3D Foray via Blender and 3DPrintshow

Some time ago I discovered the concept of 3D printing and parked it somewhere in my head for future reference (and for when a 3D printer became a real, attainable thing).

That parked memory has come to the fore again, fuelled by recent media coverage of affordable 3D printing and the even more recent discovery of the 3D Print Show.

So having decided that 3D printing looks very interesting again, I figured I’d have a go at making something, but having never used any CAD software in anger before I had to get to grips with some, and fast.

A few weeks ago I installed Blender and set about tinkering with it. It’s a bit of a beast, and I only used a fraction of it’s functionality but still managed to clumsily carve some pixels into this model:

Which is OK I suppose (my 12 year old son likes it), so I figured I’d have a go at something else and made this:

which I quite like.

Now it remains to discover if either of these models are really printable or if they’re just too poorly constructed. Maybe tomorrow I’ll find out if there’s somewhere at the 3D print show that’ll let me have a go.

On the off-chance that one (or even both – if the planets are correctly aligned) do actually materialise out of some printer or other I’ll upload some new pics.