Knitted Clothing Simulation

This one is a biggie, clothing simulation at this level has been complicated to do and involved a lot of trickery. This year's SIGGRAPH paper shows the work of a collaboration of Cem Yuksel, Jonathan M. Kaldor, Doug L. James and Steve Marschner. Their paper describes their way to accurately simulate knitted clothing. Fantastic!

 Here some words on the project and some videos, even an implementation in Blender already exists!

Cem Yuksel's Website

3D Printer: The good looking kit...

Junior Veloso posted some more Information on his 3D Printer Kit. It looks nice.

3D Printer: The good looking kit...

New SIGGRAPH 2012 Technical Papiers Trailer

Harvard Robotlab: Popup-Bots

A clever idea of manufacturing robots in a popup-book like fashion.
Who knows maybe we soon 3D-print these popup-robots at home...

FreeD- handheld digital milling with force feedback

The FreeD is a hand-held, digitally controlled, milling device that is guided and monitored by a computer while still preserving the craftsperson's freedom to sculpt and carve. The computer will intervene only when the milling bit approaches the planned model. Its interaction is either by slowing down the spindle speed or by drawing back the shaft; the rest of the time it allows complete freedom, letting the user to manipulate and shape the work in any creative way.

The idea of the FreeD is to allow designers to engage with the physical material and not just with the CAD environment, and to let them do their interpretations to the virtual model. By that, designers can create something that is one of a kind, unique based on a generic design.

 Check out the MIT Media Lab Site for more Information

For next christmas I wish an electron accelerator

Todd Johnson produces "Shockfossils", Lichtenberg figures, that are carved in acrylic by the immense power of  a rented electron accelerator. After charching the acrylic it passes the 5 million volt electron accelerator, then the acrylic needs to be hit with a hard object. Immediately after the stroke a discharge happen and builds tiny structures of the electrons traveling through acrylic. He can even cover parts with lead masks to control where the effect happens. The Shockfossils are then mounted on a wooden holder and lit by LED's, a commercial product...

This is just awesome, I'd like to see this process live.

The Pirate Bay gets physical

You may know  the Pirate Bay as torrent site, now the Bay has got a new category Physibles where you can find 3D-data for 3D-printing, or manufacturing.

I think this marks a huge point showing the influence of 3D-Printing and CNC manufacturing in our times. We will see a lot more 3D-printing going on at home, new wars on copyright (Lego's patent just ran out...). People can now construct, share, modify and build their objects of desire, furniture, art, jewelery and thiefs may print their own ATM-skimmer devices...A lot to think about before it hits us full throttle. Bring it on!