Greetings, all!

  Just wanted to get some critical comments on an espresso cup I've been designing. There are two versions, I'm working on the second one currently, so the image here is of the first version. The cup body will be the same for both, it's the handle I need comments about.

Since an espresso cup is small, this handle here is designed for two fingers -- one in the loop, one out. The handle is welded to the base of the cup, which will be in metal. The cup may go for manufacture, so I used Solidworks for the modeling.

I like the overall design.  It's simple and elegant.  I especially like the groove near the base.  The handle has a nice flow to it too.  It's a little hard to tell but it seems like the rim could be more lip friendly.  Maybe rounded a bit.  The slight texture is interesting.  Will this be all metal?  What kind of material will be used?
Well, anyway, the handle is your main concern.  Looks fine just like it is!  Very nice and aesthetically pleasing.   :)

The handle does look very nice, practical and elegant.  But I agree that the rim needs smoothing, blood and coffee doesn't mix well.... Lol!

Hey, if this does get made as a real object, it would be great to see photos of the finished item.

I love espresso & do believe the aesthetics of a cup makes a difference in the indulgence.

The overall design is awesome.
As with the others, the rim could be smoother.
Will the metal be stainless steel with the shiny polished finish? (almost like a laquer coating)?

The lip needs curving outwards to aid drinking. As it is it will encourage dribbles down the outside. As for the handle - I'm afraid I don't like it. It looks great but from a practical standpoint it doesn't work for me. Excellent render btw!

I like the the look, I like the weld and bottom rim....  nice looking cup....

Now, If I was drinking from it I'd find my self at one point tilting the cup overly too much to get the coffee left in the pocket that is form underneath the rim....  could get messy...  the rim would hit the the top ridge of my nose....  I would have to tilt the model in respect to a face to tell better...

my two alms...

Unless of course a glass is meant to sit inside the metal cup...

Wouldn't a metal cup be rather hot to drink from?

Greetings all!

  Just taking a bit of a break. The cup shall be in two materials, possibly glass or ceramic for the main cup part which contains the liquid. The base and handle will be in metal. Unfortunately when I exported from Solidworks the cup object, it exported everything as one object, so I could not ungroup anything to use different materials for texturing. Solidworks has a number of export formats, but none friendly to Bryce, except .wrl (VRML). Usually I must export to .step then to Rhino for .3ds then to Bryce. But last night for convenience, I went straight to .wrl then realized it's all one object. oops!

Anyway.... I should be uploading another WIP render with some changes in a few hours.

The cup's edge are all rounded...fillet. Unfortunately maybe not thick enough to see, or the metal texture defeats seeing the fillet. I'll change the inside dimensions and will upload a render.

The handle to the second version will be a bit different and more traditional.

Thanks all for all your comments. :-)

ICM: "Will the metal be stainless steel with the shiny polished finish? (almost like a laquer coating)?"

I'm not really sure, although I was invisioning a chrome, or something shiny and smooth, polished. One nice thing about working with an excellent render engine like Bryce is it's easy to test various looks of materials. But the actual real-world material, I don't know yet.

Greetings everyone,

  Here's a new set of espresso work. I've taken the suggestions everyone mentioned and developed a new cup body. I've also modified the base where the handle is welded to so that it's hollow so that the cup body connects into it. I'll try to identify the changes point by point.

The rim is now more lip friendly (I hope) and so there shouldn't be any adventures involving lips, blood and coffee ;-)  I've increased the fillet edge diameter to be the same diameter as the handle, which is precisely 3/16".

This is still version 1 of the handle. Version 2 will come soon, which will be more tranditional in shape.

Concerns from Tom271 about the coffee dribbling into the pocket between the cup and the base has led me to change the base so that it's hollow, allowing the cup's body to fit in it. Hopefully that will prevent the coffee from collecting in a pool between the cup's body and base.

A metal cup will be too hot to drink from. I'll post a few little images showing glass and ceramic looks.

There should be enough glass in the cup's body to keep it from becoming top heavy and tilting. This would be a 2 to 3 shot espresso cup.

Critical comments both positive and negative are welcomed. Please let me know your thoughts.

I really like the white ceramic looking cup.....

yea.. the shape seems to eliminate the problem, at least from my POV..

"Hey, where you goin'? I was gonna make Espresso!" - the Hermit, Young Frankenstein..;)

That was a funny movie...   too bad he died... I could have used another Mel Brock's film with him in it..

