Interesting facts:
Surprisingly, the history of 3D modeling began long before the first PC appeared. It all started with mathematical ideas which are behind 3D visualization. In fact, some of the basic ideas came from Euclid, sometimes referred to as the “founder of geometry”, who lived in the 3rd century BC. Then, Rene Descartes in the 1600s gave the world analytic geometry, also known as coordinate geometry, which allowed to accurately track distances and locations. Later in the mid 18th century, English mathematician James Joseph Sylvester invented matrix mathematics which is now at work for every computer-generated image where one can see reflections or light distortion.
In the 1950s, computers were developed and put to many mathematical uses – mainly military and scientific, but not much else. However, this was a stepping stone in history because someone thought of making it useful for a realistic simulation of products and designs.
As we all witnessed through history, 3D printing could not have been imagined without the development of 3D modeling. The first advancements in the history of 3D modeling came when the first commercially available CAD or Computer Aided Design systems started coming out in the 1960s. The biggest breakthrough came from Ivan Sutherland who introduced Sketchpad, also known as “Robot Draftsman,” in 1963 with its revolutionary interface. Sketchpad established that computers can be used not only for engineering or repetitive drafting but interactively by Designers and potentially Artists. In the same year, the General Motors and IBM partnership created the DAC-1, Design Augmented by Computer, which was publicly presented in 1964 and used by General Motors for the rest of the decade to speed up their car production workflow. It demonstrated that computer design visualization can cut down workloads which would have taken forever if the drawing boards were used.
At the end of the decade, in 1968, Ivan Sutherland and David Evans founded the first 3D graphics company, “Evans & Sutherland”. They started the company to produce hardware to run the systems that were being developed but were soon also developing software. Their appearance and success in the market inspired others to take a big leap of faith, set up their own companies and work on developing the technology.
