3D Print Your Own Stereoscopic 360 VR Camera System

3D Print Your Own Stereoscopic 360 VR Camera System

This guest post is written by Thierry Pul, one of the founders of Purple Pill VR, a production house for cinematic VR content. His technical background in Engineering at the TU Delft allowed him to design and build his own 3D printed stereoscopic 360º camera system.

My Love/Hate Relationship With 3D Printing

Yes, we at Purple Pill developed a camera that can film on all sides at the same time in stereoscopic 3D, and we were crazy enough to open-source these designs. Now everyone with an idle 3D printer can print their own 360º stereoscopic virtual reality camera system. In this article we share some valuable tips and tricks we learned during this process.

Let’s get things straight, 3D printing is not as easy as it sounds. 3D printers are like puppies; you take care of them, feed them, take them out for a walk, and they are almost hypnotising to look at, but in the end they will still crap on your carpet until you get them housebreak. It’s the same with 3D printers; you have to maintain them, feed them with quality filament, then train them to get a good final result, and believe me, they are definitely hypnotizing to look at, but are hard to tame.

Don’t get me wrong 3D printing is great and will be a game changing technology in the upcoming years. But because I don’t want you to make the mistakes I made, I will give you some tips that will come in handy when you are printing your own 360 camera rig. For everybody that is not an expert in 3D printing, you can skip till the end where you can find the G-code files and print settings, but I suggest everybody who is new to 3D printing to stay with me.

Cost vs. Maintenance

There are a lot of 3D printers available these days, but most home 3D printers range in price between $1800 dollars and $3000 dollars. More expensive does not always mean it is a better printer, most of the time they have the same building platform and the same print resolution and they all have the same steep learning curve.

Where they differentiate is the necessary maintenance, print speed and build quality. We at Purple Pill VR use two different models of 3D printers: the Ultimaker 2 and the Leapfrog HS. If you like to know what the inside of a 3D printer looks like, get an Ultimaker, because you have to deal with clogged nozzles, burned temperature sensors and filament that won’t get through the extruder because it has a filament feeder that comes straight out of a surprise egg.

I know the Ultimaker is a 3D printer that you have to modify to get it working properly, but I really can come up with 100 fun activities, and none of them include fixing a 3D printer that should have worked in the first place. So if you have some money to spend, buy a Leapfrog, because it will save you both time in maintenance and print speed. On top of that, they are built as a tank, come pre-calibrated, have very good support systems, and have a bigger building platform. This last feature allows you to print bigger objects in one print, instead of having to glue them together afterwards..

The Right Filament

You can buy a lot of different filaments these days, ranging from PLA and ABS (most common) through exotic materials that conduct current, change color at a certain temperatures or dissolve in water. For our model we will stick with PLA or ABS. PLA is sugar based, easier and faster to print, and sticks easier to the printing bed (it also smells better during printing).

ABS is oil based, has better heat and structural properties, and is more durable. However, it is much harder to print than PLA. I only recommend ABS when you really know what you are doing, especially when it comes to large prints (like our model) because it has the tendency to curl from the printing bed (even when you have a heated bed) and will get your nozzle clogged much faster. I actually always use PLA, because you can print it faster and the risk of failure is much lower than with ABS.

First Layer is Key

Every house needs a good foundation, and it’s the same with 3D printing, because every layer is built on the previous one. The rig that you are printing has a lot of detail in the first layer and it has to be perfect to get the whole print right. Every mistake made in the first layer will come back at you later on in the print, resulting in parts that won’t fit, support structures that will come loose, or worse.

Yes, this a 3 days old 3D printer that scooped up the print after a couple of layers because the first layer did not stick well to the bed and the bed was not completely level. It coughed out filament for a good 10 hours when I was out of the office and this piece of art was the end result.

So how can you improve the first layer? First, pick a material that makes your bed sticky. I use print stickers with my Leapfrog, but some hair spray or kapton tape works just fine as well. Second, print very sloooooooooowwww. And I mean slow like watching mushrooms grow slow. Normally it’s recommended to print the first layer at 30% to 50% of your normal printing speed, but I generally go for 10%. This gives time for the print to really stick to the adhesive and gives you time to make minor adjustments in print settings, like print temperature and leveling the bed.

If you want to know more about adhesive materials read this article about – ‘Bed Adhesion and Squish’.

Print Settings and Support Structures

Alright, here we go, these are the print settings I use with my Leapfrog. Of course these settings will change depending on your machine of choice, but they give you a general idea of the quality we are looking for. I use Simplify3D as my software of choice, and I save my prints to an SD card or USB stick for printing, because having the printer connected to your computer can sometimes result in errors, especially with large prints.

You can get the .STL, Solid Works and, G-code files here, including all of my printer settings for a Leapfrog HS and a list of parts and suppliers. The whole print time for the 16 camera design is about 3 days. If you decide to modify our designs, we would love for you to share them in the Purple Pill forum, so that other pioneers can benefit from your work.

Support structures are obviously very important. For a good print we tried to minimize support structures in our prints, but you can’t get around them completely. There is nothing more frustrating than seeing a finished print and you can’t get out the support structures out because they are stuck to your print like this.

Make sure they have a horizontal offset of 0.5 mm or more so you can get your material out with ease. If you are happy to have a 3d printer with dual extruder, you can print support structures in easy-to-remove PLA or PVA, which dissolve in water. Both of these materials are hard to print so for experts only.

