Motorola Mobility, a Google company, is building a 3D printed modular phone, and has partnered with 3D Systems for commercial fulfillment. More »
The Captured Dimensions pop-up studio was located in the Smithsonian Castle and featured approximately 80 digital cameras all connected to 3D software. More »
Microsoft expanded their support for 3D printing by launching a Windows 8 app called 3D Builder. It includes a library of objects you can edit and 3D print. More »
3D Systems (NYSE:DDD) announced the availability of the Sense 3D scanner, the first 3D scanner designed for the consumer and optimized for 3D printing. More »
With rumors circling that 3D Systems will be purchased by IBM, the stock soars. We look at why IBM might be interested in the 3D printing giant. More »
Yearly Archives: 2012
Futuristic Medicine: 3D Printed Jaw Implant Rescues 83-Year-Old Woman
In a groundbreaking first in the medical field, a team from the University of Hasselt has created a method for using 3D printing to fabricate a functioning lower jaw implant that rescued their patient from a massive infection.
“The introduction of printed implants can be compared to man’s first venture on the moon: a cautious, but firm step,” said Professor Jules Poukens of BIOMED.
The patient was an 83-year-old woman who was suffering from a major infection in her mandible. Traditional treatments, such as removing the lower jaw, would result in greatly decreased quality of life. Luckily, this medical team of doctors from the University of Hasselt, Belgium, partnered with engineers from Xios University College, SIRRIS, Xilloc Medical BV in Belgium, and the department of Cranio-, Maxillo-Facial surgery of Orbis Medical Center Sittard-Geleen in The Netherlands to develop an innovative treatment using 3D printing.
“Computer technology will cause a veritable revolution in the medical world. We just need to learn to work with it,” added Professor Jules Poukens. “Doctors and engineers together around the design computer and the operation table: that’s what we call being truly innovative.”
Pictured above and below, Dr. Ivo Lambrichts holds the 3D printed mandible. It was fabricated using a titanium powder in only a few hours. Typical methods to create implants usually take days.
Within 1 day after surgery, the patient had normal functioning speech, swallowing and movement.
Congratulations to this team for their major achievement!
Via UHasselt.
Top 10 Countdown: Most Popular 3D Printing Stories in April
Here are the top 10 most popular stories On 3D Printing brought you in April 2012.
10. We explored innovative and strange 3D printing concepts, from chocolate to stone to candy to organs!
9. Former MakerBot COO is launching a new 3D printer called Solidoodle, with a $500 price tag.
8. The Forbidden City is cloned with 3D printing (photo above).
7. Hollywood’s storytellers turn to 3D printing, including Iron Man.
6. The lucrative toy industry is challenged by 3D printed generics.
5. The Economist publishes a special report on 3D printing, called “The Third Industrial Revolution“.
4. Google sold 3D modeling software SketchUp to Trimble.
3. We analyzed the market size of 3D printing creators and consumers.
2. Stratasys merged with Objet, and we captured the key deal points.
1. Leapfrog launches a new 3D printer line in Europe.
Thanks for reading in April!
3D Printing Companies Exhibiting at Maker Faire 2012
Maker Faire is a two-day, family-friendly festival of invention, creativity and resourcefulness, and a celebration of the Maker movement. Maker Faire Bay Area will be held May 19-20.
With 3D printing hitting an inflection point in awareness, it’s not surprising that there are over 20 companies exhibiting at Maker Faire with a 3D printing leaning. From MakerBot to Fab@School, check out the exhibitors below.
3D Scanning (Structured Light & Laser) Zip-Bit, Inc.
Taking Your Project into the 3rd Dimension with Zip-Bit, Inc. Zip-Bit, Inc. provides 3D Scanning, 3D Modeling, 3D Printing, and 3D Engineering services for all areas of industry/manufacturing, science, education, arts, and more…
3x3x3 LED Cube Arduino Shield Kit Look What Joey’s Making
3x3x3 LED Cube Arduino Shield Kit is a beginner kit. With this kit you will solder pieces together making the shield. You will then hook it to an Arduino (sold separately) and learn to program it making the leds go on and off in whatever pattern you wish.
