The system automatically removes any parameter values that will create objects that are not 3D printable, or are unstable. The cloud servers then generated all of the possible variations that each object could have made to it if individual parameters were to be changed, and it stores all of these outcomes in a large database which is utilized by the Fab Form software, where a user can access them via the virtual sliders. To test the feasibility of this system, the researchers loaded in eight different designs which included a chess set, a coffee mug, a toy car and high-heeled shoes. This is a process that would take hundreds of hours to complete on a single computer, but the power of the cloud allows it to be done much quicker. All of the computing and mathematics are done via a cloud server, consisting of millions of values, parameters and calculations. In order to use Fab Forms, a design which has been created by an experienced CAD designer can be loaded into the software, where an amateur user can simply move virtual sliders around on the screen in order to change its physical appearance, rather than having to input numbers to represent individual changes. Upon this modification, tremendous amounts of processing must be done on the computer’s end in order to adjust a design and ultimately determine if it is feasible from a physics standpoint as well as determine if it will be 3D printable. Traditionally CAD software uses many variables which are input into the software in order to modify how a design looks. “So the question we set out to answer was, ‘How do you actually allow people to modify digital designs in a way that keeps them functional?’” “We envision a world where everything you buy can potentially be customized, and technologies such as 3-D printing promise that that might be cost-effective,” explained Masha Shugrina, an MIT graduate student and one of the new system’s designers.
Researchers at MIT, in conjunction with the Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya in Israel, may have just solved part of the problem, with a system that they call “Fab Forms.” Fab Forms is a software solution that has the ability of turning CAD files into web-based visual models that can be manipulated and modified using simple virtual sliders. The answer here lies in the simplicity of both the modeling process and the printing process, and only time will tell how long it takes before both of these processes become simple enough for amateurs to begin. There has been a lot of conversation over the past couple of years about when 3D printing as a technology will go mainstream. 3D modeling, especially when it comes to creating models for printing, can be extremely tricky, and even the most advanced CAD users have problems from time to time. CAD software, although it lends itself to helping create some amazing 3D printable products, is not typically a software that just anyone can open up and begin using. I must admit that, while I have been covering the 3D printing space for nearly two years now, and have had an interest in the technology long before that, when it comes to modeling designs that I can print at home on my 3D printer, I’m just an amateur.
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