3D Printing For Everyone 183
mmacx writes "Technology Review has up an article about Shapeways, a new online rapid-prototyping service that allows users to upload digital designs which are then printed on 3-D printers and shipped back. A spinoff from Philips Research, the service gives small businesses, designers, artists, and hobbyists access to prototyping tools that were once available only to the largest corporations. The fee for a typical printed object is $50-$150. Their video shows the steps behind the process." We've been talking about 3D printing for years.
My first order (Score:3, Funny)
A life-size statue of CowboyNeal.
My guess? Dildos (Score:4, Funny)
Which is why I tagged this story dildo.
Seems like the perfect use for the service :)
Can they do cavities? ;/
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Which is why I tagged this story dildo.
Seems like the perfect use for the service :)
Can they do cavities? ;/
Ssh, you'll anger the dentist lobby.
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I'm waiting for the first copyright/patent suit (Score:2, Funny)
...because someone used that service to copy a product.
It will be from a dildo manufacturer, I promise you that much!
You can't patent something.... (Score:5, Funny)
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I doubt that specific dildo shapes (like, say, a Jesus Dildo, and yes, such a thing exists. I refrain from direct linking to a page that has one. Google is your friend if you're really interested...) are in public domain.
Though I dunno who sues first, the maker of the dildo or the RC church. Afaik they claim some rights to the cross with a carpenter's corpse and all that stuff surrounding it.
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I remember encountering such things in the past. Oh yes, plenty of hits. http://www.divine-interventions.com/baby.php [divine-interventions.com] if you like it one way. Or http://www.blowfish.com/catalog/toys/symbolic_dildos.html [blowfish.com] if you like it lots of other ways.
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...because someone used that service to copy a product. It will be from a dildo manufacturer, I promise you that much!
Well they do have a limit in size, so [insert penis size joke here]
Re:I'm waiting for the first copyright/patent suit (Score:4, Insightful)
DUDE! 50x50cm is the max size (source [hightechcampus.nl]).
If you get sqrt(2*50)cm (about 28in) into any orifice of yours, I'd go for a career in the porn industry. I'm pretty sure there's a market for that (hell, there's people who get off on anything, so I'm almost sure!).
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Actually, you can print on the volume diagonal, so the correct formula is sqrt(3*50^2), or about 87cm (34 in). Ouch indeed.
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How about this one [ajokes.com]?
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Exploit (Score:3, Funny)
Haha, they don't realize that they will bring about their own downfall:
1. Order prototype of prototype-making machine
2. Make your own prototypes.
3. ???
4. Profit!!!
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Speculating on the Hobby Implications (Score:5, Interesting)
Every time 3-D printing comes up I like to consider what this will do to my favorite hobby, model-building...
Styrene injection kits have been around for ages, and they're generally the cheapest way to get a kit made in large quantity - but because it costs so much to set up the molds, usually they're pretty hesitant to make a kit of anything that's not a pretty sure-fire seller... Additionally the hobby has been dying by inches for a long time.
To fill all the niches of interesting subjects that nobody's bothered to make injection kits of (this would be, for instance, things like the Serenity cargo ship) there's resin kits - but because of the high degree of manual labor involved in casting the parts, as well as the material expenses and the initial sculpting work divided over a run of maybe a couple hundred kits, they're pretty expensive for the person buying the kit...
But then you think about stuff going on these days, like papercraft - people making model designs, putting them online in a form that other people can print out and build dirt-cheap. The results aren't generally as good as injection or resin models but it's quite impressive, and inspiring what they've accomplished...
So it's fun to think about what fabrication could mean for the hobby. On the one hand it may actually mean less people buying and building models, or scratch-building parts themselves. Rather, once the technology is cheap enough, more things will be simply fabricated. But on the other hand - to think of something that would today be a garage kit, only done up as a downloadable design for fabrication... that would be pretty damn cool.
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One would hope it would have the same effect as in the printing industry. Two decades ago, getting custom color printed materials for businesses was a real hassle. Now we print color letterheads as a part of daily business. I just sent out a short order (20 pads) of sticky-notes with our custom mailing worksheet (who it's to, how many copies to make, how to mail it, and where to file it). Heck, I even printed out a pattern off the 'net for making a hemispherical model rocket parachute. Think of all the pho
Re:Speculating on the Hobby Implications (Score:5, Interesting)
I would love to be able to print my own replacement model parts. Next time I break a rotor blade on my heli, just print one out. Need a new control horn, print it out. Servo arms, wing assemblies...such a home capability might bring back a renaissance of RC building that is becoming a lost art due to RTF products.
