Weekend fun with 3D prints

Guess what I m doing this weekend? A little hint:

Got a box full of goodies from Shapeways containing 3d prints of some of my Brooch a a Week designs. Some are from early designs, some newer. I am starting to get a feel for what prints well in the low resolution cheaper nylon material. I think this time I only had one model rejected by them for not being printable in that material. Usually there is a little part too small to print requiring remodelling (which I often don't have time for). Or I would have to opt for the more expensive high resolution polymer prints. But I am trying to keep the cost in check since this is just a fun project and not generating sales.

So this weekend I will play with some of these and try to attach brooch findings in some way or the other to make them wearable. Should be fun.

Here a few in more closeup:

3d prints in white and coral red nylon of BAD-42 and simple variations of BAD-53/54. Those printed patterns look pretty. They will make nice little brooches. Think I need to send out the others from that pattern series too.

These are 3d prints from my virtual BAD-10 to 24 "Hex Space Rails" 
Those came out better than expected, except maybe the dense version on the upper right. Clearly they print better if there is some space between those rails, otherwise the material just smooches together to one big blob since it's the low resolution white nylon plastic. Now I need to figure out how to attach a brooch pin of some sort.Not an easy one with these. Right now I am drawing a blank here, but I am sure something will enlighten me if I stare at it long enough.


So other than that little fun project I am also planning to work a bit more on my new website (still have to add ton's of products) and check out the Abbot Kinney festival in Venice on Sunday. Plus a little bit of landscaping in my yard is in order, maybe a bike ride to the ocean too and buying fresh veggies at the farmers market.

Brooch A Day, Week 2 Catchup

I took a look through my Flickr set of all my brooches so far for the Brooch a Day challenge and realized that I actually never updated the blog with the process. Time to play catch up and go back in time.

Week 2 did not have any Grasshopper programming work involved. It was all about learning more about brooch mechanism as I have never done any brooches before. I used some objects I had laying around and made them into brooches.
It came in handy that I had some failed 3D prints on hand from earlier design explorations for bracelets. This keeps it still somewhat related to the original intend of using CAD process for some of the brooch making.

Brooch #9 The Wheel Brooch

 

Those are 3D printed stainless steel miniature bracelets  on my brooch #8 magnetic pin.

I accidentally messed up the scale of these bracelet designs and they are only 1/2 the size (35mm diameter). Too small for any human hand, maybe it would fit a doll.  Rookie mistake in the virtual CAD world ;-) But perfect size for some brooches. Since they are just holding on by magnetic power the arrangement is flexible. 

Brooch #10 Bumpy Rail Brooch

One of those accidentally 1/2 sized bracelets that could be napkin holders or, well, a brooch.
3D printed stainless steel, modeled in Rhino/ T-splines. Stainless steel brooch pin and catch welded to ring. Testing out my PUK stainless steel welding settings with these brooches too. Stainless steel welds pretty nicely. The PUK even has a pre-settings for that material. Makes it easy.

Brooch #11 Rilled Pin

In this one I was using a 3d printed stainless steel bead I had designed earlier in Rhino3D/ T-splines. Perfect for a brooch design. I made a little "flower" bouquet out of some sterling silver head pins and added a thicker wire as the stem. Sterling silver was then oxidized. The 3D printed stainless steel bead is 23mm long, 12mm diameter.

Brooch #12 Rilled Slider Brooch

One more of these rilled 3D printed stainless steel bead. Here it slides and spins freely on a steel pin, which is tension set in a welded stainless steel frame. The frame was all welded with the PUK welder. As a brooch mechanism I used some SST tubing, formed catch from sheet and bent SST wire into a double pin.

The next brooch deserves it's own post. There was no CAD involved at all. But it will be the inspiration for the next weeks Grasshopper practice designs.

Diamond Faceted Rings and Brooch Panel Studies

The other day I was playing with some new new software plugins for my Brooch a Day challenge. These involved using the Lunchbox plugin for Grasshopper to study with paneling components. Some great tools in there that need to get explored further. So I played with those tools a bit on very simple ring shapes too.

