Hey that one image is a Wiimote gun!

LiquidGravity

@karmaghost: Women will save a fortune on "pleasure devices" by using these printers instead of paying $100 for such devices

geiko

I saw a 3D printer once that used this plastic stuff and it was so cool to watch it print. It took quite a while and each print cost a couple dollars in plastic stuff but it was cool how the print head would go back and forth and slowly the object would appear out of nowhere.

reddingofish

@geiko: *tries to play it cool and seem like i'm indifferent even though i desperately want you to stick around*

huh? me? uh, nah man, i'm good. i have a lot of friends and stuff, i'm just uhh waiting for them to show up. but yeah, so if you're not doing anything, we could like talk or something and, i don't know, be friends for life or something.

Anonymoose

If these become popular, I could see a big business in reselling whole post-industrial waste paper, like non-sensitive office waste, print shop overstock, newspaper, etc.

dingus

I can't wait until the day when, God willing, these will become as commonplace as ink printers and everyone will be able to make their own severed hands within the privacy of their own homes.

karmaghost

@Anonymoose: You seem lonely over here. How's it going? Would you like some company?

geiko

@Anonymoose: sons of monkey gropers, i just have to paste the link without the embed tags? this internet is a strange and furry place and i'm not sure what to do with it.

Anonymoose

@Anonymoose: uh, yeah, that youtube embed didn't work so well.

i tried to post a vid of a 3d printer in action:

+ Watch video

and then some dude who used one to print out an iphone case:

+ Watch video

Anonymoose

and since this is gizmodo:

Anonymoose

@jdbaile3: Sadly, our immature geek brains would never let something this easy pass up. NEVER!

geiko

we all know where this is headed...

jdbaile3

@jdbaile3: Usualy they use .stl files. Most 3d packages can spit them out, including blender, if i'm not entirely mistaken.

CoyoteBrown

@jdbaile3: well, I guess they have to increase the printer's size to life-sized, or you have to glue the parts together...

yogibimbi

@Anonymoose: Monkey gropers? Is that anything like simian slappers?

Jrsy is the dude, playin' the dude, disguised as another dude

You can get little models of your WoW characters made like this for a crazy amount of money. I guess they paint them and stuff though...

What kinds of file types do these printers take? Solid Works?

jdbaile3

@jchabotte:

CAD isn't as difficult as it looks, especially if you're just making models and not creating formal, ASME or ISO drawings for traditional manufacturing - GD&T is tricky, and takes a lot of practice to do elegantly and in an easily understood fashion.

What i'd recommend is Vectorworks, but only because that's what i'm used to, and AFAIK it's a bit more user friendly than AUTOCAD.

Anyways find some small objects around the house and recreate them in 3D - you may need micrometers to attain any real precision - and work your way up to more complex objects. The trick is being able to visualize the steps you'll take to make a shape - a good way to start making things is to create a rough, encompassing shape and then subtract various other shapes from it.

nutbastard

@Jrsy is the dude, playin' the dude, disguised as another du...: no. the monkey gropers are much more subtle and frankly more polite. they're the ones who might see a primate on the subway and cop a gentle feel. sure, they may get a bit agressive, but that's only when the primate responds in an anxious manner.

simian slappers are, needless to say, violent and unshaved. but they are good with the sweet talk.

Anonymoose

@CoyoteBrown:

Good to know, and i'm pleased to find that Vectorworks can export .stl files - useless for now due to a lack of a 3D printer, but still, good to know.

nutbastard

I would love to have one of these if i knew anything about designing in CAD

jchabotte

@nutbastard: I guess it's all what your use to. I'm a AutoCAD person and I've been using it since Release 12 was new, mostly engineering work. I used to do 3D renderings of all the steel in the buildings we did. I can't imagine there's a better 3D program, but like I said, it is the one I'm use to.

It would be cool to use one of these printers to print out building models; both architectural and engineering.

baltwade

@jchabotte: I take the opposite approach. I build up the part like a layer cake. (this seems to work the best in solidworks)

CoyoteBrown

But can it render Crysis?

Discofunk

@yogibimbi: well, that's gotta be less taxing then the other way. i could never complete it the old way since i would always run out of breath.

Anonymoose

@Discofunk:

ZOMG ROFL SOOOO FUNNY LOLOLOL XP WTFBBQ i wonderz if it play doomz too!!!!!

