3D printing with glass powder

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haleybach
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3D printing with glass powder

Post by haleybach »

Wow.
http://www.shapeways.com/blog/archives/ ... eways.html

They use glass powder, add a binder with the 3D printer, add powder, add binder, add powder....
Then fire it in a kiln. I knew they were trying to develope this but didn't know anyone had any success.

Cool.

I've wanted one of these since the first time I saw one: http://store.makerbot.com/replicator-404.html
Morganica
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Re: 3D printing with glass powder

Post by Morganica »

Yup, it's been around for awhile; the CEO of Shapeways gave a very interesting lecture on it at the last BeCON. The glass it produces is opaque, like a very coarse and somewhat porous pate de verre, still fairly low-res. But it can be colored with enamels and definitely is a step in the right direction.
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haleybach
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Re: 3D printing with glass powder

Post by haleybach »

Hi there Morganica!

I've worked in other mediums but I'm brand new to fused glass.

I found your blog about a week ago and have been reading through it rather compulsively. It is a wonderful source of information and inspiration. I am a big fan of your open source style.
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Re: 3D printing with glass powder

Post by Rick Wilton »

Is it really "a step in the right direction" or the equivalent of a print of a painting?

It really doesn't appeal to me to see something made more by a computer programmer rather than an artist / craftsman.
It really takes the artist / "handmadeness" (yes I am creating my own word) right out of the equation. I am sure you could create a machine (if they haven't already) that could create a painting that would rival any humans abilities. Would that be "art" or even craft?

Thoughts? this is the philosophy page what are others thoughts?
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Re: 3D printing with glass powder

Post by Judd »

The AP community is divided on 3D art and printing. There are those that say for an object to be 3D, it must be made by an artist's hands. Others say that artists have used tools for millennia and the computer is simply the next tool. I'm not sure how I feel about it. Warhol and Hirst had/have art factories. Chihuly doesn't blow his own glass. For production work - yes, a little art brightens everyone's life. For fine art - I agree with the purists, that I want an artist to actually touch the object I plan to buy. Otherwise I'm simply buying Thomas Kinkade dreck.
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Re: 3D printing with glass powder

Post by Morganica »

I suppose it depends on whether you think:
--Photoshop and digital photography ruined the medium or enabled it to grow
--The substitution of acrylics for oil paints helped or hindered painting
--Stone sculptors should be allowed to use power tools or forced to stay with chisels and hammers and rasps
--A bit closer to home: Whether the advent of tested-compatible glass and affordable kiln controllers destroyed the artist/craftsman aspect of kilnforming and casting...or freed artists working in glass to focus on the actual creative processes.

I'm a sculptor, I do portraits. I tend to dismiss lifecasters because they took an easy shortcut instead of building the model with their hands..but that's just my own snobbery talking. Has nothing to do with whether or not they're creating valid art.

Would you accuse Rodin, Brancusi, Degas, Henry Moore, and Botero of making "Thomas Kinkade dreck?" Most sculptors working in bronze rarely if ever do their own casting and many have almost no hands-on work on a sculpture once the plastilene leaves their studios. Send out a model, get back a bronze (or edition of bronzes, in various sizes, patinas and materials). And many of the sculptors working in glass today do the same thing, with minimal hands-on time with the glass. Foundry work in either medium requires solid skills in many areas, to the point that acquiring and practicing those skills kills the time you have to actually make art--the smart artist sticks with what s/he does best.

3D printing is simply a different kind of foundry, one that can quite possibly change the way sculptors deal with foundries in the same way that powertools changed the way they carve. The artist must still conceive and build the model, so I'm not sure there's that much difference between that and lifecasting. Plus, 3D printing adds some capabilities--including the ability to enable shapes and interconnecting figures that are nearly impossible to create in a single pass using any other method--which may actually expand the choices sculptors can make.
Cynthia Morgan
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Re: 3D printing with glass powder

Post by Rick Wilton »

and that is exactly why I asked the question "is it a step in the right direction"

Very good food for thought

Thanks
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Re: 3D printing with glass powder

Post by Morganica »

Rick Wilton wrote:and that is exactly why I asked the question "is it a step in the right direction"

Very good food for thought

Thanks
Yup. I have a sneaking suspicion that it's the same discussion that occurs every time technology and art intersect. ;-)
Cynthia Morgan
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haleybach
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Re: 3D printing with glass powder

Post by haleybach »

What about words? They can be artful or not, yet it would be a stretch to claim they are handmade. We use the terminology of craft, wordsmith, but understand it is a metaphor only, don't we? Yet I hope no one would suggest words can not fall into the catigory 'art.'

Computer code is just another language (or group of languages) which can be used for all sorts of purposes. Just like glass, or clay, or words; functional or art or anything in between.

If using a 3d printer to make the equivalent of a print of a painting is all you can imagine it would be good for, I can see the lack of enthusiasm. It is a potential tool which opens up possible techniques.

