Drawing – or sketching – is a fundamental tool of product design. By tracing a few pen strokes, designers can quickly explore 3D shape ideas, and communicate these ideas to colleagues and clients. However, while 2D drawings are easily understood by humans, they are currently not interpretable by computers. To confront their ideas with physical reality, designers have to separately create 3D models that form the necessary input for engineering tools, such as numerical simulation and 3D printing. But while drawing is visceral and quick, 3D modeling requires careful planning, precision and constraints to manipulate 3D shapes on screen. Skilled 3D modelers often need several hours to convert a drawing into a 3D model, at an hourly rate of 50euros on average, making 3D modeling a major bottleneck that hinders rapid iterations between ideation and prototyping. As a consequence, even though the fluidity of drawing stimulates the creativity of designers, only a small selection of the ideas generated during design exploration get evaluated during design engineering.
The ERC Starting Grant D3 (
https://ns.inria.fr/d3/index.html(opens in new window)) succeeded at bridging design exploration and design engineering by offering the first algorithm capable of automatically lifting 2D design drawings to 3D. This technology brings unique benefits to product design:
- Accelerating design. During design exploration and presentation, our technology allows designers to visualize and refine their drawing from any viewpoint. In contrast, in the current workflow, designers need to re-draw the same shape multiple times to show how it would look in different contexts.
- Facilitating collaboration between designers and 3D modelers. During transition to 3D modeling, our technology allows designers to communicate their intent to 3D modelers more effectively, supporting faster iterations between team members.
- Accelerating 3D modeling. During 3D modeling, our technology provides an initial reference of the shape and its proportions, which 3D modelers can build upon instead of using 2D drawings as mere visual guidance.
The objective of DLift is to demonstrate how our technology for reconstructing drawings in 3D can streamline the Computer-Aided-Design (CAD) workflow, and to take the first steps in industrializing this technology. DLift will fundamentally transform the design workflow by freeing designers from the burden of mastering 3D modeling, and by freeing 3D modelers from the burden of deciphering design drawings. By providing a seamless transition from drawings to 3D models, DLift has the potential to drastically increase the creativity and productivity of design teams, empowering them to explore a larger design space during the initial phases of product design.
