I mentioned Mani Zamani and the awesome model Rose Keeper in the previous post. Mani used Shapeways Steel 3D printing and existing Revoltech joints to make a movable, pose able model that is just amazing. 

Below Mani explains to us, a great and inspirational story, the journey to Rose Keeper.

Well I am a foreign student and graduate of the Design Academy in Eindhoven  and as long as I remember I was always fascinated by those giant robots from Japanese animation specially the old school ones. So based on that background, believe it or not, I decided to become a designer.

After coming to The Netherlands, in my forth year of study I started a project in the plastic course which the focus was designing a robot action figure based on injection molding in a form of kit model for kids. For that project I used the simple technique of making all the parts with balsa wood and simply vacuum form them with polystyrene (the same material used for kit models) and I used Lego parts for the joints.

A month later a friend of mine who is also a computer nerd introduced me to Shapeways. And that was a big deal really big deal. See after 5 years of modeling in Rhino3d and printing data sheets to make parts in foam and balsa, Shapeways was a big eye opener.

So I decided to go straight and without any test print I ordered my first model which was also a very human like robot inspired by ninja-samurais (The Samurai-Poet Project).

As you can see every thing is printed by Shapeways except the ball joints system which I order them from Japan. I did some test prints of the same ball and socket system with SLS(White, Strong & Flexible) but it was not as strong as I expected to be specially for the hip joints where there is more weight but I did use the SLS ball joints in arms where there is no weight issue there .

It was after this experience which I came up with the conclusion that ratchet and klicky ball joints are better solution for heavy models and after some research I found Revoltech.

Now what is Revoltech: Revoltech is an action figure line from the Japanese company Kaiyodo. The main selling point of the line is the 'Revolver' joint, which all of the figures utilize. This gives the figures a high degree of articulation, allowing for many dynamic and varied poses.

Exactly 4 months before my visa expired I saw an announcement of metal 3d printing for all on Shapeways and I went nuts for it. I had to design a robot all in metal (I have a goal in my life and it is to design and build robot figures in as many different materials and techniques a as possible and become a master of it)

So in order to over come the costs I decided to cancel my summer trip to Zurich and spend the money on this project.

Rosekeeper became a different project during designing. The organic shape of a rose and a background story that I had in mind lead to this creature which is not a robot but a rejected demon from hell which has to find the perfect rose in order to bring balance between the world of angels, demons, humans and birds.

It has 14 points of articulation together with 2 point extra for knees (double joints).

Unfortunately even with Revoltech joints it is heavy for some poses but I am really pleased with it and this brings me to my next project which will be to design my own joint system this will also let me sell my works without any restrictions. (the figure itself is 205 mm long).