David Burger VK2CZ spoke about professional antenna modelling and optimisation using the “HOBBIES” [link unreachable] software package. “HOBBIES”, or “Higher Order Basis Based Integral Equation Solver”, can be used for antenna design and placement, EMI/EMC analysis, and many other applications.

David’s lecture includes several practical antenna design examples, including:

– 80m Bobtail
– 160m inverted L
– 20m 4 element Yagi
– 10GHz horn antenna

David is a Life Senior Member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers, as well as being a veteran Amateur contester. In addition to his usual callsign, VK2CZ, David makes full use of his new VJ2J contesting call. Check out his QRZ.com page to see his upcoming schedule.

Watch the lecture on VK2MB-TV.

Update, August 2025: as noted above, the HOBBIES web site seems to be defunct. We reached out to David VK2CZ, who had this to say:

At the time of the lecture, the HOBBIES software was still active, however, shortly afterwards, the Professor who sponsored the PhD project out of NYU passed away.
The whole project literally fell apart and was since abandoned, with all active licenses, including my own, served with an expiry date of 2030.
The software titled MANAGAL is arguably the next most friendly which is still very much like NEC based software. 
The ANSOFT suite is near equivalent to HOBBIES with a beautiful CAD interface, and I recall there may be a cut-down free version… Full licence costs for ANSOFT is prohibitively expensive.
If you google Steve Stearns K6OIK, he has some great tutorials on antenna modelling, and likely updates on what is the most ham friendly these days.