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New to Inspire Studio? Learn the basics here.
Construction History
The software saves versions of your objects as you create them, enabling you to return to an earlier stage of an object, and modify or reuse the object from that stage.
Construction Tree
The Model Browser displays the construction history of an object in a tree. Like a real tree, the parent, root nodes are at the bottom of the tree, and the child nodes, like branches, are on the top.

Welcome
What's New
Discover new features and enhancements.
Get Started
New to Inspire Studio? Learn the basics here.
- Altair Inspire Studio Overview
  Learn about Inspire Studio, the workspace, and the system requirements.
- File Import and Export
  Learn how to import geometry and export results.
- Select and Edit
  Review techniques for selecting and editing objects.
- Construction History
  The software saves versions of your objects as you create them, enabling you to return to an earlier stage of an object, and modify or reuse the object from that stage.
  - Role of Construction History
    Construction history serves two main purposes: to reveal the steps involved in the creation of an object and to enable editing of an object or its source object.
  - Construction Tree
    The Model Browser displays the construction history of an object in a tree. Like a real tree, the parent, root nodes are at the bottom of the tree, and the child nodes, like branches, are on the top.
  - Working with Construction History
    You can left-click or right-click an object in the construction history.
  - Editing Objects in Construction History
    You can edit child and parent objects in the construction history.
- Adjust the View
  Change the view in the modeling window using the mouse or view controls.
- Take a Snapshot
  Capture an image of a model. The background is white by default, but you can make it colored or transparent. Arrows on curves are automatically turned off.
- Move and Snap
  Translate, rotate, and scale objects using the Move tool. These tasks can be accomplished with greater precision by using grids and snaps.
- Browse and Organize
  Browse and organize the objects, layers, lights, materials, and drawings in your scene using the Model Browser.
- Help and User Assistance
  Learn about the forms of help and user assistance available from the product.
- Units and Measurement
  Change the default units and measure geometry features.
- Tool Belts
  Inspire Studio has four different tool belts to help you quickly access the tools you need for 3D modeling, sketching, creating PolyNURBS, and rendering. You can use the tool belts with the default configuration of tools or you can customize the tool belts by adding and removing tools as required.
- Preferences
  Modify the workspace display, default keyboard shortcuts, and other settings.
Tutorials
Start using Inspire Studio with our interactive tutorials.
Sketching
Create and edit a 2D sketch curve. A sketch curve is any "wire" entity such as a line, rectangle, circle, or arc.
Curves
Create and edit 3D curves by extending, rebuilding, intersecting, splitting, and projecting the shapes.
Surfaces
Create and edit 3D surfaces and solids by creating primitives or editing existing curves and surfaces.
PolyNURBS
Create polygonal surfaces that can easily be converted into NURBS surfaces.
Modify
Create new objects by manipulating and modifying source objects.
Direct
Quickly modify objects that are not a part of Construction History.
Deform
Deform one or more objects with respect to an axis.
Analysis
Analyze curves and surfaces, import simulation data, or access the Design Table and Variable Manager.
Dimensions
Dimension a line, edge, bounding box, angle, and radius/diameter in order to create objects which must fit predefined dimensions.
Drawing
Create detailed 2D drawings of the selected parts of a complex 3D model from multiple perspectives.
Rendering
Adjust the materials, environment, and properties of objects in the scene to create a photorealistic image.
Animation
In Inspire Studio you can animate an object or group and the camera. There are two methods of animation: key frame animation and path animation.
Die Design
Create a draw die in Inspire Studio that you can export to Inspire Form to perform a stamping simulation.
Custom Plug-ins and Scripts
You can use C++ and Python to add custom operations and file formats.
Keyboard Shortcuts and Mouse Controls
Learn keyboard shortcuts and mouse controls for common operations.
SpaceMouse Support
Inspire Studio supports 3Dconnexion's SpaceMouse.

Construction Tree

The Model Browser displays the construction history of an object in a tree. Like a real tree, the parent, root nodes are at the bottom of the tree, and the child nodes, like branches, are on the top.

For example, in the following image, selecting Trim #1 in the modeling view (upper window of the Model Browser) displays the construction history of the object in the tree (bottom window of the Model Browser). The tree displays two highlighted objects in gray: Circle #1 and Shelling #1. These two are source, parent objects for the Trim. The Trim is the child object.

The following diagrams show the linear flow of the object's construction. Note that the diagrams are an illustration only, not a view from the Model Browser.

As you can see in the tree and the diagrams, the construction of the final object, Trim, which includes the cutout, began with the Cube object. The Cube was modified and saved as the Round object. Hence, the Cube is both a source object and parent of the Round object.

When the round operation is performed, two things happen in the tree of the Model Browser:

The source or parent object, in this case the Cube, is hidden and grayed out.
A copy of the Cube is created on the fly and used as input for the Round.
When the Round is selected in the modeling view, the tree displays the Round highlighted in yellow and the Cube grayed out, indicating that the Cube is the parent/source object of the Round: