kicad new tool: import 3D model into footprint in Altium style

[easyw]

Hi,
I've made a tool to align the 3d model directly moving it over the pcbnew footprint.


here there is a small video tutorial:

https://youtu.be/O6vr8QFnYGw

With 'kicad-StepUp-tools' is possible to download a STEP part from on-line libraries (e.g. 3dcontentcentral, grabcad, etc), align the model to kicad footprint and export the model to wrl. That will produce a 3d VRML model exactly aligned to footprint as in mechanical CAD.

That will align EDA to MCAD 3d viewers. No need to reiterate the aligning process or empiric calculate offset and rotation to apply to VRML model.
You can also click on 'Create axis' button to have an other help in orienting the part.

TIP:
footprint aligner workflow:
- load the Macro
- open the 3d STEP model in FreeCAD
- click on 'load the footprint' button
- align the part to footprint
- click on 'scale to kicad VRML' button

This 3d tool is a part of the kicad StepUp MCAD exporter, a plugin for pcbnew to make ECAD MCAD collaboration available also in kicad.
and here the place to download the script:

http://sourceforge.net/projects/kicadstepup/

Maurice