Coming down to the final few posts for this blog now, I may do one more post when our books arrive in Jan but that may be something for my personal blog as opposed to here. I don't wish to clutter or fill this blog with tonnes of Junk when there is no more development. Anyway this post is about Rapid Prototype printing particularly for our Charles model, for this I will be referencing the company I have used in the past and personally know. It was said by Phil after our presentation that he would like to know this information so here it is...
The company I used for our Printing is a German firm known as "Expo Nat", they do a number of jobs including Rapid prototyping in various materials. They also provide scanning services for bringing physical objects (such as peoples faces or specific items) into 3D geometry. We met them at one of our many games events where I happened to ask them if they could print a model of ours at the time. While we were waiting for the print we kept coming back to their stall to check on it, when we came back my business partner kept helping them cleaning up some of their scans... Before we knew it they had some work for him in a freelance capacity, I got introduced through him...
Their website can be found at - http://expo-nat.jimdo.com/ and as I said they can knock up any number of prints in any shape or form. So if you have any rapid prototyping needs for your project give them a heads up they will do their best to accommodate you. I have been made aware that the Uni have a facility for printing but if you wish to contact an external company such as these I'm sure they will give you a deal. Phil also wished to do a greet with them specifically should other students wish this facility in the future and I think its to reach out to more businesses on a professional basis something which I know they are more then happy to do...
Our main contact on the Expo Nat side of things is Dirk Moller (pictured above), I will direct him to this post once I have made it so he is further made aware of a CG students standing point for printing. Dirk is a nice guy and will do anything and everything to make sure a students need is met for their print. I would present his email but to be honest I think any of the people at Expo Nat will be able to accommodate your needs, just submit a request through their website. Of course if you have an issue understanding it just mail through your requirements from the contact page. Alternatively you can ask me or Phil I will connect Dirk with him when we return in Jan.
The image above shows the print created from the 3D file I provided Dirk which was pre-posed and devoid of any holes in the geometry. The colour print takes on the polypaint from the UVs when sculpting. The only slight flaw is some of the ruffles on the surface where it is not quite "finished" but in this case its still quite cool. Nat told me dipping it in Glue would pristine the colour back up but for this model I thought it worked this way... Charles is old fashioned so its only right that he looks like he's covered in dust haha. Anyway as you can see the quality is top rate so if you need anything printed, hit them up I totally recommend them and would be more then happy to get you connected.
Last but not least the image above is a shot of me on the D-Day for our Narrative Crit, holding little Charles. Dirk asked me to take a picture when I received the model I just kept putting it off but never the less this is me happy with the result. I will give Dirk the link to this post so he can see and join in the masses at mocking my dumbfounded expression. I'm personally amazed I managed to muster a smile I was pretty knackered by the time we took that Photograph.
I almost forgot to mention that Dirk gave me this model for free as well as the models for my partners and the Uni... THANK YOU VERY MUCH DIRK!!! I will be using your services for future prints, can't wait to get working on some more 3D work!!
Well I think that's it for this little post, I have a few more to make on this blog before the dreaded deadline complete post which I always do for my time management. Gonna miss this little blog but at least its here for me to marvel at in the future :)
Take it easy!!
xXStItChXx
