Saturday, March 19, 2016
Cherry blossoms at night.
I messed up. I didn't have enough juice in the batteries, so I rushed these photos and took just a handful of shots at 4:30~5:30 am. Normally in the daytime the waterfront would be filled with people wandering around the cherry blossoms, so it occurred to me that the best time to photograph them would be in the middle of the night with long exposures ~ 1 minute.
Monday, February 8, 2016
3D Printing: Ceramics.
To clarify, this isn't precisely 3D-printed ceramics; Shapeways uses a process by which it 3D-prints the shell into which a clay mixture is poured into.
This first image (above) highlights the problem with Shapeways' process, which I consider a quality control issue. Notice the deeper color at the base of major edges? That's the pooling of liquid glazing when applied by spray. In my design, I designed for roughly 1.5mm tolerance so that the shot would fit inside of the base. The pooled glaze ended up bulging outward by 1mm all around. Remove that bulge and the shot would have fit.
Up close, you can see this bulge very clearly. Having done a decent amount of ceramics in my youth, including hand-applying glaze, I know that this is a sign of quality control problems.
Nonetheless, I took to my espresso machine to make some tasty liquid so that I could have a mini photo shoot.
It wasn't 5 minutes after opening up the box and examining the print, that I ran to my desktop and made modifications to the 3D design, by lengthening the shot slightly, and narrowing the base so that it would slide effortlessly into the base. At the same time, I also modified the base to widen it slightly and straighten the top and bottom to limit the effects of edge pooling.
Of course, I initially contemplated complaining to Shapeways about issues of QC. But I realized that making these changes would bypass their QC issues and eliminate any future risk.
And so goes my dive into 3D printing of ceramics.
Late last week I got my prints back, and of the three prints I ordered, my porcelain print was the one I was most interested in. I got mixed results in this, however.
This first image (above) highlights the problem with Shapeways' process, which I consider a quality control issue. Notice the deeper color at the base of major edges? That's the pooling of liquid glazing when applied by spray. In my design, I designed for roughly 1.5mm tolerance so that the shot would fit inside of the base. The pooled glaze ended up bulging outward by 1mm all around. Remove that bulge and the shot would have fit.
Up close, you can see this bulge very clearly. Having done a decent amount of ceramics in my youth, including hand-applying glaze, I know that this is a sign of quality control problems.
It wasn't 5 minutes after opening up the box and examining the print, that I ran to my desktop and made modifications to the 3D design, by lengthening the shot slightly, and narrowing the base so that it would slide effortlessly into the base. At the same time, I also modified the base to widen it slightly and straighten the top and bottom to limit the effects of edge pooling.
Of course, I initially contemplated complaining to Shapeways about issues of QC. But I realized that making these changes would bypass their QC issues and eliminate any future risk.
And so goes my dive into 3D printing of ceramics.
Wednesday, January 20, 2016
8 hour design study.
I'm still testing out ideas for designing and building my own home, using primarily shipping containers, with various sites that are currently available. This design study took about 8 hours.
Conceptually, it's a 1,920 sf (exterior dimensions) house with an accessory dwelling unit, in this case, a home office / production studio, with its own parking spot, as mandated by the jurisdiction this is located in. I'm always interested in creating spaces, so there is a low -- 3' tall -- partial retaining wall that helps isolate the space from the busy street traffic, and an elevated deck that ties in the ADU and main living area.
It's not a complete design, obviously, so I've left out a lot of fussy details. It's more of a massing and layout design.
Conceptually, it's a 1,920 sf (exterior dimensions) house with an accessory dwelling unit, in this case, a home office / production studio, with its own parking spot, as mandated by the jurisdiction this is located in. I'm always interested in creating spaces, so there is a low -- 3' tall -- partial retaining wall that helps isolate the space from the busy street traffic, and an elevated deck that ties in the ADU and main living area.
It's not a complete design, obviously, so I've left out a lot of fussy details. It's more of a massing and layout design.
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| View from East |
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| View from Southwest |
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| Plan View |
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| South Elevation |
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| North Elevation |
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| East Elevation |
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| West Elevation |
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| Inserted into Google Street View, looking from Northeast |
Sunday, December 13, 2015
3D Prints
I got my 3D prints back from Shapeways, a few days ago, and I think they look fabulous!
The first set, snowflakes, are made up of three separately printed parts. The main body is Shapeways' metallic plastic, the centerpieces are yellow strong and flexible, polished and red strong and flexible, polished plastic. There are some minor edits that I need to do on the models, as there was dimensional expansion during printing, such that I had to sand down the centerpieces to fit into the main body. The overall size is 5" tall x 4.5" wide x 1/4" thick. Preliminary pricing is about $55, which is completely reasonable for something that can't be found anywhere, but I'm not making this available until next year, as I'm planning on adding a few other designs and making some minor modifications to the current 3D files.
The second set, are single-piece prints of my 3D representations of my 2D dog holiday card print series. While these particular prints are large at 6" long x 4" wide x 3 1/2" tall, I'm planning on making smaller versions of these, to be printed out in metal (steel). Like the snowflake series, there are additional designs that I'm planning on adding, and as such, I won't be making these available until next year. I'm currently building up a series of 2D dog designs for cards and other materials on Cafepress and Moo, and once that's done, I'm going to translate those to 3D. The goal is to have a dozen dogs.
Not bad, don't you think, for my very first, ever, 3D prints?
The first set, snowflakes, are made up of three separately printed parts. The main body is Shapeways' metallic plastic, the centerpieces are yellow strong and flexible, polished and red strong and flexible, polished plastic. There are some minor edits that I need to do on the models, as there was dimensional expansion during printing, such that I had to sand down the centerpieces to fit into the main body. The overall size is 5" tall x 4.5" wide x 1/4" thick. Preliminary pricing is about $55, which is completely reasonable for something that can't be found anywhere, but I'm not making this available until next year, as I'm planning on adding a few other designs and making some minor modifications to the current 3D files.
The second set, are single-piece prints of my 3D representations of my 2D dog holiday card print series. While these particular prints are large at 6" long x 4" wide x 3 1/2" tall, I'm planning on making smaller versions of these, to be printed out in metal (steel). Like the snowflake series, there are additional designs that I'm planning on adding, and as such, I won't be making these available until next year. I'm currently building up a series of 2D dog designs for cards and other materials on Cafepress and Moo, and once that's done, I'm going to translate those to 3D. The goal is to have a dozen dogs.
Not bad, don't you think, for my very first, ever, 3D prints?
Thursday, December 3, 2015
Saturday, January 3, 2015
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