Some Final Tips

• Always print directly from a usb or SD card, You can use software like Simplify3D or software that comes with your printer, but then you have to connect your printer through USB to a computer. I have noticed especially with large prints that sometimes the connection fails and your printer stops in the middle of the print.
• Make sure the bed is completely level and well calibrated, This sounds obvious, but I have made this mistake too many times, ruining two 3D printers. A good tip to know is to listen after the first layer is complete if your printer makes any scraping sounds caused by the printer head moving over the first layer.
• Don’t compromise quality for speed, 3D printing takes a long time, so make sure you get it right on the first go. Of course you can print with a higher layer height or increased print speed, but most of the time you will end up with a bad quality print and you have to do it all over with more precise settings.
• If you have to glue parts together, use locktite.
• If you have a 3D printer that can’t print the complete mount as a whole, you can use Locktite 401 to glue your parts together. Don’t rush this job, because you will never get the parts loose again.
• Use quality filaments.
• Don’t use filaments from eBay etc., because they are usually bad quality and vary in thickness, which can cause severe damage to your 3D printer.

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Fast Bioprinting of Human Cartilage Implants

Fast Bioprinting of Human Cartilage Implants

At ETH Zürich’s Cartilage Engineering and Regeneration laboratory they have made some notable speed advancements in 3D printing of human cartilage which should lead to implantable replacements for trauma victims. Team of researchers led by Professor Marcy Zenobi-Wong’s and Matti Kesti developed a process that would enable hospitals to make a full size nose implant under 20 minutes. Any cartilage implant could be produced with nose, ear and knee implants being the ones most used in surgeries while significantly reducing the need for transplant donors.

In ETH Zürich news article, Kesti describes how this technology may revolutionise reconstructive surgery in the future:

A serious car accident results in a passenger’s nose being shattered. It is possible to reconstruct this as a 3D model on the computer. At the same time, a biopsy is performed on the patient and cartilage cells removed from his or her own body, for example from the knee, finger, ear or splinters of the shattered nose. The cells are spawned in the laboratory and mixed with a biopolymer. From this toothpaste-like suspension, a nose cartilage transplant is created using the bioprinter, which is implanted in the patient during surgery. In this process, the biopolymer is used merely as a form of shaping mould; it is subsequently broken down by the body’s own cartilage cells. After a couple of months, it is impossible to distinguish between the transplant and the body’s own nose cartilage. This procedure has significant benefits compared to traditional implants, for instance those made from silicone: the risk of the body rejecting the implant is a lot lower. A particularly crucial factor for young patients is that the cellular implant grows together with the patient, because it is controlled by the patient’s internal growth engine, as is the case for other body parts.

Nose cartilage implant 3d printed on a bioprinter tray from human cells and hydrogel (Picture credits: Cartilage Engineering and Regeneration Group)

Their 3D printer is not just a simple three axis system with the single syringe attached but a very complex bioprinting medical device. They use “Bio Factory” made by RegenHu from Villaz St-Pierre, Switzerland, which is equipped with three printheads for normal viscosities, one for high viscosities and a UV lamp. The system is also equipped with a 355 nm UV-Laser for photopolymerization.

If you want to learn more about 3D printing of cartilage tissues and medical applications you can watch this 20 minute presentation from Dr. Jos Malda who talks about it at the ICRS Focus Meeting 2014 at the FIFA Auditorim in Zürich.

Cartilage. Learn to appreciate it!

With pre-clinical animal trials planned for the near future this medical 3D printing technology will hopefully help many victims of heavy injuries.

Nose made by bioprinters

3D printers are opening up new opportunities in medicine too. A group of researchers in a team led by Marcy Zenobi-Wong is printing cartilage transplants using the body’s own cells. They are personalised and grow with the patient.

Bioprinting, 3D printing with cellular materials, is currently well on the way to becoming the next big thing in personalised medicine. In the laboratory of the Cartilage Engineering and Regeneration group at the Department of Health Sciences and Technology Matti Kesti presents the latest results of their research: a bowl filled with nutrient solution contains murky white cartilage forming a nose and miniature ear. The doctoral student created both of these from a mix of biopolymers and living cartilage cells using the laboratory’s own bioprinter, a 3D printer for biological materials. This remarkable printer is as big as a laboratory hood and at first glance resembles a protected extraction device in the laboratory. The heart of the system is a wheel with eight syringes that can all be filled with a different suspension. Using a computer outside the lockable printer, the pistons of the syringes are controlled using digital data from a three-dimensional model. The suspension is then ejected from the syringe nozzle at the highest level of precision and a random structure is created on a platform below, which whizzes to and from at rapid speed, using the layering method. This method can be used to create structures such as a joint cartilage or a nose cartilage, which the bioprinter takes just 16 minutes to create.

Kesti outlines how this method may revolutionise reconstructive surgery in the future: A serious car accident results in a passenger’s nose being shattered. It is possible to reconstruct this as a 3D model on the computer. At the same time, a biopsy is performed on the patient and cartilage cells removed from his or her own body, for example from the knee, finger, ear or splinters of the shattered nose. The cells are spawned in the laboratory and mixed with a biopolymer. From this toothpaste-like suspension, a nose cartilage transplant is created using the bioprinter, which is implanted in the patient during surgery. In this process, the biopolymer is used merely as a form of shaping mould; it is subsequently broken down by the body’s own cartilage cells. After a couple of months, it is impossible to distinguish between the transplant and the body’s own nose cartilage. This procedure has significant benefits compared to traditional implants, for instance those made from silicone: the risk of the body rejecting the implant is a lot lower. A particularly crucial factor for young patients is that the cellular implant grows together with the patient, because it is controlled by the patient’s internal growth engine, as is the case for other body parts.