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I missed the "model", and my mind spun off on a wild tangent...yes, I would like to have a new left arm, please—the one I've got is pretty messed up. Then if that works out OK, how about a new heart? Oh...
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I'm a member at the TechShop, and they have a 3D printer from Stratasys. It prints in ABS, what Lego is made of, but it doesn't yield Lego-like parts. First, resolution is limited because it feeds small diameter ABS rod from spools and fuses it together -- imagine printing in 3D with weed-whacker cord and you have a good mental picture. Secondly, it is not as strong because it has lots of heat-fused joints and also not all ABS is created equal. You can dip your resulting part in acetone and get the whol
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Right, because broadening the appeal of a hobby makes it a "lost art". Much better if you have to take a test before you're allowed to do a hobby. That will keep the "art" from being "lost".
This issue hits kind of close to home for me, too, but in a somewhat different way due to the differences in my hobby...
Basically, one of the new things these days with injection model kits is parts that are not simply color-molded, but pre-painted. For instance, some of the recent Armored Core or Gurren-Lagann kits, the Revell of Germany Star Wars kits, the Bandai Star Trek kits... The trend for pre-painted kits is on the rise and I'm afraid it's only going to continue that way. Even Fine Molds is makin
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Yeah, if you're not interested in actually assembling the individual pieces and then painting them... you aren't really interested in modeling. If you're buying a snap together kit with pre-painted pieces you might as well just buy a pre-made assembled model and stop pretending. If it only takes you 10 minutes to make the model then you didn't really make anything.
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Right, because broadening the appeal of a hobby makes it a "lost art". Much better if you have to take a test before you're allowed to do a hobby. That will keep the "art" from being "lost".
I have no problem with RTF. I like RTF and it is the way I started with model RC. There is more, though, that if you stick with RTF, you will never see. When you build your own plane or heli, it is an art. That art is being lost, yes, due to pre-built RTF. So while one aspect of model RC is growing (flyers), another aspect is decreasing (builders). Building your own plane will entail more cost in the end, than buying something mass produced in a Chinese factory -- which is where the RTF industry right
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I hope you don't misconstrue me either. I've built Guillows balsa kits with my granddad, and designed a large remote control airplane from the wheels up for a design competition. I really like building model airplanes.
But it's silly to assert that, just because RTF is the most visible (and most popular) form of model aviation, that's somehow detrimental to scratch building.
Heck, with the Internet, I'd wager that you're seeing a major renaissance in scratch-built modeling. It may or may not be growing in
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IMO, 3D printing solves one problem (generating copies of a design) but not the other (creating the design in the first place).
Traditionally, creating the design has been done in hardware (a master, which is used to produce moulds etc.).
With a 3D printer, you can either build a master, scan it and clean up the data, or you can build the model in CAD. CAD is less messy, but I'm not convinced it's faster than building a master.
Using CAD will result in more accurate models, though. A handmade master is hard to
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I believe Games-Workshop uses some CAD now for there models, though I gather this uses some sort of milling machine to make a mold or similar, rather than 3D printing.
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IMO, 3D printing solves one problem (generating copies of a design) but not the other (creating the design in the first place).
I've done a little bit of computer modeling and a fair bit of scratch-building - certainly there are things that are perfectly simple to do by hand, not worth complicating the process by introducing a computer-design phase... And there's inherent limitations in current display and input technologies that make it difficult to model on the computer, even with the right tools...
But on the other hand, I've basically finished my computer-modeled Zaku, but the process of making the corresponding physical parts h
Re:Speculating on the Hobby Implications (Score:4, Funny)
Additionally the hobby has been dying by inches for a long time.
At what scale though?
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Can I order print of the machine that prints?
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But on the other hand - to think of something that would today be a garage kit, only done up as a downloadable design for fabrication... that would be pretty damn cool.
Agreed. But look at the dark side... IP laws are going to apply to this new medium too. Fox or whoever owns the copyrights isn't going to let you sell that Serenity kit even if you created the CAD files as a labor of love.
Looking ahead to the "diamond age" when we have matter compilers, we'll have DRM that makes today's padlocks on music look
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But on the other hand - to think of something that would today be a garage kit, only done up as a downloadable design for fabrication... that would be pretty damn cool.