Very nice cup design.

Quote - And the last render (yay) showing glass material and showing the cup's edge is now much thicker than before.

What glass material?  I just see metal.
I like the improved design, much more lip friendly.

I'm not convinced about that handle now, the way it's sitting there just connected at the base like that, gives me to think it might feel a little too... springy in the hand, making each sip feel rather too adventurous, as if the cup is unstable.

But I guess it does rather depend on what the finished cup will be made out of, the handle and base part anyway.

I do like the idea of being able to use different inserts, like the white ceramic, or a glass or metal cup.

Next on Donahue- Dangerous coffees...and the people who drink them..;) 

I've seen more unstable types of cups out ther IRL, though to a baby, there's nothing so stable that it can't be knocked to the floor...;)

Still to come, the handle for this version might need to be designed more flowing to the contours of the cup's body. Right now it's still following the contour of the previous design.

And still to come is orginal second version of the handle.

This body design has been improved last night. I've changed the shape of the inside of the glass to a better looking parabola.

This last render shown above the material is indeed glass. But purhaps I could have used a lighter glass or cut down on reflection. I really wanted to show the inside shape, so ya gotta look really hard to follow the contours, but looking really hard wasn't what I wanted to achieve.

I like the look of the glass, have you seen the bodum nudes (dual wall glass espresso cups, they even keep the heat in).  Just one thing to point out if you're talking espresso (rather than cappuchino) and you're looking to get it made, make sure that bottom is rounded and there are no corners around the bottom of the cup.  The curved bottom of the cup helps with crema production, if you've got a flat bottom and a corner where it joins the sides then you'll disipate crema as the shot pulls.  For example...

Got to say one of those, with a the glass insert and a good tiger striped shot on it would look superb.  I'm thinking...

Or one of the large ones with good latte art on the top like...

Anyway I digress.

I like the look of the cup.

:-)  Thanks for the tip on the glass shapes. The inside of mine is curved. I like that double walled cup.

Quote - Greetings all! Slowly but surely, the cup is getting done. Finally found the time to make some foam. I hope it looks real enough.

Hey, I really like the look of that foam, looks pretty real to me - but it looks more cappuchino to me, not espresso.

@ FranOnTheEdge: shhhhh ... :-)   let that be our secret.

I don't go for espresso... I feel guity that it's so strong. So I usually go for either a cappucino or mocha. But I guess I should make some photos of espresso... ... ack! Now I feel bad for not using espresso. Okay, I have a free coffee in my card at the shop... so I'll use if for that ;-)

There's always room for coffee.... of any sort.

Lol!

Nescafe - slam it in the cup, add milk, sugar, hot water. Stir. They don't call it instant for nothing.....

Yikes! Too much work for me.  :-)

It's strange. For me it's a balance: All I want in one of them stores is a bit of history and a place I can sit all day long with a power outlet for my laptop and program. I telecommute.

Nescafe?  Yeeeuuurk!  No no, gotta be decent coffee, with a real caffeine hit, like Dowe Egberts Dark Continental... or maybe Alta Rica, Costa Rican at a pinch, and that Kenco Really Dark is nice too...

In comparisson (to me, anyway) Nescafe is like floor sweepings,  bland and bluuuuh!

Fran: Oh very posh! But I  drink coffee all day and I don't have time to make the filter stuff.   :glare:

Nor do I and none of the ones I mentioned is filter - all are instant, but when you drink (and like) as much coffee as I do, I feel the necessity of buying the best instant I can.  Otherwise it just doesn't tast as good, and since the fairtrade coffees improved so much and their prices are so much lower - the other coffees prices have lowered to compete, so it's not as expensive as it used to be.

Which is good for me.  :thumbupboth:

When I'm working, I drink a LOT of coffee (Real coffee - anything else is just heresy!:biggrin:) Being a Barista has no downsides...

Ooo! Barista! That reminds me of a story I've been writing.. collection of short stories of wizards around a coffee table in Cafe Perilous... a truly magical cafe. Been thinking too if it's possible to make something like a group project with us all here on that theme....... Maybe just crazy thoughts, or maybe it's a good idea... dunno... but anyway.....

Do you do latte art?

Sounds like a cool idea to me. Latte art hasn't really caught on round here yet - though I did make an excellent birdlike pattern once! The problem is you can't just re-render it when it goes wrong....