- Upload a new design to Shapeways with the tag iPhone5_3D by 5pm EST Friday October 19th 2012.
- Upload a description of your design specifying the use/context.
- Make it awesome.
Terms and Conditions:
- Free prize draw, closing date, 5pm EST Friday October 19th 2012.
- Winner will receive $500 worth of 3D Printing from Shapeways.
- The winner be notified in writing by October 30th, 2012.
- No purchase necessary.
- Multiple entries allowed.
- Entry must be a new design uploaded after September 13th, 2012.
- Entry must be on display to public to be eligible
- All IP for all entires remain property of the designer as per standard Shapeways terms and conditions.
- All entries, images, renders and 3D prints may be used by Shapeways for promotional purposes
- By entering this competition, entrants will be deemed to have accepted and agreed to the conditions.
- No cash or other alternative prizes available.
- The prize draw is not open to Shapeways employees or their families.
- The promoters decision is final and no correspondance will be entered into.
- Promoter: Shapeways LLC, 419 Park Ave South, New York, NY 10016, USA
The Shapeways Blog: 3D Printing News & Innovation
Shapeways Blog
Thursday, November 15. 2012
Shop Owner Holiday Tips Series: #4 Personalization & Shapeways Co-Creators
We're back with the fourth in our series of Shop Owner tips to help you get your shop ready for the holiday season.
4. Personalization: Put a name on it!
5. Merchandising: Design for the occasion
6. Promotion: Go where your audience is
7. Fan Engagement: Put down the bullhorn and have a conversation
8. Data is your Friend: Statistics, Tracking and Analytics
9. Pay for Play: An introduction to the advertising world
Personalization is one of the most popular ways to make a gift special. Not coincidentally, it is one of the greatest things we can do with 3D printing! Luckily, it's easy too.
If you have a model that can be personalized, you can turn it into a co-creator. Good models that could be personalized include rings, tags, keychains, company logos, business card holders, and iPhone cases. The list is endless!
Making a model into a Co-Creator is easy. On your My Models page, under the description there is a link to make this model a Co-Creator
You will get this pop-up where you can specify what is able to be customized on your model whether it is adding text, adding an image or even changing the size. You also indicate how long it will take you to make these changes once someone has ordered your model.
Best Practice Examples. Kaetemi makes this customizable keychain that can have custom images.
This is the what the customer sees for kaetemi's model:
Another example is Ovidu Opresco's ring which is able to be customized with text and for ring size.
For more instructions, see this tutorial page on Co-Creators and consider if any of your models could become co-creators.
As always, if you have tips or any questions, share them here!
Monday, November 12. 2012
Designer Spotlight: Janelle Dehanne Wilson
This weeks Designer Spotlight focuses on Janelle Dehanne Wilson, a jeweler who turned her fascination of fractals into a jewelry line, unellenu.
Tell us a little bit about yourself: Who are you? Where are you located?
Hi, I'm Janelle Dehanne Wilson, located in Sydney, Australia. Approximately two years ago I started my own online business unellenu which focuses on 3D printed designs. I am also employed as a salesperson in fine, high end jewelry.
What's the story behind your designs? What inspires you?
Designing has always been a passion and escape of mine. I am constantly visually inspired by the built and natural environment. I usually design by daydreaming and picturing things in my mind before bringing them into reality. Alternatively I create by experimenting with different digital design processes, and apply various levels of conscious intervention.
What brought you to 3D printing with Shapeways?
I found the Shapeways site through google, and was delighted to see the variety of materials on offer. I was already familiar with 3D printing in the context of wax print to precious metal casting, as it is used in the jewelry industry. 3D printing allows for unique, complex geometries to be developed. It also enables designers to digitally explore exciting permutations of their designs before physical production.
How did you learn how to design in 3D?
My 3D design skills are largely self taught. Having initially acquired some knowledge through following many different tutorials, I combine ideas using traditional and custom processes.
How do you promote your work?
My designs are available online, primarily on my Shapeways shop unellenu, and also my own website. I am interested in exploring more online and retail options very soon. I also enjoy connecting with people who are interested in art, fashion, design and technology via social media. I am active on Twitter, Facebook and have a YouTube channel as well.
Who are your favorite designers or artists? Who in the Shapeways community has served as an inspiration to you?
