James says:

try the free download of Rhino. (Google for Rhino 3d)

snip

... but
I Would never work without Rhino

I use Rhino every day, but would never try it for this purpose. The shpaes
produced are just not fair. For a quickie guestimate of numbers, it may be
fine, but that is it.
Here's an example, kinda...
I found this old lines plan in a book by Phillips-Birt:

http://www.boatdesign.net/gallery/sh...ize/big/sort/1
/cat/500

After 2 hours with Rhino and a tracing program, I had something that looked
right in profile, but had a surface so unfair that you could see the "planks"
where Rhino had tried to fit a surface.

Two more hours in AutoShip, woring "off-surface", it had faired into this:

http://www.boatdesign.net/gallery/sh...ort/1/size/big
/cat/500/page/

I'm not going ot kid you that those lines are exact, but they are extremely
close.

Eventually, my imagination got the better of me and I stuck on a deck and rig:
http://www.boatdesign.net/gallery/sh...ort/1/cat/500/
page/1

With just Rhino, it would be another "failed project" on the back-burner.

Steve
Stephen C. Baker - Yacht Designer
http://members.aol.com/SailDesign/pr...cbweb/home.htm