Stringent requirements for bioink

There are many reasons why cell printing is finding its way into medicine just now: “3D printing has been around for nearly 20 years. The fact that it is only just being discovered for surgical purposes is, in particular, down to the lack of bioinks,” explains Marcy Zenobi-Wong, professor and head of Kesti’s research group. Commercial cellular printer cartridges do not yet exist due to the extreme requirements placed on the materials used in transplants. All materials used in clinical procedures are subject to strict international and national guidelines and need to undergo years of testing before being used in hospitals, a process that can cost millions. For that reason, Zenobi-Wong and her group of researchers use biopolymers, with which they are already familiar given their widespread use in everyday hospital procedures. These biopolymers include alginic acid, which is extracted from seaweed and is easily tolerated by the human body, or chondroitin sulfate, a macromolecule generated by the human body, which is responsible for the resistance in cartilage tissue.

Such biopolymers are prepared for the bioprinting process by adding human cells (or for laboratory use, animal cells) and processed to create a hydrogel comprising up to 90 per cent water. The liquid properties of this bioink need to be just right for the gel not to block the syringe cannulas, but the gel must also be sufficiently viscous so that the structure of the object to be built actually holds. If the gel were too li-quid, the layers would melt during printing. The gelatinisation properties must also be taken into account, because for the gel to become a solid structure that doctors can use, it must have a fixed form. This is done by polymerising the hydrogel, which is initiated by light, temperature, a change in pH value or by adding ions. “We have very little room for manoeuvre here,” explains Zenobi-Wong, “because we need to be careful at all times that the cells are not damaged during the printing process.” She therefore devotes a large part of her research to looking for suitable biopolymers and forms of polymerisation that do not damage the cells.

Third dimension as a pointer

One of the first applications for printed cartilage transplants could be in treating injuries to knee and ankle joints. Cartilage transplants are already performed on younger patients with sports injuries, as part of which the patient’s own cartilage cells are cultivated on hydrogel bands in the laboratory. A suitable section of this band is chosen and then sewn into the injured area. Although this is a good approach, it is not ideal because two-dimensional cell growth in the laboratory lacks key spatial information for the future functioning of the patient’s joint. The cells therefore form scar-like tissue instead of cartilage mass. As cells and their supporting structure – the so-called cellular matrix – are printed in the same step using a bioprinter, their future use is clear from the very outset. This allows the cells to retain their original features and reproduce new cartilage from the patient’s body.

The first transplants involving a bioprinter are to be tested in sheep and goats as early as this year. Such tests in large animals must be carried out before clinical trials can be performed on humans, which in turn, paves the way for everyday use in hospitals. “Whether we will see bioprinters in hospitals in the future, however, is less of a technical question; instead, it depends on whether the technology will be accepted by doctors, patients and insurers,” says Zenobi-Wong. Her group of researchers is therefore already collaborating closely with health professionals from the Schulthess Clinic.

Hearts out of the printer?

Since the first international workshop on bioprinting was held in 2004, this area of research has grown continuously. More than 80 research groups are currently working on potential applications in clinical procedures and the first commercial providers of “printed” cell structures for clinical trials have already entered the US market, backed by a healthy amount of venture capital. Does this mean that hearts and kidneys will soon follow the first printed and implanted cartilages, as some are forecasting? Zenobi-Wong is not so sure: “While there’s great deal of hype around bioprinting at the moment, our research is a long way from offering things that are already being promised today.” Producing cartilage is relatively simple compared to body organs, which need to be supplied with blood and large quantities of oxygen immediately. When it comes to the heart, lungs or kidneys, hundreds of capillaries would need to be printed to supply the organ, and this needs to be done to a degree of precision and using materials that will likely not be possible for a long time to come. In contrast to cartilage, various cells need to communicate with one another in such organs in order to perform a whole series of different functions. “Our expertise is in cartilage, probably the easiest bodily tissue for bioprinting,” says Zenobi-Wong, “but even today we know that this is anything but easy to print.”

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What is 3D printing?

What is 3D printing?

3D printing or additive manufacturing is a process of making three dimensional solid objects from a digital file.

The creation of a 3D printed object is achieved using additive processes. In an additive process an object is created by laying down successive layers of material until the entire object is created. Each of these layers can be seen as a thinly sliced horizontal cross-section of the eventual object.

How does 3D printing work?

It all starts with making a virtual design of the object you want to create. This virtual design is made in a CAD (Computer Aided Design) file using a 3D modeling program (for the creation of a totally new object) or with the use of a 3D scanner (to copy an existing object). A 3D scanner makes a 3D digital copy of an object.

3d scanners use different technologies to generate a 3d model such as time-of-flight, structured / modulated light, volumetric scanning and many more.

Recently, many IT companies like Microsoft and Google enabled their hardware to perform 3d scanning, a great example is Microsoft’s Kinect. This is a clear sign that future hand-held devices like smartphones will have integrated 3d scanners. Digitizing real objects into 3d models will become as easy as taking a picture. Prices of 3d scanners range from very expensive professional industrial devices to 30 USD DIY devices anyone can make at home.

To prepare a digital file for printing, the 3D modeling software “slices” the final model into hundreds or thousands of horizontal layers. When the sliced file is uploaded in a 3D printer, the object can be created layer by layer. The 3D printer reads every slice (or 2D image) and creates the object, blending each layer with hardly any visible sign of the layers, with as a result the three dimensional object.

Processes and technologies

Not all 3D printers use the same technology. There are several ways to print and all those available are additive, differing mainly in the way layers are build to create the final object.

