5 ms·
Cartesian – AI 3D Modeling for Design
- leetrout 20d agoIs the site owners are here: that background and scroll effect is terrible.
- jonwinstanley 20d agoCame to the comments to say something similar.
- mcluck 20d agoI usually kind of roll my eyes when people complain about visual effects on a website but I wholeheartedly agree. It makes it very difficult to read
- dofm 20d agoIndeed — I try to stay away from website design critique here and it's against a rule, but that dot field makes it actually impossible for me to read, especially given the low text contrast and small fonts on the body text.
- yieldcrv 20d agoadding representation to the silent non-bothered audience, I like the scroll effect here and don't find it terrible
- virtualritz 20d ago"Architecture and product design" but no STEP/IGES/BRep output, just triangles?
- dofm 20d agoActually this appears to output 3DM, which is the CAD format Rhinoceros 3D uses, and is based on openNURBs. The typically tiny Claude (?) text (such as I can read it) makes it clear it's not just a mesh format, mentions faces and edges. On that basis it is a step up from the usual AI CAD silliness.
- fsloth 20d ago"no STEP/IGES/BRep output" SketchUp does not really have that either if you are expecting something else than triangles. Since sketchup has polygons you could argue they are brep but even then only accidentally. Architecture works with a bit different ruleset than mechanical cad.
- throwitaway222 20d agoI've been using Astra to just create things in Blender. It's great. Kill the scroll jacking. It's a sign you're on Windows.
- s-macke 20d agoExactly. I just give Astra an image such as furniture, and it creates an 3D reproduction in Blender. You don’t even need computer use. Codex and Blender’s scripting engine is enough.
- tayo42 20d agoCan you do this with the 20 dollar plan?
- raincole 20d agoYes, but it eats your 5-hour quota really quick.
- s-macke 20d agoI have an example here. Took 3 hours with Pro Plan. https://simulationcorner.net/chair/chair-evolution.gif https://simulationcorner.net/chair/chair-evolution.gif
- CamperBob2 20d agoThat's cool as hell.
- jrflo 20d agoCAD is a different beast than mesh modeling. For product design you need a parametric model that can have precise dimensions and is constructed mathematically step by step. Mesh modeling is just moving a pile of triangles around in a very imprecise way. Works fine for 3D printing or digital assets, but if you want something that can be manufactured that's not good enough. And there isn't a good way to go from STL -> Parametric CAD so there's still room for a product here.
- atonse 20d agoI'm so excited about this sort of stuff. ForgeCAD [1] for me was the first mind-blowing application of this a few months ago, where I'm able to just have claude (or codex) write JS that creates 3D Models that I can then print in my 3D printer. - Built a ring for my compost bin that can properly hold down the plastic bag. This was originally a multi week project because I was also learning Fusion 360 in small 2 hour chunks over many weekends, then with ForgeCAD I had a good prototype in 60 mins with multiple iterations. - I also built a cover for my overheating Logitech Circle doorbell, snapped a photo, gave it to claude, and claude found all the dimensions on Logitech's website, and then we iterated with 3-4 prints until we had it just right. This is a whole new set of workflows that are unleashed with agents, even for hobbyists. 1: https://forgecad.io https://forgecad.io
- akozak 20d ago[dead]
- soundworlds 20d agoYeah I was skeptical about AI until I learned (through hands on testing) that an AI can fail 9 times and get it right on the 10th time - in like 1/10th of the time it takes a human to get it right. It's all in the iteration.
- Xelynega 20d agoAre those not the exact same workflows, just replacing "I spent time learning" with claude? I find that if you don't skip the learning step, you can then use the tool more efficiently(e.x. you learn to measure twice and verify so you can iterate in 1-2 prints instead of 3-4)
- atonse 18d agoI am not averse to learning (I spent hours learning Sketchup many years ago when redesigning my garage). But the time freed up not learning Fusion360 freed up time to learn about different kinds of fasteners, clasps, how to arrange magnets, etc, so I moved the learning to a different place. Plus avoiding the "wife is angry cuz this project I over-engineered has gone on for weeks unsolved" factor is always a nice bonus.
- dreamerworkz 20d agoI love the web design though! Formas.ai has been doing great work in the visualization space, and it’s great watching them tackle 3D via the very apt name Cartesian. Defo support what they are doing. Maybe I can finally sleep better too!
- IChooseY0u 20d agoLooking at a bunch of these: I don't think they are even manufacturable. This is something you would use in a video game.
- FLeXMurphy 20d agoYou are right to push back on that.
- ur-whale 20d ago> This is something you would use in a video game. You say it like it's a bad thing.
