With the AU 2015 Call for Proposals opening in just over a week, what better way to show some of the great reasons you should speak at AU than by asking a real live AU speaker and member of the Autodesk Expert Elite, Chris Benner, to give it to us straight. As the CAD department supervisor at Powell Fabrication & Manufacturing in St. Louis, Michigan, Chris knows his stuff. A mechanical designer and drafter for more than 20 years, Chris has been using Autodesk products for most of his career, and not only AutoCAD but also Inventor. READ MORE >

If you’ve been to AU or watched classes on the AU website, you know a great class when you see it. But if you’re thinking about giving a presentation at AU, how do you make yours good? With the AU 2015 Call for Proposals rapidly approaching, we put our heads together and came up with a short list of what we think takes a class from interesting to awesome. Relevance First and foremost, people attend AU to learn about industry trends and best practices in engineering and design. For speakers, this means that, while obscure content may be interesting, rich, robust material that can be put into da... READ MORE >

For AU 2014, we chose a visionary theme—The Future of Making Things—that spoke to what Autodesk products make possible. This year, we’re building on that foundation by tearing it down. Without further ado, we present the theme for AU 2015 (drumroll please…): The Future of Breaking Things. As always, we’ll be bringing together top minds in design, engineering, and manufacturing to share best practices, demonstrate workflows, and explore industry trends. This year, however, those best practices will involve flamethrowers, innovative workflows for garbage compactors, and industry trends in sledge... READ MORE >

So you’re a mechanical designer, or a mechanical engineer, and you work in the cloud.  (Or, if you’re still thinking about it, check out these 6 reasons to leap into the cloud. Then check back with us.) You know the cloud is a great way to leverage computing power, access your work from anywhere, and collaborate more easily, all without breaking the bank. But do you know exactly how to get optimal design at the lowest cost? And what about security—is it safe to put all your data in the cloud? Well, worry no more. Check out this great mechanical engineering class for answers to all your qu... READ MORE >

Got your head in the cloud? If you’re a designer or maker of things, that’s actually a great place to be. The cloud makes both CAD and CAM more powerful, more accessible, and it simplifies collaboration, too. That means more people can do it. And that’s good for the world. ICYMI, Autodesk CEO and President Carl Bass took pen to paper (fingers to keyboard?) last week to discuss the future of CAD/CAM and the transition to the cloud. Autodesk offers several cloud-based tools that allow you to harness the power of cloud computing, and access from any device, anywhere: Fusion 360, AutoCAD 360, and ... READ MORE >