I appreciate work by the following (quite random assortment) of artists and companies: Rene Lalique, Boucheron, Faberge, Graff Diamonds, Gary Coffey, Lorenz Baumer, H.R.Giger, Escher, Mark Henry Doolittle & Jason P. Nelson. There are also many talented designers and interesting stores on Shapeways. Some that I particularly like are Electrobloom, Mack Madness, Virtox, Alienology, Dario Scapitta Design, Bathsheba, Nervous System, Dropping Form Designs, Spaho Design, Deagoddess, and Bulatov.
If you weren't limited by current technologies, what would you want to make using 3D printing?
When 3D printing becomes more affordable for larger items, I would love to create more sizeable sculptures, furniture, and significant architectural components, perhaps part of a building facade or an enormous contemporary chandelier.
Check out Janelle's intricate jewelry designs and this incredible LED fractal lampshade on her Shapeways Shop or her website.
Thursday, November 8. 2012
Shop Owner Holiday Tips Series: #3 Getting Found in Search
We're back with the third in our series of Shop Owner tips to help you get your shop ready for the holiday season.
3. Discovery: Getting found in search
4. Personalization: Put a name on it!
5. Merchandising: Design for the occasion
6. Promotion: Go where your audience is
7. Fan Engagement: Put down the bullhorn and have a conversation
8. Data is your Friend: Statistics, Tracking and Analytics
9. Pay for Play: An introduction to the advertising world
You've spent time perfecting your model, photographed it, chosen appropriate materials. Now its time to get discovered!
We at Shapeways love that everyday we see new designs being posted and are thrilled by what you do. We write weekly Designer Spotlights, highlight a rotating cast of products on the homepage and we feature your 3D prints at events worldwide.
Categories & Tags. How can you help us help you get discovered in search? Categories and tags! On the model edit page, under the material picker, you can choose two categories to put your model into, and then create an infinite number of tags.
Categories are the indisputable "what" that defines a product, and they are mutually exclusive or at least have one primary purpose. Tags will still be used to share other attributes, like the occasion (e.g., holidays, gifts), suggested recipient (e.g., for him, for her, for mom), qualities (e.g., geeky, whimsical), or even potential uses (e.g., driving, photography). The wider the net you can cast, the more potential buyers you can catch!
Two great examples are jewelry and homewares. For a bracelet you would choose the categories Jewelry and Bracelets and then create tags to describe them: the color, the style and who they might appeal to.
Best Practice Examples. Kevin Wei has done a great job with the Cosma Silver Bangle using these tags: art, arabesque, architecture, facet, filigree, floral, lace, lattice, mosaic, romantic, silver, white, Valentine's day. These tags describe his design, and even suggest which occasion it might be appropriate for.
For a coffee cup, the categories For Your Home and Dining are perfect. For the Aero Cup, Kioro Design has used these tags to cover a broad range of searches: art, for your home, dining, ceramics, coffee cup, cup, espresso cup.
The more tags you use, the more likely someone looking for something like your product will find you. It is not redundant to use both the tags coffee cup and espresso cup, it just increases the chances that someone will find it in search, either on the Shapeways site or using a search engine like Google.
Do you have any other tips for getting found in search? Any questions? Feel free to share them here!
Stay tuned for next week's tip: the role of personalization and custom gifts in 3D printing.
Tuesday, November 6. 2012
3D Printed Relief: Join Us in Helping the Hurricane Sandy Relief Efforts This Thursday
A firefighter in Queens NY, where there was a fire on October 29th. (AP, via Atlantic Wire)
With so many in distress in the wake of Hurricane Sandy, including several members of our team who are recovering from damaged homes, our thoughts go out to everyone affected. We were very lucky to emerge relatively unscathed, but we know there are still many without power, food, and homes.
As people throughout the Northeast rebuild their lives, the Shapeways team and community felt passionate about doing our part to help with relief efforts.
This Thursday, we will donate 10% of our sales revenue to the American Red Cross' Sandy relief effort: $0.10 on every dollar anyone spends on Shapeways.com (excluding markup) will go to Sandy Relief.
Shop Owners, we hope you will join us in our efforts! We've heard that some of you would like to donate your markups to charity for the day (big thanks to Shapeways community member Michiel Cornelissen for starting the conversation). We invite you to join us on Thursday by pledging to donate your markups for the day to Sandy relief.
We will supercharge your efforts: by tagging your products Sandy Relief not only will you be pledging to donate your markups, you will secure a spot on the Shapeways homepage as we'll be featuring those products from Thursday to Sunday.
We know there is still a lot of work to be done, but we hope you will join us in doing what we can.
Take a look at some of the Shapeways shop owners pledging to donate their profits so far.
Friday, November 2. 2012
Shop Owner Holiday Tips Series: #2 Function & Form
We're back with the second in our series of Shop Owner tips to help you get your shop ready for the holiday season.
1. Master the Basics: Making your shop shine
2. Function & Form: Which materials for which products?
3. Discovery: Getting found in search
4. Personalization: Put a name on it!
5. Merchandising: Design for the occasion
6. Promotion: Go where your audience is
7. Fan Engagement: Put down the bullhorn and have a conversation
8. Data is your Friend: Statistics, Tracking and Analytics
9. Pay for Play: An introduction to the advertising world
This week we'll be sharing suggestions on function and form, namely how to choose the right materials for your products. If you are making a product for yourself, it's great to have unlimited choice and to be able to experiment with various materials. But if someone is buying your product, you want to help them choose the best material for your product so they have the best experience possible. For example, your customer probably wouldn't want a ceramic iPhone case or a wedding ring in Frosted Ultra Detail...
To get started, when you upload your model to your shop, all materials are automatically enabled. It is important to check if all the materials are appropriate. Ask yourself:
1. Does my design meet the design rules for this material?
2. Would this product make sense in this material?
3. Do I have all materials selected still? If so, can I help customers decide by limiting the choices?
To select materials for your product, the easiest thing to do is to make a material selection when you are editing your product page for markup, description, or other details.
Overall, there are three things to keep in mind: design with the material in mind, use images that reflect the material options, and less is more.
Read More »
Saturday, October 27. 2012
Recommend A Friend this Weekend and We Will Share the 3D Printed Love with You
We are really, really close to signing up our 200,000th Shapeways community member and we know that word of mouth/social networks are the way most people find out about Shapeways 3D Printing in the first place.
We would love for you to help us spread the word so we can connect with our 200,000th Shapeways community member and as an incentive, we will contact the 200,000th member, ask them how they found out about Shapeways, and if you recommended them we will share the 3D printed love right back to you by delivering some special 3D printing to your door.
So this weekend, spread the word far and wide, recommend a friend to Shapeways and we will share the love right back to you.
PS. if the 200,000th person randomly found us, we will contact the 200,001st etc. until we find a social sign up.
Friday, October 26. 2012
Top 10 Most Popular 3D Printed Designs at Shapeways This Week
Every Product Page on Shapeways has a Favorite button to the right so that you can let designers know just how awesome they are. The Wishlist Button helps you to keep track of the 3D Printed goodness you want to have and hold. Clicking either button will send love to the Feed, so everyone can see what 3D Printed products are popular at any one point in time. Let's take a look at the 10 most popular 3D printed designs for the past week in order of popularity from number 10 up to number 1.
10. Death's Head Hawkmoth Skeleton
Read More »
Thursday, October 25. 2012
Shop Owner Holiday Tips Series: #1 Master the Basics
Can you believe the holiday season is only nine weeks away?! Fall snuck up on us, it's almost Halloween, and that means that the holiday shopping rush will soon begin in full force.
Shop Owners, we're here to help! We've prepared a nine part series of tips and tricks to help you get your shop ready and make the most sales in the busiest time of year.
Here is what's in store:
1. Master the Basics: Making your shop shine
2. Function & Form: Which materials for which products?
3. Discovery: Getting found in search
4. Personalization: Put a name on it!
5. Merchandising: Design for the occasion
6. Promotion: Go where your audience is
7. Fan Engagement: Put down the bullhorn and have a conversation
8. Data is your Friend: Statistics, Tracking and Analytics
9. Pay for Play: An introduction to the advertising world
#1 Master the Basics: Making your shop shine
There are three key elements to getting your shop ready for an influx of sales: (1) cleaning up your shop, (2) telling a story, and (3) taking great photos.
Read More »
Tuesday, October 23. 2012
10% Off Smooth Colored 3D Prints at Shapeways
With the launch of our new, smooth 3D printed colors last week at Shapeways we are also offering a 10% discount on our new colors until October 31st.
We are really excited about the increase in quality of surface finish with our new colors and we want you to get your smooth, bright 3D prints into your hands as soon as possible.
