LDD is an Underdeveloped Abomination - Why Do So Many Still Use it?

[Brick Customs]

Why do skilled builders use LDD?  I understand there's a smaller learning curve, and that it's official and more well known... but those are all really bad reasons for a serious builder.

LDD sucks.  It's bad.  Really, really, really bad.

I mean sure, I can build a small 300 or 400 piece set without much trouble.  Even then, it's still necessary to export to LDraw to produce any kind of real instructions.

But the big models.  How do you guys do it?  I've seen some crazy stuff done in LDD.  It boggles my mind that anyone would put up with LDD's infuriating idiosyncrasies when it comes to assembling larger models.  How do you organize without sub-models?  Grouping is ridiculously limited.  How do you work without a grid system?

I've been using LDD since I was a kid, but made the switch to LDCad a few years ago when I started building more "adult" level stuff.  I have over 1000 hours in LDCad now.  I'll occasionally open a project in LDD (old files, downloaded models).  It's horrifying to work with. Even just a little bit.  I feel like someone stole my iPad and handed me a stone tablet and chisel.

Why is LDCad not the gold standard? 

[JopieK]

Well, Draw is not that user-friendly, is it? And LDD does the job for most things. Apart from that tools like LDCad are not for macOS. Talking about a "stone tablet and chisel", that is also what Windows feels to me (and I'm a windows programmer, or at least used to be) so I don't want to start Windows if not absolutely necessary. LEGO should make LDD open source, then we could enjoy community development and get the best of both worlds by fusing the two.

[NathanR]

43 minutes ago, Brick Customs said:

LDD sucks.  It's bad.  Really, really, really bad.

Wow, that's harsh! I'm not exactly a "skilled builder" but I appreciate the simplicity of searching or browsing bricks in LDD, the part snapping features, and the simple/clean interface.  Sure LDD has it's flaws - new parts are added rarely, many bionicle-type parts are missing, and the flex-parts seldom ever work for me.  Building technic models is the only really difficult part, but once you learn how to rotate gears so they can align, it becomes fairly straightforward.

44 minutes ago, Brick Customs said:

I mean sure, I can build a small 300 or 400 piece set without much trouble.  Even then, it's still necessary to export to LDraw to produce any kind of real instructions.

LDD is useless at creating instructions, and always has been.  But then there is the likes of Blueprint which can handle that.

 

12 minutes ago, Brick Customs said:

Why is LDCad not the gold standard? 

I confess I m not familiar with LDCad, but mostly because I'm a Mac user.  The only Lego-building software available for the Mac is LDD and Bricksmith, which has seen fewer updates than LDD in recent years and I find incredibly tedious and frustrating to work with. The mecabricks website is also good, but I struggle a little without the part-snapping.  So LDD is the gold standard for me, and will likely remain so for many years to come.

 

Oh, and a small aside - I did once try writing my own cad editor for macOS.  I learned a lot about SceneKit, Swift and ObjectiveC, but the stumbling block for me was actually parsing the LDraw file format.  It's... archaic, really, and requires very low level manipulation of the geometry data, such as manual calculation of the normal vectors.  It would take a genius to figure this out, and I imagine that's why there are so few Lego cad programs around.

 

[legolijntje]

I believe LDCad can be compiled for Mac, but the author has no mac to compile it on. But I'm not sure about that, you gotta ask @roland 

[Lyichir]

Echoing what the others have said, LDD may have a lot of unresolved bugs and be falling further and further out of date, but it's the most user-friendly building software I've found for Mac. I have both Stud.io and Bricksmith downloaded, but tend to use them somewhat grudgingly, since they're much harder to work with.

There's also the matter that, as far as I've been able to tell, the LDraw library (and by extension, all the programs that rely on it) is still pretty useless when it comes to CCBS parts, which is one area where LDD still has it beat (even if it's starting to fall out of date in that respect as well).