Creating a Middle School 3d prototyping lab
Riley & Vernon are ardent CAD designers, 3D Printer users and above all Makers. Come see how they managed to set up a lab on a shoestring and make 3D work a part of everyday school life at a public school.
Ecological 3D Printing-Research
A research team from the College of Environmental Design at UC Berkeley, led by Assistant Professor of Architecture Ronald Real, has developed a process for the creation of 3D printed buildings, building components, and interior accessories.
Extreme Marshmallow Cannon uses PVC to hold air pressure, a sprinkler valve to release air & a bike pump. Marshmallows go in the end of the cannon. Pump it using a bike pump to 30psi & fire. The marshmallow will travel about 176 feet.
Math Sculptures & Hyperbolic Jewelry
The models were created through authentic computational design based on algorithms aimed to generate objects according to the mathematical laws. The 3D printing machine composes the piece from steel powder and infiltrates it with molten bronze.
QU-BD 3D Printer & Milling Machine
We are excited to announce world’s first desktop manufacturing machine with the capability to do additive AND subtractive manufacturing will be introduced at Makerfaire! We will see you there!
Applied Science Research and Robotics
Students from AS&E at Menlo School present the robotic arm, a sensing Teddy bear, superconducting MagLev train, Sumo wrestling robots, self-directing car, cloud chamber, hover craft, motorcycle conversion projects, and many more!
Public users group for the promotion, development, and understanding of RepRap and RepStrap 3D printer projects in the Bay Area.
Fab@Home and Fab@School Project
Fab@Home is a platform of printers and programs which can produce functional 3D objects. It is designed to fit on your desktop and within your budget. Fab@Home is innovating tomorrow, today. Join us, and Make Anything.
The Hacker Dojo is a place for makers and hackers to gather and share ideas, collaborate on projects, and build community. We provide facilities and instruction for both software and hardware, open to anyone.
Klein Bottles, topless teapots, siphon-glasses, and a homebrew forklift
How do you make a glass Klein Bottle? How about knitting a woolen Mobius Scarf? Perhaps a self-syphoning wine-glass? Or a robotic mini-forklift? Cliff will give away a glass Klein Bottle; maybe two if there’s enough questions.
Knightqueen is a novelty chess piece that is a hybrid of a queen and a knight. You can write funny words onto the box and give Knightqueen to your friend. Examples: “Garry Kasparov’s worst nightmare” or “Use if you want to beat ME.”
Seikowave’s 3D scanner captures images in under 0.5sec with a resolution of 300 microns. Those images, saved as an .STL file, are ready to be exported to a 3D printer or CAM for fabrication. Seikowave will be offering free scans in its booth.
The MakerBot Replicator is an affordable, open source 3D printer, with 2-color printing and a bigger printing footprint, giving you the superpower to print things BIG!
Mike’s ORDish Bot 3D Printer
The ORD Bot is a RepRap style 3D printer using MakerSlide for linear movement.
Printrbot
Printrbot: Your First 3D Printer
Expandable 3D printer kits
QU-BD 3D Printer & Milling Machine
We are excited to announce world’s first desktop manufacturing machine with the capability to do additive AND subtractive manufacturing will be introduced at Makerfaire! We will see you there!
SparkLab: an educational build-mobile!
SparkLab is a big red truck filled with cutting-edge maker tools that goes from school to school, bringing the joy of making back to kids.
TechZoneCommunications
We stumbled upon the Open Source Rep Rap Project a few years ago.. We became very interested in building our own and could not source all the parts. So we began assembling and selling electronics and eventually moved into selling complete kits.
Tjiko Snap! 3D Printer
The Tjiko 3D printer uses no screws or nuts, just lasercut mortise & tenon joints to go together. This means that the only tools you need to get started building are your hands, and a brain or two.
A San Francisco startup, building 3D printers! All about open source hardware and cool design.
Maker Faire photo by twelves via Creative Commons.
