It’s been a wild ride for Carbon3D and their CLIP technology ever since CEO and co-founder Joseph DeSimone presented the technology live on stage during his TED2015 presentation in Vancouver on March 16th. “What we think of as 3D printing,” said DeSimone, “…is really just 2D printing over and over…slowly.” If the live Carbon3D CLIP…

In what was certainly one of the product design events of the year, DEVELOP3D Live went down last month in Warwick, England and featured a host of talks and workshops centered around CAD and the near-future of product design. Among others who were on-hand to talk about their latest technologies included SolidWorks CEO Gian Paolo…

Before the era of smartphone video and video sharing sites such as YouTube and Vimeo, one of the more frustrating skills to learn was sketching – and to be more specific – design sketching. As the old saying goes, “kids today don’t know how good they have it,” using video to learn new skills is…

Ever since they hit the block with their Pixologic partnership in late January earlier this year, Luxion has showed no signs of slowing down the KeyShot awesome train for 2015. The KeyShot for ZBrush + Bridge was – and still is – one of the company’s biggest announcements to date and effectively opened up their…

Okay, perhaps we’re all glad that winter is over (at least in the Northeast US) – but that doesn’t mean we can’t start preparing next winter’s adventures…particularly if it means having a full-year to consider riding a pair of handmade skis on the slopes next season. In the case that you find yourself in Norway…

We live in a world full of amazing design software and hi-tech automated machines. These “tools” are designed to reduce design cycle times and leverage productivity. Companies spend a lot of money on these tools and expect a productivity pay off from their designers. Some of the new expectations are realistic and some are not.…

Most ‘zen’ practitioners will tell you that reaching a state of higher consciousness is not an art but a way of life, where “awareness” is “consciousness”. The emphasis on the present moment is perhaps Zen’s most distinctive characteristic. In modern times, finding the time and ability to disconnect from technology, busy schedules and sensory overload…

It use to be that when you wanted to get rid of a well-made oak dining chair, you would cut it down for kindling, toss it to the curb or set it on your front porch as a friendly gesture to that raccoon who was maimed by your dog last winter. Rick Koren does none…

It goes without saying – science should be (and most often is) fun and entertaining. When we’re curious our minds are the most open to new ideas and sometimes people forget that ‘playing’ is the most natural form of discovery and exploration – especially where innovation for product design is concerned. Nanotechnology is the study…

Last time we checked in with YouTube’s King of Random (AKA Grant Thompson), he was teaching his 3-million YouTube subscribers how to create a backyard foundry for melting down recycled aluminum cans for use in other projects. Well, the self-described “Mad Scientist” is at it again and this time, he’s teaching those who have followed…

For some, working between the worlds of art, design, craft and technology seems like a part of your everyday workflow. For inventor Dominic Wilcox, these means literally taking objects and ideas from across the widest points of any given scale and merging them into singular concepts that mix the four disciplines to create innovative and…

Some of the best conceptual manufacturing equipment designs that we’ve seen over the past few years have involved altering traditional processes into more simplified approaches that strip away the complexities in favor of the bare minimum. Among others that come to mind instantly is Dave Hakkens’ Precious Plastic project – where he has simplified traditional…

Innocent automobile drivers out for their Sunday drive in London in the fall of 2013 may have felt the noticeable increase in temperature, the sudden blinding windshield glare and continued motoring down Eastcheap Street with little more than an automatic brief adjustment of the climate control. If they were to stop and peer upward through their…

It was a sad day when My Robot Nation was gobbled by 3D Systems and subsequently buried on the Cubify website. (You can find it here now: http://cubify.com/en/store/app/JOW97UI59Y.) They were onto something. It’s the first site where I sat down with my kiddos, talked bots, made bots and bought bots. A year later, a man…

Molding (the manufacturing process, not the food spoilage one) has been around for a good six millennia, with a cast copper frog from 3200 B.C.E. being among the oldest surviving examples. The technique has adapted along with emergent technology throughout history, up to and including quick-set resins, CAD, and (as you saw here on SolidSmack…

You would think that for as long as wood has been around, its various possibilities and forms within its natural state would have been exhausted by now – not unlike various pop music melodies. However every now and again, we’re reminded of just how many more possibilities are out there that takes the old and…

With so many cool things coming out each week, it can be hard to wade through all the rock-awesomeness. With ‘Cool Tools’, we’ve done the hard work for you. This week we saw everything from a storage container inspired by eating yogurt to a hut on wheels, a new way to write emails, the launch…