Agreed. But look at the dark side... IP laws are going to apply to this new medium too. Fox or whoever owns the copyrights isn't going to let you sell that Serenity kit even if you created the CAD files as a labor of love.
This is exactly the situation we have today. People who want to sell garage kits of their favorite copyrighted subjects have two options, basically - the first option is to get the kit properly licensed - which actually is practical in some cases. (For instance, an event-only license to sell a kit at Wonder Fest in Japan is pretty reasonable, I hear... There's also the resin Falke that was released a year or two ago, that kit was produced as a garage kit and then officially licensed...)
The second option
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Too expensive, and too low resolution/rough. For models, try www.printapart.com, the parts are durable enough, and the minimal texture covers fine with primer and paint.
I am familiar with printapart - people bring up the subject of fabrication services every now and then on modeling forums... I know it's not ready to take the place of paper craft and GKs now - but there will come a time when it will do so. It's inevitable, in my view - the hardware will get better, and the printouts cheaper - at some point this is going to shake up the hobby in a major way. For the better, I think.
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Well, at $50-100 per part according to TFS, a 200-part kit is going to set you back a pretty penny.
Did you not get the part where I'm talking about the future potential of 3-D printing? Do you really think it's always going to be as expensive as it is now?
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3D printing would make that hobby much easier - and obsolete.
How do you figure?
I mean, right now, the model-building hobby is "obsolete" for any number of reasons. Resin Figure kits are obsolete due to high-quality pre-painted polyvinyl, or pre-painted resin products. Injection kits are sold pre-painted, too. Even kits without such gimmicks are generally of such high quality these days that modelers joke that you can "toss in some glue and shake the box" and have a winning model... Some even argue that the whole reliance upon kits has killed modelers' potential t
Bah... (Score:3, Interesting)
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Only 3 dimensions? (Score:5, Funny)
Great there goes my plans of printing tesseracts.
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Not so fast:
http://www.infostuka.org/2007/9/1/tesseract-3d-prints
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The tesseract is 3d
They hypercube (of which the tesseract is a "shadow") is 4D.
Print away.
direct link (Score:5, Insightful)
I would have complained about a direct link (http://www.shapeways.com/ [shapeways.com] in the summary, but the site is a bit rude to looky-loos like us who just want to see what's going on. Almost all their front page links are blocked until you log in, even the "getting started" page! The "about" page is about all you can see, and it's got no real details. What is the printing resolution? What material choices? Can you print two-material designs? Come on, Shapeways, if you want to generate buzz, put out a bit more welcome mat.
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Actually we are private beta now. But you are right. We could show a bit more information without requiring a beta login.
Let's see what I can do!
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Re:direct link (Score:5, Informative)
FWIW, I'm the lead dev on all the 3D portions of the site. I had no idea these guys were going to get it posted to /. today! I wake up late to find my inbox filled with emails about it....
Anyway, on to answer your questions. Two ways:
1. there's some simple editors built in for specific object types (and more on the way)
2. Upload from your favourite modelling tool. Right now support is for X3D, Collada and STL files. More formats are on the way, but are not, as yet, fully tested.
There is also some restrictions on the basic structure of the models. The system tries to correct a lot of problems, but it is by no means perfect as it is all automated.
Costs are like the article summary states - $50-$150 per piece. However, that is dropping very, very rapidly as volume increases. Only this time last year, costs were an order of magnitude higher for exactly the same pieces. We're expecting a similar sort of drop in prices over the next 12-18 months as bulk manufacturing really starts to drive prices down.
Turn around time is usually a couple of weeks. The actual printing process is still relatively slow and manually managed. We'd love t automate it, but the printer hardware companies are not giving us that capability yet.
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Thanks for the clarification....
I would like more clarification though.
1) I have SolidEdge.
2) Could you define "per piece" - Volume constraints (size), weight, etc...
Re:direct link (Score:5, Informative)
Hmmm... don't know much about SE and what formats it can export. If you can get STL, then you should be fine. There's very few CAD apps that can't do at least STL. Many have Collada support already. Between those two you should be OK. If not, have a dig for software called PolyTrans (Okino Graphics). That's a huge file format conversion tool that supports almost every known 3D file format. I believe they have a free demo download.