Some methods use melting or softening material to produce the layers. Selective laser sintering (SLS) and fused deposition modeling (FDM) are the most common technologies using this way of printing. Another method of printing is when we talk about curing a photo-reactive resin with a UV laser or another similar power source one layer at a time. The most common technology using this method is called stereolithography (SLA).

To be more precise: since 2010, the American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM) group “ASTM F42 – Additive Manufacturing”, developed a set of standards that classify the Additive Manufacturing processes into 7 categories  according to Standard Terminology for Additive Manufacturing Technologies. These seven processes are:

• Vat Photopolymerisation
• Material Jetting
• Binder Jetting
• Material Extrusion
• Powder Bed Fusion
• Sheet Lamination
• Directed Energy Deposition

Below you’ll find a short explanation of all of seven processes for 3d printing:

Vat Photopolymerisation

A 3D printer based on the Vat Photopolymerisation method has a container filled with photopolymer resin which is then hardened with UV light source.

The most commonly used technology in this processes is Stereolithography (SLA). This technology employs a vat of liquid ultraviolet curable photopolymer resin and an ultraviolet laser to build the object’s layers one at a time. For each layer, the laser beam traces a cross-section of the part pattern on the surface of the liquid resin. Exposure to the ultraviolet laser light cures and solidifies the pattern traced on the resin and joins it to the layer below.

After the pattern has been traced, the SLA’s elevator platform descends by a distance equal to the thickness of a single layer, typically 0.05 mm to 0.15 mm (0.002″ to 0.006″). Then, a resin-filled blade sweeps across the cross section of the part, re-coating it with fresh material. On this new liquid surface, the subsequent layer pattern is traced, joining the previous layer. The complete three dimensional object is formed by this project. Stereolithography requires the use of supporting structures which serve to attach the part to the elevator platform and to hold the object because it floats in the basin filled with liquid  resin. These are removed manually after the object is finished.

This technique was invented in 1986 by Charles Hull, who also at the time founded the company, 3D Systems.

Other technologies using Vat Photopolymerisation are the new ultrafast Continuous Liquid Interface Production or CLIP and marginally used older Film Transfer Imaging and Solid Ground Curing.

Material Jetting

In this process, material is applied in droplets through a small diameter nozzle, similar to the way a common inkjet paper printer works, but it is applied layer-by-layer to a build platform making a 3D object and then hardened by UV light.

Binder Jetting

With binder jetting two materials are used: powder base material and a liquid binder. In the build chamber, powder is spread in equal layers and binder is applied through jet nozzles that “glue” the powder particles in the shape of a programmed 3D object. The finished object is “glued together” by binder remains in the container with the powder base material. After the print is finished, the remaining powder is cleaned off and used for 3D printing the next object. This technology was first developed at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1993 and in 1995 Z Corporation obtained an exclusive license.

Material Extrusion

The most commonly used technology in this process is Fused deposition modeling (FDM)

The FDM technology works using a plastic filament or metal wire which is unwound from a coil and supplying material to an extrusion nozzle which can turn the flow on and off. The nozzle is heated to melt the material and can be moved in both horizontal and vertical directions by a numerically controlled mechanism, directly controlled by a computer-aided manufacturing (CAM) software package. The object is produced by extruding melted material to form layers as the material hardens immediately after extrusion from the nozzle. This technology is most widely used with two plastic filament material types: ABS (Acrylonitrile Butadiene Styrene) and PLA (Polylactic acid) but many other materials are available ranging in properties from wood filed, conductive, flexible etc.

FDM was invented by Scott Crump in the late 80’s. After patenting this technology he started the company Stratasys in 1988. The software that comes with this technology automatically generates support structures if required. The machine dispenses two materials, one for the model and one for a disposable support structure.

The term fused deposition modeling and its abbreviation to FDM are trademarked by Stratasys Inc. The exactly equivalent term, fused filament fabrication (FFF), was coined by the members of the RepRap project to give a phrase that would be legally unconstrained in its use.

Powder Bed Fusion

The most commonly used technology in this processes is Selective laser sintering (SLS)

This technology uses a high power laser to fuse small particles of plastic, metal, ceramic or glass powders into a mass that has the desired three dimensional shape. The laser selectively fuses the powdered material by scanning the cross-sections (or layers) generated by the 3D modeling program on the surface of a powder bed. After each cross-section is scanned, the powder bed is lowered by one layer thickness. Then a new layer of material is applied on top and the process is repeated until the object is completed.

All untouched powder remains as it is and becomes a support structure for the object. Therefore there is no need for any support structure which is an advantage over SLS and SLA. All unused powder can be used for the next print. SLS was developed and patented by Dr. Carl Deckard at the University of Texas in the mid-1980s, under sponsorship of DARPA.

Sheet Lamination

Sheet lamination involves material in sheets which is bound together with external force. Sheets can be metal, paper or a form of polymer. Metal sheets are welded together by ultrasonic welding in layers and then CNC milled into a proper shape. Paper sheets can be used also, but they are glued by adhesive glue and cut in shape by precise blades. A leading company in this field is Mcor Technologies.

Directed Energy Deposition

This process is mostly used in the high-tech metal industry and in rapid manufacturing applications. The 3D printing apparatus is usually attached to a multi-axis robotic arm and consists of a nozzle that deposits metal powder or wire on a surface and an energy source (laser, electron beam or plasma arc) that melts it, forming a solid object.

Examples & applications of 3D printing

Applications include rapid prototyping, architectural scale models & maquettes, healthcare (3d printed prosthetics and printing with human tissue) and entertainment (e.g. film props).

