[ExI] Full Colour 3D Printing - the next big thing?

[Emlyn]

I thought that too; miniatures for all!

Here's a thought...

When people talk about 3D printing for the masses, the assumption is
we'd move to a model where people sell blueprints rather than hardware
(3d models that you can download and print). I think this misses
something much more interesting.

When I imagine how it'll play out, I think of how people use paper
printers. What do they print? Do they download and print documents
made by others? Sometimes. But not so much. People tend to print stuff
they write/put together themselves.

I think it'll be the same with 3d printing. There'll be some static
models that people might want to download and print, sure, but often
(for a while anyway) it'll probably be cheaper to buy a mass produced
and distributed version than print your own one-off.

OTOH, 3d modeling is kinda complex... I can't see people installing 3d
studio max next to Word on all the consumer machines out there.

What I see is a lot of custom software which can do some restricted
customisations on a basic model or models. For example, with gaming
miniatures, downloading and printing the existing miniatures would be
ok, but downloading software that lets you choose colours, hairstyles,
weapons, stuff like that, showing you the result onscreen as you play
with the parameters, then lets you print out the result... now that
has legs.

Or for World of Warcraft players, imagine the ability to 3d print your
character. Or a mug with your character on it. etc...

Consumer electronics - what's cooler than an iPod? Perhaps an mp3
player where you buy a kit with internals and a CD with software that
lets you heavily customise the colours and shape of the external case
(in simple ways - select a shape, size, colour scheme, etc etc), then
print out the result and clip it all together. The models used by the
software would be designed by the same industrial designers that
currently design the iPod  et al, so you wouldn't lose the excellence
of those designs, just add choice.

Thoughts?

Emlyn

On 05/08/07, Dagon Gmail <dagonweb at gmail.com> wrote:
> Anyone ever played wargames here? Warhammer 40K?
> *giggles*
>
> 3D printing will kill that scene overnight - unless they are
> smart and start selling the 3D models.
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