3d Pen!
Hey reader,
I know its been a minute while since we have had a non-house related post. Fear not, there will be more house drama next week, but this post is about something totally different. On Christmas morning I opened a present that contained a 3d Pen! Cue Link opening a treasure chest music. Special thanks to the stuffed animal that was credited with getting me this amazing toy.
Link would never be able to work this thing. Especially not Nintendo 64 Link, as he only had two fingers: his thumb and a mass that would typically be the other four.
There are a lot of really cool people out there on YouTube making neat stuff with 3D pens. My current favorite artist online is Jazza from Draw With Jazza. He made a sweet dragon his first time. I discovered him because of his trending video using mermaid sequins to make art.
Slight tangent: Jazza is amazing and has some great content out there on YouTube. I especially enjoy his style swap challenges, where he draws cartoon characters in the style of a different cartoon. He also makes some scary ass Pokemon.
Enough links to Jazza and all his cool stuff. We have a 3D pen to try! I am certainly not going to be making a dragon on my first go, but I wanted to get a feel for how it all worked. You know, I should do this kind of like an unboxing. That sounds fun. Lets do that.
Inside the box you will find the pen itself, yay. Also inside is a clear plastic stand for your pen. It makes it stand up like you see in the photo. I am not really sure what purpose that serves and why it can't just lay on its side, but it does give me Raiders of the Lost Arc vibes for some reason.
The power cord comes out, though I am not really sure why because it isn't battery operated. Also inside was a crazy amount of filament for the pen!
It came in two vacuum sealed plastic pouches and all the filament was tangled up in each other. I had some trouble during the de-tangle process. I know that filament can be brittle and so I wanted to be extra careful. I found a lot of success in unscrewing the filaments from each other, gently twisting them apart. Eventually, I wound up with a tray full of colorful filament! There was also a few templates in the box, as well as a small sheet of clear plastic that allows you to draw on it without ruining the paper templates. There were also two colorful thimbles in case you have to interact with and of the hot parts of the machine.
If you are not familiar with how 3D pens work: its essentially a super fancy hot glue gun. It puts out a super small bead of filament that hardens pretty fast. This allows you to build up structure with the pen.
Loading the filament was easy, though I didn't realize I needed to hold buttons down at first and just pressed them like an iPhone home button. It didn't like that. Once I figured out how to use the buttons, it loaded up fast. The biggest drawback of any 3d printing device is the time it takes to load and unload. The pen needs to draw in the filament down the whole shaft of the pen using a little gear right near the far end of the pen. To unload, it runs in reverse and inevitably, you wind up with some wasted filament. Might be a good plan to switch colors as infrequently as possible. Especially since the pen needs a flat cut in the filament when loading new filament in - requiring a trim if you have used the filament before.
Another thing to keep in mind is that when the pen is running, ink is coming out. That seems intuitive, but think about a regular pen. It isn't just spilling out ink all the time, it reacts to pressure on paper (or the skin of a classmate who isn't paying enough attention). I found myself struggling to find the off switch when I was done with my drawing at first, so try to focus on holding the pen with the power button under your finger to avoid my issue.
Enough discussion, lets get to making stuff! I got a few cool stickers and decided to try tracing one of those. I lined up my super cool guy banana sticker under my clear sheet and got my yellow filament all ready.
I gotta say, reader, it came out much faster than I was expecting, especially considering how slow my 3d printer works. I had to really work quickly. There is definitely something satisfying about the lines that are formed. It looks so awesome.
So that is impressive and all, but not very 3d. Lets start making something in 3d! I found that it was pretty hard to control just drawing upward with no support. I was going to make a simple box/dice to get the mechanics figured out. I drew 6 squares like this and then held them together in the shape of the box I wanted to make. I drew along the edge of the two parts to seal them together. Before I knew it, I had a little black wire frame cube. Clearly, it needed to be filled in. This is where I learned about how tough changing inks can be. I used a different color on each side.
There we go. A prefect little cube with 6 colored sides. You can see the gift giver sitting happily with his new banana friend in the background of this picture.
I definitely want to try making some more stuff with this. I am wondering if I can freehand some horns with it for a puppet. Two of the filaments are glow in the dark. There has to be some cool uses for that!
