ViaCAD 12 2D/3D

The innovative design tool for professional results

• Create architectural drawings, mechanical designs, electrical diagrams, DIY projects and more.
• Powerful 3D tools such as mesh, surface and solid modeling, blending, beveling, hollowing.
• 3D printer checks for optimal results
• NEW! Advances in 3D Design
• NEW! Design updates and comments
• NEW! Usability improvements
• NEW ! Interoperability updates

With ViaCAD® 2D/3D, creating 3D designs has never been easier. With our CAD software you can design anything you can imagine including architectural drawings, mechanical drawings, electrical diagrams, furniture designs and much more. All you need is an idea and ViaCAD.

Our surprisingly affordable 2D and 3D design tool has it all! You can design 2D projects like floor plans and diagrams, but also create spectacular 3D designs for construction, home renovation, inventions, musical instruments, furniture, and really fun DIY projects with a 3D printer at home or in the classroom. Suitable for beginners and advanced users.

AFFORDABLE, EXTREMELY POWERFUL AND EASY TO USE 2D/3D CAD SOFTWARE.
ViaCAD 2D/3D offers precise design tools for beginners and advanced CAD users. You can create in 2D or 3D and quickly switch between the two views. Our price/performance ratio exceeds that of the competition. Amateur users will be delighted with the professional looking results, while professionals will appreciate the economy of this version of ViaCAD.

WITH VIACAD 2D/3D YOU CAN CREATE PROJECTS SUCH AS

• Architectural drawings
• Redesign of plans
• Prototypes of inventions
• 3D printer projects
• Mechanical drawings
• Interior design plans
• Furniture design
• Jewelry making
• Musical instruments
• Objects for use in the development of video games
• Technical graphics and illustrations
• Classroom, science fair, and robotics club projects

Compatibility and file sharing

ViaCAD software works well with other programs. ViaCAD is compatible with AutoCAD® and offers up-to-date DWG import and export capabilities. This allows your team to collaborate without everyone having to use the same CAD software.

ViaCAD is also compatible with more than a dozen popular CAD and graphics formats, so you'll be able to deliver files that can be opened and modified by users of other popular design software. In our latest version (version 12), you can import PDF and Adobe Illustrator files and import/export SketchUp 2019 and Collada files.

• ViaCAD offers compatibility with AutoCAD® DWG files.
• DXF/DWG versions from R12 to 2019
• STL import/export for 3D printing
• SVG import and export
• 3MF import and export
• VMRL 2.0 texture support
• OBJ texture support
• Adobe Illustrator® import.
• PDF import
• SketchUp 2019 import/export.
• Collada™ (DAE) Import/Export.
• Full support for metric and imperial units.

Features

VIACAD 2D/3D IS PACKED WITH TOOLS FOR 3D MODELING AND 2D DRAFTING.
Bring your designs to life with our powerful 3D CAD software. Discover the powerful world of 3D mesh modeling! ViaCAD offers robust modeling technology found in many high-end products. Behind the scenes, there is programming that combines 2D and 3D, so you can modify 2D profiles used to create 3D objects, and the 3D shape will update automatically.

• Powerful 3D design tools, including mesh, surface, and solid modeling.
• 3D editing tools such as blending, chamfering and peeling.
• Comprehensive design tool with extrusions, Boolean matching, and surface modeling.
• Accurate geometry for design and manufacturing.
• Automatic creation of 2D drawings from 3D models
• Tools for creating 3D from 2D shapes
• Over 275 tools for 2D drawings (text, dimensions, points, lines, arcs, etc.)
• Verification tools for 3D printing
• And much more!

INTUITIVE DESIGN AND EDITING TOOLS
Accurate drawing is easy with ViaCAD! We designed it to be user-friendly and intuitive.
The LogiCursor™ anticipates your next action and guides your cursor to possible point selections in the drawing.

The Gripper provides drag-and-drop functionality for easy design editing.

Customizable grids make everything even easier by allowing precise drag-and-drop in rectangular, polar (circular), and isometric layouts.

3D PRINTING TOOLS
ViaCAD 2D/3D includes 3D printing tools to help you prepare and validate your designs for 3D printing.

3D PRINT CHECK
Checks printability and displays warnings or errors to the user.

