I’d actually come across the reprap.org site when I was looking into this, but I wasn’t sure how well it actually worked and I’m not mechanically inclined, no way I’d be able to build something like that. I do remember back in high school a HP Laserjet was a huge 100 pound thing that cost like $5,000+ and the idea of color laser printers was just a fantasy, maybe one or two experimental models existed that cost a million bucks or whatever. Now you can get a color laser printer for under $200 (the toner adds to that price of course).
An affordable, reliable, plug and play, easy to use 3D printer, especially one that works with metal, or at the very least ABS, is something I’d really LOVE to have. Figuring out how to make stuff with the CAD software would be the only learning curve and significant opportunity cost. I do hope it’s less than 10 years off, but I can’t say I wasn’t thinking a decade or so myself, if it ever happens - the limitations of people being able to learn to use the CAD software are much greater than the limitations of people learning to use a word processor to make use of a regular paper printer. So maybe there will never be a mass market to justify a cheap 3D printer since only “professionals” would be able to make anything of use with them, keeping the prices in the thousands of dollars. I sure hope not. I’d be the first to buy 3D Printing for Dummies.
Unfortunately, I don’t think there’ll be one in every home, because people have no need for 3D printing, and like kaltkalt said, CAD software is hard to use. The best we can hope for is popularity like Photoshop.
Define “need”. If you could run off a custom set of plastic leggos or army men or whatever for roughly the store cost, it would be pretty cool. There’s a gazillion doodads you’d be able to make, and you wouldn’t have to know ANYTHING about CAD, just be able to download stuff other people had worked up.
A gagillion people print photo quality inkjet prints without ever having touched photoshop. Before the printers existed, nobody needed them in home either.
There was a cool article recently about using 3D printing to produce hermit crab shells because the local hermit crabs ran out of naturally occurring alternatives.
I don’t think I had any of those build it out of parts games like leggos, lincoln logs, or erector sets than I didn’t need more of one part. 3D printing could provide that.
This is one of those “if you build it, they will come” technologies.
There will be a vast market for people who do have the CAD skills to sell downloadable models (this is already a thing) - think of it like the App stores, only for things to print.
That and the 3D tech will simplify - it’s like the difference between high-end CAD software and those “Design your home layout” programmes that let you move virtual furniture around.
Well there are already a bunch of websites who offer this service. Some even have free online CAD software with which you can use to design your custom object, and they’ll 3D print it and ship it to you, and it costs far less than the cost of a 3D printer itself (cost depending on the size/weight/complexity of the thing you make).
I think the software can be made simple enough for the average person, equipped with a “For Dummies” book, to make most of what they want to on their 3D printer. We’re not talking about making special effects for a movie. Why doesn’t such simple to use CAD software exist now then? Because there’s no need for it. Being able to get instant gratification and immediately build the thing you design, whether it be a plumbing fixture, car part, or sex toy, would create a whole new HUGE group of customers for CAD software - easy to use CAD software. Without a cheap 3D printer sitting on your desk, only professionals have any need for something like AutoCAD.
Many years ago a friend of mine had a pirated copy of AutoCAD on his computer, and it was primarily cool because it was like a $10,000 program at the time. I played around with it for a few minutes, had no clue how to use it, and had absolutely no need to use it. He ended up deleting it after a few days because he had no use for it either and it was extremely large (back then 100 megabytes or whatever it was took up over half your hard drive).
I see this as a futuristic chicken and egg problem. If cheap 3D printers become available, the easy to use CAD software will be developed for them. But without such software there may never be a cheap 3D printer ever developed and they’ll be kept expensive for specialized niche markets.
Imagine if everyone could print out realistic face masks like these.
Right away that could have a pretty big effect on society, and that’s just one use for a 3D printer (albeit something that the first couple generations of printer would probably not be able to do).
In this case, I’d say “need” corresponds to “something you can convince your grandma or a non-tech savvy person to buy”. The reason printers are so popular are that photos are extremely easy to take. Yet, people are only interested in printing their own photos - how many people print photos of people they don’t know? Even if a photo is National Geographic quality, people don’t print them and stick them around their house. Add in the problem of copyright and I don’t think people will find good 3D designs to print. Of course, this might change if 3D scanners also became popular.
I’m in the process of teaching myself 3D rendering software so that I can try out shapeways. It would be so cool to make my own 3D stuff. It would make great gifts, for example. So far I’m still in the early learning phases (using Blender).
