Skynet is Here: 3D Printing Robots
I have this little hobby, and I call it Skynet search. I basically look around the internets for signs of an emerging Skynet. What? Have I ever said anything negative about your hobbies? Gardening? Or collecting stamps? Can your hobby save humanity? Well today is a big day in Skynet search because I’ve just heard about RoboEarth. RoboEarth allows robots to build on and learn from the experiences of other robots. The project aims to be a internet for robots. Currently every robotics project has to ”teach” their robot to navigate in the real world. By collecting and centralizing information on objects, navigation and recognizing objects Robo Earth does this for everyone. Potentially each robot connected to the network will instantly be as capable of navigating our world as the network is. This also frees up a lot of robotics researchers time so they can concentrate on making the robots better.
Scientists and researchers from the Technical University of Eindhoven, Philips & the univ
3D Printed .MGX art added to the Smithsonian
The Mylight.MGX lamp by Lars Spuybroek and the Future Systems Bowl by Amanda Levete now form part of the permanent collection of the Smithsonian’s Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum in New York! Already on display in the Cooper Hewitt are the One Shot and the C2 chair by Patrick Jouin.
Congratulations are in order for our designers & colleagues at .MGX on this amazing form of recognition for their 3D printed work! Below you can see all the .MGX models that are in the Cooper-Hewitt.
Mylight.MGX by Lars Spuybroek
Future Systems Bowl by Amanda Levete
One Shot by Patrick Jouin
C2 chair by Patrick Jouin
3D Printing Architectural Models
Karel Honigs made a 3D print of a house he was constructing together with his twin brother. They made it in polyamide and designed it so you could see both the exterior and interior.
To view our house in 3D before we actually started constructing it, we decided to design it in Google SketchUp. We, that”s my twin brother and I. Therefore, we called the project ”The Brothers”.
This 3D model is the symbol of our hard work and fine cooperation. We spent many hours working on the model since we started out with the 2D files we got from our architect.
What”s nice about our 3D printed model, is that it can be disassembled and viewed from the inside. We are really happy with the produced result. In the end the effort was well worth it.
— Karel Honings
3D printing in contemporary art: Nick Ervinck
3D printing is becoming more and more the technology of choice for artists nowadays. Artists’ models often employ a variety of different materials involving small and intricately detailed pieces with various shapes and curves, and special kinds of finishes that accentuate artistic elements. 3D printing allows artists to manufacture forms and shapes that cannot be fabricated in any other way. A lot of them are collaborating with Materialise because sometimes the unthinkable becomes a tangible reality. Meet Nick Ervinck.
“I make sculptures that are on the edge of the physical and digital realm in terms of sculpture and architecture. The art of sculpting has evolved through history with the help of technology. Because architects design mainly with computers now, a new type of language is created. In light of this, I see this new world of architecture as a precursor for what will happen in the world of art and sculpture. It’s great that high-tech companies like Materialise are help
The Cutest 3D Printed Robot Ever
Robots are mostly portrayed as evil cold calculating creatures. Cylons, HAL, ASH have a cute deficit. Even Commander Data misses a certain degree of warmth. As you may know we’re doing a lot of work with customizing robots using 3D printing. We love the idea of “pimp your robot” and think that there is a lot of potential there.
But, in Japan..in Japan people are always light years ahead. Our Business Development guy in Japan Hiro shot a video of an extremely customized robot at Dekinnoka!7. She, wears a skirt, has glasses, is a competitor in robot wrestling and has had us all in stitches laughing all morning. Introducing, the world’s cutest robot… wanmi be sure to watch the video, we think its hilarious. She comes on stage at around 55 seconds.
Eric van Straaten exhibition
i.materialise Community Member Eric van Straaten is part of a joint exhibition called Zilverlingen in Haarlem the Netherlands. Eric”s 3D printed work will be displayed until the 10th of December in the “provinciehuis” in Haarlem.
One of Eric”s works on display is pictured here and called Glaucoma. It is 3D printed with Zcorp and depicts Glaucus, a merman. The statue was inspired by the Greek myth whereby Glaucus, a fisherman, was transformed into a merman. He ate a magical herb that brought fish back to life and this transformed him. The unquenchable thirst it gave him caused him to have to live in the sea. Quite the reversal of fortune for our fisherman. He does go on to become a minor underwater god and fall in love with a beautiful nymph. The nymph then runs away because she feels more than a little stalked. He goes to another nymph called Circe to help him. Sadly, Circe falls in love with Glaucus and turns the rival nymph into a six headed sea monster. This monster is ca
3D Printing a Xeno-coRPus
Koen Boonen, who works in HR and prevention at Materialise made a wonderfully arty and geometric piece called Xeno-coRPus using i.materialise. The model cost 44 Euro to make using Zcorp 3D printing.
“This model is an adaptation of the Julia-fractal in a xenodream metamorph. I optimised the mesh in Cinema4D, created some renderings, and the result was so appealing that I simply had to have this object! The i.materialise result is stunning:Â it is heavier than expected and has the look and feel of a rough stone sculpture.
The object now fills the void in my living room like an alien artifact: wonderful and strange…
Koen”
A 3D Printed Individualized Fluid Vase
Supabold’s FluidVase is one of the most beautiful things ever made with i.materialise. This fully customizable art object lets you take falling and colliding water and turn that into a vase. You can learn about the Fluid Vase here or play with the online tool on the Supabold site here.
Choose your container, choose where you want to pour, determine how much water you would like and watch the water dance. Replay the clear animation and select your favorite frame. This frame can now become a real object thanks to 3D printing. The 3D printing process used is Selective Laser Sintering. Each Fluid vase will be different but the size can be up to 9.5cm by 9.5 cm by 21 cm. The Fluid Vase costs $560 (399 Euro).
When designer Fung Kwok Pan first made this with us we were thrilled. When we saw his fun interaction & design tool we were happier still. Our happiness turned to pride when DesignBoom, PSFK, Wired, FastCoDesign and many other publications joined in a chorus of approval fo
dancing & wrestling robot Wit Laser augmented by 3D printing
Appearing at the Dekinnoka! 7 Robot Pro — Wrestling Competition is Wit Laser. Wit Laser is a combat robot, specifically a humanoid wrestling robot decked out using 3D printing. The robot”s head and torso body parts are made with Selective Laser Sintered polyamide parts. I for one salute our attractive robot overlords(and would like to point out that the Skynet & Cyberdyne Systems T shirts I own are not taunts). You can see Wit Laser below showing off some awesome break dance moves that will hopefully help his wrestling. It seems like our man in Japan Hiro is successfully continuing his journey to introducing the Japanese robot world to 3D printing.
3D Printing the TulipK Lamp
Ben Geebelen’s TulipK lamp is Laser Sintered in polyamide. The pattern of the lamp was designed in Excel and the file was prepared in 3-matic. The lamp opens and closes through an ingenious mechanism that acts as a 3D printed dimmer for the lamp. Ben tells us about the TulipK in his own words below.
TulipK is a lamp shade I designed as a present to my wife. Its shape is inspired by a picture of tulips we had on our wedding invitation. I designed it fully in 3-matic and Excel (yes, I consider that design software too).
The shade has 6 tulip petals surrounding the light bulb. It includes a mechanism to make the flower open up. The petals are attached with hinges to a ring that is suspended from the ring attached to the light socket. Each petal has a small rod that slides through a slot in the latter ring. If you rotate the first ring with respect to the other, the rods slide through the slots and are pushed outward, making the petals open up. The idea was to have some kind
