The Shapeways Blog: 3D Printing News & Innovation
Entries from June 2011
Tuesday, June 14. 2011
Updated Design Rules For Shapeways 3D Printing Ceramics
Hello all! We've been busy printing and learning about 3D Printing Ceramics. Thanks to all your awesome designs, we've learned quite a lot over the past few weeks about what types of designs work best for this new material.
We've updated the Ceramics Design Rules, which will be the "Golden Source" for all ceramics related design guidelines from now on.
Here are some tips we added:
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Crowdfunded Creations: Entoforms: 3D Printing Evolution
Entoforms is a really interesting project by Dolf Veenvliet aka macouno using Python scripts in Blender to create a series of Future Fossils using 3D printing.
Macouno is using IndieGoGo to crowd source funding to fully realize the creation, and exhibition of a series of limited issue, highly collectible, art pieces. They are artificial life, generated in the computer, 3D printed, grown, and presented in classic specialist entomology style. In august of 2011 the Entoforms will be exhibited in association with a renowned art gallery in Amsterdam.
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Monday, June 13. 2011
N12 3D Printed Bikini: Technical Update
Wow, we thought the first ever ready to wear, fully 3D printed article of clothing would get some attention, not only because it is a bikini, but also because of the innovative use of materials and software processes, but the response has been huge.
The N12 has been featured on MSNBC, Time, Wired, Gizmodo, cnet, dezeen and hundreds more blogs around the world with much excitement about the prospect of 3D printing clothes to fit.
It is important to note that the garment/fashion industry is one of the few remaining industries where mass produced items are still assembled almost entirely by hand. This means that although design may happen in the first world, production is often outsourced to the third world where labor is cheap and working conditions can range from questionable to appalling. The N12 3D Printed bikini may at first impression seem like nice story with little depth, but what it represents is a possible end to the sweatshop with a completely 3D printed garment pulled direct from a machine. This of course may not be about to happen with the material properties currently available to produce 3D printed fabrics but as the materials become more complex, stronger and more flexible with simultaneous decreases in wall thickness we will see 3D printed garments become increasingly viable.
Sweatshop project / marissaorton / CC BY-SA 2.0
We will follow up soon with more images of the N12 3D printed bikini in use, how it responds to water and address questions about the comfort of the fit and fabric, but for now we would like to go over the fabrication process in a little more detail, to share how Continuum Fashion designed the N12 and what might happen next.
For starters check out the intro video by Continuum Fashion
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Sunday, June 12. 2011
$500 3D Printer Kit: The eMAKER Huxley (no longer) SOLD OUT
UPDATE: Another 500 eMaker 3D printers have now been made available for $550!!!! Expect a delay in delivery, but get em while they are hot...
No big surprise that a fully functioning 3D printer for $475 (or with $465 without 3D printed components needed) that eMaker made available through crowdfunding site IndieGoGo has sold out their first batch of 150 with 16 days still to go and exceeded their goal of $30,000 by raising $75,545....
The eMAKER Huxley 3D printer is a Replicating Rapid prototyping machine, or RepRap for short. It is derived from the open source RepRap project which was started at Bath University, UK.
Machine specifications:
- Build volume: 140x140x110mm
- Overall size: 260x280x280mm
- Printing materials: ABS, PLA
- Build surface: Milled Aluminium, heated.
- Resolution: 0.0125mm
- Speed: 12000mm/min
- Deposition rate: 33cm3 / hr
- Motion: Linear bearings on X and Y axes, Igus low friction bushings on Z axis.
Congratulations to the team at eMaker and the 150 lucky people who have scored themselves a 3D printer for under $500.
via Boing Boing
Friday, June 10. 2011
Friday Finds: 3D Printed Designs From the Shapeways Community
And just in time for the weekend, we're back with some 3D printed inspiration. Remember, you can always find more in the Shapeways shops, or in the "It Arrived" section of our forum. Happy Friday!
