New 3-D photography device created with virtual team, minimal travel, and SolidWorks.

SolidWorks Corporation has announced that a new company called Mission3-D has used SolidWorks 3D mechanical design and collaboration software to create a one-of-a-kind device for three-dimensional photography. Partners from around the world designed, developed, and manufactured the product with minimal face-to-face meetings and travel expenses.

The ground-breaking device, called Photo3-D, lets anyone take and share eye-popping three-dimensional photographs using their digital camera. In addition to using SolidWorks software to design the device, Mission3-D and its partners used SolidWorks and its eDrawings e-mail enabled design-sharing application to refine the 3D models. They also used the SolidWorks Manufacturing Network to find overseas manufacturing partners. This virtual product development helped the product get to market faster and more affordably than with traditional analog approaches.

"From conception to production, we worked as a virtual team with SolidWorks," said Sam Ramada, inventor of Photo3-D and founder of Mission3-D. "Our design engineer uses SolidWorks, our prototype maker uses SolidWorks, we use SolidWorks eDrawings, and the manufacturers in China and Hong Kong use SolidWorks. The fact that SolidWorks was everywhere cut our time to market and made it much easier for everyone to understand what we were creating."

For the first time in the consumer marketplace, Mission3-D enables new generations to experience the awesome effects of 3-D photography with their own digital cameras. To operate Photo3-D, anyone with a digital camera can simply attach the Photo3-D device, (using the standard tripod socket on the bottom of the camera), take a normal picture, and then use the Photo3-D device to take a second picture--capturing what is known as a "stereo pair" of images. Then the photographer uses the Photo3-D Mixer software to create a single 3-D image. Using specially designed glasses they can view images in three dimensions, whether printed on paper, displayed on a computer screen, or projected onto a wall. Photo3-D photographs are great for travel and vacations, special occasions, family events, portraiture, advertising, and general entertainment.

The Photo3-D device's design engineer was Michelle Pillers, managing partner of Evolution Design Engineering LLC in Seattle, Wash. "Photo3-D is a stunning invention, and SolidWorks is a great modeling platform to bring it to life," she said. "I can create anything I want and use eDrawings to share my design ideas in full photorealistic color, texture, and animations, even with people who don't have mechanical design software. Moreover, since SolidWorks believes in community as much as selling a CAD system, it is possible to go online, visit the SolidWorks Manufacturing Network Internet Directory, and quickly find a manufacturer who uses the same software I do, thus cutting weeks off the design-to-production process."

The SolidWorks Manufacturing Network is an Internet directory that helps companies shorten their product time to market by quickly finding design and manufacturing partners who use SolidWorks software. SolidWorks Manufacturing Network slashes design cycles by ensuring that companies and suppliers work from the same design platform, eliminating the errors that file duplication and conversion create. Pillers used the Manufacturing Network to find manufacturers in both Hong Kong and China.

"Photo3-D is a remarkable innovation, and its development is a great illustration of how the SolidWorks community exponentially increases the power and value of the mechanical design software itself," said Ilya Mirman, SolidWorks vice president of marketing. "We anticipate tremendous success for Photo3-D and at the same time will work to expand and strengthen the SolidWorks community."

The Photo3-D 303 Kit sells online for $129 and includes everything needed to quickly and easily take and share 3-D photos.