On March 14, the AutoCAD team hosted some bloggers to share what was in the upcoming AutoCAD 2018 release. AutoCAD 2018 has since been released:

• #AutoCAD 2018 Features

The day started off for this bloggers with me giving them a tour of the Autodesk Gallery. The Autodesk Gallery at One Market in San Francisco celebrates design — the process of taking a great idea and turning it into a reality. With about 60 different exhibits regularly on display that showcase the innovative work of Autodesk customers, the gallery illustrates the role technology plays in great design and engineering. I am one of about 80 ambassadors that conduct tours of the gallery. Being an ambassador is no one's full-time job. Most of us do it simply to practice our public speaking. By the way, the reason we chose the title ambassador instead of docent is because the correct way to address an ambassador is "your excellency," yet that never happens.

Donnie Gladfelter, of The CAD Geek blog fame, taped my tour. He was gracious enough to post it to YouTube:

So you don't have to watch the entire 45-minute video, I have highlighted the times that my descriptions of various exhibits start so you can skip ahead as desired:

• 00:00 — Welcome
• 02:16 — The Shanghai Tower and the Revit story
• 05:41 — Bruce Beasley Sculpture
• 07:38 — Generative Design
• 13:45 — Autodesk in Motion Pictures such as Avatar
• 16:19 — Edyn - the internet of things for gardening
• 16:52 — The Hydrous Project - measuring coral reefs with photogrammetry
• 17:45 — The USS Arizona Memorial
• 18:31 — The SOCCKET - a soccer ball that powers a reading light
• 20:33 — The Mercedes-Benz BIOME Car
• 22:21 — Bionano
• 25:25 — Augmented Reality Sandbox
• 26:55 — The LEGO Dinosaur
• 29:05 — The Eastern Span of the San Francisco Bay Bridge/li>
• 34:50 — Driving Simulator
• 36:35 — Inside Explorer on a 3000-year-old mummy
• 38:35 — What we are learning about 3D printing
• 43:05 — Denise Schindler Paralympic Cycler
• 45:19 — End

Thanks, Donnie.

The day ended with a trip to Silver Oak Winery in Napa where we learned about their use of AutoCAD:

• Silver Oak Winery in Napa has LEED Platinum Certification

All in all, not a bad day.

The Autodesk Gallery in San Francisco is open to the public on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays from 10:00 am to 5:00 pm. There is a guided tour on Wednesdays at 12:30 pm and a self-guided audio tour available anytime. Admission is free. Visit us. If you're ever in San Francisco, one of our ambassadors can give you a tour much like what was in Donnie's video.

Ambassadoring is alive in the lab.