The Fayetteville Free Library of Fayetteville, NY recently has assumed a new mission in efforts to serve its constituencies with 3D printing facilities. The “FFL Fab Lab” is a space set aside with 3D printing technology, which seeks to encourage innovation and learning of the concept. At the foundation of the FFL’s Fab Lab will be a MakerBot Thing-o-Matic 3D printer, donated to the library.
http://www.smartplanet.com/blog/business-brains/3d-printing-coming-to-a-library-near-you/19964?tag=nl.e662
Sunday, 20 November 2011
Friday, 18 November 2011
NY Times blog says that 3D Printing is a disruption
http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/11/13/disruptions-the-3-d-printing-free-for-all/
"Downloading — quite often stealing, in the eyes of the law — music, movies, books and photos is easier than bobbing for apples in a bucket without water. It has kept legions of lawyers employed fighting copyright violations without a whole lot to show for their efforts in the past decade.
You think that was bad? Just wait until we can copy physical things."
Tuesday, 1 November 2011
Clarks Shoes integrates 3D Printing into its design process
http://www.zcorp.com/en/Press-Room/Clarks-Strides-into-New-Era-of-Innovation-with-ZPrinting/news.aspx
"Clarks, a world leader in footwear for men, women and children, has transformed its development process to release better, more stylish shoes earlier in the fashion life cycle. Headquartered in the UK, the global company has removed weeks – and in some cases, months – from the design process by digitizing prototyping with help from Z Corporation 3D printing technology.
Traditionally, shoemakers use paper sketches, factory-manufactured samples and design reviews to move concepts toward production. Multiple cycles are the norm. 3D printing of new digital designs enables Clarks’ digital development team to create detailed, colorful physical shoe models in hours instead of the two weeks it used to take for manufactured samples to return, dramatically reducing time and cost."
"Clarks, a world leader in footwear for men, women and children, has transformed its development process to release better, more stylish shoes earlier in the fashion life cycle. Headquartered in the UK, the global company has removed weeks – and in some cases, months – from the design process by digitizing prototyping with help from Z Corporation 3D printing technology.
Traditionally, shoemakers use paper sketches, factory-manufactured samples and design reviews to move concepts toward production. Multiple cycles are the norm. 3D printing of new digital designs enables Clarks’ digital development team to create detailed, colorful physical shoe models in hours instead of the two weeks it used to take for manufactured samples to return, dramatically reducing time and cost."
Tuesday, 20 September 2011
Origo concept 3D Printer for kids
http://techcrunch.com/2011/09/20/origo-a-3d-printer-for-kids/
"Origo is a concept product right now but it should be available soon. Clad in purple plastic, the system is a standard extruder-type 3D printer that can make various small objects out of a thin stream of plastic. The founders, Joris Peels and Artur Tchoukanov, are two experienced 3D printing experts. Peels was the community manager for i.materialise and Shapeways. They designed the Origo to have a minimum of moving parts and a simple UI using 3Dtin as a design platform."
"Origo: 3D Printing @ Home" by Artur Tchoukanov from Umeå Institute of Design on Vimeo.
"Origo is a concept product right now but it should be available soon. Clad in purple plastic, the system is a standard extruder-type 3D printer that can make various small objects out of a thin stream of plastic. The founders, Joris Peels and Artur Tchoukanov, are two experienced 3D printing experts. Peels was the community manager for i.materialise and Shapeways. They designed the Origo to have a minimum of moving parts and a simple UI using 3Dtin as a design platform."
"Origo: 3D Printing @ Home" by Artur Tchoukanov from Umeå Institute of Design on Vimeo.
Right now, I am just an idea. I will be as easy to use as an Xbox or Wii. I’ll be as big as three Xbox 360’s and as expensive as 3 Xbox 360’s. I will sit on your desk and quietly build your ideas, drawings and dreams.
There are other 3D printers. But none will be as easy to use as I will. None will be as reliable or work as hard for you. I’m not a kit or an industrial machine. I’m not complicated. I’m an appliance, like a toaster or a microwave. Only I’m purple and make your stuff.
Saturday, 20 August 2011
3D Print your Own Robot Nation
3D creation for everyone - Kodama’s coolest plaything yet, My Robot Nation, launches at SIGGRAPH 2011! MyRobotNation.com’s (a joint venture with Offload Studies and Z-Corp) fun and easy creation tools let everyone, everywhere make and share totally unique designs, then materialize them in the real world as full-color 3D printed figures!
Additional Background here:
http://www.designnews.com/author.asp?section_id=1394&doc_id=232353&f_src=designnews_gnews
Thursday, 18 August 2011
Will 3D Printing Change Absolutely Everything It Touches?
Robert “Buzz” Kross, Senior Vice President of the Manufacturing Industry Group at Autodesk, thinks so.
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| Nike ID Service |
"3D printing has been refined to the point where digital models can be duplicated into physical prototypes or production parts that closely resemble mass-produced products in looks and function ...Yesterday’s factory is evolving into a global community of custom design and personal fabrication services"
Tuesday, 2 August 2011
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?
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?
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