Imagine owning your own factory that can produce what ever object you desire with a few hours; a factory that just needs the details on what will be created, details that your home computer can produce and transmit digitally when ready. For small objects, the factory fits in a highly portable briefcase; larger objects merely require finding someone else on the Network who is loaning time on their bigger model.The idea of 3D printing a physical object that you can hold in your hand is not yet a common experience, but the potential is enormous. The image on the left shows the design created with 3D software, then two objects on the keyboard that are real prints of the object using different kinds of plastics and coloring for different effects. All products produced by 3D printers must first be 3D software designs, simulations of reality edited on computer screens whose designs then direct the printing process.
3D printing a physical object is similar to printing on paper in the way a print head precisely controls the placement of a liquid. In your home now, your composition, perhaps an essay created in a word processor or a photograph edited with image editing software, is sent to a paper printer; the ink continues to be placed further and further down a page until there is no more room and a new sheet is required. (Click picture on the left to see the movie.) However, with 3D, the print head is going back to the same spot again and again, laying down ever thickening layers of liquid, spray or powder in hundreds if not thousands of layers or more. The chemical types being sprayed vary widely including paper mache, baking pasta (Clark, 2012^), sterling silver, hard or soft plastic, titanium and conductive material that enables wires, circuits, switches and sensors to be printed directly into the product; more types of printable materials are added each year. Because the addition of another layer of plastic or metal may add less than 1/10 of a millimeter, the process can take minutes or hours depending on the size of the object. 3D printing is also called additive manufacturing.
The company that invented and holds the 1986 patent for the first 3D printers is 3D Systems; their facility is located about 25 miles south of Charlotte, North Carolina ("Solid Print", 2012^). They began begun as a company exclusively creating prototypes for various businesses and other organizations but they are rapidly moving 3D printing from making prototypes to making final products. Whereas the 3D printing industry as a whole spends about 28% of its effort printing final products (Wohlers Report, 2009^), the 3D Systems company is already has final products at 40% of their work mix. Advances in 3D printing have staggering economic and cultural implications.
This high technology knowledge and equipment seems almost science fiction like, but before too much swooning over this innovation occurs, it is useful to think back and witness the in-depth knowledge our species already has with 3D in its DNA. The use of 3D thinking was our special form of composition and problem solving for millions of years. Our species would not be here without some special gifts, our hands and our ability to make 3D tools used to make other devices and structures. So, before you read on, watch this brief piece on flint knapping and thinking about the historical roots to our current stage of development.
What is now a critical advanced highly paid skill on the manufacturing factory floor, the mental 3D manipulation of moveable interacting parts (Davidson, 2012^), is a skill that began as a critical survival skill. this skill was of such value that it literally drove the development of the wrists and fingers of hominids throughout the millions of years of evolution after the species first stood up. This knowledge and skill of this giftedness of our species is increasingly lost in the "sit still and read" style of too many school classrooms. However, this ability to see an object in the mind and work it into reality is a skill that can still be taught with a little rock, and a piece of deer antler or a lump of clay in art class or other media and material for creative activity which fits well in classroom space. It was and still is our first problem solving literacy. Keep our historical background in mind as you peer into tomorrow's economy.
3D Replicating Science Fiction
3D printing is different technically yet similiar in concept to science fiction examples which have long played with the idea of future cultures that use computers to replicate real world objects at the molecular level. See 3 Star Trek commanders exploring molecular replication. Though this level of replication is beyond current technology, there is no theoretical reason that ongoing research into this area will not ultimately succeed, but no one has done it yet.
Watch Tom Paris order tomato soup at the replicator (above).
Watch Dr. Crusher interact with a replicator crash.
3D Printing Reality
In the 21st century we do not know how to do molecular construction of objects, but small steps are being taken in a direction called 3D printing. In the non-science fiction world, the range of things being replicated is much more narrow, starting with replacing items that can also be made using traditional manufacturing techniques. What is different is that such manufacturing doesn't require a factory building with all its employees, just a 3D printer which in some sizes could sit on a desk. The expectation is that it will become integrated into even consumer level use. For example, Staples is the first major company to offer 3D printing services using paper as its material for 3D construction, which unlike other 3D printing services allows a very high quality of color detail to be used for creating prototypes and art projects (Mack, 2012^).
A 3D printer can even come in a briefcase (Clark, 2012^) as in the short video clip below.