Please be sure to enable your models in the new colors if you have not already done so and we LOVE to see photos of the new colors in your product pages of your shops.
Being smooth, colored 3D prints they are so much easier to photograph than white nylon (WSF) 3D prints. Check out the photography tutorial if you need any pointers.
Thursday, October 18. 2012
Factory of the Future: Our Plan to 3D Print 3 to 5 Million Unique Products Per Year in NYC
Shapeways Director of Industrial Engineering Kegan Fisher (@keganfisher) shares our vision for the future of manufacturing as we cut the ribbon on our NYC Factory of the Future.
When we opened the doors to the Shapeways NYC office, we dreamed of building a factory nearby. A factory that would provide the thousands of designers and innovators in NYC a place to bring their products to life.
We are incredibly excited to announce that today marks the beginning of our Factory of the Future in Long Island City. We are cutting the ribbon on our new space with a little help from our friends...including Mayor Bloomberg of NYC and Kenneth Adams, President & CEO of Empire State Development.
Last month we signed a lease, sat down to ideate, and began construction on a massive 25,000 square foot space. Not only will it house 30 to 50 high definition, industrial-sized 3D printers, but it will also be a hub of innovation, research and development, and continuous community exploration.
Historically, the word factory brought up connotations of assembly lines and jump suits and iron and cement. It reminded us of the factory Henry Ford created and has been replicated time and time again.
But today, I am proud to say we are giving the word factory new meaning. One that replaces mass manufacturing with mass customization. One that empowers the independent business, the craftsperson, the hobbyist, and the entrepreneur. We are building a factory that gives everyone the ability to create, where the only barrier to entry is imagination.
Read More »
Launching New Polished Colors Today at 10% Off
We are very excited to share that we have improved our dying processes and quality and are launching new colors in our Strong & Flexible family!
Starting today, you will be able to order 3D prints in our dyed & polished red and purple, as well as two new colors: Royal Blue and Hot Pink. The new dyes are a potent mixture of pigment and dye which saturates both the surface and the interior of the nylon plastic. The results are vibrant and consistent, and means that the colors will last longer and appear brighter.
Most excitingly, all Colored Strong & Flexible plastics will now be polished first. By polishing and then dying, 3D prints look and feel like final products and the quality rivals what you can find in a store. We have gotten great feedback on the quality, consistency, and aesthetic and hope you like them!
This is the first of many more colors we will be introducing. We chose to add blue and pink based on your feedback and we can't wait to see what you design for these colors.
New Colors: Properties and Design Guidelines
The design rules are slightly different as the models have to withstand polishing first. The bounding box for polished colors is slightly smaller at 150x150x150mm and the minimum for unsupported wires is 0.9mm.
For more details, please see the Product Detail page here and refer to the design rules for polished products. Remember, you can still order White and Black Strong and Flexible in unpolished.
Pricing
To celebrate this new addition and help you prepare your shop for the holiday season, all colored Strong & Flexible plastics will be 10% off until October 31st.
Thereafter, the prices will be:
- White Strong Flexible - $1.50 startup, $1.40 per cc - no change
- Black Strong Flexible - no price change
- White Strong Flexible Polished - $2.00 startup, $1.50 per cc
- Colored Strong Flexible - $2.25 startup, $1.50 per cc
What this means is, excluding black, everything over 2cc will now be cheaper. That's right, not only are we introducing new polished colors, we're making them cheaper too!
Your Shapeways Shop: What does this mean for you?
Shop Owners, as of today, you will have the ability to add these colors as a new material option with enough time to get some samples before the holiday season kicks off.
If you currently have colored products in your shop, these will be added automatically enabled, though we will not automatically enable blue and pink. That's up to your discretion.
If you do not have colored products in your shop, you will have the opportunity to add these material options starting today, October 17th.
So try them out! Print your models in these vibrant new colors and get ready to be amazed at the vibrancy and finish! Let us know what you think! What colors would you like to see next?
Wednesday, October 17. 2012
Monday, October 15. 2012
Design an iPhone 5 Accessory to win $500 Worth of 3D Printing at Shapeways
Only a few days left to get your entry in to win $500 worth of 3D Printing at Shapeways.
We have already received some very impressive entries so the bar has been set quite high but it is always worth entering because there is always room for more awesomeness and hey, if it does not win it still might sell if you have it for sale in your Shapeways shop....
To enter the contest:
