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.