1. Direct modeling when you want it, iterative design when you need it

Let’s cut straight to the chase –  being able to design iteratively without the hassle of recreating designs from scratch was something that many of you have been longing for, and so have we. Fusion 360 was great as a direct modeler (push-pull on the fly), but now it’s even better. With the introduction of the design timeline, you’re not only still able to perform direct modeling, but will also be able to capture key commands in a historical, dynamic, and editable timeline. 

Begin a design by bringing in a reference image, starting with a sculpt body, or start modeling with solid primitives. The timeline will be capturing your commands as you progress; yet direct manipulations such as edit form and patch commands are not captured (because they’re direct of course). If you get to a point where you need to go back and change dimensions or the form of your previous body, this is where the timeline becomes massively useful. No longer do you have to remake all the mechanical features you’ve spent so much time on. 

If it is the original sculpt body you want to modify, right click on the body creation instance and select edit to make the changes you need, and your design as a whole will update and adapt to your changes. 

2. Better ways to manage your projects

We’ve also introduced a completely revamped version of the dashboard of what it should have been all along. For those that work in a collaborative team, you no longer have to switch from hub to hub; they are now all organized in your Projects section, and activities in those projects all show up in your activity stream. All your designs are stored securely in the cloud, and are accessible wherever you have an internet connection. 

Opening a design is faster, you no longer have go into the details of a design to start editing. And when you do go into the details of your design, you can see nifty previews of your design rendered by our Rendering as a Service (RaaS) technology, It also allowing you to put your design in various background environments and set custom resolutions for direct download. 

3. Commands that allow you to do more

We’ve also implemented a bunch of new commands that you can now use as part of your arsenal of powerful tools. You now can input text as a sketch, which will then be selectable for all profile-consuming commands such as extrude, revolve, etc. A new joint command called As-Built Joint has been introduced to give you the option of joining two components based on their current location, and not their snap points. This will allow you to join components at exactly where you want them to be joined at.

For our current users of previous version of Fusion 360, you’ll now find all your Sculpt commands and Patch commands under the Create Form or Create BaseFeature option in the Create dropdown menu. Once you’re satisfied with your design, finish the form or basefeature and move on to designing mechanical features. 

One of our favorite new commands is the Sculpt pipe command; it will allow you to define a T-Spline body based on a set of sketch elements or T-Spline edges. Paul made a really nice video explaining how it works.

Other usability improvements such as Lock grid, component drag, Isolate symmetry, and converting Mesh bodies to BRep (solid) bodies have also made the cut, and are at your fingertips. There are many other features that are worth mentioning but would make this too long, so make sure to check out the full list of what’s new here.

The learning goes on

Along with this update, our learning page has also gotten a quick refresh with a new getting started guide and tutorials. We have also uploaded a couple new videos, one with Charles walking me through how he designed the new utility knife sample file from beginning to end. I highly encourage you to watch it, since it’ll give you a much better idea of how to everything works together.  

Garin on a conference call, learning about stuff…looks like he’s enjoying it!

Fusion 360 has come a long way from its early days in Autodesk Labs to today as a real product. The development of the tool has always been a community effort from the very beginning; together, we have co-created something truly extraordinary.

Thank you, and as always, keep designing differently. 

Keqing and the Fusion 360 Team