Book Image

3D Printing Blueprints

By : Joe Larson
Book Image

3D Printing Blueprints

By: Joe Larson

Overview of this book

A new industrial age is here. Machines designed to build useful and interesting objects have moved from the factory to the home. Whether you have a 3D printer or not, learning how to design your first 3D models is the best way to become part of the 3D printing movement. 3D Printing Blueprints will teach you, step by step, the tools and techniques of using Blender, a free 3D modelling program, to build 3D models for printing with simple and fun hands-on projects.3D Printing Blueprints uses engaging and fun projects that teach Blender modeling for 3D printing through hands-on lessons. First you'll learn basic modeling and make a small simple object. Then each new project brings with it new tools and techniques as well as teaching the rules of 3D printing design. Eventually you'll be building objects designed to repair or replace everyday objects. Finally you'll be able to even tackle other people's models and fix them to be 3D printable. Through the course of doing the blueprints you will custom build one-of-a-kind objects that you can call your own. Starting from a custom vase formed from a picture, lessons will progress to a multi-part modular robot toy. Then simple machines will be designed with custom gears and functions. Eventually you'll learn how to download models from the Internet and make custom objects. Finally you'll be able to build models with near real life specifications and make a print that can be used for small object repair. 3D Printing Blueprints will teach you everything you need to know about building custom 3D models to print successfully on modern home 3D printers.
Table of Contents (17 chapters)
3D Printing Blueprints
Credits
About the Author
About the Reviewers
www.PacktPub.com
Preface
Index

Summary


When 3D modeling is focused on the render for a video or image, "if it looks good" that's all the criteria the modelers need. However, 3D printing needs to have its geometry well defined, or it can't bring something from the virtual to the real world.

Fixing bad geometry may not be the most entertaining part of 3D modeling for everyone. But being able to identify the unnecessary edges or vertices, create faces to patch holes, and rotate edges when they're in the way, and build a watertight, manifold model are valuable skills. And if you think about it like a puzzle to solve, it can be quite satisfying. Being able to take a model that wasn't made for 3D printing and fixing it, means that entire libraries of ready-made models open up online, so you don't have to make everything you want to print from scratch.

There are tools such as netfabb (http://netfabb.com) and meshlab (http://meshlab.sourceforge.net/) that can do a lot of these sorts of things semi-automatically. They're not complete...