3D scanning & printing are fasinating technologies. There is a sense of something magical going on when you can take something from the computer and make it real or vise-versa, take something real and have it in the computer. What really makes it magical is the simplicity of the process. It doesn't take days, it takes hours. So one minute you can be looking at something in the computer, and the next minute you can be holding it in your hand. That is a powerful feeling.
This week i attempted to try both scanning and printing.
scanning
i scanned an acorn squash. I thought it had an interesting surface that would be nice to see if the scanner could capture it. The scanner i used was the zScan. it works by creating a coordinate system using dots. it then can use that coordinate system to map the surface of a material, in this case my acorn squash.
printing
after scanning the squash i decided to use the zcorp to print it. I used geoMagic to refine the mesh which i found to be amazingly simple and intuitive. in 15 minutes i had the mesh closed and sent to print.
printing again
i also wanted to try printing using the ABS printer, which prints in plastic instead of the starch material the zcorp uses. I modelled a monkey to compliment the robot i casted a couple weeks ago.