Over the course of the weekend I saw many people try their hand at the scanner. There seemed to be some common challenges:1) Lots of feedback during the scan 2) inconsistency with the distance of the scanner fomr the object 3) ability to get the scanner all the way around the object, etc. In my first attempt at the scanner I decided to try a few different things. First, one of our TFs, Daniel, found a green trifold board to act as the backdrop in order to minimize background distraction. Second, I noticed I had a hard time trying to get all the way around the hand so I decided to try and keep the sense scanner stationary while I slowly rotated the object. Although it seemed to be capturing well as I completed the scan, the end result was less favorable. The image seemd to have layered over itself creating the clumped mess you see to your left.
For the second attempt at scanning I collaborated with Jacob. I learned several things as I worked with Jacob during his exploration of the scanner. The first thing was how to customize the settings of the scanner. We found we could get better resolution and a crisper image if we adjusted the width, height, depth, etc. We also found it helpful to keep the scanner stationary and to slowly rotate on a revolving chair. Overlap areas get distorted so we realized it was best to start at the back of the head where the distortion would be less visible and overlap more likely.
I spent a lot of time this week learning the basics of Rhino. I had never used 3D modeling software before so I wanted to take the time to tinker around on the platform and watch tutorials. I found the intro to Rhino video on Lynda.com helpful - although on the lengthery side. For the project I wanted to design something that would allow me to practice some of the commands I was learning in Rhino, while still meeting the requirements of the assignment. I landed on a rattle like design idea. To create the rattle I drew a cylinder and placed a sphere inside the tube. Next I used a series of cut hole commands and wire cuts to remove parts of the cylinder so that the sphere would be visible as it moved from one end to the next. Finally I needed to close the cylinders so I used the extrude to point command to create end on both sides. With Rhino I find it to be helpful to watch a few videos to get sense of the range of commands. Also, it was easier to dive into design once I set up the interface to look how I wanted. This included simple things like changing the background color to white and adding tool menus to the toolbar.
Once I imported my file into Cura (older version) I adjusted the scale to ensure it was the right size and wouldn't take too long on the printing. The odd thing Rob and I found was that when we looked at the view build mode it seemed like the printer was going to build from the point with no supports even though we had selected support everything. I decided to rotate the object in the file so that it would print on its side. Once the gcode was saved and SD card put into the Ultimaker, I eagerly watched as the printer heated up and began to lay the bed for my rattle. A few minutes in, however, we had a problem on our hands. As you can see the filament started to clump up and seemed almost stuck as it traced and retraced the path. This was the second time I had tried to print on the ultimaker - tired, weary I helped to cl;ean the nozzle and rethread the PLA, but decided to try my luck at the Makerbot instead.
Unfortunately, the filament feed issues persisted on the Makerbot. As you can see in the photo there is a gap that is growing the layering. When I recognized this I saw that the roll of filament on the back of the machine had some knots. As a result, instead of the filament smoothly feeding into the nozzle it was getting stuck and shaking. I ended up aborting this print and trying to reload the filament and fix the knots.
I really wanted to have one full thing printed. I got a bit concerned that my printing woes might be attributed to the design of the rattle. In one last effort I stuck with a simpler structure in hopes it would cause less printing issues. The cube I designed allowed me to play with the cut and boolean commands. I wanted to make something sleek, simply, yet intricate. I decided to add some customization by added the initals of my partner and I.
I was pretty happy with how the cube turned out. I was disappointed that I couldn't get some of the detail to show in the print that I had in the design. In particular, I thought I had made it so the letters would just barely poke out in the back so that the viewer could see the text was extruded into a solid that cut through the whole plane of the cube. This was completed on the Ultimaker.