Hi everyone,

During the release of Poser 7 (or was it Poser 6?), it was advertised that a company could take a poser model (my guess, poser model exported to a wavefront .obj file) and fabricate it.  That is to say, a machine would carve your design out from a solid block of material (plastic maybe?). 

Anyways, I was scouring the net trying to find this poser specific service with no luck.  I did look into other fabrication processes but these seem overly expensive as they assume you're some large corporation with HUGE VC funding or something.

If anyone remembers this service can you please give a holler back?

Thanks!
                 George

Practically no Poser models are suitable for 3D printing.  3D printing requires that the model be completely "water-tight" (no holes in the geometry) and be all one continuous, welded piece with no overlaps or intersections.  Certainly no character figure I've ever seen would work with it, pretty much no model for Poser that I've **EVER **looked at.

I recall the promotion but not the company. There are people posting on the forums at Shapeways talking about Poser models and how to prepare them for 3D printing.

http://www.shapeways.com 

Animationbuilder specifically mentions prototyping from Poser models.

http://www.animationbuilder.com/

I remember it too (the promotion, not the name). I think I saw it mentioned in Wired, but it was a good two or three years ago.

I used to work with someone who had a $50k version, which was impressive. It actually built the model up, rather than carved it down.

they build them up in layers, thermosetting resin IIRC, UV-cured, and it may need a bunch of sanding and painting to look nice.  this may be more a japanese speciality.  try one about 30 - 40 cm in height.  there may be a formulaic requirement in relation to pj's advice to avoid any limbs crossing each other or any part of the body, e.g. the distinction between a function and a relation, but I dunno how to convey it in terms appropriate to this forum.  they should be able to work around the problem of an hand or elbow starting in mid-air with some creative use of linking bars, as they do when casting plastic objects.  hence if anybody does one of these, let us see some photos of it.

I recall the offer for a laser-burnt block (Lucite or glass?) which would portray your OBJ in 3D within the block.  Delete the interior parts (inner mouth, etc) for this.  Also consider that transmapping won't work, so wings need to be geometry mesh rather than transmapped planes.

A guy with access to a Sunnen CK offered to machine your OBJ in stiff foam;  the sample doll statue he showed was about four feet tall.  I think that was in the DAZ forum, but I don't recall.

SmithMicro offer a free plugin for Poser Pro which exports in format for a rapid prototyper.

After doing some research (btw, thanks to lmckenzie's response), I found that this can be expensive to have done by a 3rd party.  At the same time, there are now home "kits" that allow you to build your own fabrication device for (US) $750. 

As Miss Nancy and Pakled mentioned, the piece is fabricated in layers, from the bottom up.  You can achieve some fairly complex shapes with this method.  You can also use different materials in the same device for fabrication.

Some of the more commercial fabrication systems (which are amazing to watch btw) are as low as $5k and are no bigger than an office xerox machine (some also fabricate in color,...)

Really amazing technology that's developing.

It has also been emphasized the requirements of the 3d model being fabricated (all normals facing forward, minimum thickness allowed for any form,...etc).   I'm very tempted to purchase the home system, but it does have limitations on the size of the object being fabricated.

I want to thank lmckenzie again for his response, I'll look into those sites, they offer some attractive pricing for my needs.

-CG

If you're considering spending 750 bucks for such a device, at least spend a fair amount of time learning modeling - I can pretty much guarantee you that almost no Poser content will work with this technology without truly extensive modification (might as well model something yourself at that point).

Attached Link: foam sculpture (DAZ thread)

I'll second this.  You will almost certainly need to "adjust", weld, etc. the OBJ.

Quote - If you're considering spending 750 bucks for such a device, at least spend a fair amount of time learning modeling - I can pretty much guarantee you that almost no Poser content will work with this technology without truly extensive modification (might as well model something yourself at that point).

I actually import and then rigg.  I don't think this will be a problem.  I only brought it up because the process was first brought to my attention via EFrontier's mention during Poser 6 or 7.

Hopefully someone will remember the original firm involved. the Animationbuilder site has a couple of photos of a Poser model, oddly the old Dina mesh. I'm curious as to how the former promo arrangement worked. It seems hard to believe that they expected to get any business if all of the advanced modeling skill would be required to tweak every model submitted. I'm not saying it isn't required for the tech, but perhaps whatever company was involved was geared up to do that for the customers - the time & expense of which might explain why they are now a lost memory :-)

I think it was Poser 5, where there was a company that gave poser users a discount. I can not find the orginal site, but here is a company that does 3d printing.

http://www.3darttopart.com/index.php

 Give this a read through... CLICK

Old link ... not much to it.

http://market.renderosity.com/mod/forumpro/showthread.php?message_id=2467993&ebot_calc_page#message_2467993

Nancy, if you are talking about the PVC statuettes I don't think those are 3d printing.  This european company does a form 3d printing for WoW.

If you were to do 3d printing you need to know what kind of detail the printing can hold and frankly if you start in poser it might be best to import your objects over to your modeler and start rebuilding it there, using your original object and a template.

Note the quality of printing below, see the small bands/ridges across the surface?  This is what other posters were referring to when they said you may have to apply sanding to the object once it has been printed.  Not all printers have this kind of output, but this is what you'll probably encounter on the low-end of 3d printing.

Quote - Nancy, if you are talking about the PVC statuettes I don't think those are 3d printing.  This european company does a form 3d printing for WoW.

If you were to do 3d printing you need to know what kind of detail the printing can hold and frankly if you start in poser it might be best to import your objects over to your modeler and start rebuilding it there, using your original object and a template.

Some creative shrinkwrapping comes to mind as a possible (quick) solution for those using poser-sourced models?

The pic in the previous post showed output from a $5k printer,....This is output from a $10k printer:

Note the banding hasn't been completely removed, but it's less pronounced than the output from the 5k printer. 