The fast paced video below shows in five minutes one way the complete process might work for a wide range of users. Beginning with the complete setup of the 3D printer with a personal computer, the video shows the downloading and setup of the free software from ReplicatorG, the selection of a free design on a Web site, one example of using the software to modify the design, and the final steps to starting the printer. Not shown are the use of the software to initially create the design nor the actual printing. Video of the printer in operation will be found below.
You do not have to own a 3D printer to use the software to create designs. Any 3D software that can produce the correct file type containing the correct printer directions can produce a file that can be used by a 3D printer. Items created on your computer can be sent as email attachments to a site that has such a printer or can be hand carried to a site on a memory card or USB drive. One such location is Engineering facility at Western Carolina University where it can be printed (once the cost is paid for). The 3D printing facility just has to have a printer with sufficient size to print the object needed. Western Carolina University's Rapid Prototyping Lab has different kinds of these printers such as the Z400 model on the right.
Easy to use 3D software designed for non-engineering types, for home hobby, experimental tinkerers and kids is just becoming available. Even middle school children and undoubtably younger are finding access and learning the spatial thinking and other skills to produce a wide range of devices (Vance, 2012^). A number of different software options are available for exploring 3D capacity. In addition to the previously discussed ReplicatorG software, AutoDesk is one of the leading companies producing software for computer-assisted design and manufacture (CAD/CAM). Since 2011, they have introduced software designed for adult home users and beginners in 3D design work, and the pictures on their Web pages provide further example of possibilities. Their set of software includes 123D for easy modeling on a desktop computer; 123D Catch which takes photographs from almost any camera and can produce a 3D model; 123D Sculpt which allows users to shape, sculpt and paint on an iPad; and 123D Make which creates/prints do-it-yourself designs. Children might be introduced to 3D computer modeling using Spex, which also introduces spreadsheet modeling as a way to think about costs associated with moving beyond models to real world creation. A related application is Cosmic Blobs that enables children to shape models as if they were shaping clay. Cosmic Blob models can also be animated and included with background scenes, music and sound effects. Others have discovered that many autistic children can have a special ability to think visually and spatially and have made progress with a free 3D design program from Google called SketchUp (see Project Spectrum). Just as 3D printers are in their infancy, 3D software for a wider range of users is in its infancy as well.
Larger objects made from real size parts can be assembled into working prototypes using larger 3D printers, saving millions of dollars from traditional machining technologies. In the example videoclip below a prototype of an actual size turbo prop airplane engine was printed, assembled and tested.
3D Printing children's prosthetic devices
It easier to see the manufacturing potential, but somewhat harder to see the personal implications and the potential for rapid production of customized designs that can be continually modified to fit a changing situation. Children's prosthetic devices are one example (Yuan, 2012^), as in the videoclip below of a child wearing was scientists would call an exoskeleton.
Assessment is a rather simple affair with 3D printing. Can the creation do what the designer intended?
3D printing implications
Though 3D printing is a long way from science fiction's "make anything" concept, there is much that it can make. Further, everyone understands the reality of what has happened to American and European factory jobs as manufacturing plants left their countries for cheaper labor in low wage emerging economies. What if 3D printing could turn this around? Most of us don't need a 3D printed airplane engine (left image) or a prosthetic device (right image). The wide range of what is possible is significant. Do you need a new extension cord that is shorter or longer than the ones available in the store? Go to your 3D printer and make one, changing the length parameter in the software, watching it change shape on a computer screen and then appear for your use. Electronic components including wires are now being sprayed into place ("Print Me", 2012^). Did your flippy sandals wear out? Invent your own entirely unique design and print a new pair. Taking the results from a 3D printer and making it useable can still involves some clean up and assembly, some additional labor; however, if you can use 3D software to design your own unique sandals, and if the design is creative enough, then you could put your desigin online at Amazon.com and charge others each time they download and print the design in their home. Designs that require more clean-up and assembly may simply require going downtown or to a 3D printer store at the mall to pick up an order that was manufactured and post-processed at the store itself. UPS and FedEx might even evolve from shipping companies to post-production and assembly store chains.
What about using a 3D printer to make a new 3D printer or ever larger 3D printers? What about 3D printing a new bike, chair, boat or new engine for your car that includes wires, sensors and other electronics? In principle, yes; some items just require room sized 3D printers, which are already being used. In fact, the technology is not that far advanced, yet it is advancing rapidly (Cole, 2012^). In 5-10 years will it advance enough that shipping products made in Chinese factories on giant ships will no longer be cost effective? Many think that a significant turn-around is possible. Serious business and economic publications such as the Economist see 3D printing as the beginning of a new third age of manufacturing ("A Third", 2012^).
