Multi Material 3D Printing and an observation about 3D Printer Ads

The Objet260 Connex is a multi-material 3D printer. The printer can, in a single print job, combine up to 14 material types, textures and shades, drawn from a palette of over 60 materials, including rubber, transparent!, to engineering plastics ...

I love the way 3D printers are advertised. Many of the ads focus on the ability of the printer to perform seemingly impossible feats and diverse tasks, opening possibilities that, until you see them with your own eyes, would never occur to you.

The way 3D printers are marketed in 2011 reminds me of the early ads from 1984 for that seminal computing device, the Apple Macintosh. Many of the Macintosh ads also focused on the 'new new' things you could DO with Apple's suite of early WIMPS (window, icon, menu, pointing device) driven applications, such as never before seen (other than in a lab at PARC) graphical bitmap editing.

Below the Objet260 ad is the famous 1984 ad by Steve Jobs, a wonderful example of his showmanship. I've written before about the parallels between the emergent consumer 3D printing capability and the early PC industry. Does this portend similar explosive growth for the 3D Printer? Who will be the Steve Jobs of the consumer 3DP industry? Are the PC, and the 3D Printer, both generic multi-purpose devices, following a similar trajectory?

A 3D Printed Crab

It is occasionally fun to profile a specific 3D Printed object, just to get a sense of the 'art of the possible'. This crab caught my attention. Printed on a ZCorp printer in full color. From the ZCorp Flickr photostream, the model may have been created by 3D services company OffloadStudios.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/32406038@N02/5832418820/in/photostream

The Clone Factory 3D Prints You

Would you like a 3D Printed Doll of yourself, at a special time in your life? Perhaps your wedding, during pregnancy ... the possibilities are endless. The Clone Factory, a commercial operation in Japan will take on the challenge.

http://clonefactory.co.jp/about.html

(My thanks to Danny Choo for introducing me to Japanese cultural trends and how they are beginning to intersect with the world of 3D Printing and Digital Replication)

@NationalGeographic ... Tone down the hype guys or Can U spot the error in this 3D Printing video

3D Printing and the future of manufacturing-driven growth

"An economist visiting China sees a large number of men digging with shovels to build a dam. His host points to how many men are employed. The economist points out that fewer men with the right equipment could build more efficiently. “But then we wouldn’t be employing the other men,” the host replies. “Well, in that case, why not give them all spoons?”"

Mark P. Mills, writing for Forbes is optimistic. He says "The third manufacturing revolution is upon us.  America has the advantage.  The whole world will participate and economic growth, and full employment, will follow, again."

http://blogs.forbes.com/markpmills/2011/07/05/manufacturing-3d-printing-and-what-china-knows-about-the-emerging-american-century/

Will 3D Printing Revive American Manufacturing?

http://blogs.forbes.com/richkarlgaard/2011/06/23/3d-printing-will-revive-american-manufacturing/

According to Rich Karlgaard, publisher of Forbes and writer on innovation, "The transformative technology of the 2015-2025 period could be 3D printing."

He writes in Forbes that "This has the potential to remake the economics of manufacturing from a large-scale industry back to an artisan model of small design shops with access to 3D printers. In other words, making stuff, real stuff, could move from being a capital intensive industry into something that looks more like art and software. This should favor the American skill set of creativity."

A ready-to-wear 3D-printed bikini. A breakthrough in fashion + technology?

The N12 bikini is the world's first ready-to-wear, completely 3D-printed article of clothing. All of the pieces, closures included, are made directly by 3D printing and snap together without any sewing. Created by Continuum Fashion, they claim the "N12 represents the beginning of what is possible for the near future." Watch the video here:

http://www.continuumfashion.com/N12.html

"N12 is named for the material it's made out of: Nylon 12. This solid nylon is created by the SLS 3D printing process. Shapeways calls this material "white, strong, and flexible", because its strength allows it to bend without breaking when printed very thin. With a minimum wall thickness of .7 mm, it is possible to make working springs and almost thread-like connections. For a bikini, the nylon is beautifully functional because it is waterproof and remarkably comfortable when wet."


Learn more about the inspiration behind this surprising project with serious design and fabrication implications here:
http://www.continuuminum.com/