Quote -  Give this a read through... CLICK

Fantastic article, thank you for sharing!

Just curiosity - Other than the somewhat idiosyncratic use in Synpainter's link, what would be the primary use of such 3D printing? Art objects? prototypes (what sort of things could they be useful for as prototypes)?

I'm also curious about the smoothness of Curious George's image from the $10k printer... as smoothing is applied in the render, would this just be achieved by a very high polygon count?

Many come to mind, but here's a few: prototyping tool design, making physical props for stage or film, or mass-producing sculptures for sale.  These aren't terribly related to Poser or its content though, people who design and model that kind of thing would be the big customers.

If the item were carved from wax, you could then cast a bronze statue using the lost wax method.  I'd like a TinkerBell in my back yard. ^^

Vicky might not be a prototype, but remember that you could use this for mechanical/architechtural models.

How big an item can that $10K printer make?

Thanks, Paul. I was thinking of architectural mockups, and art deco pieces, but hadn't thought about film and stage props. Can certainly see the value in that - though I would think that would take a lot of "postwork."

been thinking about getting a Fabber kit myself.. for printing my models to make model kit moulds of them.. just a case of breaking the models down into model kit parts. (which can be done with poser figures btw. looking at the grouping, you've already got most of the work done. just a case of sealing the parts. some assembly required later ;))

The method was used by the BBC in producing several parts for their new Dalek props from the first ones they built.   As stated, the parts need a lot of tidying up afterwards.

The best use for rapid prototyping is, in general, producing replicas of real world objects for mass production, rather than working from meshes.

Quote - I'm also curious about the smoothness of Curious George's image from the $10k printer... as smoothing is applied in the render, would this just be achieved by a very high polygon count?

Not sure of the specifics of how the printers are able to achieve a smoother surface.  Definitely a high-poly count is required for curved surfaces I'd think.

My use of the fabrication would be for glass casting.  There are many applications for fabrication but, for the artists, mass production of a single piece (as others mentioned) definitely comes to mind.

Quote - I'm also curious about the smoothness of Curious George's image from the $10k printer... as smoothing is applied in the render, would this just be achieved by a very high polygon count?

  I would think that what you see in a modeler program is what you get.  So, smoothness would rely on poly count.

Hair would be an issue if using a Poser dollie;  the layers of transmapped rectangles without thickness wouldn't work.  I would guess that one would want to replace the Poser hair with a mesh facsimile.

I wonder if the 3D "printer" requires the polys to be/avoid triangles? quads? planar n-gons?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R-JOJ91p9Wc

If you can endure the advertisement, this gives some interesting info on the z printer, which is extremely flexible in what it can create.  The vid will answer some of the questions a few of you have posted in this thread.

Other links of interest:

http://www.3dtotal.com/3dprinting/

http://www.shapeways.com/tutorials/prepping_blender_files_for_3d_printing

I'm anxious for the day when 3D printing is lower-priced with higher quality. One of the hobbies that I used to have was porcelain doll making. However, unfired porcelain generates a LOT of dust that is nasty for the lungs.

I just think it would be REALLY awesome to create a very cool character in Poser (say, Nefertiti or something Egyptian); and then use a 3D printer to manufacture the head, hands, and feet that could be put onto a poseable armature; and then create the costumes with regular fabrics. It's an idea I've had for quite some time. I'm hoping I can afford a printer before I retire, though! LOL

 apparently there was someone who used a vickie for making a doll to try and sell but it broke some copyright law so they had to stop.
Love esther

Here is another link that may add to the discussion:

http://fabathome.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page

Kits or printers.  Probably useful for creating models for jewerly components, etc (small stuff).

Also here (pricey)  Page 428

http://www.riogrande.com/virtual_catalog.aspx

Quote - I'm anxious for the day when 3D printing is lower-priced with higher quality. One of the hobbies that I used to have was porcelain doll making. However, unfired porcelain generates a LOT of dust that is nasty for the lungs.

I just think it would be REALLY awesome to create a very cool character in Poser (say, Nefertiti or something Egyptian); and then use a 3D printer to manufacture the head, hands, and feet that could be put onto a poseable armature; and then create the costumes with regular fabrics. It's an idea I've had for quite some time. I'm hoping I can afford a printer before I retire, though! LOL

Assuming you create a set of meshes (rigged poser characters, props) that are "waterproof", there are many  possibilities I believe.

Quote -  apparently there was someone who used a vickie for making a doll to try and sell but it broke some copyright law so they had to stop.
Love esther

I am not familiar with that specific instance, but I can say that all of the EULAs that I have read for Poser content say that you can distribute still and animated images.  They don't give permission for the distribution of 3D prototyped creations.  You could make them for personal use, but not for sale. 

Just saying,

--Rebekah--

I work for a company that makes telephones. We use 3D printing to make prototypes of new phones so you can actually handle them before we've finished the design. Often a design looks good on the screen but doesn't feel right in the hand. Plus later we can get a transparent model made so we can see if the insides really fit like they are supposed to.

Here at RMP the license on the newer Aery Soul products explicitly prohibits using the model to create tangible reproductions. I don't know about their older stuff, of that from other vendors.

Quote - > Quote -  apparently there was someone who used a vickie for making a doll to try and sell but it broke some copyright law so they had to stop.

Love esther

I am not familiar with that specific instance, but I can say that all of the EULAs that I have read for Poser content say that you can distribute still and animated images.  They don't give permission for the distribution of 3D prototyped creations.  You could make them for personal use, but not for sale. 

Just saying,

--Rebekah--

Good to know ... I don't think I'd have a problem making my own original 3D heads and hands, so that wouldn't be a barrier. In fact, it would be more fun that way. 8-)