LD Assistant 2010 - Better Predict What Your Event Will Look Like -

A realistic rendering of a model can give a production team or prospective client a clearer vision of a conceptual design than a plotted drawing. Most drafting time is spent working on line representations of a model. On occasion, however, you might need to see a more realistic image involving color and perspective—for example, when verifying your design or when presenting a final design.

LD Assistant's advanced rendering tools produce highly detailed and photorealistic images.
   
Ray-traced Reflections and Refractions: Ray tracing traces the path of rays sampled from the light source. Reflections and refractions generated this way are physically accurate.
    
Benefits of LD Assistant's Indirect Illumination: Indirect illumination techniques, like global illumination and final gathering, enhance the realism of a scene by simulating radiosity, or the interreflection of light in a scene.
    
Final Gathering: Final gathering is an optional, additional step used to improve global illumination (GI). It increases the number of rays used to calculate GI to smooth out and eliminate adverse lighting artifacts.


LD Assistant is the only Entertainment Lighting and Event Planning CAD program that's 100% AutoCAD DWG

December 2010 Featured News

• Autodesk 3ds Max News
Web-Based Rendering for 3ds Max On the Way - allowing 3ds Max users to tap into reality server, mental images' cloud-hosted rendering platform powered by Tesla GPUs, rendering faster, Keneth Wong's Virtual Desktop - The CPU and GPU in your workstation may be top of the line, but they cannot possibly compete with a cluster comprising 32 NVIDIA Tesla GPUs. So what if you can dial up (so to speak) the rendering horsepower of that cluster, or some other remote cluster with far more cores than your own machine?


• LD Assistant 2010 Photometric Lights
For more precise control over lighting, you can use photometric lights to illuminate your model. Photometric lights use photometric (light energy) values that enable you to define lights more accurately as they would be in the real world. You can create lights with various distribution and color characteristics, or import specific photometric files available from lighting manufacturers.

Photometric lights can use manufacturers' IES standard file format. By using manufacturers’ lighting data, you can visualize commercially available lighting in your model. Then you can experiment with different fixtures, and by varying the light intensity and color temperature, you can design a lighting system that produces the results you want.





• Protect Your Drawings - You can collaborate on design projects using passwords and digital signatures in LD Assistant 2010. When a drawing has a password, it cannot be viewed until the password is entered. When a drawing is signed, the signature identifies an individual or an organization through a digital ID (certificate).
      
You can provide a safe environment for sending and receiving data, and maintain the authenticity of drawings. A password protects a drawing with encryption, and a digital signature identifies an individual or an organization through a digital ID (certificate).
      
• Encryption Password-based encryption helps secure drawing data when you collaborate on projects. Specifically, when you maintain a password for a drawing, you can help prevent unauthorized viewing of the drawing when it is sent to others.
• Protect Drawings with Encryption If you add a password to a drawing and save the drawing, the drawing is encrypted and cannot be reopened until the password is entered.
• View Password-Protected Drawings To view the data in a password-protected drawing, you must first obtain and enter the password. After you enter the password, it stays with the drawing, even if you modify and save the drawing, unless you remove the password.

LD Assistant 2010 Below are a few of the LDA commands found in Help (F1)

3A 3DARRAY
3DO 3DORBIT
3P 3DPOLY
A ARC
AA AREA
AL ALIGN
AR ARRAY
B BLOCK
BR BREAK
C CIRCLE
CH PROPERTIES
CHA CHAMFER
CO COPY
D DIMSTYLE
DED DIMEDIT
DI DIST
DIV DIVIDE
DLI DIMLINEAR
DST DIMSTYLE
DT TEXT
DV DVIEW
E ERASE
EL ELLIPSE
EX EXTEND
EXIT QUIT
EXP EXPORT
EXT EXTRUDE
F FILLET
FI FILTER
G GROUP
HI HIDE
I INSERT
L LINE
LA LAYER
LEN LENGTHEN
LI LIST
LT LINETYPE
LTS LTSCALE
LW LWEIGHT
M MOVE
ME MEASURE
MI MIRROR
ML MLINE
MO PROPERTIES
MS MSPACE
MT MTEXT
MV MVIEW
O OFFSET
OP OPTIONS
ORBIT 3DORBIT
OS OSNAP
P PAN
PE PEDIT
PL PLINE
PO POINT
POL POLYGON
R REDRAW
RA REDRAWALL
RE REGEN
REA REGENALL
REC RECTANG
REG REGION
REN RENAME
REV REVOLVE
RO ROTATE
RPR RPREF
RR RENDER

