User:Bbv5002
Benjamin Visnesky
Sophomore at The Pennsylvania State University studying Mechanical Engineering
Blog Post #1 - September 4, 2012 - Exploring Thingiverse
Thingiverse.com is a very cool website on which anyone can contribute designs for a wide variety of objects, which users of the site can then download and create using a 3D printer. I found exploring Thingiverse to be a great exercise in discovering the great variety of things that can be 3D printed, both useful and useless. These are just a few of the notable designs that I found while browsing the site.
Thing 1 (Useful) - Camera Lens Cover
~ This is a lens cap for a small, pocketable camera designed to prevent the lens damage while being carried in one's pocket. It is a one piece print and requires only minimal assembly.
Thing 2 (Artistic/Beautiful) - Fractal Lamp Shade
~ This is a lamp shade created to mimic the appearance of a fractal pattern. Because of its intricate features, I think it would be a very complex and difficult print, but at least one user in the Thingiverse community as successfully managed to print the design.
Thing 3 (Pointless/Useless) - 'Fire'
~ I suppose that some things are designed and created just for fun. This printable 3D 'fire' is a great example of that. Beyond having no actual purpose, in my opinion it does not really look all that much like fire...
Thing 4 (Funny) - Decorative Garden Frogs
~ These little decorative garden frogs are a good example of the more comical side of things that can be 3D printed. I find these frogs to be funny simply because of their goofy, quirky appearance. These frogs are also interesting, however, because the .stl files for them were made using a program called 123D Catch, which turns a set of 2D pictures of an item into a 3D rendering of that item. At least in this instance, the program worked extremely well.
Thing 5 (Weird) - Strange Sculpture
~ This is a thing that was derived from a statue of a lion that was posted to Thingiverse by another user, but was altered to feature a different head. As noted in the comments on the design, the head seems to resemble a young Frank Sinatra or perhaps Lee Harvey Oswald. Needless to say, it is a strange thing.