[Aanchir]

Some of the reasons I tend to like LDD:

• I'm used to LDD's interface, controls, categories, and colors. The colors are a particularly big factor. Going into a program like Bricksmith or Stud.io I'm confronted with a vast number of colors, most of which I'm unlikely to wind up using, under names I have to think harder about to make sense of, in a confusing order. Some of the colors listed aren't even discrete LEGO colors at all, but rather just variants of other colors that are listed separately. Meanwhile, on Stud.io at least, there are many instances where entirely separate colors are conflated under one name. LDD keeps colors simpler, using their actual names and showing mainly just current colors in most menus.
• Working with ball joints in the other programs I've tried is a pain. On Bricksmith, you can't hinge a part or assembly along a specific axis of rotation like in real life — instead, you're forced to rotate the part or assembly along its center point and then haphazardly nudge it back into place. Often, this "nudging" requires actively going into the preferences and changing the grid size, and even then it only lets me approximate parts being connected. This is a nightmare for building posable figures and testing their range of movement. Stud.io at least has a hinge tool sort of like LDD's, but it's a pain to use with ball joints compared to the LDD version. Instead of just clicking on a set of arrows that show what axis of rotation you're manipulating, you have to click on one of several hinge points and just hope it's the one that corresponds to the direction you want to hinge the assembly in. You also can't view the numerical angles of a ball joint piece's current rotation all at once like you can on LDD. It's also buggier than LDD's hinge tool, from my experience.
• LDD has parts that the other programs often lack, like CCBS parts, which Lyi mentioned. This sort of cuts both ways, since LDD also lacks quite a few parts, and not just older parts that I'm unlikely to want to use, but also current ones like mini-doll parts. Half the reason I even bother having programs besides LDD is so that I can do stuff with mini-dolls, but I rarely end up doing that much with them anyway since the building process on these other programs is such a hassle.
• TBH, I'm so used to not making building instructions for my models that that's barely even a consideration, and I don't tend to build especially big models — hardly any of the stuff I build is more than 1000 pieces.
• I'm a Mac user, so a lot of the digital building software that comes most highly recommended doesn't even work on my computer.

Ironically, the only way I've learned to create a model in these programs I'm really satisfied with is to import that model from LDD, then fix whatever parts disappeared or got misplaced during the import. This certainly has its uses — Stud.io in particular is very good at calculating the BrickLink price, height, width, depth, and weight of a model I've built on LDD. But I have had too many frustrations with these programs to use them as a first choice for building an original creation.

[Umbra-Manis]

Quote

LDD sucks.  It's bad.  Really, really, really bad.

The thing is, that LDRAW sucks for rendering. It's really, really, really bad. The only good renders I've ever seen out of LDRAW models come from @Renderbricks and @BEAVeR, both of who have spent hundreds if not thousands of hours building up complex workflows. As someone who can't stand presenting a screenshot or crappy render as a finished model, I have to go with the programs that lets me make good renders easily. POV-Ray renders of LDraw suck, LDD2POVRay produces better results (But is slow and old) Bluerender also beats out most LDraw renders. 

What really seals it is that LDD can be imported into Mecabricks and immediately exported to blender for easy production of some of the best fanmade Lego renders. LDraw simply has nothing close in terms of ease to quality, so it stays Mecabricks and LDD for me. 

[Brick Customs]

19 hours ago, NathanR said:

I confess I m not familiar with LDCad, but mostly because I'm a Mac user.  The only Lego-building software available for the Mac is LDD and Bricksmith, which has seen fewer updates than LDD in recent years and I find incredibly tedious and frustrating to work with. The mecabricks website is also good, but I struggle a little without the part-snapping.  So LDD is the gold standard for me, and will likely remain so for many years to come.

Lack of Mac support is annoying. I'm a Mac user as well, but run a dual-boot Windows/Mac installation. LDCad is one of the major reasons I maintain a Windows installation. I would abandon OSX before I would ever go back to LDD. 