NWoolridge's fractal-esque Linking Stars would make an awesome Christmas tree ornament
macouno sharing his creepy-yet-adorable entoforms
Fabriek took the geometry of a hallway in a photo, and did a sphere inversion on it. Whoa.
Thursday, June 9. 2011
Todd Blatt: How to use a Shrink-Ray at Ignite Baltimore #8
Todd Blatt aka Baltmore has five minutes and twenty slides to show a crowd of unsuspecting Baltimoreans how to make with the Hans Solo Carbonite action in real life.. If you are nearby check in to Ignite Baltimore #8 on June 16, 2011, 6pm at 2549 N. Howard St , Baltimore, Maryland 21218 to see how it can be done.
Through the use of 3d scanning and 3d printing technology, Honey-I-Shrunk-the-Kids style shrinking technology is now in the hands of the general public. Todd will share how he recreated an extremely accurate shrunken version of one of the most iconic props in film history, Han Solo in Carbonite, using this cutting-edge technology.
About Todd Blatt:
Todd Blatt is a maker from Baltimore. He holds a
Bachelors Degree in Mechanical Engineering from UMBC, is the Vice
President of the Baltimore Node Hackerspace, and loves 3d modeling and
3d printing. Todd has been an active Shapeways community member with his Shapeways shop filled with a wide range of designs from jewelry, to replica film props including Tom Selleck's Mustache.
Tuesday, June 7. 2011
Walkabout NYC
This coming Friday, Shapeways is participating in Walkabout NYC as part of the local celebration of Internet Week. What's Walkabout NYC? It's a city-wide startup open house, and an opportunity for a behind the scenes look inside Shapeways and lots of other awesome up and coming tech companies.
Since Shapeways moved to NY, people have been very excited to see our office, which, as you might expect, has an impressive array of 3D printed designs. If you've been waiting, this is your chance! Drop by on Friday June 10th between 12pm and 6pm to 419 Park Avenue South, Suite #900. Get a look around, and get your hands on a 3D printed giveaway...while they last.
Monday, June 6. 2011
The World's first 3D printed bikini
It started in August of 2010 when Mary Huang of Continuum Fashion
visited our booth at SIGGRAPH and was immediately captivated by our Digi-Fabric
sample printed from White Strong & Flexible. "You could make a bikini
from this," Mary said, and the project started. Jenna Fizel then also
joined Continuum, contributing her background in 3D computational geometry, and
together they aimed to make the first wearable, accessible 3D printed garment.
Over the following months much research and trial and error was done to model
the highly complex 3D structure that would create a design that is visually
striking as well as comfortable to wear. Early in 2011 the first samples of the
now finished product were printed, and the photoshoot with the first full
prints were done in May. Today the product is ready for launch and is available
for sale at a reasonable price through Continuum's Shapeways shop.
The significance of this launch should not be underestimated. Of
course there has been some 3d printed fashion on catwalks around the world, but
those were concept pieces that are impractical for usual wear, and not readily buy-able. Continuum is demonstrating that with the current state of the
technology and a platform like Shapeways you can make an innovative fashion
design that is immediately accessible to everyone. This is a totally different
industry that can start to use 3d printing for personal production, which is
huge. The Strong & Flexible material (selective laser sintered nylon) is very
versatile, and has proven itself in a number of unexpected applications. As the
technology gets better and even smaller and thinner structures can be printed
the possibilities for 3d printed fashion will grow.
It is great to see the first 3d printed clothing. It will hopefully inspire the fashion and couture industry to imagine new directions in how to use 3d printing. Meanwhile we are proud to have to worked with Continuum on this product and further possibilities. It truly shows that 3d printing is a serious production technology. We can't wait to see what's next!
The World’s Smallest 3D Printer
High-quality 3D printing at home has just come one step closer. Researchers at the Vienna University of Technology in Austria have presented the smallest 3D printer to date. At the size of a carton of milk and weighs 1.5 kilograms, it currently costs around €1,200 but the makers expect the price to drop quickly.