Bounds constraints vary wildly and also vary by material type. A material may only be available on a specific printer (manufacturer and model), that will then limit what size model can be printed. For example, selecting an ABS material can be printed on all the machines, but 720 Fullcure is only available on one. Each machine has a limited production size. However, as an absolute max, no machine is capable of printing something greater than 1m cube - at least right now.
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Maximum size varies from 20x25x33cm to 35x40x40cm, depending on the material as well. Prices range from $1.87 to $2.89 per cubic centimeter.
I'm not affiliated, just a beta user. I got my invite the same day(?) I signed up for one, so if you're intere
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The most interesting part of the site, accessible without logging in, is their blog [shapeways.com].
I found the three posts about the used printers rather informative, with discussions about possible materials, level of detail,...
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there is this company in the bay area that I have used, while their prices are currently slightly higher than whats quoted in the article - its still a good service:
http://www.protopulsion.com/ [protopulsion.com]
What else do folks use? (Score:2)
It seems most of the content on the ShapeWays site is unavailable to folks not in their closed beta program (even the FAQ's). So, there's no much to go on other than the video?
So, staying mildly on-topic, what else do hobbyists use in this arena? Say I want to prototype a new computer case:
Re:What else do folks use? (Score:4, Informative)
Not sure on the open source software front but i've always been fond of Rhinoceros 3D for doing modeling since it is relatively in-expensive to buy a commercial copy ($900).
You can send your 3-D file to lots of companies, i'm not sure why ShapeWays is getting all the press when there are thousands of RP companies called "service bureaus" that will take 3-D models you upload and print them using some RP machine then ship them to you, usually with a 1-2 day turn-around time.
I used to get some parts done with http://www.rjmrp.com/ [rjmrp.com] but they focus mainly on high-resolution small parts (such as jewelry pieces). So, if you're designing jewelry i'd recommend them otherwise look for some other companies using Stratasys type machines (there are lots). The costs they quote sound about normal, typical jewelry prototypes were around $100 or so for a ring in .001" resolution.
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Most of our users are using Blender to create their own model. In fact, one of the principles of the project is the former head of the Blender Foundation.
The difference here and the other companies is that this one is going for the mass market. The others are looking at niche areas. They are also looking at doing Cafe-Press-style stores and so on.
The Techshop (Score:5, Insightful)
The site seems slashdotted already. Google's cache should have a copy of their 3D printer, laser etcher, and other services for building (nearly) anything that you can imagine.
This is the most innovative thing to hit Silicon Valley in years. It really should've been covered by Slashdot long ago.
The advantage the Techshop has over mail-in is that you can get advice on how to create your prototype. The costs for a 3D print job can vary greatly depending on how you do it. Just the orientation alone can either save you or cost you quite a bit. So that's why I prefer "hands on". Now, if I really knew what I was doing, or I didn't have a TechShop nearby, then I'd probably do a mail-order service.
As far as apps goes, you can pull down one of the Google apps (whose name I've forgotten at the moment) and use that.
Oh - and the guy who founded the TechShop used to work with Mythbusters in creating their gadgets. I hear they even showed up on opening day.
I have no connecting with the Techshop other than has a happy and frequent customer.
SLA? (Score:2, Informative)
We've had 3D printing for over 15 years to my knowledge. Probably more like 20 years. My high school got one way back when, it was called a "Stereo Lithography Apparatus" or SLA for short. You inserted a disk containing an acceptable 3D wire mesh file format, put in a bucket of "printing goop" and pressed a button. An ultraviolet laser then solidified the goop in the shape of the 3D object you gave it and drained the rest of the goop back into the drainage pan. We used it for rapid prototyping in our C
I like the sound of this (Score:5, Funny)
Hello, gentlemen. I am interested in your offering. I am linking to my specification here: http://babes.com/monica_bellucci [babes.com]. How long should I expect to wait for delivery?
Re:I like the sound of this (Score:4, Funny)
Typical Slashdotter, going for a cheap knockoff rather than enjoy the real thing. But then again, I shouldn't expect any different. ;-)
Re:I like the sound of this (Score:5, Funny)
Typical Slashdotter, going for a cheap knockoff rather than enjoy the real thing. But then again, I shouldn't expect any different. ;-)
If I went and got the real thing, that would be kidnapping. This does not deprive her husband of use of the original Monica Bellucci, I'm just committing a copyright violation. That's far more socially acceptable.