LDCad has parts snapping that works very well most of the time.  Lego without parts snapping just feels wrong.  The grid is often a essential lifesaver though.

19 hours ago, NathanR said:

Wow, that's harsh! I'm not exactly a "skilled builder" but I appreciate the simplicity of searching or browsing bricks in LDD, the part snapping features, and the simple/clean interface.  Sure LDD has it's flaws - new parts are added rarely, many bionicle-type parts are missing, and the flex-parts seldom ever work for me.  Building technic models is the only really difficult part, but once you learn how to rotate gears so they can align, it becomes fairly straightforward.

It took me a few weeks to learn LDCad.  I went through the tutorials methodically and researched a few things the tutorial didn't cover.  LDD is indeed considerably more simple.  However, after the initial learning curve, LDCad's ease of use generally far surpasses that of LDD, even for the most basic assembly tasks.   Most of LDCad's commands are keyboard shortcuts. This makes it extremely fast to use. Manipulating bricks is easy, fluid and reliable.

 

19 hours ago, NathanR said:

Oh, and a small aside - I did once try writing my own cad editor for macOS.  I learned a lot about SceneKit, Swift and ObjectiveC, but the stumbling block for me was actually parsing the LDraw file format.  It's... archaic, really, and requires very low level manipulation of the geometry data, such as manual calculation of the normal vectors.  It would take a genius to figure this out, and I imagine that's why there are so few Lego cad programs around.

Interesting that the LDraw system is so archaic. That's probably why the Stud.io developers chose not to use it. I hope Stud.io continues to be developed. I like what I've seen of it, but it's still missing some features that I use regularly.  Also, mad props on trying to write a CAD editor.

EDIT: Stud.io does use LDraw. My bad. 

11 hours ago, Umbra-Manis said:

The thing is, that LDRAW sucks for rendering. It's really, really, really bad. The only good renders I've ever seen out of LDRAW models come from @Renderbricks and @BEAVeR, both of who have spent hundreds if not thousands of hours building up complex workflows. As someone who can't stand presenting a screenshot or crappy render as a finished model, I have to go with the programs that lets me make good renders easily. POV-Ray renders of LDraw suck, LDD2POVRay produces better results (But is slow and old) Bluerender also beats out most LDraw renders. 

What really seals it is that LDD can be imported into Mecabricks and immediately exported to blender for easy production of some of the best fanmade Lego renders. LDraw simply has nothing close in terms of ease to quality, so it stays Mecabricks and LDD for me. 

Fair enough.  I've only just dabbled in rendering a bit, so I can't speak on that too much.  My final goal is always a real life build, so the actual function of the program takes precedence over rendering quality. Also, many of my builds are simply impossible to create in LDD, so a rendering advantage is lost on me.

12 hours ago, Aanchir said:

Some of the reasons I tend to like LDD:

• I'm used to LDD's interface, controls, categories, and colors. The colors are a particularly big factor. Going into a program like Bricksmith or Stud.io I'm confronted with a vast number of colors, most of which I'm unlikely to wind up using, under names I have to think harder about to make sense of, in a confusing order. Some of the colors listed aren't even discrete LEGO colors at all, but rather just variants of other colors that are listed separately. Meanwhile, on Stud.io at least, there are many instances where entirely separate colors are conflated under one name. LDD keeps colors simpler, using their actual names and showing mainly just current colors in most menus.
• Working with ball joints in the other programs I've tried is a pain. On Bricksmith, you can't hinge a part or assembly along a specific axis of rotation like in real life — instead, you're forced to rotate the part or assembly along its center point and then haphazardly nudge it back into place. Often, this "nudging" requires actively going into the preferences and changing the grid size, and even then it only lets me approximate parts being connected. This is a nightmare for building posable figures and testing their range of movement. Stud.io at least has a hinge tool sort of like LDD's, but it's a pain to use with ball joints compared to the LDD version. Instead of just clicking on a set of arrows that show what axis of rotation you're manipulating, you have to click on one of several hinge points and just hope it's the one that corresponds to the direction you want to hinge the assembly in. You also can't view the numerical angles of a ball joint piece's current rotation all at once like you can on LDD. It's also buggier than LDD's hinge tool, from my experience.
• LDD has parts that the other programs often lack, like CCBS parts, which Lyi mentioned. This sort of cuts both ways, since LDD also lacks quite a few parts, and not just older parts that I'm unlikely to want to use, but also current ones like mini-doll parts. Half the reason I even bother having programs besides LDD is so that I can do stuff with mini-dolls, but I rarely end up doing that much with them anyway since the building process on these other programs is such a hassle.
• TBH, I'm so used to not making building instructions for my models that that's barely even a consideration, and I don't tend to build especially big models — hardly any of the stuff I build is more than 1000 pieces.
• I'm a Mac user, so a lot of the digital building software that comes most highly recommended doesn't even work on my computer.