- jdiff 20d agoThey're saying it as if it were contrary to what's being claimed. The tagline says "for architecture and product design." The supported file formats are not video game formats.
- raincole 20d agoIt is when the tool's tagline is literally: > an AI 3D modeling tool for architecture and product design.
- fofoz 20d agoThese products are still in their early stages, but it is clear that the AI wave is reaching 3D modeling as well. It will impact mechanical and civil engineering just as it has impacted software development.
- tadasv 20d ago3d modeling for use in software (games or similar) imo is fine, but I would love to not see this stuff in civil engineering. People without AI are unable to design buildings that don't collapse (e.g. recent NYC apartment highrise), adding AI into the mix will just make things worse.
- yieldcrv 20d agohastily adding AI in into the mix will make things worse its good to be skeptical, better to spur competition and address any limitations to competition functioning quickly
- fragmede 20d agoWhy do you presume it will make it worse instead of better? Humans, as you point out, could not manage to competently review buildings that don't collapse. Why would adding an additional level of checks (human or AI) do worse than not adding one?
- tayo42 20d agoAi isn't being used to make competent people better but tries to give supposed expertise to people who don't have skill in that area.
- jrflo 20d agoI don't think so. As a mechanical engineer, CAD is only half of the design process. The other half is actually building and assembling your design and testing/debugging what you've created. You still need the mechanical knowledge and intuition to take something in the physical world, figure out why it doesn't work, and apply that to the CAD design to improve it. It would be incredible to have AI help me model faster, but there's no validation loop like there is with software, so you can't have an agent run wild and endlessly iterate.
- aitoolcrux 20d ago[flagged]
- deleted 20d ago[deleted]
- ricardobeat 20d agoI've just started working on 3D modeling software of my own, though this looks to be far ahead. Mostly focused on 3D printing - creating printable models is pretty expensive and tedious at the moment, and fully native. [1] https://tomasimodeler.com https://tomasimodeler.com (pardon the AI-slop, it's just a placeholder)
- idid 20d agoI love to see more of these tools build on rhino's kernel. Arguably the best modelling (parametric, manual, or SDK) ergonomics when it comes to, from my experience, early stage aec workflows. A similar tool launched recently [0] that i found interesting. I'm also biased as it's my first and only true love when it comes to "coding things" for the built environment. My take was that designing buildings was always the cheap part, and not core to what moves the needle in AEC (architecture, engineering, construction) [0] https://illoca.com/ https://illoca.com/ , not affiliated
- Foobar8568 20d agoConsidering the ability of men to aim in urinals, Cornucopia is really one of the worst idea.
- JonathanCross 20d ago[dead]
- kemuri 20d agoThe moving dotted background makes it impossible to read anything..
- dmkolobov 20d agoThe video game applications are truly pretty cool ... though I don't know who would admit to using such a tool in the current environment. Some of the other things like the `Residential`, `Structure and Complex Shape`, and `Large Scale` seem like they'd need review by engineers to be useful in real world scenarios? Do architects just sketch whatever looks good as a first pass?
- Ciantic 20d agoGPT-6 Astra with computer use has gotten some of architects and 3d modelers wondering what their future is. Astra does such a good work with SketchUp 2026 and computer use, here is video, but it is well worth it because the author actually knows his stuff: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E-ECbD14g_8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E-ECbD14g_8
- matthew-wegner 20d ago"What you keep is never redrawn. What clashes is said out loud."
- nekooooo 20d agoi can't even read the website because you're animating the background, why would i trust you with architecture?
- lastlife 20d agoMinecraft style designs work but complexed geometry yields presentation quality in a triangular hell, which is and has been the problem with all Ai CAD since day 1. What Ai is good at in CAD is finding applicable formulas but anything functioning in a civil space is a nightmare on wax. There's not even enough correct Ai in sensory to make it reliable for self-driving cars and now they want to make the car itself with Ai? I guess in for a penny...
- YuechenLi 20d agoI keep seeing people in this thread lamenting that "There is no good way for LLMs to design/generate parametric STEP models yet", while I've spent the past 6 months working on this exact problem. So, yesterday, I've had Astra build a moving assembly of Babbage's difference engine with it with 400+ parts and real parametric geometry, and you can also download the full STEP model assembly there. https://aetheris-difference-engine-showcase.yuechenli.workers.dev/ https://aetheris-difference-engine-showcase.yuechenli.worker... And here's a STEP file that I've had GPT reconstruct of a popular phone with exact parametric dimensions just from the 2D drawing, took like an hour: https://github.com/yuechen-li-dev/Aetheris/blob/master/samples/reconstruction/phone-reconstruction.step https://github.com/yuechen-li-dev/Aetheris/blob/master/sampl... Completely free and open source, you can use your own Claude/Codex to start vibe-coding and generate perfect STEP file right now. So, no, it's not a matter of time on "when can AI do CAD", we are already here. Sorry if I sound a little frustrated and a bit too self-promotion-y, but I just really want people who says "I wish this capability exists sometimes in the future" to know that it already does, and you can use it right now, for free.
