In their early days, 3D printers were only used in industrial and specialized business settings such as architectural firms. As they have inched further and further toward the consumer market, they’ve begun to draw attention from individuals who would love to make rapid prototypes and custom objects at home. The problem is that even the smallest and least complex commercially available 3D printers cost upward of $500, with the cost of higher-end models climbing into the thousands. A company called New Matter wants to put 3D printers into every home with a revolutionary $250 machine.

New Matter calls their 3D printer Mod-T, a nod to Ford’s vehicle that finally made it possible for the general population to afford their own cars. With some clever engineering tweaks, the Mod-T’s designers were able to lower the complexity and production price of their machine.

But the company noticed that price wasn’t the only thing holding people back from experimenting with 3D printing. The other hurdles included the need for special skills to operate the machines and the lack of high-quality objects to print. With their revolutionary concept, New Matter would more or less create an app store for 3D printable objects. Designers will be able to upload their designs and Mod-T users can download them with a few taps or clicks.

Unlike current sources of 3D printable objects, there is no special programming, tweaking, or modification to be done before the object is printed. Designers and artists build their printable object files just for the Mod-T so they are already customized to that specific machine and its requirements.

After finding and purchasing an object to print, it truly is just like downloading and app and waiting for your object to be produced. Users do have the option of making small changes like the color of the objects before the file is communicated to the machine via built-in wi-fi. Early adopters can order their own Mod-T through the company’s IndieGoGo campaign for $249.

(via: Wired)

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The cosmetics industry is a $55 billion giant, and anyone who uses makeup will understand why. A $12 four-pack of eyeshadow, a $17 bronzer, an $8 mascara – it all adds up quickly. But Harvard Business School graduate Grace Choi realized that the cosmetics industry is charging us over-the-top prices for something that technology can provide for free: color.

Her invention, Mink, is a small 3D printer that prints cosmetics using regular printer ink. And it isn’t limited to the colors you can find on the shelves – Mink can grab any color from absolutely any source. Your computer, your phone, your tablet, and your digital camera all become your color shopping devices. Find any appealing color – either from a website or via a camera – and use the color picker tool to select it.

The hex code for the color will pop up; you just paste the code into a program like MS Paint or Photoshop and send the color to the printer as a regular document. The Mink will print the color as a powder or cream in its own proprietary little container. According to Choi, the ink is FDA approved and the Mink will cost $200-$300 – a small price to pay when you think about how much money makeup-wearing people spend on cosmetics each year. The designer promises that we are about to live in a world where the internet is our cosmetics shop, and soon you’ll be able to take a picture of a friend’s lipstick and print it out for yourself at home.

(via: TechCrunch)

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The Rabbit Proto is a huge leap forward in the way we use 3D printers. Rather than printing a shell of an electronic object and requiring the guts to be inserted later, the Rabbit fits onto the head of your RepRap 3D printer to print circuits right into the object.

Using a 10cc syringe to inject lines of conductive ink, the Rabbit lays down circuits inside of the object as the RepRap printer is making it. The Rabbit Proto is a print head add-on that just plugs into your existing RepRap printer, so if you’re already 3D printing your own stuff at home this will just add an amazing new layer of usefulness to your printer.

The video above shows a video game controller being designed and printed, circuitry and all, on a RepRap fitted with the Rabbit Proto. In this case, the syringe is filled with Bare Conductive ink – but the creators encourage people to use novel materials in the print head add-on.

The Rabbit Proto team demonstrated one unusual printing material in this video: peanut butter. You can buy your own Rabbit Proto pre-made from the group or find instructions for making your own on GitHub.

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As 3D printers are taking the world by storm, genius designers around the world are coming up with novel ways to use the technology every day. We’ve seen food printers, web-based 3D printing services, simple metal shapes made with 3D printers, a surgical 3D printing pen, a printer that can make complex free-standing metal shapes, and even a pen that can “print” objects in thin air. The 3D printing pen now has a bit of competition in the form of Lix, an even smaller model that does some even more amazing things.

Just like the 3Doodler featured previously, the Lix eats up pieces of solid plastic, melts them, spits them out as 3D “ink” and lets you draw 3D objects in mid-air. The aluminum Lix, however, is small, lightweight, and beautifully nimble – its creators deem it the smallest 3D printing pen in the world.

With the thin extruded plastic filaments, the Lix can create amazing 3D sculptures, instant prototypes, or even small toys or decorative household objects. It’s powered by a USB cable and as easy to use as a pen. With a little practice, any artist could turn their Lix creations into a completely new form of expression – if you can draw it, you can make it come to life in three dimensions.

The design team behind Lix plans to launch a Kickstarter campaign to fund the project, but even if the campaign is unsuccessful the team plans to go ahead with producing and marketing the frankly impressive handheld 3D printer.

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3D printing is taking over the world, one new material at a time. First it was plastic, then ceramics and even food, and now a freestanding robot can print incredible self-supporting metal structures with a combination of 3D printing and welding. Amsterdam-based Joris Laarman Lab invented the MX3D in collaboration with Acotech and Autodesk, and it might be the most impressive examples of 3D printing yet.

The MX3D looks a lot like an automobile assembly-line robot. It works by printing very small pieces of molten metal one piece at a time, slowly building up lines of metal that can stand up on their own in mid-air. The machine can print with aluminum, copper, steel, stainless steel, and bronze, allowing for a variety of effects.

What the machine does looks more like art than building. The robotic movements, welding, and materials placement all have to be carefully coordinated to make the lines which can curl, spiral, or even extend straight out from a wall.

Could this humble robot be the future of art, manufacturing, and even construction? We would love to see entire buildings being constructed from the ground up by a graceful one-armed robot. Failing that, though, the art that the MX3D creates is fascinating and weirdly beautiful. We’d settle for seeing a lot more of that.

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