I went ahead and CNC milled 2 rings in wax in different width with a diamond shape facet pattern to see how well that pattern would translate into the real world with the tools I have on hand. Cast those in Sterling Silver. The facet edges came out a bit softer after polishing the wax first to remove the light tool path lines and then a light polish and satin brushed finish over the silver rings. I prefer it that way as it looks less machined. A more subtle look. Overall this makes some simple, lightly textured wedding rings with a soft feel. Here the finished rings:

 I am testing how people react to these and listed them on Etsy and my new web site.

There were other panel options too for the rings, here shown in a computer rendering. Panels can be squares, triangles, diamonds, skewed or staggered quads. Could not figure out how the hex panel tool works. Next time.

The Grasshopper definitions for each ring. Pretty simple to use.


So for the brooches I am working along the lines of uneven panel fields with triangular grids maybe.

Or some round brooches with different paneling.

Still needs some work.

Brooch A Day First Week: Rosettes

We are now a couple days into the BAD ( Brooch A Day) challenge and it has been fun so far. It is really liberating to think outside of the "ring making box". Brooches seems to offer lot's of design freedom. It's all very playful so far. I am trying to use the blogging as a way to keep a journal of the process. So bare with me if this gets a bit technical at times.

To dive into learning Grasshopper software I watched lot's of video tutorials to get familiar with the possibilities it offers. The first week was all about rosette designs.

Wax models of week one rosette designs, CNC milled

I followed a video tutorial that outlines the grasshopper definition setup for rosette creation.

Grasshopper definition

By switching the geometry shape of the item that gets rotated and scaled, it generates lot's of different designs from the same base definition. Playing with the sliders was really fun. I love watching how the designs evolve dramatically when certain variables change.

Variations of a rosette by deleting certain elements and changing the depth.

The first 2 rosette designs where done by rotating a elliptical solid and down scaling it towards the center. Once the right rotation, density and scale factors were found, I took that into Rhino and started to manipulate it further.  To test it I also milled those designs in wax on my CMC mill. Ultimately the designs will be sent out for 3d printing in stainless steel. But since I have a mill I can at least do a test the same day to check the design. It's somewhat easier to evaluate a design if I can see and feel it. Just judging from renderings can lead to some surprises.

Single layer rosette, CNC milled wax, can be cast in silver

Double layer rosette, CNC milled wax

Rendering of double layer rosette with added brooch pin

The next 2 designs used a circular shape instead of the elliptical. The look is very different. The difference between those 2 are just changing the radial density from 9 circles around the center to 15.  

Rendering

CNC milled wax models

Next day I started to play with some pyramid shapes.

Testing settings in Rhino and Grasshopper

2 designs, same 5 sides pyramid as a base shape but changing the rotation of the shape around the pyramid center axis yields a different design

CNC milled wax model. The first test model had very thin areas in those valleys that would not print and even brake during casting.

Day six was a fun one! It crashed my computer a couple times. But it finally worked, well virtually.  The base shape was a weird morphed shape that looked like a crippled joy stick. Once used in the definitions it created some wonderful shapes and reliefs.
The rosette looked like a sea anemone and was quite complex. It can only really be 3D printed as it has undercuts. The wax model I milled just does not have the same detail. Unfortunately  for the stainless steel it's too filigrane and it got rejected by Shapeways. It can probaly only printed in the high-res plastics. So no steel version of this one :(

"Sea Anemone" rosette wax model, CNC milled

Rendering, even the back has a interesting texture. If the rosette would be stainless steel using a magnet pin would allow to show off both sides.

Next day a slightly different base shape than the eliptical one from day one and 2. This series shows how playing with the sliders is a great way to get different designs very quickly. The only difference is the rotation of the shape.

Rendering

CNC milled wax model

Once I get the 3D printed steel models I can just weld or solder some pin findings to the back to make them into wearable brooches. I also thought using a magnet would be fun as then the steel rosettes can be worn 2 sided.  Some have a really interesting texture in the back that ought be be shown off.

I fabricated this little magnet pin out of textured and oxidized sterling silver with a pin clutch. The final version should be made out of 3D printed steel. The strong magnet was from the hardware store.