Ironically, the only way I've learned to create a model in these programs I'm really satisfied with is to import that model from LDD, then fix whatever parts disappeared or got misplaced during the import. This certainly has its uses — Stud.io in particular is very good at calculating the BrickLink price, height, width, depth, and weight of a model I've built on LDD. But I have had too many frustrations with these programs to use them as a first choice for building an original creation.

I'm not very familiar with Bricksmith or Stud.io.   LDD was my go-to for a long time.  I switched when I found myself unable to execute certain building techniques in LDD. 

I actually like LDCad's handling of colors much more than LDD.  They have a lot of non-Lego colors for some reason, but all you have to do is add the colors your want to your favorites, and then you never have to think about other colors ever again (unless you need a weird one).

The parts library sorting does take some getting used to.  I don't know if it's better or worse, but most LDD users probably won't like it at first (I didn't).

Good point.  Ball joints suck in LDCad.  Hinging in general is more difficult as you'll often have to adjust the hing point manually.  It's annoying.  I do remember some really annoying hinging behavior in LDD as well.  LDCad's hinging is very manual, but LDD's is buggy sometimes.  

I've actually never used a CCBS part (I had to Google what it was lol).  It's usually pretty easy to find a missing unofficial part for LDraw.  I've never looked for a CCBS part, however.


 

 

Edited September 18, 2017 by Brick Customs

[SylvainLS]

34 minutes ago, Brick Customs said:

Interesting that the LDraw system is so archaic. That's probably why the Stud.io developers chose not to use it.

I’m not sure if it’s said tongue in cheek but just in case it wasn’t: Stud.io uses LDraw parts. The .io file format is just zipped LDraw files. And the “integrated” rendering tool is POVRay, using LDView’s export module.

 

[deraven]

I'll not rehash what was said above, but let me add specifically that, having started with LDraw-based tools, trying LDD after that was painful.  Going the other direction may not be.  In particular, the forced bottom-up building in LDD (and having to use scaffolds to place things, etc.) is the deal-breaker for me.  It's not how I build, digitally or IRL.  If I'm going for a complex shape, for instance, I'll start from the outside in with something that may ultimately require all manner of internal SNOT structure, and I like to start the whole process by just dropping elements into 3D space and seeing how they can be joined together.  That's basically impossible for me in LDD.

The natural parts snapping and logical points of rotation and such are nice, however, and I do sometimes miss that in other tools where I do waste time nudging things around and manually aligning with the grid.  Someday maybe there'll be a cross-platform solution that does it all!

[Darats]

5 hours ago, Umbra-Manis said:

POV-Ray renders of LDraw suck

Have a look at my renders (in my flickr signature bellow). I wouldn't say they suck... Any renderer can suck if you don't know how to use it.

 

I don't mean to get into this Lego softwares war but the OP was a bit rought with LDD, as other answers where with ldraw.

