AU24: Autodesk University—It’s All About the Data

AUTODESK UNIVERSITY TOOK PLACE IN SAN DIEGO at the San Diego Convention Center, famous for its Comic Con. The San Diego Convention Center is a famous location featured in film and television, including the movie “Demolition Man.” The backdrop of San Diego Bay provided the perfect backdrop for the sustainable eco message that permeated many parts of Autodesk’s message at AU.

The Keynote

CEO Andrew Anagnost was the keynote speaker for the first general session. He is passionate about his vision for the future. I am impressed by his leadership for the company while thinking about the environment we live in. He has a vision that must be admired because he believes in the future he talks about.

The message for this year illustrated their path forward with Autodesk AI and how it is being implemented into their platforms. Data was a big focus on how to improve AI (artificial intelligence) and how it can help creators. There is some delicacy in handling the subject of generative AI due to backlash from artists who don’t want to be replaced by AI and what they may see as a violation of their creative copyrights. Autodesk is trying to make AI a tool that can benefit pipelines working with creatives since it would not be in Autodesk’s best interest to replace the actual people who buy their software.

Data Story

“Data” was a heavily mentioned subject related to AI training. Autodesk made a considerable investment in AI to help save time and money for their end users. I believe that the vision can include both artists and AI working together, but this is something that would require collaboration on both sides. I think if you are an artist or client with reservations about the impact of AI, you should share your thoughts with Autodesk because they are interested to hear them.

In terms of AI and data, Autodesk products include these three basic principles to increase productivity to help their clients’ businesses:

• Data Granularity–multiple disciplines can work together.
• Data Interoperability–connect AutoCAD and other products, including non-Autodesk products, to their ecosystem.
• Data Access–get data when or where you need it. 

Autodesk customers increased spending by 72 percent this year by adopting the new technologies to their pipeline. 

Some of the reasons they adopted Autodesk’s new tools are:

• 1/3 saved on increasing cost in construction
• 1/3 helped create jobs for architects who were out of a job
• 1/3 saved on materials wasted.

There have been some ups and downs about the subject of AI. RAND recently published a report that stated that “By some estimates, more than 80% of AI projects fail at twice the rate of the failure of information technology projects that do not involve AI”

Apple recently published a study exposing the deep cracks in LLM’s “reason capabilities.” Six engineers from Apple showed that the mathematical reasoning used by advanced large language models can be unreliable and brittle in simple problems.

Autodesk is a company at the forefront of technology. Because they have been working with developers for many years, they have foreseen many of these problems and built redundancy and will exercise all caution before a product release. The RAND paper reflects mostly startups without the expertise of a company like Autodesk. I would imagine Autodesk works with partners to ensure that the language models in their AI are used with human interaction to reduce flaws.

“Data“ was a word mentioned in every General Session, Keynote, and numerous industry sessions. The focus was to help customers understand how to share their data when using AI to get better results by teaching the AI about how they work. In the final analysis, Autodesk wants to target AI at redundant tasks and gain efficiencies and optimization. In the end, the data used is critical to AI as it must be trustworthy and accurate in order to get good results about AI-based systems.

Autodesk & LA 2028 Olympics

Autodesk partnered with the LA Olympic committee to help design and make transportation and retrofit current housing and sports venues for the athletes and fans. Autodesk will be involved in helping plan several projects at the Olympics while providing data and analysis information to help make it work. LAX airport is one of those projects. July 28, 2028, is the opening ceremony for the Games.

Autodesk Platform Services

The keynote had a different approach this year, and, in general, Autodesk University had a different feel than in recent years. I felt like it was geared more towards new customers, and very understandably so. The AEC/O industry has generally been slow to adopt newer technologies, and the influx of AI will take the AEC/O industry some time. Anagnost noted that AI has sped past the hype phase and has entered the phase of lowered and more reasonable expectations. From there, software companies will best figure out what AI can practically and reasonably do for users. (for more info on the Gartner Hype Cycle, read this feature and see the chart below.)

AI is a major change to customer pipelines, which means upfront costs. AI is not just about software; it may include needing newer hardware. Autodesk spoke about how this computing power can be harnessed over their cloud, introducing Autodesk Platform Services. APS provides a cross-industry set of APIs with shared capabilities and services to connect industry clouds, products, and other solutions. You can personalize your technology ecosystem from your desktop to co-workers to the client. Autodesk Hub allows access to your data in bite-size chunks; move it where you need it.

Autodesk added Australian servers to expand their reach globally. I don’t know how the price point works for customers, but if it can save your project time and money, it is worth investigating. 

Autodesk Docs

Autodesk Docs is the hub that connects all of Autodesk’s software with the ability to share information and data more securely. One hundred-plus new features have been added to Autodesk Docs.