I don't equate technical ability and artistic ability. I do not care if a machine that rivals human abilities exisits or not, a machine can only have the equvilant of technical skill.
sbach
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Re: 3D printing with glass powder

Post by sbach »

>something made more by a computer programmer rather than an artist / craftsman

I'm a computer programmer (and also married to Haley). :wink: While some like to pretend that it's engineering, programming is a craft, and programmers are just a kind of craftsman. I have found that sometimes they can even be artists.

Defining art is a tar pit, but I tend to think of art as an expression of vision through mastery of a medium, and look at the various techniques in a given medium as approaches toward artistic expression. New techniques allow us to push the bounds of art out further. As they make things easier, it allows us to push the boundaries of what is challenging further. 3D printing will allow some kinds of output that are more sophisticated than hand working, but it still requires vision to generate a 3D model, and would involve its own kind of mastery and vision to create. If it makes productions of some kinds of glass forms easier than doing them by hand, then I hope it will result in more compelling art as artists pick up the technique and gain more facility for creating a more sophisticated expression.
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Re: 3D printing with glass powder

Post by Rick Wilton »

Okay I can certainly see how a programmer has the potential to be a artist and the machine is their medium.

That being said is the second, third, fourth ..... time the programmer hits the "print" button, is that object worth the same as the first one?

At least with any kind of a production casting someone, be it the artist or the craftsman had to do more than hit a button.

With a 3d printer the work and skill is intangible to the item created. They are two completely separate things it's just that one can't exist without the other.
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Re: 3D printing with glass powder

Post by Judd »

"Would you accuse Rodin, Brancusi, Degas, Henry Moore, and Botero of making "Thomas Kinkade dreck?" "

No, because my bias and prejudice compels me to view those fine artists in a different light. I know I dislike Kinkade and Hirst, but have no problem with much of Warhol. As I said, " Others say that artists have used tools for millennia and the computer is simply the next tool. I'm not sure how I feel about it."

After writing this, I realized that if a "Rodin" used 3D printing, I'd probably have no problem with it.
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Re: 3D printing with glass powder

Post by Morganica »

Rick Wilton wrote:Okay I can certainly see how a programmer has the potential to be a artist and the machine is their medium.

That being said is the second, third, fourth ..... time the programmer hits the "print" button, is that object worth the same as the first one?

At least with any kind of a production casting someone, be it the artist or the craftsman had to do more than hit a button.

With a 3d printer the work and skill is intangible to the item created. They are two completely separate things it's just that one can't exist without the other.
So your argument is with editions, not output?
Cynthia Morgan
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sbach
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Re: 3D printing with glass powder

Post by sbach »

Rick Wilton wrote:Okay I can certainly see how a programmer has the potential to be a artist and the machine is their medium.

That being said is the second, third, fourth ..... time the programmer hits the "print" button, is that object worth the same as the first one?

At least with any kind of a production casting someone, be it the artist or the craftsman had to do more than hit a button.

With a 3d printer the work and skill is intangible to the item created. They are two completely separate things it's just that one can't exist without the other.
First, I can't imaging that any glass artist would turn to 3D printing and abandon all other tools of glass work. It's another tool, one that (probably) makes some kinds of work possible/easier to do, but actual 3D printers currently print out grainy opaque white glass with all the limits of 3D printing, which currently are very binding. I'd imagine an artist could use it as a tool to fabricate the kinds of things that it was good at, and use other tools for other parts of a work to create a whole.

Second, art is a vaguely defined term with no universally accepted definition, so perhaps we have very different ideas about how it's defined, but do you really think that if an artist creates a reproducible work that it's no longer art? If a musician records an album, does that mean that those recordings aren't art? Are movies not art? Are Ansel Adam's prints or other photo prints not art? If someone has a print of a famous work, does it stop being art since it's a print? Reproducibility seems like an iffy way to define whether a thing is art. Uniqueness is desirable, and those people who wear "Artist" hats and have their art in galleries or museums limit the editions of their work when it's mechanically reproducible. If someone was doing glass art with an "Artist" hat using this tool, I'd imagine they'd do the same. I'd expect they'd use more tools than just 3D printing that would add to their work's uniqueness as well.
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Re: 3D printing with glass powder

Post by Rick Wilton »

I believe that is exactly what someone did for Emerge 2010, I'm not sure I am correct but I seem to remember someone entering a prestigious show with a 3d printed piece. Hey if you are first then all the more power to you.

I guess if that artist sold that piece (if I am correct) for at a large price point, only then to pay someone to produce more day in day out. That most certainly would and should have an impact on the monetary and artistic value.

I'm certainly not trying to denigrate anyone's work by this, I am seriously interested in others opinions about this topic.
Rick Wilton
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Re: 3D printing with glass powder

Post by Rick Wilton »

So I guess that if someone was able to reproduce an exact copy of a famous painting then it's just as worthy as the original?

You cannot compare movies or music to an object you can hold in your hand they are completely different. They are both "ART" but different.

As for a print NO a print of something isn't the same as the original that's kind of the point here.

After the original is produced you can then make a second "original" is the second "original" just as valuable as the first?

It's accepted that an original is more valuable and even the editions are more valuable with a limited number.
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Re: 3D printing with glass powder

Post by Morganica »

Rick Wilton wrote:I believe that is exactly what someone did for Emerge 2010, I'm not sure I am correct but I seem to remember someone entering a prestigious show with a 3d printed piece. Hey if you are first then all the more power to you.