Other examples of 3D printing would include reconstructing fossils in paleontology, replicating ancient artifacts in archaeology, reconstructing bones and body parts in forensic pathology and reconstructing heavily damaged evidence acquired from crime scene investigations.

3D printing industry

The worldwide 3D printing industry is expected to grow from $3.07B in revenue in 2013 to $12.8B by 2018, and exceed $21B in worldwide revenue by 2020. As it evolves, 3D printing technology is destined to transform almost every major industry and change the way we live, work, and play in the future.

Source: Wohlers Report 2015

Medical industry

The outlook for medical use of 3D printing is evolving at an extremely rapid pace as specialists are beginning to utilize 3D printing in more advanced ways. Patients around the world are experiencing improved quality of care through 3D printed implants and prosthetics never before seen.

Bio-printing

As of the early two-thousands 3D printing technology has been studied by biotech firms and academia for possible use in tissue engineering applications where organs and body parts are built using inkjet techniques. Layers of living cells are deposited onto a gel medium and slowly built up to form three dimensional structures. We refer to this field of research with the term: bio-printing.

Aerospace & aviation industries

The growth in utilisation of 3D printing in the aerospace and aviation industries can, for a large part, be derived from the developments in the metal additive manufacturing sector.

NASA for instance prints combustion chamber liners using selective laser melting and as of march 2015 the FAA cleared GE Aviation’s first 3D printed jet engine part to fly: a laser sintered housing for a compressor inlet temperature sensor.

Automotive industry

Although the automotive industry was among the earliest adopters of 3D printing it has for decades relegated 3d printing technology to low volume prototyping applications.

Nowadays the use of 3D printing in automotive is evolving from relatively simple concept models for fit and finish checks and design verification, to functional parts that are used in test vehicles, engines, and platforms. The expectations are that 3D printing in the automotive industry will generate a combined $1.1 billion dollars by 2019.

Industrial printing

In the last couple of years the term 3D printing has become more known and the technology has reached a broader public. Still, most people haven’t even heard of the term while the technology has been in use for decades. Especially manufacturers have long used these printers in their design process to create prototypes for traditional manufacturing and research purposes. Using 3D printers for these purposes is called rapid prototyping.

Why use 3D printers in this process you might ask yourself. Now, fast 3D printers can be bought for tens of thousands of dollars and end up saving the companies many times that amount of money in the prototyping process. For example, Nike uses 3D printers to create multi-colored prototypes of shoes. They used to spend thousands of dollars on a prototype and wait weeks for it. Now, the cost is only in the hundreds of dollars, and changes can be made instantly on the computer and the prototype reprinted on the same day.

Besides rapid prototyping, 3D printing is also used for rapid manufacturing. Rapid manufacturing is a new method of manufacturing where companies are using 3D printers for short run custom manufacturing. In this way of manufacturing the printed objects are not prototypes but the actual end user product. Here you can expect more availability of personally customized products.

Personal printing

Personal 3D printing or domestic 3D printing is mainly for hobbyists and enthusiasts and really started growing in 2011. Because of rapid development within this new market printers are getting cheaper and cheaper, with prices typically in the range of $250 – $2,500. This puts 3D printers into more and more hands.

The RepRap open source project really ignited this hobbyist market. For about a thousand dollars people could buy the RepRap kit and assemble their own desktop 3D printer. Everybody working on the RepRap shares their knowledge so other people can use it and improve it again.

History

In the history of manufacturing, subtractive methods have often come first. The province of machining (generating exact shapes with high precision) was generally a subtractive affair, from filing and turning through milling and grinding.

Additive manufacturing’s earliest applications have been on the toolroom end of the manufacturing spectrum. For example, rapid prototyping was one of the earliest additive variants and its mission was to reduce the lead time and cost of developing prototypes of new parts and devices, which was earlier only done with subtractive toolroom methods (typically slowly and expensively). However, as the years go by and technology continually advances, additive methods are moving ever further into the production end of manufacturing. Parts that formerly were the sole province of subtractive methods can now in some cases be made more profitably via additive ones.

However, the real integration of the newer additive technologies into commercial production is essentially a matter of complementing subtractive methods rather than displacing them entirely. Predictions for the future of commercial manufacturing, starting from today’s already- begun infancy period, are that manufacturing firms will need to be flexible, ever-improving users of all available technologies in order to remain competitive.

Future

It is predicted by some additive manufacturing advocates that this technological development will change the nature of commerce, because end users will be able to do much of their own manufacturing rather than engaging in trade to buy products from other people and corporations.

3D printers capable of outputting in colour and multiple materials already exist and will continue to improve to a point where functional products will be able to be output. With effects on energy use, waste reduction, customization, product availability, medicine, art, construction and sciences, 3D printing will change the manufacturing world as we know it.

If you’re interested in more future predictions regarding 3D printing, check out The Future Of Open Fabrication.

Services

Not everybody can afford or is willing to buy their own 3D printer. Does this mean you cannot enjoy the possibilities of 3D printing? No, not to worry. There are 3D printing service bureaus like Shapeways, Ponoko and Sculpteo that can very inexpensively print and deliver an object from a digital file that you simply upload to their website. You can even sell your 3D designs on their website and make a little money out of it!

There are also companies who offer their services business-to-business. When, for instance, you have an architecture practice and you need to build model scales, it is very time consuming doing this the old fashioned way. There are services where you can send your digital model to and they print the building on scale for you to use in client presentations. These kind of services can already be found in a lot of different industries like dental, medical, entertainment and art.

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3D Printing Needs More Metal!

Here's Why 3D Printing Needs More Metal

More and more companies want to make 3D-printed metal parts.