As a ldraw user, I'd like to express my pov:

Please, remember that ldraw is a brick library not a renderer. Hundreds of people have put energy to make ldraw what it is today, they deserve a bit of respect. Ldraw started more than 20 years ago and is still alive, I would not say the same for LDD. Mecabricks is quite new but maintained by a few amount of person (if not one), what if the team stop the development...

So, yes ldraw is harder, yes ldraw seems complicated and yes ldraw is maybe not meant for beginners. But as soon as you learn the tools, start to author parts yourself, share them to the community, believe me a new lego world will open to you.

PovRay is what it is : an outdated renderer, but it's free and quite simple to tweek if you are familiar with programming. Blender also have a ldraw importer, and you can even export ldraw to 3dsMax.

Of course, if you want a straight forward soft to built and render: go for LDD or Mecabricks. But if you want to get involved more deeply in a digital lego community, get rid of closed softwares limits: go for ldraw.

[Lyichir]

Don't get me wrong, I have full respect for the people behind the Ldraw library. That said, the people chipping away at the Ldraw library have very different preferences than I do in terms of Lego, and that influences what new parts get modeled. LDD was quick to add CCBS parts to tie in with the Hero Recon Team program, and continued updating with new ones for several years. By contrast, Ldraw has yet to add even a single shell or bone piece.

[Darats]

No worries, I didn't wrote that to you, or even to a particular person. I'm just tired to read people saying ldraw sucks only because they didn't even try to learn...

 

About CCBS parts, all parts available in LDD have already been converted to a ldraw format, they only need (a lot of) cleaning to be officially released. But they are downloadable (http://digital-bricks.de). As those parts are quite complex, and as a few ldraw authors are working on those parts, it takes time to have them available. But it is still possible to add them one day.

[Brick Customs]

6 hours ago, SylvainLS said:

I’m not sure if it’s said tongue in cheek but just in case it wasn’t: Stud.io uses LDraw parts. The .io file format is just zipped LDraw files. And the “integrated” rendering tool is POVRay, using LDView’s export module.

 

Oh!  Really good to know.  I was sure I read something about Stud.io not being LDraw based.  I like it even better now.

 

4 hours ago, Darats said:

I don't mean to get into this Lego softwares war but the OP was a bit rought with LDD, as other answers where with ldraw.

Sometimes overstating your position makes for a better thread. 
 

6 hours ago, deraven said:

I'll not rehash what was said above, but let me add specifically that, having started with LDraw-based tools, trying LDD after that was painful.  Going the other direction may not be.  In particular, the forced bottom-up building in LDD (and having to use scaffolds to place things, etc.) is the deal-breaker for me.  It's not how I build, digitally or IRL.  If I'm going for a complex shape, for instance, I'll start from the outside in with something that may ultimately require all manner of internal SNOT structure, and I like to start the whole process by just dropping elements into 3D space and seeing how they can be joined together.  That's basically impossible for me in LDD.

The natural parts snapping and logical points of rotation and such are nice, however, and I do sometimes miss that in other tools where I do waste time nudging things around and manually aligning with the grid.  Someday maybe there'll be a cross-platform solution that does it all!

Preach! 

3 hours ago, Darats said:

I'm just tired to read people saying ldraw sucks only because they didn't even try to learn...

This.  A learning curve is not equal to "hard to use".  It's only hard to people because they never learned it in the first place.  I'm always shocked that people ignore the most powerful Lego building programs just because they don't want to learn them.  Especially people building large MOC's.  A lot of extra pain for no reason. 

 

[Hart New Bob]

On ‎9‎/‎17‎/‎2017 at 1:45 AM, Brick Customs said:

LDD sucks.  It's bad.  Really, really, really bad.

I mostly agree.  When I was building, it was a brick above where I wanted it!

Edited September 18, 2017 by Hart New Bob

[M2m]

Part of the reasons why LDD is popular is because it's an official product from lego. So if you google around for lego digital tools of course it's in the top hit list, and as a starter of course many will go for an official product first. 

