HALP! Artsy people, I need help for science

[Moe]

Hello, unlike-myself-non-artistically challenged people! I come to you with a question. I want to make a sketch/drawing like this one:

You'll notice that it's simple, but sorta 3-D ish. Assuming that I can get pretty much whatever software is needed, what would you recon is the simplest way to create something like this? Which program should I use?

I'd be eternally grateful for any help you could provide, and as an added bonus you can rest assured that by helping me, you're helping science, humanity, and the Campaign To Make Moe Supreme Overlord of Earth.

Thank you!

[Jopax]

I'm thinking Google Sketchup would be your best bet, it's free, very simple to use and can make most of what you'd probably need. Not entirely sure about the arrows but I think you can add those with an image editing program later on (Photoshop, GIMP and the like). Or there might be a template that has them.

[Sparki]

Looks 2D, so GIMP/Photoshop/Illustrator should do the job.

Photoshop (and Illustrator) have the "pen tool" which should give you enough freedom to build the objects. Likewise, you can use the standard geometric shape stuff and warp them with (options bar) Edit -> Transform -> Warp (or others) to form them the way you like.

Do you want to make a copy of that pic?

[Moe]

Well, sorta-kinda. See that blue "tube" running through the setup? That's supposed to be the laser beam. Notice how it gets squished in one dimension by the cylindrical lens. I'm seriously lacking in artistic skills, so drawing this 3-D tube in squished form is way beyond me...

[Vijil]

Send me money and I'll do it in full 3D if you like. Lots of money. FOR SCIENCE.

But yeah, sketchup for 3D and cell shading, and PS or whatever for arrows and colours and stuff.

[Jak.]

As a purist, i'd suggest blender and inkscape, perhaps with a tad bit of gimp.

All i can say that in blender, the actual geometry would be fairly easy (for a semi-experienced user), the colours might be harder, but still doable. For arrows, i would probably suggest a vector drawing program (such as inkscape), but Microsoft Powerpoint would likely work as well.

[Moe]

I can't seem to get that narrowing or bowing in to work in sketchup. Is there a way to manipulate faces?

[BalanceSheet]

For that narrowing, you could make a long rectangle section, pick the Arc tool, drag a line from end to end, and pull it in a little to create that shape on both sides. Then just use Push/Pull to cut out the edges.

The harder part would be where that cylinder becomes a rectangular shape--the best solution I can think of would be to make a separate cylinder, get it as close to the size of the rectangle as possible, then right click the line of the end of the cylinder to select "Hide". You might need to trim it up in PhotoShop or something else if it still looks wonky.