The printer uses stereolithography: it hardens layers of synthetic resin by an intense beam of light of only .05mm wide. So not only is this printer small and cheap, but it also prints at a very high resolution!
You can see it in action here:
Sunday, June 5. 2011
Saturday, June 4. 2011
Friday Finds: 3D Printed Designs From the Shapeways Community
Your weekly dose of 3D printed inspiration has arrived. Remember, you can always check out more in these community member's shops, or in the "It Arrived" section of the forum. Happy Friday!
Froland uses simple WSF to create the striking SwirlMe collection.
Cradder's Mini Ninja in Frosted Ultra Detail, against an atmospheric sunset.
Spoor's HOn30 Scale Shay locomotive, with exquisitely fine details.
Jeff's stylish-yet-natural Honey Ring
Friday, June 3. 2011
The Rise of the Citizen Engineer
Creative Sydney recognizes the rumblings in the DIY World
As part of the VIVID festival in Sydney this year, the organizers have arranged a series of discussions examining major issues across the creative industries. Sessions offer panel discussions on education, technology, investment and more. This year the final (and I assume most exciting) discussion will be DIY World: The Rise of the Citizen Engineer, featuring Andrew Simpson, Founder of Vert Design, Colleen Morgan - Catalyst-in-Residence at The Edge Digital Culture Centre and founder of ThreadTech, Damien Butler - Assemblage Studios and fabrication lab and last but not least Duann Scott of Shapeways....
The discussion is aimed to explore:
Open source culture provides blueprints to create almost anything. Forums, hackerspaces and networks offer expertise and opportunities for collaboration. Rapid prototyping and 3D printing automate the building process and make it instantaneous. So what does the great tech leap forward mean for creativity. Designers, artists and technologists explain how they are transforming the production process, democratizing technology and empowering people to become citizen engineers.
It is a really important step we are seeing at the moment when major festivals, not just those already orientated towards maker and DIY types start to integrate these streams into their programs. At the same time we are seeing Universities (I just visited Bert Bongers at the University of Technology of Sydney) encouraging cross disciplinary tinkering.
So now we have the groundswell coming from you the Shapeways & maker community, we have the cultural intermediaries recognizing the movement and tapping into the unbridled creativity, then we have the universities formalizing and analyzing the tinkering. This starts to triangulate, strengthen and create a really strong framework for the culture to grow.. Exciting times for the citizen engineer....
The event is being held at in the Playhouse within The Sydney Opera House and has been fully booked up for weeks now but I will be sure to post a recap of my impressions of the evening. If anyone is already booked to attend come and say g'day after the event. email me duann(at)shapeways.com if you would like to meet up as well.
Thursday, June 2. 2011
Use the Kinect to 3D Print "a stringy blob of plastic vomit"
Impractical, awkward and ugly but I still REALLY want to have a go at gestural 3D printing using Kinect and a RepRap. No need to learn that tricky CAD software when you can wave your hand in the air..
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Wednesday, June 1. 2011
Over 2000 3D Printed Dice on Shapeways
We have seen how popular Ceramic Wombat's Thorn Dice Set have been over the past few months with a torrent of interest online that have converted into sales and requests for information from mainstream press (stay tuned).
Dice have become quite a popular attraction on Shapeways with over 2000 items now tagged as being dice, die or at the very least dicey...
Along with the Thorn Dice, we have seen some really interesting experiments like the mathematician's die, the simple yet beautiful 20 Sided Dice and of course Dizingof with a diceload of dice models on Shapeways with Mctrivia having even more...
So what are we going to see next in the world of dice? what other materials would the dice masters like to see available to 3D print their die in? What else will be as popular as dice in the Shapeways shops?
The above widget showcases just some of the thousands of dice currently available. If you would like to use it somewhere the code is :
<iframe frameborder="0" src="http://www.shapeways.com/widget/include.php?fav=dice&style=light&rows=3&cols=3" style="border: 1px solid rgb(192, 192, 192); height: 464px; width: 474px;"> </iframe></p>
Or you can make you can make a widget from your own shop, shop section or favorites.