Alcoa, a colossus of the aluminum and metals industry, is currently building a new additive manufacturing center with a $60 million price tag in Pittsburgh. Its purpose: To serve as the main production site as Alcoa begins developing a line of powdered metals made specifically for 3D-printing applications. What Alcoa’s new center represents, however, is a broader shift taking shape in the additive manufacturing industry.

More companies in a variety of sectors are interested in using 3D-printed metals for end-use parts. But when it comes to 3D printing in metals, there are currently two problems to surmount. One is the overall cost of not only the additive processes by which metal is printed, but also of the 3D printing machines and the support staff needed to run them. The other is the cost of the metal materials themselves and the lack of metal materials made specifically for 3D printing. Alcoa  AA 0.48%  is hoping to find solutions for both problems when its new additive manufacturing center opens, as Rod Heiple, the company’s director of R&D for engineered products and solutions, said during a call with Fortune.

“There are just a few materials available today that are usable within 3D printing of metals,” Heiple said. “A material developed as a feedstock for one additive process may not be, and in fact is unlikely to be, the optimal material for the next additive manufacturing process.”

Today companies that produce metal parts via additive manufacturing processes are using powdered titanium, nickel, aluminum, and steel. Direct metal laser sintering is a common way for these powdered metals to come together to make solid objects. It’s how General Electric produced the fuel nozzles for its bestselling aircraft engine and Solid Concepts created a working firearm.

MORE: Why 3D Printing Is The Future of Manufacturing

But optimizing powders for 3D printing is the challenge. Solving that challenge would not only mean a greater number of powdered metals for use in 3D printing, but also cheaper powdered metals. This is the sort of task for which Alcoa is well-suited. The company has nearly 100 years of experience in the atomizing process (the means by which a molten metal is converted into a powdered metal).

“That’s the focus we have, the optimization. We’re looking at the chemistry, the alloy elements,” said Heiple. “In the case of powdered feedstock, we’re focused on developing powders that are shapes and sizes tailored to 3D printing. Our primary focus is on titanium, aluminum, and nickel-based alloys for 3D printing.”

While the technology is fascinating in its own right, the business imperative is driving the research in cheaper powdered metals made specifically for 3D printing. Companies’ primary reasons for investing in additive manufacturing capabilities are the cost reductions that accompany collapsing the manufacturing supply chain. When GE, for example, chooses to invest $3.5 billion to purchase the 3D-printing machines that can produce metal parts and train the staff needed to run them, it’s not doing so because the technology is cool—it’s doing so because that’s where the additive manufacturing industry is headed.

A recent report from Stratasys Direct Manufacturing, the service arm of 3D-printing company Stratasys  SSYS -0.22% , bears this out: More than 80% of 700 survey respondents from the manufacturing industry said further development of strong yet lightweight metals for additive manufacturing is what they want the most. In three years’ time, Stratasys Direct Manufacturing predicts use of metals in 3D printing to double.

Stratasys and 3D Systems  DDD 0.76% , two titans of the 3D-printing sector, are keen to make inroads in metals printing as well. The increasing focus on what metals printing will do for the overall additive manufacturing industry—currently valued worldwide at $4.1 billion, according to the latest report from consulting firm Wohlers Associates—is the reason, for instance, Stratasys acquired Solid Concepts in 2014 and 3D Systems just established a partnership with the U.S. Army to develop 3D-printing materials for the automotive, medical, and aerospace industries.

The market for prototyping via 3D printing remains weak, but metals printing continues to grow at an impressive clip. More than just a new way for companies to make end-use parts, direct metal printing represents an area of revenue growth for an industry that has struggled to live up to the hype.

“The opportunity here is that these metals materials for additive manufacturing are low in number,” said Heiple, who couldn’t comment about the timeframe for when Alcoa’s new additive manufacturing center opens (although a company press release from September estimates sometime in the first quarter of 2016). “And the reason there’s an interest in metals is it all comes down to cost reduction, in end product and end solutions.”

In other words, there’s a growing movement of companies interested in crossing the chasm between 3D printing as a neat prototyping tool and 3D printing as a production tool on par with traditional manufacturing processes. To do that, they’ll need metals.

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Mattel remakes '60s ThingMaker toy as an easy-to-use $300 3D printer

Mattel remakes '60s ThingMaker toy as an easy-to-use $300 3D printer

Mattel has reinvented its iconic ThingMaker at-home toy-making device, this time as a 3D printer that will cost $300.

Mattel unveiled its 3D printer at the New York Toy Fair taking place this week.

Preorders for the ThingMaker 3D Printer began this week. The machine will be available Oct 15. (See Amazon.com pricing.)

The original ThingMaker was limited by several dozen die-cast molds, into which a user would pour Mattel's Plastigoop thermoplastic or Gobble De-goop edible liquid, which was then cured using a 360-degree Fahrenheit hotplate. Plastigoop made Creepy Crawlers and other single-piece toys; Gobble De-goop made Incredible Edibles that could be eaten.

The new ThingMaker 3D Printer is a fused filament fabrication machine that extrudes layer upon layer of melted thermopolymer to create an object. The thermopolymer filament comes in multiple colors on reels that attach to the 3D printer.

Users upload design files via Mattel's proprietary Design App, which works on Android or iOS devices, and can print parts to be assembled into toys.

After downloading the ThingMaker Design App, which is based on software from Autodesk, families can browse through toy templates or build their own creations from hundreds of parts also offered in loadable files. Designs get uploaded from the files to the ThingMaker 3D Printer, which prints parts in batches for assembly via ball-and-socket joints.