December 2010 Articles

• I (Still) Don't Get What's Great about Macs - Windows 7 better than OS X in many small details, limitations Apple imposes on its hardware/software, Android makes more sense, WorldCAD Access.
• AutoCAD for Mac Available - AutoCAD for Mac has an intuitive interface that will feel familiar to Mac users and takes full advantage of Mac OS X, including graphical browsing of design files with Cover Flow and use of Multi-Touch gestures for pan and zoom on Mac notebooks, Magic Mouse and Magic Trackpad. Autodesk is making a free* 30-day trial of AutoCAD for Mac available for download and will offer free* educational licenses to students and educators.
• CAD Manager's Survey 2010 - CAD managers working, employment arrangements, insurance benefits, demographics, Robert Green, Cadalyst.
• Using OFFSET Command - creating instances of object offset by distance in AutoCAD, command options, OFFSETGAPTYPE system variable, Orhan Toker, Daily AutoCAD.
• About AutoCAD for Mac, Linux, Clouds and Competitors - Miikka Arala, EMEA Industry and Marketing Development Manager at Autodesk on project Twitch, 3D parameterization, AutoCAD for Linux, Isicad.
• Get a 3D View with the VPOINT Command - displaying current view's vector information in AutoCAD, displaying model in 3D, Orhan Toker, Daily AutoCAD.
• Get Plugged In - the AutoCAD WS Plugin - installing plug in version required, online tab added to AutoCAD interface, auto-sync function, managing uploads, sharing drawing, Iris Shoor, AutoCAD WS Blog.
• 4 Viewport Tips: Configurations, Irregular, Clip, and Scale - using viewport configurations in AutoCAD, viewport spacing, creating irregular viewports, converting a viewport to other viewport shape, scaling by choosing from scale list, Edwin Prakoso, CAD Notes.
• AutoCAD WS Plugin for AutoCAD, a Quick Test - uploading files directly from AutoCAD without opening browser, permission settings, drawing file security, Edwin Prakoso, CAD Notes.
• MIRRTEXT System Variable Let's You Configure Text Mirroring - MIRROR command in AutoCAD, changing MIRRTEXT command variable to 1, Daily AutoCAD.
• AutoCAD for Windows on Mac 3D Graphics Performance - using BootCamp is better than running on OSX, Deelip Menzes, Deelip.com
• PDF to DWG...DWF to DWG...Hack - exporting PDF to DWG using Adobe Illustrator, opening DWF in Autodesk Design Review, PDF using Acrobat writer, David Light, HOK BIM Solutions.
• How to Hide Some Parts of Blocks - using wipeout in AutoCAD, CLIP/XCLIP, choosing block to clip, new boundary, inverting/modifying, XCLIPFRAME variable, Edwin Prakoso, CAD Notes.
• Create and Edit 2D Objects - AutoCAD for Mac, using mouse/tools in user interface/prompts, YouTube
• Use Gestures to Navigate a Drawing - AutoCAD on Mac, gestures for trackpad/Magic Mouse, YouTube
• What's Missing from AutoCAD MAC? - list of missing key features, Brian Benton, CAD-a-Blog
• Autodesk Updates Photo Scene Editor, Project Photofly - Although it's only been a short while since the last Project Photofly update, Autodesk released another update yesterday. Recall that Project Photofly is a technology preview of service for creating 3D scenes from photographs. The Photo Scene Editor is an application that you use on your computer to upload the photographs and work with the photo scenes returned by the service.
• McAfee and Autodesk Products Performance Issues and Solution - steps to reduce impact of anti-virus software on Autodesk product performance, JTB World - ISSUE You are experiencing performance issues with Autodesk products on systems where McAfee anti-virus software is installed and active. These performance issues may include sluggish response times within the product and slow refresh of the UI.


HOW TO...
• Aligning Text Using Quick Properties Window - Daily AutoCAD by Orhan Toker
• How To Attach Lines Onto POLYLINE Objects - Daily AutoCAD by Orhan Toker
• How to Create Backwards Text In AutoCAD - Daily AutoCAD by Orhan Toker
• Copying All Layers From One Drawing To Another - Daily AutoCAD by Orhan Toker
• How To Plot Multiple LAYOUTs at the Same Time - Daily AutoCAD by Orhan Toker
• How to Maximize Your Workspace? - Daily AutoCAD by Orhan Toker

December 2010 Reviews

• Dell Precicion M4500 Mobile Workstation


Starting at $1,449.00
To build your mobile workstation.
Contact: Clifton Poff
Direct line: 512-513-0237
Email: Clifton_poff {at} dell.com


Maximized Performance
Working on the go has never been so powerful and productive. A robust mobile workstation, the Dell Precision M4500 features: Advanced 3D graphics featuring NVIDIA® Quadro® FX 1800M graphics engine with 1GB of dedicated graphics memory for demanding tasks such as computer-aided design (CAD) manipulation. Pick from Intel® Core i7 740QM, 840QM or the Core i7 Quad Extreme Edition processors for number crunching performance. 15.6" high resolution displays, including the 100 percent Adobe® Color Gamuts RGB LED Display. Choice of 32-bit and 64-bit operating systems makes a trus mobile workstation.

Recommend for LD Assistant.

• Intel® Core™ i7-840QM Quad Core 1.86GHz 8MB
• NVIDIA® Quadro FX 1800M Graphics with 1GB dedicated memory
• 4.0GB, DDR3-1333MHz SDRAM, 2 DIMMS for 32 bit Win 7
• 8.0GB, DDR3-1333MHz SDRAM, 2 DIMMS for 64 bit Win 7
• 15.6" Full HD (1920 x 1080) Wide View Anti-Glare LED Display