I don’t recall if I’d previously read about this or not, but I’d not seen it: the Fab@Home additive-process, rapid prototyping device (Link), here shown creating a watch strap. It’s a nice resource site with plenty of information and apparently plenty more to come. I’ve not done much more than skim through the site but it’s a link I’ll be visiting with some regularity.

Besides the device itself, of interest to me both on the Fab@Home site and on the RepRap blog which alerted me to it a couple of days ago (Link) are discussions about 3D fab catalogues. There is a “Printables” library (Link) on the Fab@Home wiki and a new, anticipatory centralized location for RepRap parts (Link) that seems… ambitious. I’ll be very interested to see the first fruits.

Probably goes without saying that I’ve been thinking about just such things for quite some time. Recently I told someone how an immersive 3D catalog might be accomplished (I’ve been grinding on how to do it for years – since I first started modding Quake 3 – but I’ve always run into content theft issues). Maybe they or someone else will get something like it up and running. It’d be a trip to have that weapons warehouse scene from “The Matrix” play out in a virtual world.

{Image source: Fab@Home}

Okay, I’ll admit to not seeing a practical use for this at the moment; seems like this is the beginning of a whole new section in the dictionary beneath “shaky-cam” (“shaky-furniture”, “shaky-housewares”, “shaky-surgical tools”, etc). One thing for sure though: it beautifully illustrates the rapidly dissolving barrier between thought and physical thing. Definitely worth watching.

You can find pictures of the completed objects over on the FrontDesign website (Link).

{Update: you can view the official video here: frontfilm on YouTube (Link)}

via Core77

See the above image? That’s from Alienware’s website (Link) in which it is an embedded background. Alienware is owned by Dell Computer, a very big corporation. So big that every executive officer currently listed on the Yahoo Finance page makes a seven-figure salary. See the image below?
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I couldn’t have timed this bit of news any better, coming as it does on the heels of the Nissan virtual vehicle dispenser in Second Life: the Mass Customization blog brings word (Link) of what is possibly the first working prototype for a shoe created using one of the technologies most often associated with rapid manufacturing. From the post:

Today, I had the opportunity to have the world’s first working prototype of a totally new shoe concept in my hands: a 100% laser-sintered shoe.

…

The TNO shoe concept, named ‘Head over Heels’, is the first application of rapid (digital) manufacturing technologies (more about RM) to an entire product in the footwear industry. Such a concept would allow the rapid customization of shoes to a radical extreme – without any of the constraints of conventional custom manufacturing mechanisms like the need for custom lasts, custom cutting of materials, and a new organization of the work process in manufacturing.

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As expected (only not quite so soon) comes word from Electric Sheeper Giff Constable of Nissan’s entry into Second Life (Link). I’m liking the vehicle dispenser enough to give me a reason to post about this – very Smart car-like (and I’m a fan of the Smart if you recall – reLink). It’s also more in keeping with the possibilities inherent in using virtual worlds. Instead of just being about the car, it becomes more of an Experience. That last bit should sound familiar for at least a couple of reasons (reLink 1, reLink 2).

Unfortunately I didn’t have time to get a password to claim a toy and play. I did, however, take note of who created the doppelganger vehicle sitting out on show… it wasn’t whom I thought it might be (anyone who followed my trademark debates on the old Second Life forum will know to whom I’m referring).

via eightbar