Parametric modelers track your manipulation of an object and support changes to earlier steps. With extensive tools and capabilities, it’s broad enough to handle many of the needs of hobbyists and non-professionals.įreeCAD is a parametric modeling program. As mentioned before, it’s completely open sourced and has a vast community working in the program.

It’s a great program to start with because it’s completely free and will help you learn the idea of creating a part by taking basic object shapes and combining them together and either adding shapes together or cutting one shape out of another. It operates by placing shapes or building blocks together, similar to how you might stack legos. Tinkercad, which uses direct object manipulation, is the first CAD program I’d recommend anybody start using. Modeling allows you to draw a shape or object, and manipulate the lines that make it up directly. Direct object manipulation allows you to drag different shapes onto your screen, stacking them to create your object. There are a number of ways you can produce and manipulate physical objects with CAD programs. It’s important to be aware of licensing requirements for these to ensure you’re following them. If you are a professional or want to sell your products, you might benefit from a paid program. All three have their own benefits but for the purpose of my audience which includes many hobbyists, I like to focus on free and open source programs.

There are three main types of CAD programs: paid, free, and open source.

Free 3d printing cad