Day 8 brooch: Magnet pin

It's a very handy tool that I will keep pinned to my apron as I can use it to clean out the broken saw blades out of my previous metal filings in the bench drawer.

Day 8: Broken Saw Blade Pin Brooch

Those were the first 8 days.

The last 2 days of the challenge I used some found objects and make them into brooches.

I am waiting for my new PC to arrive on Friday to start with a new Grasshopper definition. Little spoiler: there will be some bees or wasps involved in the new design. 


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2013 Year of the Grasshopper and Making Brooches

Happy New Year! 2013 will be the year of the Grasshopper for me. No, I did not invent a new animal sign for a Chinese Year. It's just my motto for this year. Grasshopper is a plugin for a 3D modelling software Rhinoceros and one I want to learn. So this year my resolution is to play with it as much as I can. To help me stay on track I use the same motivator I used 2 years ago to learn Rhino 3D: I joined a flickr group to create a Brooch a Bay (BAD) or Brooch a Week (BAW). Anyone can join and submit designs. It's a personal challenge and open to interpretation as long as it is some sort of brooch, pin or badge.

In 2011 I did the Ring a Week challenge by designing and modelling 1 ring design per week in Rhino. I only went up to 32 weeks and got sidetracked with ... well live.  But it was still successful and I eventually learned the software. It is now a part of my everyday work and allows me to create a few of my selling ring designs. Posting the learning results to flickr and blogging about it was a great way to see the progress and change in complexity during the year. Plus it serves as a form of journal. What worked once, could work again.

Grasshopper definition for first brooch project

Grasshopper is a free software plugin for Rhino 3D geared towards parametric form generation. It allows exploring shapes and designs through algorithms. It's often used in complex architectural designs but also in lot's of other design applications. I have seen it in action in my former day job as an architect used by those nerdy computer kids. But I haven't actually used it myself. It's a great tool to explore options and variations of designs, shapes and patterns. It allows making instant changes without having to remodel everything. It should be a awesome tool for jewelry applications and especially brooches that allow more flexibility than rings.

Brooches can really be anything that can get attached to clothing. As long as it has a pin of some sort - it's a brooch. I have never made a brooch and probably have never even worn one, ok maybe some pins or badges long time ago. I am excited to get out of my ring making comfort zone and explore another medium a bit. Brooches will allow me to play with patterns, reliefs, shapes and forms that would not be suitable for other jewelry applications.

Variations of a Rosette design, Rendering

I am not sure yet if I will follow through with the daily BAD challenge but I will try. Since Grasshopper allows creation of design variations I can use those spin offs as each days submission. I am hoping to create a mini series each week and post the best brooch design in the weekly challenge.  It will start out with renderings first. I will also send out files to Shapeways to be 3D printed in stainless steel or plastic/ resins or if appropriate mill them on my CNC mill and cast in silver. With any of these production methods there is a lag time of 2 to 3 weeks between the design and having the milled/cast or printed object in my hand. Once there is a physical object I can attach pin findings to it to make it a brooch or pin.

Modelling in Rhino and Grasshopper

I really see this challenge as a learning experience and to some extent as an art project. I have no intent to sell these brooches (through if something amazing comes along I might eventually add them in my shop).  I am just looking forward to some playful explorations and extending my design repertoire. It will be inevitable that I get stuck with the software, sidetracked with life and too busy with my business. But I hope I can always return and play some more. You can follow along on Flickr and I will try to blog off and on.

One of the first things I need to do is buying a new computer. I crashed the program multiple times this week while just playing with some simple definitions. So far I used Rhino4 via Paralles on my MAC book pro. It worked ok for some simpler ring designs but I already started to have problems with modelling bracelets as the files got bigger and bigger.  It's time to to upgrade to a dedicated PC and the newer software. I was hoping they would develop the MAC version of Rhino a bit faster but I don't really see that happen anytime soon (Rhino is available for MAC but no plugins like T-splines or Grasshopper yet). So I am out PC computer shopping. It's not my favorite thing to do, Mac shopping would be a lot more fun.