 

Having said like many others for Mac OS there are not many alternatives (if you don't want to dual boot or fiddle around with wine). 

Adding to this I like the snapping and 'natural' hinging of parts, plus it's really easy to get you started. 

Of course grouping could be greately improved, as the overall performance. But then I think most of the casual builders don't target for enourmous builds - and even my 7 year old MacBook Air can handle 2000 parts models quite ok. So I expect more current machines will not feel so many performance problems with LDD. 

One more point is ease of use, plus that lxf  as the official format can be used with lots of other tools. 

Would be overly happy if lego would support it more or make it open source though. 

[legolijntje]

14 hours ago, Brick Customs said:

Good point.  Ball joints suck in LDCad.  Hinging in general is more difficult as you'll often have to adjust the hing point manually.  It's annoying.  I do remember some really annoying hinging behavior in LDD as well.  LDCad's hinging is very manual, but LDD's is buggy sometimes.  

I think I vaguely remember some discussion about adding an extra meta type to LDCad's shadow library (used for the part snapping) to add custom rotation points for parts. But I'm not sure if that a feature request from someone or if it was @roland actually considering implementing it. It would be a very useful feature nevertheless.

[roland]

On 9/17/2017 at 2:31 PM, legolijntje said:

I believe LDCad can be compiled for Mac, but the author has no mac to compile it on. But I'm not sure about that, you gotta ask @roland 

Yes as it should be 99.95% identical to the current Linux version.

I tried to make the Windows version run under wine which it does, but the OpenGL driver in recent mac's seems to miss support for display lists resulting in a broken gui. LDCad 2.0 will no longer use display lists so hopefully it will run seamless using wine then.

6 hours ago, legolijntje said:

I think I vaguely remember some discussion about adding an extra meta type to LDCad's shadow library (used for the part snapping) to add custom rotation points for parts. But I'm not sure if that a feature request from someone or if it was @roland actually considering implementing it. It would be a very useful feature nevertheless.

Someone suggested that, he also suggested using the snap info as rotation points by having the user cycle trough them. I never really figured an efficient way of doing that in the current code/gui though. Again hopefully this will improve in 2.0

In the meantime you can use custom selection centers and or use groups with alternative centers to help posing stuff.

[Blakbird]

On 9/17/2017 at 1:45 AM, Brick Customs said:

Why do skilled builders use LDD? 

LDD sucks.  It's bad.  Really, really, really bad.

I think the answer can be illustrated by comparing a cell phone camera to a DSLR.  Why does anyone use a cell phone camera?  They suck.  True, but they are simple and convenient to use and it takes skill to use a DSLR and get the best results.  It's the same with LDD versus LDraw.  I've been using LDraw tools for far longer than LDD has even existed, and therefore I find LDD completely unusable.  That's not an exaggeration, I can't do anything with it at all.  It doesn't work like a CAD system, it works like a building system.  Which you likeis a matter of preference, but I find CAD much more intuitive, and I can build far faster in MLCAD than LDD even though it is not relational.  And I'm talking about complex, multi-thousand part Technic creations with crazy angles.

Suum cuique

The benefits of LDraw are that I can do whatever I want.  I can put parts wherever I want whether the code thinks it works that way or not.  I can open up a part and modify how it looks, add a stud, paint a portion of it silver, or cut it in half.  I can synthesize flexible parts, or copy loosely linked parts along a path.  I can add building steps, hidden parts, buffer exchanges, and the list goes on.  But all of this took a considerable investment in time to learn.