I guess if that artist sold that piece (if I am correct) for at a large price point, only then to pay someone to produce more day in day out. That most certainly would and should have an impact on the monetary and artistic value.

I'm certainly not trying to denigrate anyone's work by this, I am seriously interested in others opinions about this topic.
Yes, indeedy. One of the prizewinners (Newcomer Award) in eMerge 2010 was a 3D printed glass (vitraglyphic) object:
http://www.bullseyeglass.com/images/sto ... ter_th.jpg

It's an interesting piece because it illustrates two of the points we're making here, and a third I haven't (yet) made:
--Quality is not all that fantastic--it's grainy and rather crumbly looking. This is an emerging, not emerged, technology.
--It includes an interlocking ring structure that would be exceedingly difficult to cast with conventional methods, at least in a single pass.
--It's relatively small; most 3D printing systems that support glass media are extremely size-limited.

Value of the original over the copy or limited edition? In some sculpture media there *is* no original; the model is made to be reproduced in multiples. Yes, artists limit editions but that's an arbitrary thing--somebody smashes the plates/molds/whatever. You could do the equivalent in 3D printing by deleting the CAD files that instruct the printer.

And we aren't really talking exact copy. The resolution issues now with glass and ceramic printing virtually guarantee that you won't get identical products. For 3D-printed glass (or ceramic) to become a serious artistic medium, a LOT of work has to be done with resolution and heatwork management to ensure accurate reproduction. The goal, though, isn't to reproduce a gazillion pieces exactly but rather to give the artist more control over the final work.
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Re: 3D printing with glass powder

Post by sbach »

First, I admit I am just thinking these things through, so I may be completely off base here. Cynthia really answered everything solidly but I am weak and can't resist adding a little more.
Rick Wilton wrote:So I guess that if someone was able to reproduce an exact copy of a famous painting then it's just as worthy as the original?
Not in that case since it wouldn't be a creation of the original artist. If a master painter somehow managed to paint two indistinguishable copies of a work would one of them have less artistic significance? Maybe so, I don't really know, but that's a more analogous example.
Rick Wilton wrote:You cannot compare movies or music to an object you can hold in your hand they are completely different. They are both "ART" but different.
You are right they are different. But there was a time when we did not have recording and every time a band played it was a live event that produced unique music. Technology changed that so music was reproducible through recordings. As this was happening there were purists who denied the artistic merit of recordings, but nowadays it's rare to see the claim that only live music is art, and it's easy to see how new technology opened vast new fields of opportunities for artistic expression. Perhaps a similar thing might happen with 3D replication, where it's eventually accepted as a fine art medium once it has evolved and fine artists have worked to master the possibilities it offers?
Rick Wilton wrote:As for a print NO a print of something isn't the same as the original that's kind of the point here.
Ansel Adams original photos were gelatin silver prints. There was a lot of art involved in producing those prints from the negatives, but they were prints.

Prints of a famous artwork are not the same, but if you were visiting someone's home and they had a print of a Rembrandt over their mantle would you tell them it wasn't art? It is certainly different than the original. It certainly has less artistic significance. You can qualify it in various ways, but it's still typically labeled art. It's not qualified as "fine art" in the sense of stuff that would wind up in a museum, but that's just one type of art.
Rick Wilton wrote:After the original is produced you can then make a second "original" is the second "original" just as valuable as the first?
I don't know. As Cynthia mentioned in some art forms the idea of an "original" isn't even a meaningful way to talk about things.
Rick Wilton wrote:It's accepted that an original is more valuable and even the editions are more valuable with a limited number.
That's true. Greater value is often a characteristic of original unique artworks. At the same time copies are still typically regarded as art. As Cynthia mentioned, an artist could use the tool to make an original unique piece, or a limited set. They have the freedom to choose how they use their model.

It also means that they can share their models to open the possibility of much greater participation and cross-pollenation of artistic ideas and progress the state of the art since the more that artists can collaborate and share, the more that the art form can evolve and grow to find fuller and more creative developments. It used to be that art colonies and salons were the medium for that, now we all see how discussion with internet forums can help people grow as artists. 3D printing is already here, so you can check out how enabling sharing models is letting people develop their understanding, learning, and art in new ways and opening up unexpected advancements. May as well embrace it since it's not going to go away any more than music recording or other advancements in technology.
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Re: 3D printing with glass powder

Post by Don Burt »

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Re: 3D printing with glass powder

Post by Morganica »

Don, absolutely fascinating and probably one of the best looks at the additive process I've seen. Thanks.

What's even more interesting is that they're talking about using this method for Egyptian faience. Many consider that the original "pate de verre," and it was certainly what Henri Cros and others who invented the Art Nouveau pate de verre processes were trying to emulate. They call it "self-glazing ceramic" here, but it's actually a crude form of glass, sintered in a furnace, and the way the Egyptians did relief sculptures, jewelry and other things.

Wonderful symmetry in using advancing technology to recreate what may be the oldest form of glassmaking.
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