3D Printing Done Cheap!

ok. so i'm in this game that's very great for the creative mind. known as minecraft. in this game you can make virtually anything you could think of. this is great! a world you can make anything!

but what if you want it IRL? well. that can be done now with an awsome program that can export your creations into a language 3D printers can use!

this goes for any FFXI replicas that can be made in the game... i'm getting some crazy ideas... just... soo much that can be made and printed... don't know what i want to make and have printed D:

here is a video i did of my first print and unboxing. enjoy!



PS: by cheap. the process is not cheap. i payed $15 + $7 shipping for that thing. however compared to most other places or buying your own Z650 3D printer... its amazingly cheap!

1:57... Thats what she said. ty and gn
2:36..Thats what she said.

They can also make gyros, tools, etc (not just gaming renderings) with these amazing printers.

man thats awesome xD but i wonder how much it cost,,,

That is pretty cool. Anybody wanting to do this, however, with FFXI or any game replicas for that matter might need to have some knowledge of 3D programs to 'fix' a variety of 3D printing related problems that would occur. For example, every piece of armor in FFXI is infinitely, impossibly, paper thin. None of it has any depth at all, which works out perfectly fine in a computer environment, but you obviously can't print something that's supposed to be less than 1 atom thick. As such all surfaces must be closed, which often times just ends up requiring that you extrude the surface and tidy up any resulting intersecting faces if they occur. There could be more elaborate problem with cuffs and things that are folded back where both sides of a surface are used as the 'outside'.

Anything that's alpha mapped (uses transparency to fake detailed edges) would not print properly. In those cases you'd have to model it out yourself, but it shouldn't be too difficult given you'd have the alpha map to work from.

Also, as to the print being very tiny. Most 3D programs do have a real world scale setting somewhere, though I believe Shapeways uses strictly metric settings (and there may be sizing discrepancies if you send them a file using a different scale -- ie. 3 inches becomes 3 centimeters, but I don't remember exactly).

They list a ton of requirements for sizing (nothing can be very big) including a restriction on any weapons bigger than a certain size (they don't want to be printing actual useful daggers and what not). Restriction vary based on the material you choose to print in, but are fairly lax for the colored sandstone (used in Danz's video). They've come a long way and even full color prints are pretty decent now (even gradients form my understanding).

sadly it's not cheap. that TINY model i ordered costed me $15 and $7 shipping

What program makes this possible?

for minecraft. the program was called mineways

Shapeways offers some proprietary design methods but also accepts most industry standards for models so you can use most any 3D modelling program you have access to. Anyone interested might try Blender, a free open source 3D creation program.

From Shapeways.com:
Export your work to an STL, Collada or X3D file. You can use AccuTrans3D if your 3D Modeler doesn't support these formats.

AccuTrans3D supports virtually every 3D file format I've ever heard of.

Costs vary quite a lot. They go from relatively cheap ($1.40/ cm³) for solid color plastic to expensive ($20/ cm³) for sterling silver.

I totally would love to have one of those printers, but the printer is $40,000.

Wow, the detail on that is amazing. I kinda like that it's tiny. Make 3 more pieces to connect to it and grow a collectible map =3

That's pretty cool

If it's not cheap why is the title 'done cheap'? Just curious <.<

I shouldn't have clicked this thread... now I'm going to want some kind of model done.

I would say $22 is cheap for something specially done like that.

I don't have many collectibles and whatnot but I did pay $18 for a tiny lead Mr. Sinister statue,
totally worth it. lol

I think it would be interesting to make a firearm with the printer. The only concerns would be if the composite material would be strong enough to be fired and if such a thing would legal to do.

"LOLPUP" me if you want, but I'd LOVE to have a little replica of my automaton. Heck, all of my autos. Interchangeable heads even. I'm sure you other Puppetmasters know what I mean.

That's kinda cool, where do I go to if I want to order something like this? of course I probably won't since I have no knowledge of 3d printing or the program to be able to export it into said file that could be used to make a 3d model.

Would be cool to make ***like... a .. uh ... TINY MOOGLE?

A moogle would be good! Even better though: How about your own character wearing your favorite armor? I'd gladly pay $20-something plus shipping for a "Gorby action figure" wearing a Scorpion Harness or something!

oh god, I would pay for that in a heartbeat!

I think there's a market for this. Square Enix needs to get on it!