Doing DaVinci: Improving Leonardo's Design?

The team of 21st century builders, engineers and historians tasked with recreating Leonardo daVinci's inventions for the new Discovery Channel series Doing DaVinci are using Autodesk Inventor 3D design and engineering software to virtually test the renowned inventor's designs.

With the first of 10 high-definition episodes premiering on Discovery Channel on April 13, DOING DAVINCI puts a modern twist on daVinci classics by taking viewers through the build process to determine whether daVinci's designs really work.

Using materials available only in daVinci's time, the program team works to reconstruct his inventions - everything from a futuristic armored tank to a towering three-story siege ladder - to determine the viability of each design and whether some ideas are better left in the history books.

"Autodesk Inventor is an awesome program. It is the most intuitive program out there, and it allows us to easily design and perform what-if studies to figure out the best option for daVinci's designs," said Valek Sykes, designer, sculptor, special effects expert and one of the team's builders.

"Inventor software gives us the most realistic simulation, so we know that when we design and test it in the computer, that's it, it's going to work in the real world.

I can't say enough good things about Inventor. I absolutely love creating with it."