How would you connect the budding thinkers of the future with the best of the innovative tools to realize their dreams? It’s simple: take it to their door step. Well, that’s what North Carolina-based Betaversity’s BetaBox is designed for anyways. The shipping container-turned fablab packs more than enough practical and clever tools that bring some…

It’s no secret that although 3D printing has emerged to become a mainstream technology, the speed of being able to convert a digital file into a physical object leaves much to be desired regardless of the additive manufacturing technology being used. In what sounds like something that’s too good to be true, Redwood City, California…

After moving from Japan to LA in 1999, a young Shin Okuda held a variety of different jobs over the following couple of years before finding work with a sculptor who also happened to do furniture pieces. After spending countless hours in the studio absorbing the various woodworking techniques and studying designers, Okuda set out…

It’s been a wild and crazy week for the Apple Watch, but the best parts of Apple’s Spring Forward event this past Monday had little to do with the final details of the Watch at all, but rather the material and process videos behind how the watch even got there. While many have been moaning…

Dave Petrillo and Dave Jackson made waves with the Coffee Joulies; and now their new sensation – Booze Joulies – keeps alcohol cold without watering it down is creating quite a literal stir. According to the team, a few Booze Joulies in a glass of room temperature scotch gives “medium chill without the flavors becoming…

Starting next month, some flat-pack college dorm furniture may be more design and environmentally-savvy than that table you bought last year that you swore would be handed down to your grandchildren. Thankfully, the flat-pack furniture in question won’t take too much of a dent out of your wallet in the case that you want to…

Although we’ve been seeing an increase in wooden bicycle concepts over the past few years, few have ever made it outside of the concept stage – and for many bicycle enthusiasts, this is for good reason. Despite the unarguable beauty of a handcrafted wooden bicycle frame, most designs have come across as purely that: aesthetics…

Although living in a big city may have a seemingly endless list of perks for many, living in a cultural epicenter with millions of other people is not without its drawbacks, too. Aside from high real estate costs and a lack of greenery, many who work on creative projects are oftentimes left with having to…

There’s something about intricate woodworking that makes the salivary glands kick into overdrive and dormant facial hair follicles sprout anew. Scott Lewis doesn’t need facial hair to prove he’s a wood-shaping creator of uber-cool cutting boards; All he needs is some fancy camerawork, bearing-guided router bits and multiple bandsaw cuts that are smoother than lacquered…

Amongst the sad Keanu Reeves figurines and modified vacuum cleaner parts, additive manufacturing is also stepping in to solve some major medical problems in ways no one predicted it would. Similar to how Makerbot and RepRap managed to cut the cost of desktop rapid prototyping, Philadelphia-based startup BioBots has been focusing their efforts on radically…

Dutch Supermarket chain Albert Hejin (AH XL) have taken it upon themselves to create a user-facing kiosk and a customized chocolate 3D printer to allow customers to make cake designs on the fly. The Dutch always strike me as one of the few countries that like living on the bleeding edge of the Future. Don’t worry…

We’ve seen quite the gamut of 3D printers come out of the crowdfunding space, and although many have been able to take off successfully, few have really been able to hit the jackpot and sustain long after their campaign ended. CEL Robox has been one of the exceptions, releasing new software, finding new partners and so far have…

It’s one of the most unusual things that Autodesk has ever done – a software company making hardware products – and now you can get your hands on it. Precise, Sleek and Open-Source, the Ember was created to be a 3D Printer for everyone so anyone can easily physicalize models via Autodesk’s very own Spark Platform and…

One of the principal problems on living far away from home is doing the most with less. No, I am not equating living on Mars to your first year at college, eating Ketchup Sandwiches to stay alive. Getting to Mars is not easy, and if you can build ‘the most’ with the least amount of tools and…

Don your favorite bath robe, cream that coffee and get comfortable with this weekend’s SolidSmack Weekend Reader. This week we saw everything from a new parametric multi-material CAD program to an update to the popular Paper by FiftyThree iPad app and more. So lay back, relax and take a load off while reading the top…

Jupiter Ascending by the Wachowski siblings opened this weekend. After seeing the original trailer, I was struck by the hovering, glowing cool factor of the boots for “Caine” (played by Channing Tatum). Hmmm, LEDs on the bottom of the sole. And there lying in the corner of my shop, an old pair of my boots. It…

In the annals of getting-things-made, there have been two distinct approaches that have become apparent in the past two years. One is the classic Shapeways/Ponoko approach (or B2C), which depends on a company owning digital fabrication machines and putting all of the models on one build plate and shipping it to you and/or having a…

