Rotary IPhone case with printed spring

It’s that cute, a rotary dial on an iPhon…. HOLY SMOKES, it snaps back! I love this sort of thing. 3D printed springs excite me. I tried myself to harness the power of a 3D printed spring, without success. So when I see someone else make it work, even on a novelty level like this, I get kind of excited. …

Makerbot to become Stratasys Makerbot

Rumors have been flying. Rumors have been confirmed. Stratasys will be acquiring Makerbot. When the rumors started that Makerbot was going to sell, but no one knew who to, this to me was the best possible scenario. Stratasys invented the 3D printing process everyone is using now and they’re still innovating today. I would rather Makerbot be in the hands …

Dizingof having his desgins misused by 3DSystems and Stratasys

Thingiverse user Dizingof, well known for intricate latices work designs, recently removed most of his designs from thingiverse in response to 3DSystems and Stratasys ignoring the non-commercial license associated with his things and using his designs to market their product. There are so many facets to this story I can’t decide which one I want to talk about. For starters there’s …

Creating a test print object

Andrew Mazzotta approached me with the possibility of creating a test object similar to, well, lots of test objects out there already, with a little indirect marketing towards his 3DHacker website. The thing about creating a test object, particularly a comprehensive one, is you have to decide who your audience is, what do they want to test and what can the …

Creating 3D objects… with your brain

So the project is pretty limited and hasn’t actually gotten very far yet, but its very promising: an evolutionary algorithm that uses a brain scanner to determine fitness. I suppose that’s the best we can expect since brain interfaces aren’t suited for running 123DCreature yet, not without a surgical implant anyways. The hard part is going to be developing a …

MakerWare vs RepG

For my book (yes, got it in early) I had to explore MakerWare for the first time, for the sake of completeness. Before I’ve never really had any incentive to switch over and I still don’t. I do like like that MakerWare allows you to plate multiple objects easily and I’m currently trying to see if it’s slicer does a better job …

Challenge Accepte..ugh.

DesignMakeTeach issued the challenge and I rose to answer it… sort of. To be fair, I already knew I was going to have problems with the overhangs. Overhang issue aside this, I think, is the best way to print this object. All overhangs become gradual slopes with few exceptions, and the majority doesn’t even need the supports. You don’t need …

Andrew Mazotta’s interview with Shapeways

Andrew Mazotta recently visited Shapeways an had an interview with Bart Veldhuizen who, incidentally, was one of the people who bought Blender and released it free and open source. (By the way, I’m totally writing a book that’s all about Blender.) So an all around good guy and awesome to have Andrew interview him. I like Shapeways. I’m on Shapeways. I really …

Makerbot Project Blueprints on Preorder Now!

It is with great excitement that I can finally announce a project that I’ve been working on for months! I’ve written a book! Makerbot Project Blueprints will pass on my masterful knowledge of making things for 3D printing to you. 9 awesome projects give you the knowledge you need in an exciting and fun way at your pace, as opposed …