Starting with CAD
Build understanding and confidence around the products you want to make, with tuition paced to your experience.
Explore Rhino tuition →ABOUT JOHN BLAND
Practical experience since 1981.
CAD since 2001.
Marine CAD tuition and consultancy grounded in designing and making the products.
From the workshop
to digital design.
I’m John Bland. I’ve been designing and developing marine canvas products since 1981, first using traditional hands-on methods and, since 2001, CAD.
As Tecsew’s founder, I built my experience across boat covers, sprayhoods, cockpit enclosures, biminis and upholstery projects—from bespoke work for private owners to repeatable designs for boat builders, importers and dealers.
I developed the company’s 3D CAD approach, bringing together design, customer approval and preparation for manufacture. My CAD work began in 2D; the complete 3D process developed later.
HELP THAT STARTS WHERE YOU ARE
Your experience.
Your next step.
Today, I draw on that background to help individuals and businesses around the world get more from CAD. My teaching has reached the UK, Europe, the USA, Canada, Australia and Brazil.
Introducing CAD to a business
Work through how digital design fits your existing skills, measurement methods and production process. Agree a practical route forward.
Discuss your workflow →Taking experienced work further
Review difficult designs, refine established methods or tackle more demanding work with a practical second pair of eyes.
Hear from other learners →More than knowing the commands.
My tuition and consultancy focus on understanding the product, making sound design decisions and developing a process you can use with confidence. The aim is to connect what happens on screen with what needs to happen in the workshop.
That same practical approach informs the specialist software I’m developing through John Bland Tools, including Bimini & Frame Designer and NestMate.
FROM JOHN'S PORTFOLIO · AZIMUT 58
Different boats. Practical detail.
Motor-yacht canvas brings a different set of shapes and fittings into the design. This Azimut 58 cockpit enclosure is from my work at Tecsew.
Design by John Bland at Tecsew.
Discuss your own design challenge →PUBLISHED BACKGROUND
Experience you can explore.
- Specialty Fabrics Review, August 2016 — the development of the 3D CAD process, including production design work.
- Yachting Monthly, October 2015 (PDF) — a 10/10 review of a Tecsew cockpit enclosure designed through that process.
- Tecsew’s CAD background — international teaching and the development of its digital methods.
- PhotoModeler’s learning resources — lists John Bland as a source of CAD-for-canvas training.
TALK DIRECTLY TO JOHN
What would you like
to do better?
Tell me what you make, your current CAD experience and where you need help. We can agree a useful next step.