We’ve been laying a lot of groundwork for our project this week, developing some tech and focusing in on what our deliverables are going to be. In this stage of our process, we’re not certain what is covered by our NDA, but we can share some interesting 3D printing-related links that we’ve found!
There are a few amazing browser-based 3D modeling programs out there, and a few more in the works. Made to be easy, simple and extremely accessible, they fall along a spectrum of usefulness and approachability.
3DTin, the first such program, is fairly robust but has some serious flaws in usability. I, personally, find the user interface far more confusing and difficult than helpful, but it does allow for a fairly wide range of options, including color data in .stl files. Selecting, modifying and deleting objects can become a futile and frustrating exercise in random pointing-and-clicking, but with a more robust existing knowledge of 3D modeling software, it may be less of an issue. Using voxels, on the other hand, and drawing as if with LEGOs, is pretty simple. Uploading to i.materialize and Thingiverse is a simple affair, and it’s been used for some TEDxKids workshops with some awesome results. 3DTin requires that all objects made with the interface enter Creative Commons.
Tinkercad, on the other hand, is far more simplistic but also much more friendly. It is intended specifically for printed output. The “wood-look” of the pieces you manipulate speaks directly to a hardness as well as a scale, and makes the actions of subtractive modeling more clear, as an analogy to carving into the wood. The extremely helpful @craftyb told me about her 8-year-old son designing and modeling creations with the tools, after learning the basics through the “Quests” or short tutorials the website provides. This video from a Maker Faire demonstrates how easy it is to get started with simple modeling processes. It also allows easy sharing with Thingiverse. Tinkercad does require an account, and saves all user-generated projects in an easy-to-access dropdown.
Shapesmith is another up-and-coming browser-based modeling platform which, while still in progress, promises to be quite exciting. While the distinctly Matrix-looking interface is more confusing and less inviting than the previous two, the placement system seems more robust. After selecting a primitive type, the user clicks to select the placement along the x-coordinate plane, then drags the cursor for a real-time view of the width and height of the object, rather than being required to specify all dimensions before placing it in the work area. Since Shapesmith is created with the goal of exporting to STL, once it’s fully fleshed out, it should be amazing.
As an added bonus, I’m also excited to check out Waybe, a plug-in for Google SketchUp that translates 3D designs into printable pages that can be cut, folded and assembled for paper-based models. Since several of us have papercraft projects in the works (or sitting on the back burner) this might be an interesting way to help us think about the translation between different digital and physical forms, and the process of creating or assembling those forms.