We will keep playing with this, but for now, keep making cool stuff.
Until next time,
JoshPrime
I know its been a minute while since we have had a non-house related post. Fear not, there will be more house drama next week, but this post is about something totally different. On Christmas morning I opened a present that contained a 3d Pen! Cue Link opening a treasure chest music. Special thanks to the stuffed animal that was credited with getting me this amazing toy.Link would never be able to work this thing. Especially not Nintendo 64 Link, as he only had two fingers: his thumb and a mass that would typically be the other four.
There are a lot of really cool people out there on YouTube making neat stuff with 3D pens. My current favorite artist online is Jazza from Draw With Jazza. He made a sweet dragon his first time. I discovered him because of his trending video using mermaid sequins to make art.
Slight tangent: Jazza is amazing and has some great content out there on YouTube. I especially enjoy his style swap challenges, where he draws cartoon characters in the style of a different cartoon. He also makes some scary ass Pokemon.
Enough links to Jazza and all his cool stuff. We have a 3D pen to try! I am certainly not going to be making a dragon on my first go, but I wanted to get a feel for how it all worked. You know, I should do this kind of like an unboxing. That sounds fun. Lets do that.
Inside the box you will find the pen itself, yay. Also inside is a clear plastic stand for your pen. It makes it stand up like you see in the photo. I am not really sure what purpose that serves and why it can't just lay on its side, but it does give me Raiders of the Lost Arc vibes for some reason.The power cord comes out, though I am not really sure why because it isn't battery operated. Also inside was a crazy amount of filament for the pen!
It came in two vacuum sealed plastic pouches and all the filament was tangled up in each other. I had some trouble during the de-tangle process. I know that filament can be brittle and so I wanted to be extra careful. I found a lot of success in unscrewing the filaments from each other, gently twisting them apart. Eventually, I wound up with a tray full of colorful filament! There was also a few templates in the box, as well as a small sheet of clear plastic that allows you to draw on it without ruining the paper templates. There were also two colorful thimbles in case you have to interact with and of the hot parts of the machine.If you are not familiar with how 3D pens work: its essentially a super fancy hot glue gun. It puts out a super small bead of filament that hardens pretty fast. This allows you to build up structure with the pen.
Loading the filament was easy, though I didn't realize I needed to hold buttons down at first and just pressed them like an iPhone home button. It didn't like that. Once I figured out how to use the buttons, it loaded up fast. The biggest drawback of any 3d printing device is the time it takes to load and unload. The pen needs to draw in the filament down the whole shaft of the pen using a little gear right near the far end of the pen. To unload, it runs in reverse and inevitably, you wind up with some wasted filament. Might be a good plan to switch colors as infrequently as possible. Especially since the pen needs a flat cut in the filament when loading new filament in - requiring a trim if you have used the filament before.
Another thing to keep in mind is that when the pen is running, ink is coming out. That seems intuitive, but think about a regular pen. It isn't just spilling out ink all the time, it reacts to pressure on paper (or the skin of a classmate who isn't paying enough attention). I found myself struggling to find the off switch when I was done with my drawing at first, so try to focus on holding the pen with the power button under your finger to avoid my issue.Enough discussion, lets get to making stuff! I got a few cool stickers and decided to try tracing one of those. I lined up my super cool guy banana sticker under my clear sheet and got my yellow filament all ready.
I gotta say, reader, it came out much faster than I was expecting, especially considering how slow my 3d printer works. I had to really work quickly. There is definitely something satisfying about the lines that are formed. It looks so awesome.
So that is impressive and all, but not very 3d. Lets start making something in 3d! I found that it was pretty hard to control just drawing upward with no support. I was going to make a simple box/dice to get the mechanics figured out. I drew 6 squares like this and then held them together in the shape of the box I wanted to make. I drew along the edge of the two parts to seal them together. Before I knew it, I had a little black wire frame cube. Clearly, it needed to be filled in. This is where I learned about how tough changing inks can be. I used a different color on each side.
I definitely want to try making some more stuff with this. I am wondering if I can freehand some horns with it for a puppet. Two of the filaments are glow in the dark. There has to be some cool uses for that!
We will keep playing with this, but for now, keep making cool stuff.
Until next time,
JoshPrime
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