This week I decided to practice printing with transparent PLA on the architecture shop's Bambu printers. My goal was to design and print covers for an LED tube as a step forward in my final project.

The form I modeled was inspired by iconic Akari Light Sculptures designed by Noguchi. My design takes these forms and recreates them out of an undulating surface, similar to many on-the-market 3D printed lamp shades that are popular today.

After a few rounds of back and forth with the Bambu slicer, I figured out that modeling the shades with a 1/32" thickness translates into 2 walls of thickness from the 3D printer, which sounded like a good place to start.

The first print of a tube went perfectly. I then printed several more pieces and was able to do all of them without support material. The pieces are designed to be stacked and played with in multiple configurations.

To test scanning, I scanned two of the pieces stacked on top of each other using the Polycam app on my phone. I was curious to see how the resolution of the semi-shiny, semi-transparent material would turn out. It came out with a decent quality and might be interesting to compare its resolution of the undulating surface with the actual modeled gemoetry.