In the pre-industrial society of the 1800's and earlier, a time and culture in which a growing group of skilled craftsman produced all the durable goods that their largely agricultural community needed. Large scale manufacturing in factory assembly lines had not yet been invented. By the 1800's the industrial revolution was in full swing with dramatic cultural transformations including mass movement of population from rural areas to cities; in two hundred years the world population increased sixfold while the per capita income increased over ten times previous levels (Maddison, 2003^), an unprecedented surge of development in human history. By the end of the 1900's, e.g., the 20th century, a large percentage of factory-based industrial companies generally left the United States and many other advanced counties in pursuit of cheaper labor elsewhere. Because urban areas have in part been built up because of the concentration of product availability in major cities, this could have an enormous impact on the relationship between rural and high density urban areas. Will it lead to a long reverse exodus from major cities in the same way the industrial revolution led an exodus from the farm? Why drive to "the big city" to get greater selection and cost competition when the product can be reviewed online then printed at home or locally, then edited on a home computer if the fit or color was not just right? Such a future holds the potential for new transformations, just as significant as those which occurred in the switch from the agricultural age to the industrial age. What thinking and composition skills should our curriculum be teaching children now so that after 15 years of the advancement of such technologies they are prepared to work and invent new culture, new ways to work, and new businesses?
We may in some way be returning to aspects of the skilled designer age of the 1700's but with a whole new set of high technology resources. If today's schools and educational systems are a product of the industrial age and factory model thinking, what will schools, education, teaching and learning need to look like in a "personal factory" future that is wired to the global Internet and uses the full range of the digital palette to communicate and create? Is there sufficient creativity and productivity in being proficient with the new digital tools that could yield another tenfold increase in global per capita income in a new and post-industrial revolution?
At whatever pace this develops, the end result will become one more technology that transforms our cultural lives and the nature of employment. Cheap labor is being replaced by smart labor. This should be having a direct impact on our classroom curriculum practices today. Today's kindergarten child will be graduating from high school when these 3D printing technologies are significantly advanced from today's 3D printing capacity, when the need for someone skilled in using software to think in 3D will be much greater. Once again the digital age has raised the need for stronger skills with creativity, style and inventiveness.
Solid print: Making things with a 3D printer changes the rules of manufacturing. (2012, April 21). The Economist. http://www.economist.com/node/21552892
Wohlers Report (2009). State of the Industry Annual Worldwide Progress Report on Additive Manufacturing, http://www.wohlersassociates.com/, ISBN 0-9754429-5-3.
The idea of 3D printing a physical object that you can hold in your hand is not yet a common experience, but the potential is enormous. The image on the left shows the design created with 3D software, then two objects on the keyboard that are real prints of the object using different kinds of plastics and coloring for different effects. All products produced by 3D printers must first be 3D software designs, simulations of reality edited on computer screens whose designs then direct the printing process.
(Click picture on the left to see the movie.) However, with 3D, the print head is going back to the same spot again and again, laying down ever thickening layers of liquid, spray or powder in hundreds if not thousands of layers or more. 
The chemical types being sprayed vary widely including paper mache, baking pasta (Clark, 2012
Any 3D software that can produce the correct file type containing the correct printer directions can produce a file that can be used by a 3D printer. Items created on your computer can be sent as email attachments to a site that has such a printer or can be hand carried to a site on a memory card or USB drive. One such location is Engineering facility at Western Carolina University where it can be printed (once the cost is paid for). The 3D printing facility just has to have a printer with sufficient size to print the object needed. Western Carolina University's Rapid Prototyping Lab has 
Though 3D printing is a long way from science fiction's "make anything" concept, there is much that it can make. Further, everyone understands the reality of what has happened to American and European factory jobs as manufacturing plants left their countries for cheaper labor in low wage emerging economies. 
What if 3D printing could turn this around? Most of us don't need a 3D printed airplane engine (left image) or a prosthetic device (right image). The wide range of what is possible is significant. Do you need a new extension cord that is shorter or longer than the ones available in the store? Go to your 3D printer and make one, changing the length parameter in the software, watching it change shape on a computer screen and then appear for your use. Electronic components including wires are now being sprayed into place ("Print Me", 2012