Terry Wohlers, founder and principal analyst at industry research firm Wohlers Associates, said he would have rather seen the ThingMaker with a $199 price tag, but he did herald it as a product that will let a kid produce almost any creature imaginable, "with limits, of course."

"It should help to unlock the creative juices of our youth in a way that we have not seen in the past. Over a period of years, it could even help to reinvigorate careers in design and manufacturing here in the U.S.," Wohlers said.

A long-time proponent of an inexpensive, safe, and "super easy-to-use 3D printer for children,"  Wohlers said while he's hopeful the ThingMaker will be disruptive, a lot needs to happen before it will be.

3D content creation will be key (i.e. the ability for children to be able to create their own objects) -- something Autodesk's involvement should help. Simple post processing, or the ability to easily remove support material from around a printed object, will also be important to a successful 3D printer for kids. 

"The start to finish process is almost never as easy as the machine maker leads you to believe, but maybe Mattel can be a pioneer in this area after 28 years of development in 3D printing," Wohlers said. 

Mattel's ThingMaker Design App is based on Autodesk's Spark, an open 3D printing platform that provides extensible APIs for each stage of the 3D printing workflow. Because it's based on an open architecture, the ThingMaker Design App also works with other 3D printers; it is available now and free to download for iOS and Android devices.

"In today's digital age, it's more important than ever for families to transcend the digital world and make their ideas real," Aslan Appleman, senior director at Mattel, said in a statement. "ThingMaker pushes the boundaries of imaginative play, giving families countless ways to customize their toys and let their creativity run wild. We're thrilled to work with the 3D design experts at Autodesk to bring this one-of-a-kind experience to life."

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3D Printers Gaining Traction With Nike, Boeing, HP Inc.

3D Printers Gaining Traction With Nike, Boeing, HP Inc.

The stock charts of 3D Systems (DDD) and Stratasys (SSYS), the two largest U.S. providers of 3D printers, do not paint a picture of success.

But despite the long declines, the 3D printing industry is stronger than it seems, say industry analysts who track the field. As a group, the Machinery-Material Handling and Automation group that houses the stocks has climbed 20% in the past four weeks — outpacing all but 3 of the 197 industries tracked by IBD. Analyst consensus calls for powerful earnings rebounds for both 3D Systems and Stratasys this year and next.

And globally, 3D printing technology is being increasingly embraced by corporations, governments and universities.

“If you look at the industry through the lens of investors and share price, that will give you a distorted view of what’s happening in the 3D printer market,” said Terry Wohlers, president of Wohlers Associates, which provides technical, market and strategic analysis on the 3D printer market.

Industry Growing While Stocks Sag

The stock’s steep declines since 2014 really show what analysts often describe as the market getting ahead of itself. The 3D printer companies generated widespread excitement beginning around 2010 on the idea that their products represented an innovative leap in the manufacturing process. The media pounded home the view that 3D printers were the hottest invention since the laser. Investors bought the pitch, and the stocks of 3D Systems and Stratasys soared over a two-year period that ended as the companies began reporting earnings declines in 2013.

As the stocks unraveled, the promise of 3D printing also seemed to fade. Stratasys and 3D Systems were crushed as both continued to post disappointing earnings reports, quarter after quarter. Sales also began to decline on a year-over-year basis over the past two quarters, replacing the double-digit sales growth that had been the norm.

But this year, Wohlers thinks the market for 3D printers, including supplies, will grow 33% to $7.3 billion and will approach $10 billion in 2017. Consensus projections see significant sales upticks for both Stratasys and 3D Systems next year.

Investors also appear to be returning for another look. 3D Systems had climbed 136% as of Friday since marking its low on Jan. 20. Stratasys was up 60% on Friday from its January low.

Some analysts continue to sound a cautious tone on the two stocks, not fully convinced of a full-scale rebound. After Stratasys reported Q4 earnings, Cowen analyst Robert Stone said visibility was still limited, though he raised his price target on the company to 23 from 19. 3D Systems, after it reported Q4 earnings, said industry conditions remain challenging.

Wohlers says the long-term future of the technology is strong.

“When you look at what some of the biggest corporations and brands plan to do, and the investments made, there’s a tremendous amount of activity going on,” Wohlers said.

Off To A Running Start

One key 3D player is Nike (NKE). Two years ago, the athletics wear giant debuted football cleats made from 3D printers, and then showed off another set a year later. Nike said insights from the project “have revolutionized the way the company designs and manufactures footwear.” Its most recent creation from 3D printers is the Zoom Superfly Skyknit for sprinters.

Nike’s interest in 3D printers is accelerating. At a technology conference in October, Chief Operating Officer Eric Sprunk said the time is coming when consumers can log on to a Nike website to design their own shoe and have it made via 3D printing at a Nike store.

Footwear competitor Adidas is also in the game. In October, it announced Futurecraft 3D, an initiative it started with 3D printer company Materialise (MTLS) to create athletic-shoe midsoles tailored to an individual customer’s foot. The idea is that shoppers would enter an Adidas store, run briefly on a treadmill and quickly receive a printout of their footprint. An in-store 3D-printer would then serve up a midsole matching the customer’s exact contours and pressure points.

The 3D printers use liquid or powder materials and other chemical agents to “print” products by repeatedly depositing thin layers of material bonded together, layer by layer. The technology is increasingly used in aerospace, automotive, medical and consumer product fields, among many other industries. Parts can also be produced with various types of metals, using a different type of printing process — a laser-based method called laser sintering, or fusing.