SURFACE NORMALITY CHECK
Facet normals define the inner and outer areas of a part. If the facet normals are aligned in the wrong direction, the 3D printer may have problems creating the part. This identifies problems, and we have several commands that can help you solve them.

OVERALL ANALYSIS
This allows you to visually inspect areas of the model that may need structural support for 3D printing. The normals of the meshes, faces, and facets of the solid are compared to the direction of the working plane. Angles less than or equal to 45 degrees are highlighted in red.

WALL THICKNESS ANALYSIS
This tool allows you to visually inspect model regions that may be too thin for 3D printing. Meshes, faces, and solid facets are examined with radius cuts.

PREVIEW CUT
This interface allows you to cut models in a specific direction and thickness. The dialog box allows you to animate individual slices and steps. Use this feature to verify that a part has closed, non-overlapping sections, a requirement for 3D printing.

AUTO POSITION
The Auto Position tool moves the model to z=0 in the positive x,y coordinate system.

SUPPORTMATERIAL
Manually adds geometry to the support material when it is created by the 3D printer. Commands for support structures include "attachment radius", "center radius", "base radius", "base thickness", and "drag base and centers" to change the position of the structure.

SHOW PRINTER VOLUME
Enables the default limit for 3D printers. The volume is defined in the Printer Definitions dialog box.

PRINTER DEFINITIONS
Defines the key parameters of the 3D printer, including the length, width, and height of the volume that can be reached by the printer. The settings in the Printer Definitions dialog box are used for commands such as 3D print verification and automatic positioning.

New Features

ADVANCED 3D DESIGN FEATURES
SPLITMESH
This tool splits a mesh into two parts based on a cutting plane. Split Mesh is an ideal tool for anyone working with faceted data in 3D printed manufacturing processes.

BOOLEENS MESH
This advancement provides a way to add or remove material from a meshed body. Previous versions only allowed Boolean operations on ACIS-based solids. With the introduction of Boolean operations on meshes, you can now add/remove materials imported from STL, OBJ, 3DS, and SketchUp.

WEIGHT AND VOLUMEBOMS
Whether you are designing an airplane, a car, or a picnic table, weight is an important control parameter in design. V12 introduces a new BOM attribute specifically for creating a weight summary table.

UPDATES AND COMMENTS ON DRAWINGS AND MODELS
BEST-FIT LINE AND CIRCLE
Excellent for drawing accurate curves on rough sketches. Use this tool to best fit a line or circle from a sample of points.

ANGLE TOLERANCE UPDATES
The Angle Tolerance interface has been updated to dynamically provide data from the Inspector dialog box.

USER FRIENDLINESS IMPROVEMENTS
SHOW/HIDEFACE
The Show/Hide Faces tool hides the faces of a part, allowing access and viewing of the internal representations of complex models.

SAVE PLANES WITH VIEWALIGNMENTS

You now have the ability to save planes that are associated with view alignments.

REPEAT PREVIOUSCOMMAND

This "right-click" feature saves you a lot of time by providing a list of the last drawing commands you used. Select an item from the list to quickly switch tools.

You can now work with the file types of these other programs:

• PDF Import
• Import from Adobe Illustrator
• SketchUp 2020 import/export
• Import/Export from Collada (DAE)

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System Requirements

Windows
Version    12
Operating System    Windows 7 64-bit, Windows 8 64-bit, Windows 10
Microsoft® Windows® 64-bit 10, 8, 7
64-bit systems only!
Intel® Pentium® IV or AMD® Athlon64™ 64-bit class processor
Mouse pointing device (wheel button recommended) OpenGL/DirectX9 compatible graphics card with 256 MB dedicated RAM
3 GB hard disk space
8 GB memory (RAM)

MAC
Version    12
Operating System    Mac OS 10.11 El Capitan, Mac OS 10.12 Sierra, Mac OS 10.13 High Sierra, Mac OS 10.14 Mojave, Mac OS 10.15 Catalina, Mac OS 11.1 Big Sur
1 Macintosh® OS 10.11 to 11.01 or later¹ x64 Intel® Mac® 3 GB hard drive space 8 GB RAM or more Mouse pointing device (wheel button recommended) OpenGL compatible graphics card with 256 MB VRAM ¹ Program compatibility is not guaranteed for later operating systems ²User is responsible for all internet access and phone charges. PC & Mac require a computer with an x64 (64-bit) architecture operating system.