Graphics Reference
In-Depth Information
Software for 3D
Printing
3
An overview of the necessary design, slicing, and
client software.
W
RITTEN
BY
M
ATT
M
ETS
AND
M
ATT
G
RIFFIN
You've got a shiny new 3D printer and a bril-
liant idea for your first original design—now
what?
type will help you turn your idea into reality,
but one may be handier for, say, designing a
mechanical part, and another for sculpting
an action figure.
Creating and printing your own unique 3D
models requires three kinds of software.
First, there's the 3D modeling program used
to design the shape of your creation. Tradi-
tionally, the use of software to prototype
physical objects has been referred to as
computer-aided design (CAD)
. Second, there's
the
computer-aided manufacturing (CAM)
program (commonly referred to as a slicer)
that converts your model into specific, me-
chanical instructions for the printer robot.
Third, there's the
printer control software
, or
client
, that sends those instructions to the
printer at the right time, and provides a real-
time interface to the printer's functions and
settings.
Solid modeling programs
mainly use a meth-
od called constructive solid geometry (CSG),
or similar techniques, to define complex 3D
shapes. Popular free solid modeling pro-
grams include SketchUp, Autodesk 123D,
and Tinkercad (which runs entirely in your
web browser and is shown in
Figure 3-1
; read
a tutorial in
Chapter 4
). In a solid modeling
program, simple “primitive” shapes like box-
es, cylinders, and pyramids are manipulated
to make more complex shapes, often using
Boolean operations. For instance, a hollow
box can be modeled by drawing two over-
lapping cubes, one slightly smaller than the
other, and “subtracting” the smaller from the
larger.
3D Modeling/CAD
Software
Probably the most important software
choice you'll make is what kind of modeling
program to use. There are many to choose
from, but they fall into four basic types:
sol-
id
,
sculpting
,
parametric
, and
polygonal
. Each