- lukevp 20d agothis difference engine model has a lot of obvious flaws - the gears do not mesh with each other, the teeth directly overlap. the notches that are supposed to articulate to ratchet aren't actually engaging the teeth on the ratchet. the ratcheting mechanisms on the right are straight up just hovering in the air and are not attached to anything. that's probably what people are talking about when they say it can't do CAD?
- YuechenLi 20d agoComplex assembly mating is hard to do even in SolidWorks. It's a demonstration model to explain how it works, not a kinematic simulation, turning three.js into a physics engine is beyond the scope of this project.
- WillAdams 20d agoIs making parts which actually fit in scope? Because that was what was being criticized, and that seems to be where your project is failing.
- maouida 20d agoFrom my experience trying to build parametric CAD modeling using FluidCAD [1] using its MCP, the biggest breakthrough is ASTRA. It seems to work well actually with any CAD if it has ways to verify its output. No otjer models was able to match its accuracy even Fable. [1] https://fluidcad.io https://fluidcad.io
- Gravityloss 20d agoThese all seem backwards. I like to think in shapes. I like to draw and sketch, as that has the lowest barriers between the mental concepts and physical ones. I do not like to use cad software. It is painful to express ideas with it. Also same for all kinds of drawing software. It's just very cumbersome. I hate explaining spatial or shape concepts to people with words. I hate having them explained to me in words. A photographer doesn't explain his work, he shows photos he has taken. Adrian Newey used to work with pen and paper while others had been using CAD for a long time, and won F1 championships. Can we now make the computers less clunky and less about typing or hunting with the mouse. We want low friction to express ideas. This seems the opposite. You're not expressing your idea, you're asking for the computer's idea.
- lateatdesk 20d agoCouldn't agree more. The first thing we get ends up setting the direction before we've even figured out what we want.
- amelius 20d agoCan it work from technical drawings? Like, I give it a datasheet containing a number of projections and the tool produces a correct model with the proper dimensions?
- YuechenLi 20d agoYou can already do that with GPT Astra. Having LLMs use UI manually is very expensive on the token side though.
- amelius 20d agoWhat is the success rate?
- YuechenLi 20d agoVery high with the correct tooling. Vision tends to be the worst reasoning mode for LLMs compared to code, which is why I rely on a code-first approach for my own software stack. Essentially, they need to have a way to keep part of the drawing in focus to avoid getting distracted by the dimensions they don't need in their vision. https://github.com/yuechen-li-dev/Aetheris/blob/master/samples/reconstruction/phone-reconstruction.step https://github.com/yuechen-li-dev/Aetheris/blob/master/sampl... The initial dimensions of this phone were one-shot by Codex Astra from the publicly available 2D drawing, and we spent another turn implementing the G2 continuous fillet blend surface for that particular camera bump. If you have a STEP viewer, you can check the dimensions against that phone company's drawings which was posted on HN with their other products yesterday I think, and all of them should match exactly down to the drawing tolerances.
- ponyous 20d agoIt really depends on the complexity of the model you are trying to generate and the budget you have.
- kjjohnsen 20d agoWas there a product demo in here somewhere that I missed? This seems like a wish list, not reality.
- JonnierMartinez 20d ago[dead]
- brookst 20d agoShameless plug for Cordyceps, my MCP server for rhino / grasshopper. Works great, I’m building molds and props and all sorts of stuff: https://github.com/brookstalley/cordyceps https://github.com/brookstalley/cordyceps
- dreamerworkz 20d agoWow this is some advanced stuff re: Cartesian by Formas.ai folks. I downloaded their STL and 3DM, the definition and fidelity is just wow. Looks like lots of hard work to get here. Super keen to follow this. Giving creds where creds deserve!! If formas is reading this, kudos and great work!!
- mpalmer 20d agoYours stays yours. What you keep is never redrawn. What clashes is said out loud. It understands. What you mean, how things relate, what must not move. Pure uncut nonsense
- MrSkelter 17d agoBeing able to draw what you can describe, or steal from prior art, isn’t a solution to real world challenges. The hard part is coming up with novel design solutions. On top of this good design requires control of every line and curve (G2, G3, radius?) The things these tools do for you and don’t allow you to easily control ruin their work. If you do manually edit the output for precision they aren’t actually providing any value. They are the drafting equivalent of clip art.