Through 3D printing, robust and high-performing parts can be created at a fraction of the cost and time of traditional manufacturing methods. The technology first emerged about 25 years ago, but it only entered the mainstream after 3D Systems and Stratasys began to plumb the consumer market.

General Electric (GE) has made big investments in 3D printing, which it calls additive manufacturing. GE used 3D printers to develop complex fuel nozzles for its next-generation jet engine, known as Leading Edge Aviation Propulsion (LEAP), in a partnership with France-based Snecma.

The new fuel nozzles are at least five times more durable than the previously machined equivalent, according to the company’s website. The nozzle, once made with 18 parts that were melded together, is constructed using 3D printers into one part that is 25% lighter. GE says its use of additive manufacturing is groundbreaking, making it possible to produce components that were very difficult or impossible to produce using traditional technologies.

GE says it will invest $3.5 billion in new equipment over the next five years to produce advanced components using additive manufacturing. The company says it has just begun to touch the surface of all the applications that additive manufacturing can provide and that it will revolutionize the way parts are made.

Lockheed Martin (LMT), Airbus (EADSY), NASA, United Technologies’ (UTX) Pratt & Whitney and Rolls Royce are also becoming big users of 3D technology.

“There’s a tremendous amount of activity going on in the 3D printing market,” said Wohlers.

Heavyweight Competitors On Deck

This time last year, he said, there were 49 companies worldwide that made industrial-grade 3D printers, priced above $5,000. Today there are nearly 70 of them. At price points below $5,000, there are options from hundreds of 3D printer companies, many of them based in China, he said.

The increase in competition is one of the reasons Stratasys and 3D Systems have struggled, Wohlers said. Another is the entry of HP Inc. (HPQ) into the 3D market. In October 2014, Hewlett-Packard — which later split into HP Inc. and Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) — said it would introduce 3D printers in 2016. The company said its printers will be faster, more efficient and cost less than products currently on the market.

“We know of companies that were planning to buy 3D printers but decided to wait for HP,” Wohlers said.

Many 3D printer companies are based in Europe. They include Germany-based EOS Manufacturing Solutions, one of the largest 3D printer companies with a wide range of 3D printers. Others are Germany-based Voxeljet (VJET) and SLM Solutions, Belgium’s Materialise (MTLS) and Sweden-based Arcam.

Another competitor is U.S.-based ExOne (XONE), which primarily competes with companies that can produce parts made of metal. These companies include EOS, VoxelJet and Arcam.

Stratasys and 3D Systems have printers that primarily use resin or plastic-based materials, though both companies have expanded into the metals market, primarily through acquisitions.

Huge Reductions In Manufacturing Costs

Tasha Keeney is an analyst at ARK Investment Management, which manages four exchange traded funds and separately managed accounts with about $240 million in assets under management.  She says 3D printers are a revolutionary platform that will have a major influence on manufacturing and production.

“We’re in the early days of 3D printing and expect a lot of surprises in this space,” said Keeney. “We expect to see 3D printing lead to new product designs and ideas, huge reductions in costs, weight declines and shorter supply chains.”

While 3D printing is a $5.5 billion market today, ARK projects it will reach more than $40 billion by 2020 — double Wohlers’ forecasts. Keeney estimates 3D printing has penetrated less than 1% of the addressable market.

Despite the increased competition, Keeney believes Stratasys and 3D Systems remain in a strong market position, both in terms of size and breadth of products.

As to what impact HP Inc. might have, she said, “we’re watching this closely for the time being, but we’re hearing mixed reviews.”

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The first 3D-printed drug to win FDA approval

3D printing makes an easier-to-swallow drug

The first 3D-printed drug to receive approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is now being shipped to pharmacies.

Pennsylvania-based Aprecia Pharmaceuticals said its 3D-printed Spritam (levetiracetam) tablets are used to treat epilepsy. The company is also working on at least three other 3D-printed drugs that it expects to eventually bring to market.

Aprecia said it used some off-the-shelf 3D printer parts but mostly developed its own technology to create the drugs, layer by layer at its East Windsor, N.J. manufacturing facility. The new process, which it calls ZipDose, stitches together multiple layers of powdered medication using an aqueous fluid to produce a porous, water-soluble matrix that rapidly disintegrates with a sip of liquid.

There is no increased efficiency in producing the pill with 3D printing; the technology simply allows the company to better manipulate the drug's composition compared with traditional press and die pill-making technology, according to Aprecia Pharmaceuticals spokesperson Jennifer Zieverink.

Levetiracetam, the generic name for Spritam, has been available for the treatment of seizures for 15 years. But the new brand Spritam is the first to use the proprietary 3D-printing process to create a more dissolvable pill.

"It's an option for some folks...looking for something easier to swallow than an intact tablet," Zieverink said.

MIT developed the basic technology for the 3D-printing of liquids, which may include a drug, through an inkjet printhead. That technology was later licensed by Therics, according to Terry Wohlers, president of Wohlers Associates, an independent consulting firm.

Therics "3D-printed many pills on an experimental basis, but it never took off commercially," Wohlers said in an email reply to Computerworld. In 2008, Therics was acquired by Integra LifeSciences Holdings Corp.

"The MIT patents have since expired, but it's possible that Therics developed additional IP. In some ways, Therics was many years ahead of its time," Wohlers said.

3D printing could also some day enable custom drugs, Wohlers said, describing a scenario where a doctor sends a prescription to a pharmacy that uses a printer to create a custom formulation based on the special needs of a patient.

"The potential is large, in my opinion, but it will take many years for it to gain strong commercial traction, especially due to the requirements of the FDA," Wohlers said.

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