This second week of Fab Academy has focused on 3d modeling programs, exploring the optiones and finding the one best suited for our own projects. I tried out 123d and Fusion as well as looked over a few others (Rhino/grasshopper, Zebra imaging and meshmixer). The dear Bry Ashman helped me out and gave me a great introduction to the world of 3d modeling.
123D
I found that 123d was the easiest with a simple enough layout. On the other hand, once compared with Fusion it becomes easy to tell which one was Photoshop and which one was Paint. I loved to explore Mesh Mixer since it allows for more organic shape building but I believe Fusion would fit my needs better for the final project. The issue regarding this is that Fusion is not as common as for example Rhino and also has a pay-to-use property, something I only got around by a time limited trial. The Fab Lab on the other hand has stationary computers with Rhino pre-installed.
In 123d I followed this tutorial. It was very basic and not that great of a tutorial but allowed me to grasp the basics of the program, especially regarding the cylindrical forms I was interested in. It had several tutorials and example builds, none of which worked for me 
this error message.
Meshmixer and inverting
I had severe issues figuring out how to sculpt inwards in Meshmixer. I tried searching for answers but was left empty handed. In the end I gave up on Meshmixer and moved on to download Sculptris, a fun and easy to use program with minimalist features. 
In Sculptris there was a note on the side which suggested that I used ALT to invert the pull. It turns out that this was the case for Meshmixer too, which I had tried before but without the patience to see the results properly. Personally I liked the vide veriety of options (such as premade models, like the one I tinkered with, see image above) and the straight to print aspect of Meshmixer and thus prefered it. Check out week 5, 3d scanning and printing to see the 
facevace I developed in Meshmixer.
When they say beta, they mean it.
Once I finally got into Rhino and understood it properly I was sold. The main issue I had was using the beta-mac version. I didn't stumble upon any bugs but didn't realize at first how limited the available tools were which lead me to believe that the visable tools where all Rhino had to offer, I tried building shapes and got incredibly frustrated with the curve tool. I tried it on Windows and a completely new world opened up. A year later I will find Fusion a much more enticing option, but that's another story...
The realm of 2D
When it came down to 2D design programs the choice was an easy one for me (unfortunately). I say unfortunately since there are nice Open Source options such as Incscape but I'm raised as a graphic designer and Illustrator has been the tool of choice for too long.
a scetch stage and I was hugely nervous regarding actually deciding and settling for this path, weather or not I'd be able to deal with the steriotyping I expected to have to endure. It was with great hesitation that I made these scetches but I am currently glad i did. Below you can see my first attempts of designing the shape of a bullet vibrator in 123d works.
by using a spline in Fusion. Which was later rotated to create the object below.