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Typical Slashdotter, going for a cheap knockoff rather than enjoy the real thing. But then again, I shouldn't expect any different. ;-)
If I went and got the real thing, that would be kidnapping. This does not deprive her husband of use of the original Monica Bellucci, I'm just committing a copyright violation. That's far more socially acceptable.
And not a criminal offense.
Images courtesy of Blender... (Score:4, Informative)
It isn't mentioned in the article, but it is clear from the images that they used Blender for the demo items and screenshots, indeed the two images from the article are rather well known among Blender users, one is from 'man in man' a short by Sacha, and the other is Petunia by macuonu which was used for a collaborative animation for the Blender art festival. Also some of individuals involved in Shapeways are major Blenderheads.
I thought Shapeways was being supported by Phillips but was under the impression that it started externally and hence would not be a spinoff.
LetterRip
Very nice (Score:3, Insightful)
But it still suffers from the age old problem of control by those who own the press. Let's get the printers in the hands of everyone to insure that control goes where it belongs. Then we can make our own DRM free hardware for instance.
Everyone? (Score:3, Insightful)
I can see one stumbling block for 3D printing becoming more popular: the software you need to create a 3D model is generally expensive and difficult to use.
Google Sketchup is a potential answer here, but the last time I checked, the 3D printing house I wanted to use didn't accept Sketchup files (and/or the free version of Sketchup doesn't allow export to any generic 3D format).
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Sketchup Pro is $495 and allows CAD export.
Yea thats expensive but if you Really need this for your work, its cheap.
Second Life and OGLE (Score:2)
The Second Life building tools are actually pretty good, for putting together objects that are going to be reproduced at 3d printing resolution.
And you can extract a mesh from Second Life (and other games, but don't let Blizzard catch you :-> ) using GPU hooks and programs like OGLE.
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The video shows the 3D artist using Blender [blender.org], a free and open source 3D modeling and animation program.
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I bet it would take someone less time to learn the app and create their model in Blender rather than learning and creating something through sculpting materials or injection-moulding.
I'm not so sure about that. I'd expect sculpting to have one big advantage over 3D CAD: when you sculpt, you work in 3D, instead of a 2D representation of a 3D model.
I can sculpt complex shapes fairly rapidly, even with my limited experience. The sculpture may not be accurate to the mm, but it's close enough that it looks right, which for my purposes (scale modeling) is good enough.
Learning to draw using 2D CAD tools has taken me more time than learning to sculpt. I don't have experience working in 3D beyon
This is not a first (Score:2)
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Yeah, i thought that too. WTF is wrong with people posting articles to "new" services that aren't new at all!? :-/
-Taylor
Interesting issue (Score:5, Interesting)
When everyone can accurately 3d-print objects, does getting the design for, say, a type of chair then 3d-printing it without paying, count as theft? After all, you're not depriving anyone else of the model chair the 3d specifications were based on.
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When everyone can accurately 3d-print objects, does getting the design for, say, a type of chair then 3d-printing it without paying, count as theft? After all, you're not depriving anyone else of the model chair the 3d specifications were based on.
Compared to churning them out on an assembly line in China that produces 10,000 a day, it's very unlikely such printing will be cheaper. So the likes of Ikea probably don't have to worry yet.
Be interesting if you were copying the chair of some fancy designer company that does fantastically expensive chairs though. I suspect what will happen is something similar to what a lot of photo labs do today - unless you're already known to them as a designer (photographer), they won't print out anything that they t
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I think you're overestimating the abilities of 3d printing. You're not going to be able to print a working pillow, but a solid plastic version of a pillow. You could print as many chairs as you want, but with each part being hard plastic, you're not gonna get much use out of them. It will also take a substantially greater amount of money to print a life-size chair then it would to buy a working chair at Staples.
If you change "chair" to "toy," then you might be on to something. If I get the design of the lat
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I'm not sure about the copyright part, but if you try to actually USE the chair, you'll end up right down at the floor.
Most people who comment about 3D printers don't understand product manufacturing at all. These printers will never be useful for anything except dimensional prototypes. Unless the printers can (and for a good price they won't - not in a milli
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But wouldn't a patent apply to one specific method for making that kind of chair, which is not, presumably using a 3D printer?
Of course, since the patent office rubber stamps anything you stick under their noses, I'm surprised no one has patented, say, a spoon with a screwdriver on the other end, or measuring time in hundredths of hours or any other trivial thing you could come up with.