[Toastie]

On ‎20‎.‎09‎.‎2017 at 12:50 AM, Blakbird said:

I think the answer can be illustrated by comparing a cell phone camera to a DSLR.  Why does anyone use a cell phone camera?  They suck.  True, but they are simple and convenient to use and it takes skill to use a DSLR and get the best results.  It's the same with LDD versus LDraw.  I've been using LDraw tools for far longer than LDD has even existed, and therefore I find LDD completely unusable.  That's not an exaggeration, I can't do anything with it at all.  It doesn't work like a CAD system, it works like a building system.  Which you likeis a matter of preference, but I find CAD much more intuitive, and I can build far faster in MLCAD than LDD even though it is not relational.  And I'm talking about complex, multi-thousand part Technic creations with crazy angles.

Suum cuique

The benefits of LDraw are that I can do whatever I want.  I can put parts wherever I want whether the code thinks it works that way or not.  I can open up a part and modify how it looks, add a stud, paint a portion of it silver, or cut it in half.  I can synthesize flexible parts, or copy loosely linked parts along a path.  I can add building steps, hidden parts, buffer exchanges, and the list goes on.  But all of this took a considerable investment in time to learn.

You know, I feel so much better now - I entirely (every word that is) agree with Blakbird's comment.

And for years I thought MLCad/LDraw is my absolute favorite because: I am old. And simply not smart enough to figure out how the "new" modeling tools work. I tried them all ... just to get completely lost because a part does not stay where >I< want it to be ... but that is the core of the matter I guess.

Now with regard to rendering: There is export from LDView, from Stud.io, from LDCad (...) to PovRay. And then PovRay needs to be tuned of course. Then there is Blender with the "read LDraw files" add-on - I don't see why LDraw and rendering don't work - particularly when installing Darat's LEGO library extensions ...

Thanks a lot and best regards,
Thorsten

 

[Darats]

16 hours ago, Toastie said:

particularly when installing Darat's LEGO library extensions

Nice to see people using it because there is not that much download on them...

[Toastie]

16 hours ago, Darats said:

Nice to see people using it because there is not that much download on them...

... and even nicer, when people do you proper grammar ... "LGEO library extensions" was meat of course ... sorry. 

[ReplicaOfLife]

I use it to design my modulars. As those are generally built from the ground up, I don't face many problems. The only time I really struggled was with the circular tower in my Record Store, but even that I was able to resolve rather quickly. Apart from that I only encountered few problems, none of which were a great hindrance (mostly legal connections that for some reason it wouldn't allow).

I have no need for instructions, as I build them just using the LDD model as reference. The existing group/subgroup feature is enough to separate it all into useful sub-builds.

Lately, I've looked into other tools, as LDD is missing lots of new parts I want to use, but so far I haven't found one that I can use as efficiently and quickly. LDraw is completely lost on me (as are all traditional CAD programs... just not my thing, I guess). stud.io would be cool, but it struggled even with a ~1200 piece model I imported (framerate goes down, which makes it hard to use), I find part/color selection cumbersome, just as the grouping into submodels and steps.

 

So I guess while LDD is far from perfect, it still is the tool that works best for me....now if only someone found a way to add new parts to make up for the discontinued support by LEGO

[Jason C. Hand]

On 9/17/2017 at 5:26 AM, JopieK said:

Well, Draw is not that user-friendly, is it? And LDD does the job for most things. Apart from that tools like LDCad are not for macOS. Talking about a "stone tablet and chisel", that is also what Windows feels to me (and I'm a windows programmer, or at least used to be) so I don't want to start Windows if not absolutely necessary. LEGO should make LDD open source, then we could enjoy community development and get the best of both worlds by fusing the two.

I agree entirely. That might be the providential move for TLG to make, if it is indeed true that they have altogether given up on everything and anything to do with LDD. The signals are still kinda mixed in that regard 

[ForteNoir]

If other CAD programs could offer bigger parts libraries, I'd consider switching to something other than LDD. As it stands, LDD is very intuitive for me and has a very large and up-to-date library of parts even if those parts can't be manipulated using real-world 'rule breaking' (attaching pieces in unconventional ways). Additionally, rendering with the LDD-to-POVRay converter is a snap. It's simply easier to use in spite of its character quirks.