{"id":21483,"date":"2015-07-08T18:07:16","date_gmt":"2015-07-08T18:07:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.shapeways.com\/blog\/?p=21483"},"modified":"2015-07-08T18:49:00","modified_gmt":"2015-07-08T18:49:00","slug":"the-mystery-of-missing-obama","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shapeways.com\/blog\/the-mystery-of-missing-obama","title":{"rendered":"The Mystery of Missing Obama"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-medium wp-image-21484\" alt=\"16580756847_1c4e91253b_b\" src=\"https:\/\/www.shapeways.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/16580756847_1c4e91253b_b-625x416.jpg\" width=\"625\" height=\"416\" data-wp-pid=\"21484\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.shapeways.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/16580756847_1c4e91253b_b-625x416.jpg 625w, https:\/\/www.shapeways.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/16580756847_1c4e91253b_b-400x266.jpg 400w, https:\/\/www.shapeways.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/16580756847_1c4e91253b_b-800x533.jpg 800w, https:\/\/www.shapeways.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/16580756847_1c4e91253b_b.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 625px) 100vw, 625px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>No, this isn\u2019t a post about President Obama being \u201cabsent\u201d from some\u00a0policy debate or another.\u00a0 Instead, this is really about President Obama being missing.\u00a0 More specifically, this is about the missing high resolution 3D scan of President Obama being missing.\u00a0 The file exists \u2013 why isn\u2019t it public?<\/p>\n<p>A little over a year ago, the<a href=\"http:\/\/www.smithsonianmag.com\/arts-culture\/how-two-laser-cowboys-saved-the-day-83143096\/?no-ist\"> Smithsonian\u2019s Laser Cowboys<\/a> came to the White House to create the <a href=\"http:\/\/bigstory.ap.org\/article\/smithsonian-creates-first-3d-portrait-obama\">first 3D portrait of a sitting president<\/a>.\u00a0 The resulting 3D printed bust made a cameo appearance at the first <a href=\"https:\/\/instagram.com\/p\/pY2BCPhNf9\/\">White House Maker Faire<\/a> and was on <a href=\"http:\/\/dpo.si.edu\/blog\/smithsonian-creates-first-ever-3d-presidential-portrait\">more general display in the Smithsonian Castle<\/a> at the end of 2014.\u00a0 The White House also released a great video that detailed the entire scanning process.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/4GiLAOtjHNo\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"line-height: 1.714285714; font-size: 1rem;\">The bust popped up again at the National Portrait Gallery <\/span><a style=\"line-height: 1.714285714; font-size: 1rem;\" href=\"http:\/\/newsdesk.si.edu\/releases\/3-d-printed-bust-president-obama-view-presidents-day-national-portrait-gallery\">for Presidents Day 2015<\/a><span style=\"line-height: 1.714285714; font-size: 1rem;\"> and then, presumably, made its way back to storage.\u00a0 Which is fine.\u00a0 The nature of physical artifacts is that they can only be displayed at one place at a time and, in most cases, spend some time in storage away from the public.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-medium wp-image-21485\" alt=\"Screenshot from 2015-07-08 11:04:20\" src=\"https:\/\/www.shapeways.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/Screenshot-from-2015-07-08-110420-625x301.png\" width=\"625\" height=\"301\" data-wp-pid=\"21485\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.shapeways.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/Screenshot-from-2015-07-08-110420-625x301.png 625w, https:\/\/www.shapeways.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/Screenshot-from-2015-07-08-110420-400x193.png 400w, https:\/\/www.shapeways.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/Screenshot-from-2015-07-08-110420.png 781w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 625px) 100vw, 625px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Of course, this is not just a regular artifact.\u00a0 It is a 3D printed bust created from a 3D scan file.\u00a0 While the bust can only be one place at a time, the file could be any- and every- where at once.\u00a0 So why isn\u2019t it?<\/p>\n<p>The Smithsonian\u2019s <a href=\"http:\/\/3d.si.edu\/\">X3D platform<\/a> could easily distribute the file (they already have President Lincoln\u2019s face \u2013 both <a href=\"http:\/\/3d.si.edu\/explorer?modelid=27\">with<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/3d.si.edu\/explorer?modelid=26\">without<\/a> a beard).\u00a0 The White House could host it on <a href=\"https:\/\/open.whitehouse.gov\/\">open.data.gov<\/a> or open an account at any number of other places online.\u00a0 Then anyone could download the file and print their own President Obama bust.\u00a0 They could also remix President Obama to their heart\u2019s content.<\/p>\n<p>The strangest thing is that keeping this data under wraps isn\u2019t even preventing 3D files of President Obama off the internet.\u00a0\u00a0 The team over at Sketchfab managed to <a href=\"https:\/\/sketchfab.com\/models\/3010d6b0fdd843b397fa9e98437bc22a\">extract a version of the President Obama scan<\/a> from the White House video above.<\/p>\n<p>What\u2019s left to lose?\u00a0 The <a href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/whitehouse\">White House flickr feed<\/a> is already full of public domain (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.publicknowledge.org\/news-blog\/blogs\/what-going-usage-restrictions-media-congress\">bogus usage restrictions aside<\/a>) images of President Obama.\u00a0 Now that a 3D file is in the wild, why not provide the public with a high quality version?<\/p>\n<p>Why is President Obama missing from the world of 3D printing?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>No, this isn\u2019t a post about President Obama being \u201cabsent\u201d from some\u00a0policy debate or another.\u00a0 Instead, this is really about&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":73,"featured_media":21485,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[528],"class_list":["post-21483","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-54-3d-scan"],"thumbnail":"https:\/\/www.shapeways.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/Screenshot-from-2015-07-08-110420-625x301.png","yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v23.9 (Yoast SEO v23.9) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The Mystery of Missing Obama - Shapeways Blog<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"No, this isn\u2019t a post about President Obama being \u201cabsent\u201d from some\u00a0policy debate or another.\u00a0 Instead, this is really about President Obama being\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, 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