Why Google Sold SketchUp and What It Means for 3D Printing
Google acquired upstart SketchUp in 2006, made the product free, and drove tens of millions of users. Now Google is selling the SketchUp product and staff to Trimble, a company best known for GPS technology.
On the SketchUp blog, John Bacus, Product Manager, SketchUp wrote:
In its time at Google, SketchUp has become one of the most popular 3D modeling tools in the world. With over 30 million SketchUp activations in just the last year, we’re awfully proud of our accomplishments. But there’s still so much we want to do, and we think we’ve found a way forward that will benefit everyone—our product, our team and especially our millions of users.
That’s why I’m sharing today that the SketchUp team and technology will be leaving Google to join Trimble. We’ll be better able to focus on our core communities: modelers who have been with us from the beginning, as well as future SketchUppers who have yet to discover our products.
Why Did Google Sell SketchUp?
The simple answer is focus. As founder and new CEO Larry Page wrote in his 2012 update to investors, ”Since becoming CEO again, I’ve pushed hard to increase our velocity, improve our execution, and focus on the big bets that will make a difference in the world.”
SketchUp apparently is not included in Google’s big bets.
Good Move by Trimble
Google made the investment to turn SketchUp into a popular software platform. Trimble can capitalize on that brand. Trimble announced in a press release that SketchUp would “enhance its office-to-field platform”.
Trimble will also continue to partner with Google on running and the SketchUp 3D warehouse, an online repository where users find and collaborate on 3D models. And Trimble will keep offering a free version of SketchUp.
“SketchUp and the corresponding 3D Warehouse provide an important element of our long term strategy by enhancing the integration of our field presence with the wider enterprise,” said Bryn Fosburgh, Trimble vice president.
Did Google Make a Mistake?
Google’s move is surprising to those who believe 3D printing is at an inflection point and will be a disruptive force on our global supply chain by empowering a new generation of product creators.
We reviewed Autodesk 123D, Sketchup and Tinkercad and later featured Anarkik3D, a crowdfunding hopeful. Although SketchUp was not necessarily the best design software for 3D printing, it was one of the most popular free 3D design software packages on the planet and inspired many people to get into design. Google has now lost that audience.
We have previously suggested that giants like Amazon would get into the 3D printing field. It would surprise us if Google stayed out of the industry altogether.
Perhaps SketchUp was too technical of a product for the mainstream. Should we prepare for a new 3D modeling software from Google? A web-based 123D of their own? Or perhaps a different play.
Impact on 3D Printing?
Not much today, as summarized by Fabbaloo:
Is this a big change for 3D print operators? We think not so much, because SketchUp just isn’t the best tool for modeling solid objects. It doesn’t even output the STL format used by all 3D printers unless you install a special plug in.
But the long term impact depends on whether Google re-enters the 3D printing field with a new product.
Photo by Scott Beale / Laughing Squid, used under Creative Commons license.
Top 3D Printing Headlines from Last Week: Crowdfunding, Fashion, 123D, $500 Printer
A roundup of the top news On 3D Printing brought you from April 23 to April 29.
Monday, April 23
- Innovative and Strange 3D Printing: Chocolate, Stone, Candy, Organs
- Anarkik3D Seeks Crowdfunding to Launch 3D Printing Software for Artists
Tuesday, April 24
- 3D Printing and the Public Markets: Market Cap Comparison [Charts]
- 3D Printing and the Runway: Fashion Gets Printed in Belgium
Wednesday, April 25
- Former MakerBot COO Launches New 3D Printer with a Mainstream Price Tag
- Ponoko Team Demos Autodesk 123D and 3D Printing Made To Order
Thursday, April 26
- Analyzing the Market Size of 3D Printing Creators and Consumers
- Romantic Boyfriend 3D Prints Wedding Bands, Raises the Bar
Friday, April 27
- 3D Printing Blossoms into the Mainstream – BusinessWeek Special Report
- Fab Lab of the Week: Collab in New York City
Saturday, April 28
