Let’s face it, masks are hot and never do look realistic. But 3D scanning puts an end to all that. At this year’s Comic-Con in San Diego fans can get scanned complements of 3D Systems in a 3DMe® kiosk to become a Star Trek™ crewmember or a Walking Dead zombie. Well, as an action figure, of course. The custom likeness would then be 3D Printed by the Gentle Giant Ltd brand in the figure of your choice. I’m guessing that the figure would be shipped to you, as 3D Printing has a ways to go before it’s as speedy as the Star Trek Replicator, but it can create true reproductions of the original artwork.
If you’d like to take something home with you from the massive event, 3D Systems Booth 3513 will also have generic figures for sale. You see, Gentle Giant creates visual effects for movies and uses the authentic digital content from the films to expand the consumer experience with high-end collectibles, jewelry and action figures. 3D Systems understands that the key to selling 3D Printers is content. I’ve said before that creating designs is the hardest part of 3D Printing for the consumer – actually, that’s true even in industrial applications. But ready-made content is a game changer.
While there is content out there in the open source sharing of .stl files, often when I look at Thingiverse or other sites, the quality leaves a lot to be desired. Gentle Giant solves all that. If you’re in the ComicCon area also check out the new Cube3 that will be on display in the 3D Systems Booth. I really like all the advances they’ve come up with for a desktop 3D Printer that costs under $1,000.
I wonder which character Sheldon and his buddies on the Big Bang Theory would choose for their likeness. Hard to guess, but here’s Apocalypse getting 3D scanned and claiming that 3D scanning is upending regular photography.