3D-Printing of Non-Assembly, Articulated Models

Jacques Calì, Dan Calian, Cristina Amati, Rebecca Kleinberger, Anthony Steed, Jan Kautz, Tim Weyrich

University College London

Abstract

Additive manufacturing (3D printing) is commonly used to produce physical models for a wide variety of applications, from archaeology to design. While static models are directly supported, it is desirable to also be able to print models with functional articulations, such as a hand with joints and knuckles, without the need for manual assembly of joint components. Apart from having to address limitations inherent to the printing process, this poses a particular challenge for articulated models that should be posable: to allow the model to hold a pose, joints need to exhibit internal friction to withstand gravity, without their parts fusing during 3D printing. This has not been possible with previous printable joint designs. In this paper, we propose a method for converting 3D models into printable, functional, non-assembly models with internal friction. To this end, we have designed an intuitive workflow that takes an appropriately rigged 3D model, automatically fits novel 3D-printable and posable joints, and provides an interface for specifying rotational constraints. We show a number of results for different articulated models, demonstrating the effectiveness of our method.

Citation Style: Display Alpha ACM SIGGRAPH IEEEtran Publication

3D-Printing of Non-Assembly, Articulated Models.
Jacques Calì, Dan Calian, Cristina Amati, Rebecca Kleinberger, Anthony Steed, Jan Kautz, Tim Weyrich.
ACM Transactions on Graphics (Proc. SIGGRAPH Asia), 31(6), pp. 130:1–130:8, 2012.Jacques Calì, Dan Calian, Cristina Amati, Rebecca Kleinberger, Anthony Steed, Jan Kautz, and Tim Weyrich. 3d-printing of non-assembly, articulated models. ACM Trans. on Graphics (Proc. SIGGRAPH Asia 2012), 31(6):130:1–130:8, 2012.Calì, J., Calian, D., Amati, C., Kleinberger, R., Steed, A., Kautz, J., and Weyrich, T. 2012. 3d-printing of non-assembly, articulated models. ACM Trans. on Graphics (Proc. SIGGRAPH Asia 2012) 31, 6, 130:1–130:8.J. Calì, D. Calian, C. Amati, R. Kleinberger, A. Steed, J. Kautz, and T. Weyrich, “3d-printing of non-assembly, articulated models,” ACM Trans. on Graphics (Proc. SIGGRAPH Asia 2012), vol. 31, no. 6, pp. 130:1–130:8, 2012.

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank Martin Watmough and Richard Beckett from the Bartlett for their help with printing, and the anonymous reviewers for their valuable feedback. The work was in part funded by the EngD VEIV Centre for Doctoral Training.