Autodesk Docs is a safe and secure way to protect your data while collaborating with others on projects. Autodesk Docs can integrate all of Autodesk’s products. They will soon have third-party integrations so that other companies and their products—from AEC/O products from companies like Trimble, Bentley, and Nemetschek Group to media and entertainment companies like Maxon, Chaos, and The Foundry—can all seamlessly interconnect applications across competing platforms and ecosystems.

AU: Autodesk advances Forma, Docs and intros Forma Board

While Autodesk is hopeful that Autodesk Docs will become the center of the data universe in AEC/O, their competitors just mentioned won’t rush their clients to that outcome. Instead, particular projects and their leadership will selectively decide on Docs as the information hub for the project, and third-party tools will then rush to complete API connections in the interest of best serving mutual customers. (Architosh has another AEC/O-centric AU story coming up written by Anthony).

Fusion

Fusion is the industry cloud for manufacturing and product design pipeline that connects everyone working in the pipeline throughout the product lifecycle.  Fusion has 300% new improvements. Creators can be assured they have access to the correct data.

You can read and write to the data manufacturing model in the cloud. You can save Vault Inventor files in Fusion. This can shorten the design process, especially with new tools to give you the ability to sketch out something quickly in 3D in such packages as Bernini. Wavve Mobility used Fusion to digitize prototypes of their cars, quickly importing from multiple data formats with collaboration in the cloud. This saved Wavve money on costs and time on the design process.

Bernini

Bernini is a research effort. It is a conceptual design tool. It can convert any sketch you make into a 3D model. Bernini is available for free with no date on a commercial release.

The demonstrations for Bernini were interesting. People who can barely draw can create a concept 3D model from a rough sketch. This is a great tool for early ideas that are AI-generated for a base model, saving time building it from scratch.

Bernini has sketch constraints, so you don’t have to manually rework a model. The end target is to have a model that is more constructable than just a loosely formed mesh. This tool could be used for different use cases across architecture, product design, and entertainment, focusing on generating 3D structures or objects. These objects could be built or manufactured because they work in the real world. 

Revit/AutoCAD

Revit is the dominant BIM tool in North America, and it has an estimated 4 million users worldwide. Revit 2025 was released earlier this year and has new features that will make it a more useful tool for design and documentation. You can now export to PDF in the background, which will help many users publish large PDF sets.

AutoCAD, with a 39.9 percent market share, has had some major improvements. There is a new animated search feature, and AutoCAD 2025 can open files twice as quickly as AutoCAD 2024. Overall, Revit and AutoCAD have over 500 new features this year.

I went on a tour hosted by Gensler for the Life Sciences campus in the Research and Development District hosted by Ralph Linder, Benjamin Regnier, Ian Doherty,  and Kerstin Kraft from Gensler and  Jeff Oesterblad, Tam Tran and Jeff Dauz from IQHQ. The tour illustrated the beautiful design of the campus using Revit. The land originally belonged to the Navy and was built in an old Tuna Harbor. Gensler had to create a boat or 30-foot retaining sea wall to keep the water out of the site. 

Forma

Forma is Autodesk’s industry cloud for architecture, engineering, construction and operations (AEC/O) and a multi-year award winner in Architosh’s annual AIA Best of Show award honors.

The big announcement at AU for Forma was the new collaboration between ESRI and Forma. ESRI terrain data ARC GIS is now integrated into Forma. Forma connects design teams with a new, added whiteboard, which enables information from other packages to come into Forma so everyone can share it.

Forma can access Revit data through Autodesk Docs. It can directly import that data back to Revit. Forma AI Carbon gives you information about the carbon impact before you lay the concrete. Baker Barritos shared a presentation using Forma to design a space and how Forma helped change the location of the building due to humidity and wind data. It is like a time machine letting you see the future of your design in a real-world situation. Forma Explorer AI is rolling out soon.

Robot

Autodesk showed off a robot that captured the attention of the audience. The robot can capture information from a site (elevations, topo, and more) in real-time, providing much-needed data for projects. It is accessible anywhere at any time. It connects the data it collects to Autodesk Docs. This helps to keep everyone on the same page. The images that the robot captures are in high resolution to ensure you get the detailed data you need.  

MEDIA & ENTERTAINMENT

Autodesk has a long history with the entertainment industry, providing some of the most powerful tools for animation and visual effects.  Pixar, Disney, Illumination, and DreamWorks are a few of the companies that use these media and entertainment tools.

Wonder Studio

Autodesk announced the purchase of Wonder Studio at AU. Wonder Studio has real-time tools for creating and animating characters quickly. They can be added to live-action scenes quickly. The software uses AI to analyze the live-action scene, from lighting to texture, to make it easy for the character to match the scene.

