For those who wouldn’t normally come into contact Fran, she’s the digital art studio manager in Doherty C level. I wasn’t familiar with Fran’s work until yesterday, however. Fran’s work often references motherhood. She scan’s condensed breast milk using the 3D scanner and prints the organic forms using the 3D printer. What makes these works interesting to me is the reference to the female form and the evidence of the artist’s touch through the content of the work, her breast milk.

These 3D printed shells are part of a project called Project Shellter. The idea is to make shells for hermit crabs to live in instead of the trash that they are sometimes forced to live in due to a worldwide shell shortage. Miles Lightwood is the person responsible for this idea, although he is working with the MakerBot community as well. Here are the links:

http://www.facebook.com/ProjectShellter

http://www.makerbot.com/blog/2011/10/18/project-shellter-can-the-makerbot-community-save-hermit-crabs/

http://laughingsquid.com/project-shellter-success-hermit-crabs-adopt-3d-printed-shells/

Janet Echelman uses 3D modeling and industrial digital fabrication processes to create large scale public sculpture. In the case of the image bellow Echelman used data from a tsunami to create the form and coloration of the  hanging sculpture, currently installed in Sydney, Australia.

http://www.echelman.com/sydney.html

Constructed in 2011, this sculpture was made by a student at CMU. In fact, it was a final project for this course last year.

As a mechanical engineer, I am infatuated with anything that moves, but this creature has some smarts to it, and some pleasing aesthetic qualities that make it appealing to a wide audience. The structure is comprised of specially designed laser-cut gears that interface at a smaller and smaller scale as the structure grows longer. Each segment is also outfitted with a laser-cut paper structure that serve as frills to the spiny structure. Only the base of each ‘tentacle’ is actuated; a hobby servo motor is embedded in addition to an Arduino and Lynx Motion controller.

Under normal conditions, the creature waves around, as if being coerced by an undersea current. However, when a potential threat approaches, an infrared proximity sensor alerts the creature and it assumes a defensive, curling behavior.

Additional images and description of the fabrication process are located on the creator’s blog.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=gvUpkknryaY#!

http://www.thisiscolossal.com/2011/04/one-man-100000-toothpicks-and-35-years-scott-weavers-rolling-through-the-bay/?src=footer

These are two separate pieces by Daito Manabe. Daito’s huge hit was years ago after he published a performance/experimental piece where he electronically controls the muscles in his face. But still Daito makes incredible work. Highly computational and also highly fabricated. His work seems to have some bit of cultural divide, but still the passion is conveyed through the work.

I can’t embed because WordPress is escaping the tags but:

http://player.vimeo.com/video/21676294

It’s a geeky 3D photobooth. 3 Kinects scan you and a minature you is printed on the spot. It’s not particularly artsy, but it’s a potent fusion of current technologies, and an effective way of bringing technology out of the lab and engaging the audience more directly.

http://vimeo.com/12390617

This is an interactive installation utilizing the a CNC router, micro-controllers, and mold making plastic forms. I am very intrigued with the level of simplicity that formed this functional and artistic design.

Watch a video showing Time.

technique: shadow cloud produced via SLS 3d-print
size: 3 images, each 74 x 74 px, ball of diameter 36.7cm

“Time” is a 3-d printed orb that has a formless, unorganised geometric structure. From certain angles, the alignment of its skeletal shapes and voids causes it to cast a shadow that is a legible image. Here the shadow tells the time as a standard clock.

From other angles, the image changes to something else.

I am intrigued and amused by the procedure and choice of fabrication method in this piece. I think the use of 3-d fabrication here feels instinctive, natural, and neccesary: to make the sphere using analog methods, would just be a real pain. The motion of the sphere and the shadows coming into alignment and misalignment are a form of suspense and release that is very engaging. Having said that though, I find the reading of the clock, sundial, and giant orb as a little crude and really mars the elegance of the activation.

watch the “making-of” video, 0:40 for really finnicky 3-d printing post-processing procedures.

#making-of

Another interesting thing that isn’t really 3-d printing or digital fabrication (but probably modelled in some sort of CAD software) is Yuya Ushida’s XXXX_Sofa. Its an expandable sofa/chair contraption hand assembled from chopsticks and metal rings. I like it because, going beyond the functional furniture design reading of it, it deals with issues of living (architectural) space, solidity, functions of the body, and interactions between bodies and materials/objects. I just thought this would be informative for friends interested in mechanical things to look at.

watch?v=RvW9xN6bE8w&feature=related