As 3D printers become cheaper and more accessible, it was only a matter of time before a 3D printer trickled down into actually being a ‘toy’. After all, this has happened before with other methods of manufacturing including vacuum forming and casting molds, among others. As anybody who has used an FDM 3D printer knows…

At only 12.7 MB, this new CAD package packs a punch! Although it may come with a bit of a steep learning curve, Monolith enables users to vary the quantity of multiple materials on a voxel-by-voxel basis. New 3D Printing technologies – such as those seen in Stratasys’ Objet multi-material 3D printers – allow the…

When it comes to CAD software, ZBrush, like many other types of digital sculpting software, can oftentimes be compared to the odd friend in the group that nobody really knows well, but always wants to be better friends with. Most often used by character designers and conceptual artists, the extremely powerful digital ‘clay’ modeler is…

Brace yourselves – this is actually a pretty big deal. Last week, researchers out of the University of Rochester used laser etching methods to create unique patterns that made metal surfaces extremely hydrophobic i.e. water-repellant. Unlike chemical treatments like Teflon-coatings or Ultra-Ever Dry, they claim that this material is much more rugged and long-lasting. In…

With so many cool things coming out each week, it can be hard to wade through all the rock-awesomeness. With ‘Cool Tools’, we’ve done the hard work for you. This week we saw everything from a brilliant popcorn machine to the release of Microsoft Outlook on iPhone and…a blowdart for shooting laser-guided marshmallows (??!!) Ready?…

With an 80 cent piezo buzzer, tungsten wire and some spare MDF, Dan Berard has managed to build an working Scanning Tunneling Microscope that can image whole atomic structures. Arthur C. Clarke once said that any sufficiently advanced technology would be indistinguishable from magic… …my variation would be “any sufficiently advanced technology made in your house…

WinSun, the Chinese firm that managed to one-up the competition in mega-scale 3D Printing have recently released a new set of pictures that highlight their latest large-scale structures. These humungous one-story to six-story buildings were printed using specially-formulated extruded cement, which were each made in separate pieces and lifted into place. None of the pieces, from what…

Back when it was announced in Fall of 2013, the Martin Jetpack P12 Prototype promised to be the final version of what would unofficially become the world’s first commercially-available jetpack design capable of cutting through the sky a la The Rocketeer. Created by New Zealand-based Martin Aircraft company, the future-inspired designers had previously promised a…

Since graduating with an architecture degree a few years ago, French product designer Pierre Guibert naturally drifted into product design after working with prototyping materials extensively and being inspired to pursue smaller-scale projects during his time in university. Working primarily with cardboard – including developing a line of handmade cardboard lampshades that he also teaches…

It’s been almost a year since we’ve heard from Greg Mark, founder of MarkForged and creator of the Mark One carbon fiber 3D printer. When we ran into him at SolidWorks World 2014 last year, his 3D printer was the talk of the show and had SolidWorks executives including Gian Paolo Bassi talking about the…

It’s been a forest of quiet chirps, gentle rains and hidden high fives in Cambridge, MA, headquarters of Onshape. The company launched quietly in 2012 as Belmont Technology Inc. and started turning heads with an all-star roster of CAD industry elite. Now with a shapely new name and a team of nearly 100, you can…

Senvol has been a company on our radar for the past two years. Started by Wharton grads Zach Simkins and Annie Wang, Senvol’s original intention was to help companies find uses for 3D Printing outside of just rapid prototyping, identifying uses like producing discontinued OEM parts or finding parts that could be more cheaply manufactured…

As the tech industry patiently the awaits the release of the Apple Watch – and more importantly, how the public responds to it – a rise of quieter smartwatch concepts have been coming out of the woodwork that may give the Cupertino company a sharp jab in the smartwatch gut. With interest surrounding some yet-to-be-released…

Among other product designers who have been adding a modern twist to classic toy designs, Detroit, Michigan-based Matthew Tait of TAIT Design Co. has done an exceptional job of combining DIY interactivity to otherwise perfect wooden toy designs. The designer, who started TAIT Design Co. in 2013, went to school to become a graphic designer…

If you still haven’t managed to remove the ‘Everything is Awesome’ LEGO Movie song from your head, this next bit of awesome news probably isn’t going to help much…unless of course, keeping the song stuck in your head is awesome (it’s awesome). Inspired by his three awesome sons and their desire to create more complex…

Basic Conception (AKA BiCi) is a smart bicycle with tech that will make you drool all over the handlebars of your Huffy. Among other features, the goodies include built-in sensors that track your cycling stats to keep your ‘quantified self’ busy during the duration of your route to grandma’s house. Built by AOAO Studio, the…