is designed to aid people with partial walking difficulties. 

Ring Brothers, Custom Car Designers

Ring Brothers showcased the outcome of their latest project where they scanned the front of a car into SOLIDWORKS, resulting in the restoration of this 1972 1000+bhp AMC Javelin – impressive stuff!

Featured Tips and Tricks:

During the conference we picked up some handy Tips and Tricks which we believe are worth noting: 

3D Texturize Body

The 3D Texturized Body tool allows you to create geometry from appearances, quickly. The image below illustrates a knurled surface, which could previously be displayed in renders but would often be difficult to actually model. The introduction of this tool will allow users to quickly create geometry from any image, meaning embossing something like a logo will now be quickly achievable.   

Eternal Reference UI improvements

External references have received a new user interface and can be controlled more precisely; this will help to simplify the process when working within context parts. 

To do this, highlight and break/ lock references on a feature-by-feature basis. Then, isolate components with external references. You are then able to break or lock external reference from the feature manager using the dynamic references tool.

Gesture Sketch Splines