If you want to understand the new frontier of 3D printing Copyright, Patent and Trademark law, Public Knowledge's new white paper: So, What is the Deal with Copyright and 3D Printing? is a perfect resource to understand exactly where the law stands now.

The paper is a follow up to their previous 3D printing whitepaper It Will Be Awesome if They Don't Screw It Up: 3D Printing, Intellectual Property, and the Fight Over the Next Great Disruptive Technology.  Where as the previous paper focused on the broad connection between intellectual property law and 3D printing, What's the Deal? focuses on the relationship between copyright and 3D printing.

This is an extremely helpful paper for those creating works that lie between sculptural and functional works and copyright does not cover functional objects but can in some cases cover aesthetic aspects of the functional objects. What we like to call, 'the grey area'.  With this distinction the paper also clarifies a really important point which has been confusing for many people, a Creative Commons license cannot be used to legally protect a functional object.  We have seen many people share their functional 3D files with a Creative Commons license in a number of places online,  although this is not legally binding, it does offer a social construct that should be respected, a way to communicate the way in which you would like to share, and a possible framework for the future.

Take the time to read the paper, it is an incredibly useful resource for all of us navigating through unchartered waters. 

The paper is shared under a Creative Commons license, of course... Great work by Michael Weinberg and his team. 

Often the most meaningful gifts are the ones that you make yourself for the one you love.  Buying a bunch of roses and a teddy bear from the gas station on the way home on Valentine's Day although efficient, is not exactly romantic.  Shapeways community member jrey made a beautiful gift for his wife for their second wedding anniversary.

Jrey's wife is from the Bahamas so he designed a sea shell ring and set of earrings to remind her of home and had them 3D printed in Sterling Silver by Shapeways.  The jewelry looks beautiful and she absolutely loved them.  Now this is the only jewelry of it's kind in the entire world, made especially for one woman designed for her alone by her husband.  This is the kind of gift that will be passed on for generations, with the grandmother telling the granddaughter the story of it's creation, and the depth of meaning that far exceeds any item bought off of the shelf. 

Another family 3D printing project to hit Shapeways is the Controller Pendant by stop4stuff. Not only is it a story of a father and son, working together on a creative project, but also a story entrepreneurial spirit.  If the design sells, the boy get's his pocket money without doing any additional work, but most importantly, the boy get's his pocket money without it coming out of his father's pocket.... Win, win.

Some time last year (2012) my 13 year old son, Nath, was trying to think up ways to make a bit of extra pocket money. Knowing Nath's artistic flair, I suggested a design of something he could have 3D printed. Nath drew up the design on paper, I did the 3D model work and between us we came up with the style of the pendant based on an Xbox games console controller.

Ordered on the 15th December, the pendant arrived on the 2nd January, in plenty of time for his birthday next week.

This is Nath's first design and any markups from this model all go to Nath.

So, if you want an awesome pendant for yourself or your gamer friend, go for the Controller Pendant and support teenage entrepreneurship. Happy Birthday Nath...

Shapeways community member and design for 3D printing specialist Cunicode has just launched Crayon Creatures, a simple way to take your child's drawing to 3D print thanks to Shapeways 3D printing, because sticking your child's drawing to the fridge is so 2011.

With Crayon Creatures all you need to do is scan or photograph your child's drawing and upload it to be converted into a 3D form, 3D printed and sent to your door.  Each drawing is 3d modeled based exactly on the drawing, not wrapped around a default form so every 3D printed figure is as unique as your child's drawing. 

You can see a few of the Crayon Creatures already created in Cunicode's Shapeways shop.

We are seeing more and more applications on Shapeways that make it easy to 3D print without learning how to 3D model. At the same time as we see complex 3D modeling and scanning tools become cheaper and easier to use, we are also seeing these applications and services that allow anyone can make what they want with 3D printing, lowering the barrier to entry.  

If there was a perfect tool to make 3D printing easier, what do you think it should be?