#include "broken_patent_system_rant.h"
nice to see another competitor, but... (Score:2, Informative)
this has been done before quite a bit, there are plenty of places online that let you upload a model to their website and purchase the fabbed plastic result.
however, more competition will probably bring the prices down. also, more attention to this sort of capability will make it more popular, and bring the prices down/advance the technology.
i worked at a place where they blew tens of thousands of dollars on a 3D printer, printed one prototype out and then let it sit there. big companies can't think outside
I'm put of paper (Score:2, Funny)
can you fax me some?
Buy your own! (Score:2)
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Linux Collada Exporter? (Score:4, Interesting)
This Shapeways 3D printing service requires models in Collada (or X3D) format. Other than running Windows SketchUp under Wine, which is so buggy that it crashes when you try to save a file, what's a really good, basic Linux 3D studio, suitable for learning in about 10-15 minutes how to sketch out accurate scale models of houses and basic landscape, that imports and exports Collada format?
Then I can 3D print the models, and I can export them to Google Earth. I could even download and import my neighborhood, tweak it, and 3D print it for my trainset.
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suitable for learning in about 10-15 minutes how to sketch out accurate scale models of houses and basic landscape, that imports and exports Collada format?
Blender is great, but if he needs to learn it in 10-15 minutes it won't work. Sure, once he did learn it he would be done with his model in 10-15...
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Well, that's not a studio, but a toolkit. And when I downloaded it and tried to make it on my Ubuntu 8.04 PC, the make failed all over COpenGLDriver.cpp .
It's going to take longer to get built correctly, and then to write a C++ app, than I really should spend just learning a basic studio's GUI.
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No, this is not an execution problem, but a compilation problem. I found the compiler flag you're probably referring to, _IRR_GETPROCADDRESS_WORKAROUND_ , in COpenGLExtensionHandler.cpp#182 ,and uncommented it (after googling for the nvidia bug), and I'm still getting the same compiler errors, mostly like
COpenGLDriver.cpp: In member function 'bool irr::video::COpenGLDriver::setTexture(irr::u32, const irr::video::ITexture*)':
COpenGLDriver.cpp:1082: error: 'GL_TEXTURE_2D' was not declared in this scope
COpenGL
They're a farking print bureau, big whoop (Score:2, Insightful)
Another option (Score:2)
eMachineShop... (Score:2)
Is actually pretty pricey. Pricey enough that for prototyping more than a few parts it would be cheaper and easier to just buy a small CNC mill and lathe. Then you can make pieces parts to your heart's content really cheaply.
Ebay some used gear, or roll your own from the cheap manual mills and lathes out on the market. It's not trivial, but not as difficult as building, say, a decent real database app either.
The programm shown is Blender ... (Score:2)
... the guy you see in the end is Bart Veldhuizen of Blender and Blendernation.com fame. So *that* was the company he was founding a few months ago. I wish him Good Luck!
why do i need to log in just to read their info? (Score:2, Informative)
Meh... (Score:2)
...2D-printing's enough of a nightmare.
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When I think of self-replicating devices I think of Viruses and T-1000 cybernetic organisms. I don't think I want a 13 year old hacker prodigy with Asperger Syndrome self-replicating things. The IRAA has had enough problems with the likes of Bram Cohen et al. And yes I've been self-diagnosed with Asperger Syndrome, so beware what befalls me.
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Is that you, Charles Stross ?
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> Wake me up when we have a 3D printer that is capable of printing a 3D printer. Then we'll be on to something.
But if it copied itself, wouldn't the copy that came out be in the process of copying itself? If that happens, then it will become possible for someone to phsyically fork-bomb [wikipedia.org] the universe!
This is just the sort of end to the universe that Douglas Adams would have really appreciated.
Get a nicer one (Score:2)
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... hot!
Can it do that?
Not as such... But it can make the cup, and it could even fill it with something that's almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea.
The real trick, as I understand it, is to have "tea" and "no tea" at the same time. This goes against common sense, though, so I'm not sure how it could be possible.
Re: (Score:2)
I don't see shipping being any serious degree of expensive - after all it's not as if it needs to go by airmail. Oh, are you on the wrong side of the Pond?
A more serious problem for trans-Pondians would be the continuing decline of the dollar and the rise of the uro.
Eindhoven, eh? I think I got lost there once. But I'm not sure. Obvi