Intro chat with Scandy group

The people producing the scandy invited me to do a QA with their group earlier today and I thought I'd share the transcript with everyone. Only a few people showed up, but a good time was has by all as we talked about 3D design, the work I've done, and 3D scanning. Enjoy!

mattfryou : Feel free to brush up on some of the blogs and videos Joe posts at his website: http://joes3dworkbench.blogspot.com/ Some very interesting stuff there!
joealarson: Alright, I am ready to go.
mattfryou: Alright!
I’ll get things started. You’ve probably 3d printed hundreds of objects. What has been your favorite one so far?
joealarson: I keep a shelf above my printers where I keep prints that are good for showing off the things I've made, and the different materials I can do in. I try to keep things on that shelf pretty varied. I think "favorite" and "latest successful" are pretty synonymous in my lexicon. So I'll say the Dragon Razor Handle is my favorite.
If I think a little harder, I think that first transforming Robot Chess Set holds a special place in my heart, though.
mattfryou: That sounds incredible. Do you have a link? If not I’m totally about to go look for it :stuck_out_tongue:
joealarson: Oh, lemme see.https://pinshape.com/items/28517-3d-printed-dragon-razor-handlehttps://pinshape.com/items/711-3d-printed-chessbot-hero-transforming-chess-set
mattfryou: That’s so cool! What material is that made out of?
joealarson: That right there pretty much represents my latest and some of my oldest 3D design work.The chess set is ABS, the dragon is PLA smoothed with a 2 part epoxy.
mattfryou : Looking over some of your designs, a lot of your stuff seems to be focused around table games. I actually don’t see too many creative game applications for 3D printing.
Also: https://pinshape.com/items/22477-3d-printed-3d-printed-striped-tie I’d totally wear this
joealarson: Oh, there's a lot. There's a whole community of people using 3D models for the D&D campaigns and there's a kickstarter right now for dungeon terrain.
freyli: @joealarson  are these SLA prints?
joealarson: I'm proud of that tie. I want to do more ties, but that Dragon has eaten up months of free time for me.
freyli: i see its smoothed epoxy
joealarson: No SLA, all FFF. I'd love to have an SLA printer one day, but the versatility and economy of FFF compels me.
freyli: Yeah, I have a FolgerTech 2020 RepRap at my house. I convince work into buying the Ultimaker 2+ Extended and thats been a fun time!
joealarson: I don't think many people realize that a lot goes into finishing prints after the print is done if you want them to look really good. Acetone smoothing or epoxy coating are almost as important as layer height.
freyli: What do you use for PLA prints, it doesnt really dissolve with acetone like ABS
joealarson: 2 part brush on epoxy. Hold on I got a video.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6oAhyoSQpz0And now I lose everyone for 9 minutes while they watch the video.
mattfryou: Haha
Do you use any 3d scanners in conjunction with your printers?
joealarson: I've used many, but none have panned out. The best one I've found is an old Kinect scanner but the cable hook up is a spaghetti mess.
mattfryou: Oh my god is it ever. Kinect 1 or Kinect 2?
joealarson: Kinect 1. My goal with a scanner is to save me the trouble of making accurate mesaurements.
mattfryou: How much cleanup did you need to do with your kinect scans?
And how much time did you spend on cleanup if any?
joealarson: Surprisingly little, but you've got to use the right software. Scannect does most of the cleanup is done for you.Of course the scan still looks like it's covered mud.
freyli: I bought a kinect 2 just this week. I have been enjoying toying around with it. Any recommendations for large scale roome scanning etc?
joealarson: I will have to differ to the group for that one.
mattfryou: How large?
Sorry, I was watching that Sailor Moon video :stuck_out_tongue:
freyli: Full scale bulding scans
mattfryou: @freyli http://www.theverge.com/2016/11/10/13585786/occipital-ipad-structure-sensor-3d-scanning-augmented-reality This was just announced from the Occipital team. YMMV
freyli: http://www.csc.kth.se/~aydemir/thesis_virgile_hogman.pdf
mattfryou: Saving that for later ^ :stuck_out_tongue:
joealarson: There's also photogramatry. The problem is you don't get accurate scale, but you get detail.
mattfryou: I guess that’s because it makes a model from a bunch of pictures instead of creating a cohesive scan, yeah?
joealarson: And pictures could be microscopic or landscape and it can't tell the difference. Pixel are pixels.Quite frankly I'm amazed by the math. Like, how do you decide on a unit?
freyli: We use photogrammetry on drones at work
its so so defiantly not survery grade or anything
we are looking into buying or building a lidar drone to get through the canopy
the lighting is the downfall of photogrammetry
mattfryou: I’ve seen a few photogrammetry solutions for land surveying. I mean I get it, but yeah LIDAR is obviously superior
LiDAR?
yeah
freyli: Yea the Li is for light because LDAR sounds dumb
joealarson: It's superior because there are enough "knowns" to accurately use triangulation to get accurate distance using a little bit of Trigonometry.
mattfryou: Running through a few of your blogs @joealarson I came across this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQbkjDKtFwIAnd it hurt to watch haha
freyli: Its 5MM accuaracy vs many centimeters
joealarson: Yeah. That wasn't me, but bridging is definitely a trick I've used in my deigns more than once.
mattfryou: When would you use that over a more traditional approach?
freyli: Whats th egap on that?
joealarson: What's a more traditional approach?
I inncorporate bridging into the YHT rules that I use to teach 3D printing. http://joes3dworkbench.blogspot.com/2014/05/3d-printing-tip-designing-with-supports.html
mattfryou: Coming back to read that later. I guess I was just confused at the lack of supports for that cubetop
joealarson: Oh, so you mean when would you use bridging instead of supports? I avoid supports whenever I can. But if you need an accurate print you gotta use supports.
mattfryou: Good point on that one. Thanks @joealarson for taking the time to answer some questions :slightly_smiling_face: