VR Design Tool ‘Gravity Sketch’ Launches in Early Access

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VR-optimised 3D creation tool Gravity Sketch is now available on Steam Early Access. Developed by a group of design engineers at the Royal College of Art, the software is ‘for everyone’, but its feature set has particular relevance to creative professionals, and could become an invaluable tool for industrial design visualisation.

Image courtesy Gravity Sketch, Mike Jelinek

A quick glance at the creations on the front page of the Gravity Sketch website suggests that industrial designers, particularly in the automotive and product sectors, could have a very capable tool to add to their workflow. ‘Designer in Residence’ Mike Jelinek, for example, has demonstrated how Gravity Sketch is capable of replicating traditional automotive design techniques, such as tape drawing, or ‘Canson’-style rendering (shown above). This image might look like it has been hand-sketched on red paper with white chalk highlights, but it is indeed a 3D Gravity Sketch model.

While it might be considered ‘late’ to the creative VR party, the likes of Google’s Tilt Brush and Oculus’ Quill have a more artistic flavour, focusing on freeform brushstrokes, while Oculus’ Medium has a distinct ‘virtual clay modelling’ approach, so there is certainly room for a specific design-oriented offering. Naturally, there is plenty of overlap across these products, but Gravity Sketch may be the one that resonates with industrial designers the most, with its advanced control over surfacing and point snapping. This is reflected in the addition of ‘Pro’ and ‘Studio’ subscription options, with the ‘Studio’ licence aimed at “commercial use for SMEs and mid sized studios that make more than $100k USD a year”.

Image courtesy Gravity Sketch, Sammy Sosa

Starting life as a VR/AR sketchpad hardware prototype, a team of Design Engineering Masters students at the Royal College of Art unveiled the ‘Gravity’ project at an RCA Work in Progress Show in February 2014. At the time, consumer-level VR motion controllers were still a couple of years away, so the team developed a pad and pen that would be universally compatible with VR and AR headsets, allowing the user to generate 3D sketches in mid-air. However, as described in this Core77 article from October 2016, they were soon encouraged by the College’s incubator for start-ups ‘InnovationRCA’ to abandon the hardware and focus entirely on software.

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Image courtesy Gravity Sketch, James Robbins

As a result, Gravity Sketch iOS for iPad launched in March 2016, allowing the team to improve the software and add features through user feedback. The HTC Vive hardware arrived soon after, prompting renewed interest in motion-tracked sketching and modelling. The Gravity Sketch VR beta launched in January 2017, initially open to backers of the cancelled Kickstarter campaign. On August 2nd, the software launched on Steam Early Access with HTC Vive and Oculus Touch controller support.

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The trial version of Microsoft’s Monster Truck Madness probably had something to do with it. And certainly the original Super Mario Kart and Gran Turismo. A car nut from an early age, Dominic was always drawn to racing games above all other genres. Now a seasoned driving simulation enthusiast, and former editor of Sim Racer magazine, Dominic has followed virtual reality developments with keen interest, as cockpit-based simulation is a perfect match for the technology. Conditions could hardly be more ideal, a scientist once said. Writing about simulators lead him to Road to VR, whose broad coverage of the industry revealed the bigger picture and limitless potential of the medium. Passionate about technology and a lifelong PC gamer, Dominic suffers from the ‘tweak for days’ PC gaming condition, where he plays the same section over and over at every possible combination of visual settings to find the right balance between fidelity and performance. Based within The Fens of Lincolnshire (it’s very flat), Dominic can sometimes be found marvelling at the real world’s ‘draw distance’, wishing virtual technologies would catch up.
  • VRgameDevGirl

    Can you export the model to use in other programs? Like UE4?

    • Reality Zero One

      You sure can, OBJ in the Basic version and OBJ & FBX in the Pro version and above. Less relevant for UE4 but Pro and above also supports IGES.

      Check out the feature list here:

      https://www.gravitysketch.com/download/

      • Raphael

        The pro version is an EXPENSIVE monthly subscription.

  • Cool project!

  • Foreign Devil

    The existing Rift and Vive controllers are not optimal for drawing and sculpting in VR. We really need someone to come out with optimized sensitive VR creation tools. . Just as WACOM developped universally used tablets and drawing displays for the industry.

    • Reality Zero One

      Gravity Sketch has experimental Leap Motion support – which I haven’t tried. But the ‘Blocks’ app that Leap brought out themselves resulted in the most precise control I’ve ever had inside VR. Could be worth a try if you have a Leap VR devkit kicking around.