I have made a recent discovery. With so many
things changing in the world of design and technology,
as a designer one sometimes feels left out and left behind if one
cannot add the latest technology to one's repertoire. 3-D printing,
3-D scanning, CAD, SLS … the list of acronyms is endless. And then
you might even have to name- drop a popular CAD (computer aided
design) program or 2 to seem convincing. As an independent jeweller
who makes and designs her own work, I have not yet found the need,
nor urgency (nor funds!) to invest thousands of pounds in training to
use the best CAD tools. I have learned to do 3-D CAD independently
years ago – but due to planned obsolescence of everything computer
based, sadly my 10-year old 3-D package no longer works on my 2015
computer system. There was absolutely nothing wrong with the “old”
3-D package. It would still work had I kept a working old Windows
2005 computer (my own one crashed!). Sadly time moved on and the very
useful and powerful CAD package now gathers dust among other defunct DVDs of the era. Is it fair to call a mere 10 years ago an “era”?
(The answer is no, in case you were wondering … )
Has time improved
CAD and the need for it? At the risk of revealing my age, I was taught 3-D Design while studying an Engineering Drawings module at university –
by hand. I then privately studied 3-D CAD later on, but never really
found the need to use it often, as my hand drawings were sufficient
at the time. When I started jewellery design, I used my head, my hand, pen and paper. Designs were not always written down – they
developed “organically”. Every designer who uses a notebook and
pen (or the modern digital equivalent, although I am not sure if this
works when the power runs out ... ), will understand that an idea,
when you get it, has to be visualised in one way or another. I myself
tend to draw in 2-D paper space with a pen in my trusty non- digital
black book, and then develop the actual idea in 3-D manually, in the
workshop. It is a small technicality that our vision is only
2-dimensional, and is also the way we transfer the written word /
design. Yes, our spatial world (as many understand it today) is
3-dimensional, yet our perception of it is 2-dimensional – because
of our eyes (for those of us with sight). Our eyes have light cones
which collect light in a 2 dimensional array. Our brain interprets these signals and allows us to understand our 3-D space using the 2-D data
our eyes have collected.
I don't want to
mind- boggle anyone – just lay down the basics of my discovery.
Explorers of the past “discovered” America, Africa, Australia,
yet they already existed to the native people. In a similar way, I
discovered 3-D writing. It exists perhaps as a standard tool for those
who already know, but for me, it is a new find altogether.
3D pens are here!
I was tempted a year ago to get one: a 3D pen. Last year it was too
expensive. This year, you can get one for less than £40. So I took
the plunge. I bought one. Why? Do I need one? Could a 3D pen have the
ability to visualise my 2D ideas, and express them in 3D before I
actually make them?
A 3D pen uses a
plastic filament as the “ink”. The filament (“ink”) is a
certain thickness (mine takes 1.75mm), and is supplied on rolls of a
few metres. The concept works in a similar way to using a hot glue
gun, but with better precision and finer scale, and a wide colour
range. See photo below.
Excitedly I
opened the packaging, read the instructions and loaded the filament.
Yikes! This was not easy and not straight forward. However several
hours later (and mindful of my limited supply of filament), I made 3
bracelets in ABS plastic (see photo). I used a simple repeat design based on a hexagon,with the following result after a few hours of play. The crude finish shows it is clearly hand drawn, but this was not possible for me before now, so it is significant, if not exact.
Once the design has been made on the page, and the filament cooled
sufficiently (a few seconds), you get such excitement by lifting the
creation off the page. Your 2-D doodle is now in 3-D! It has a
shadow, it has a thickness, and it has a certain amount of
flexibility. It can be touched. You can really send words to someone
now! Solid ones! The sense of creating something out of nothing can
be slightly euphoric. Give it a go. I dare you!
It became so much
clearer to me now why I need the 3D pen. It enables me to visualise a product design idea much
sooner. It reduces the cost of incremental improvements, which many
fellow designers can commiserate with me.
The best bit is
that the molten filament sticks to the surface of the paper. It gives
me a base from which to create. Tutorials abound on the Internet and
many “how to's” regarding the 3-D pen concept. This invention
definitely raised the barrier to 3-D design for many. Firstly, cost
savings: The cheapest 3-D printer is at least 10 times or more the
cost of my 3-D pen. I don't need to know a CAD package to use my 3-D
pen effectively. Secondly, it adds another dimension to paper ideas.
Magically, I can doodle away on the flat page, and then literally
lift the design off the page, and it becomes a 3-D tangible object.
The object might not be strong enough or durable enough yet for
rigorous use, but it gives you a good start on an otherwise simple
two dimensional route to design. The precision is not yet there based
on my limited expertise, but I guess with lots more practise, I will
achieve better results.
As a conceptual
tool, the 3D pen will stay in my toolbox. I am excited about the
prospect of using other filaments – there are ones that contain
wood, elastic many other colours and other environmentally friendly
plastics like PLA. Many say to me that it is just a toy. Who knows
how far a toy like this can push boundaries, and change the way we
see / make / do things?
I wish the 3-D
pen was perhaps even more advanced than it is – that it could print
my jewellery design directly in precious metal or a metallised powder
that can be fired afterwards. Perhaps “they” have already done
that? It would be a shame for a technology with lots of potential
like this to become obsolete like my 2005 CAD DVD. Luckily, my 3-D
pen is not digital nor needs a computer to control it. So there is
still hope for it to be continuously useful. Now I just need to order
some more filament …