The demos for the software were impressive. In my professional opinion, working in VFX and animation, Wonder Studio is not at a professional level for high-end production. However, Wonder Studio is an excellent concept tool and great for new indie filmmakers with limited animation skills who want to create small films to tell their stories.  It can create motion capture by tracking an actor and applying the data to a character in a scene. It is an excellent option for new filmmakers who can’t use Unreal Engine or Unity due to their learning curve. 

Maya & 3DS Max

Maya and 3DS Max are the workhorse of the animation industry and for games. Over the years, the two software packages have been integrated into both pipelines to create some of the best films and video games on the market.

Maya is now connected to Flow, the production tracking software that replaced ShotGrid (Shotgun). You can now see the shots before and after the shots you are working on in Maya for better continuity. Maya has a new Dope Sheet with motion trails, making it easier for animation.

Maya & Max support a Smart Extrude feature and Open PBR with Adobe. This should make texturing easier when working with Substance products. Maya can do complex deformation with the new Deform AI tool meant for animators. Max introduces a Boolean Modifier, which is a game changer that is faster and more efficient.

Maya and Max now support OpenUSD and SVG.  There is a USD camera and control in Max to help frame shots better. Ty diffusion (TyFlow) is an advanced implementation of Stable Diffusion in 3DS Max. It can be used to generate AI images and animation. Arnold, the renderer, now has an AI Denoiser that will save time in rendering. 

FLOW

Flow integrates the best elements from ShotGrid. Flow is a powerful production tracking software used in production for animation, visual effects, and video games. Flow can handle all aspects of production and coordinate the pipeline with AI tracking so that changes are dynamic. 

Flow will make collaboration between producers and teams more efficient by making connections between previously siloed parts of the pipeline accessible to all. Flow Capture gives creatives and producers the ability to do an immediate review. Flow Tracking responds to scheduling through AI. Flow allows you to do the heavy computing for effects in the cloud, so you don’t have to wait for shots and do other tasks.

CHAOS Group

Third-party software company Chaos Group was exhibiting its new Chaos Envision, a brand-new real-time 3D assembly and animation tool that turns the most difficult and demanding design data into interactive realism.

Enscape Impact is the building performance add-on that helps you make more sustainable, eco-friendly design decisions. (see: Architosh, “Q&A with Chaos Enscape—Improving the Design Workflow,” 16 Oct 24) A new version of V-Ray for Blender brings the best of V-Ray to a wider audience. Chaos Cloud services will include virtual tours and the ability to view, navigate, and collaborate on complex projects using any device. There were some AI announcements, including AI Enhancer for Enscape and Gaussian splats in beta for V-Ray 7. 

Closing Thoughts on AU24

Autodesk University did have great sessions for more details about how all their products work in the pipeline. Still, for those in Media & Entertainment, those sessions were not for experienced professionals.

Half of the people who went to Autodesk University this year were new to the show. It was very different being at AU after the downturn in the entertainment business because the Media & Entertainment people were not there. Autodesk once did elaborate displays with celebrity-level professionals in the entertainment business, but that is not the case anymore.

AEC/O is a growing business with clients trying to save money while working on building new projects quickly and sustainably. In the IT industry, everything is moving to the cloud, but in several cases, there remains no immediate viable path for migrating customers and legacy data to the cloud as well. Autodesk is in the difficult stage of producing three new industry clouds for customers to move to while helping those customers migrate from old legacy desktop solutions.

The biggest example of this is Forma for AEC/O. While there were hints of drawing capabilities coming to Forma in the near future, for now, architects and engineers on Autodesk Revit rely on that BIM tool or AutoCAD for all their drawing documentation. Meanwhile, the D&M tool Fusion (the cloud tool for that industry sector) is forging ahead with Drawing Automation for Fusion, using AI to help automate the drawing workflows. We have heard at Architosh of potential automated drawings in Forma, while other sources have revealed such capabilities in Revit.

While AU2023 was the year Autodesk announced its big AI plans, this was the year that the design software giant talked up the importance of data and has made several big data-related plans and acquisitions this year. (see: Architosh, “Autodesk acquires Datum360—democratizes data access in AEC,” 25 June 2024).

Considering the union strikes and new legislation, it should be clear that data and AI are touchy subjects for many users in all industries Autodesk serves, not just media and entertainment. It should be clear how the data is being used. There are some Autodesk clients who don’t and can’t share their data, and Autodesk licenses their technology to these customers.

Autodesk’s focus on AI and data at AU 2024 shows that the company is at a crossroads. Change is in the future. And software competition has increased with rival software packages.

In addition, what we have learned from the post-pandemic is that remote work is here to stay. Autodesk has been an innovator for years, and I hope they listen to their clients so they can keep growing and innovating as a company. Their challenge is to help customers not just learn how to leverage the new AI tools but also, in many cases, help them migrate to the new cloud apps with ease.

I am an Autodesk customer, so I want to see the success of their plans and initiatives. Let’s see what happens next year.