Shapeways 3D Printspiration
Welcome to the Future of Stuff.
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#Prometheus viral takes cues from 3D printing sculptor Matthew Day Jackson’s work about Phineas Gage.
top. prometheus...
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Ceramic art by Carol Gouthro
“I have a strong interest in natural forms, cultural artifacts and personal mementos. I am drawn to ornament,...
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I have a chair in the Times today!
“Pull Up a Chair, Then Fix It” -
Prototyping takes a lot of effort so I only model half a body #TheRopes #TheRepos (Taken with instagram)
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Introducing 3D Printed Black Elasto Plastic : I Can’t Believe It’s Not Rubber
It’s squishy, it’s flexible, it stretches, it bounces, it blends, it’s 3D Printed Black Elasto Plastic!!!!!
Black Elasto Plastic is our first fully flexible material! It is still in the experimental stages of development, and we are learning more about the possibilities and restrictions of this material each and every day. Design, order and give us feedback when your model arrives at your doorstep! This material will be on trial until the July 20th, 2012, so get your orders in soon. After the trial, we will review and decide whether to introduce it permanently, whether we need to change any design rules, etc.
Satin Black 3D Printed Ceramics at Shapeways on Flickr.
Satin White 3D Printed Ceramics at Shapeways on Flickr.
The Future of Production: May 15: Thema Cafe, Amersfoort
Our community manager Bart will be hosting a talk on the future of production at the Thema Cafe in Amersfoort, the Netherlands. He will briefly touch on the technology behind 3D printing and then move on to demonstrate the current quality of the materials, and the impact that Shapeways has on designers and consumers. Of course there will be plenty of objects to see!
The talk will be in Dutch and starts at 16.00. The event is free of charge. If you’d like to join us, please RSVP at the Thema Cafe
We are running a Skillshare class at Material ConneXion on how to get started 3D printing on Wednesday May 9th at 6pm. This introductory class will cover the basic principles behind design for 3D printing, the free tools available to get started and the materials and processes used to make your ideas real. It is a perfect if you or anyone you know want to get started designing for 3D printing but do not know where to start. We will have materials there for people to play with to get an idea what 3D printing is all about. (via Shapeways | blog: Intro to Design for 3D Printing with Shapeways in NYC)
QUIRKY AND SHAPEWAYS are putting the tools of manufacturing into the hands of the masses using 3D printers and social networks. New products, designs and fortunes will follow
Introducing Polished Alumide to Shapeways
Now everyone can have smooth alumide 3D printed products.
We mentioned earlier this month that we had been experimenting with polishing alumide and now we are happy to say we can offer it as a material option.
The design rules for polished alumide will be slightly different to standard alumide design rules but we will also be adjusting the design rules for standard alumide, reducing the minimum wall thickness to 1.2mm, polished alumide will require a minimum wall thickness of 1.5mm and increasing the awesome.
We will be running polished alumide for until May 18th as a promotion to see how popular it is. During this time we will have reduced pricing for both alumide and polished alumide.
Alumide: Promotional Pricing ($1.50 + $1.75/cm3), Min wall: 1.2mm
Polished Alumide: Promotional Pricing ($1.50+$2.00cm3), Min wall: 1.5mm
If after the one month trial we continue polished alumide the retail pricing will be set at ($1.50 + $2.25/cm3).
As with previous launches we will not automatically add this new material to any shopowner’s page since we do not know that the designs would meet the design rules, or what the intended markups would be. We will, however, add this material automatically to non-shopowners product pages to make it easier for you to do test orders.
We really like the improvement that polishing makes to alumide and everyone who has seen it loves the smooth finish, we hope you will too.
Shapeways | blog: Follow Your Heart Pendant: Design by Mom, 3D Model by Son
What better gift for Mother’s Day then making her idea for real with 3D printing. The “Follow Your Heart” Pendant by Eddie Adolf’s Mom.
(via Shapeways | blog: In Search of Significant Objects : The Value of Stories)
We know your designs are awesome, we know 3D printing is mind blowing, we know that it takes amazing photographs to capture your awesomely mind blowing 3D printed designs but we also need descriptions to give your objects context.
Significant Objects, is a literary and anthropological experiment whose first two phases ran from July 2009 through October 2010, demonstrated that the effect of narrative on any given objects subjective value can be measured objectively.
Their basic idea was to take a range of thrift store items whose value was around $1.25 each, then write a story around the object and auction it on ebay with the story as the descriptor. The hypothesis was “Narrative transforms insignificant objects into significant ones” and would thereby increase the value of the object.
In the end they sold $128.74 worth of thrift-store junk for $3,612.51
Now lets take this same theory and apply it to your mind blowingly awesome 3D printed designs, if you were to write an interesting story around your design to capture the imagination, be it artistic like the Strandbeest, informative like the Bugaboo repair parts, or fantastical homage to a Chicken Nugget by a Depressed Unicorn, how would the value increase?
Look at your product page as a way to tell your product story, if you were to explain it to your grandmother what would you say? If you were to explain it to a friend at a bar? If you were going to pitch it to a retailer what would you say?
The description is your opportunity to tell those stories.
Shapeways | blog: 3D Printing Scarcity and the Nyan Cat
One of the great promises of 3D printing is that it allows for an infinite umber or reproductions of an individual object over time. Once a 3D files is produced, it can be 3D printed once, one hundred, one thousand times or more in what some have been calling a realization of the ‘post-scarcity economy’. Sometimes factors outside the physical production and material availability play a part in equation and sadly the popular Nyan “Pop-Tart” Cat 3D modeled by Sevensheaven is no longer available as a 3D printed product, exactly one year after the birth of the original Pop Tart Cat by Christopher Torres on April 2nd, 2011.
Improving The Colors of Your 3D Printing at Shapeways
To make room for the fresh new colors we are introducing to Shapeways we are going to be retiring the less popular colors currently available for your 3D prints. As of April the 4th we will stop taking orders for Winter Red, Dark Grey and Indigo and introducing a palette beautiful new colors.