(sarcastic commentard post)

nutbastard

@CoyoteBrown:

@jchabotte:

There's also novel methods like sweeps, extrude-along-path, lofts, tapered extrusions that are usually very good for creating a limited number of rough shapes. for example, something that is cylindrically symmetrical (such as a donut or a vase) is actually really simple - a donut is a swept circle and a vase is a swept profile.

if you have the time, it's a rather rewarding activity.

nutbastard

Hmmm... I'm wondering if the RepRap could be modified to use this material...

HeartBurnKid, creepy morbid freak

@Anonymoose: LOL!

Hey look at that, you made a new friend.

Jrsy is the dude, playin' the dude, disguised as another dude

@geiko: there is still the issue of adding relaxing vibration to said products...

And the best non-vibrating ones are made of glass, also not sure how well water based glue would go over in that... uh... environment.

bpapa9013

@nutbastard: I do it for a living, so it's kind of a job. I don't do lots of swoopy things on a day to day basis, mostly fabricated tanks and rotating mechanical equipment. I'd like a 3d printer just to make 3d models of our stuff.

CoyoteBrown

But how much will one unit cost??? Right now the best I've seen is $25000 for monochrome and $50000 for color.

Blaxpear

Coolness! Papier-mache for the digital age.

LA_Longhorn

This is an irish company! sweet.

hu_hu_cool

@Blaxpear: There are several 3D printers on the market for around 10k. this one should be cheaper.

fastm3driver

@dingus: It would be a massive boon to recycling if these could use waste paper and newspaper.

Maybe they need to invent one which renders with paper machie, flour, water, and use these pre-rendered hands on robot arms to mold the models.

brundlefly76

@yogibimbi: You dont need life-size - once a geek has rendered the parts he wants, he will never get around to finishing the rest anyway.

brundlefly76

@Blaxpear: Just under $25000 for this one.

hu_hu_cool

OK, so again I wil make a request to be a Giz technical adviser. Just saying.
This is very similar to a machine over 15 years called the LOM. Laminated object manufacturing. It worked exactly the same way except it cut the paper with a laser. It had the ability to make very large parts. The negative though was speed, accuracy, and delamination(this is where the part falls apart over time because it absorbs water) of parts due to humidity. I would assume this machine would have the same problems. I assume the knife cutting system will be much cheaper than the laser but you will need to replace it often and it can't be as accurate. Please the the cricut machine. It sells for $200 ish but can't stack layer like this thing. Also, you can't make hollow parts so the end product can be very dense.
[www.efunda.com]
That said if they can sell it under $1000 they should have a winner.

fastm3driver

@Discofunk: Shut the funk up!

Tex1961

@fastm3driver: no, its just under $25000. If it was 10000 i would have bought it.

hu_hu_cool

Can it create integrated mechanisms?

dantesinfirno

So if I stuff Adriana Lima in there...

Escamotage

@CoyoteBrown:

i too get to do CAD for my day job, but I mostly do mechanical assemblies, enclosures, sheet metal and machining, lots of gas flow control and custom test equipment stuff. since it's a small company i also get stuck doing wiring diagrams, design guides, PCB fabs and assemblies, the whole gamut.

I like it a lot : )

nutbastard

I can see an application for this: human scale lego models!

aerospaceman

@jdbaile3: yeah...fake iPhones

Fierock

so you can build your own 3D printer... not realy build...

you need a router, and sheets of stickers... yeah you got the ideea

but my question for this is: how long it will take a 10cm cube to print?

shpe11

@Escamotage: ...the output will be just as mindless!

FiveLiters

@karmaghost: What do you mean? It's easy to make your own severed hands in the privacy of your home...finding the unsuspecting runaway who will be the future donor of said hand,well,that part's tricky!

FiveLiters

This will extend "piracy" into a new dimension, no pun intended. As one of the above posters pointed out, should this machine make it to the general public, making model figures for gaming will become a point and click sort of thing. You'll see at least a few gaming companies behaving like RIAA as they try to track down gamers who are file-swapping the CAD-CAM files needed to "print" out a game figurine.

Ed_Becerra

Incredible! I am designing a small electronic device and need to design the enclosure for it; this printer would revolutionize the industrial design phase of prototyping. For small devices like consumer electronics and pro audio peripherals the properties of a wood-like casing are more than sufficient, and indeed possibly lighter than metal/plastic casings. I WANT one of these printers... droool. Any chance the 1st gen printers could be under the $3K USD/CDN price point? I would save up every penny to buy one of these!

LisetteGaius

@fastm3driver: yeah, the whole paper/glue construction thing is going to be the downside. on the other hand, it wouldnt be terribly difficult to prototype with this and then cast it in something else once youve got your shape rendered. and for lots of applications, paper can work just fine, even if its temporary. you can always just make another piece

peterlarson233