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Kinect plus 3D printing equals instant miniature you

by JC Fletcher on Feb 27th 2011 4:30PM

Thanks to an inventive, and kind of bizarre, project, people have immortalized themselves as Kinect sees them. The Fabricate Yourself project uses 3D models captured by Kinect as the basis for a 3D-printed figure.

Designer Karl D.D. Willis came up with the project as an interactive installation for the Tangible, Embedded, and Embodied Interaction conference. Attendees's shapes were captured by Kinect, and then turned into pieces of a giant jigsaw puzzle. But the implications are larger than just a cool thing at a conference. As 3D printers become cheaper, it will be possible for more people to use this technology to take 3D snapshots as if they were taking Polaroids.

It will also be possible to make a tiny action-figure version of yourself to fight with the Hulk. Not that we, as totally mature adults, have any interest in such a thing, of course.

Via: I.Materialize
Source: Fabricate Yourself

Tags: 3d-printing, fabricate-yourself, kinect, microsoft, pc, xbox

Reader Comments (44)

Clever.

Some intelligent programming to line up the images from multiple snapshots... or hell, even a video... Yeah, totally possible!

Personal action figure would be both awesome and personally depressing. I can't wait!

The Kinect is the new wizard wand.

@Ranko That is all well and good. But I think we need to get down to the real point.

Are you a wizard?

They've been doing this with the PS eye for long time now. I've been waiting to see what the scans a prints with kinect look like. I was kinda expecting a better looking scans.

@mmmfishtacos These aren't full-res. From the source article:

As we wanted to be able to fabricate a large number of models, we kept the size of the pieces down to approximately 3x3cm. To print at the 3x3cm size we only needed to use one quarter of the full Kinect resolution.

@mmmfishtacos

Not sure what this has to do with the PSEye, you know it's not a 3D scanner right?

@Raffi256 Just let the PS3 fanboys dream......

@Flapjackal that would be a valid comment it it had any thing to do with the scanning which i was talking about and not the prints,

@Raffi256 Well if it's not a 3d scanner then whats kinect doing there? you didn't see the people playing around in front of kinect take scans from the screen to make the prints?

@BlackLuigi7 has nothing to do with being a fan boy, I really expected it to capture 3d models better than what it was showing, and i have a feeling it's more of an software issue than anything.i guess i must have dreamed these too... http://hackaday.com/2009/12/30/update-realtime-3d-for-you-too/ http://hackaday.com/2009/12/30/update-realtime-3d-for-you-too/

I would go out and buy one right now if it could help me scan and model cars. With a simple set up rather than using a complex one with the eye.

@mmmfishtacos Sorry, this is the second one http://kotaku.com/#!5627191/turn-your-playstation-camera-into-a-3d-scanner

@mmmfishtacos When did anyone do this with the playstation camera?

@mmmfishtacos; "They've been doing this with the PS eye for long time now."

Yeah, but the difference is that nobody cared when they did it with the PS Eye.

@mmmfishtacos Hey boys and girls, let's play "Spot the Fanboy!"

@mmmfishtacos

there is such a big difference between kinect and that pseye setup. so you're either a big fanboy or you just don't know what you're talking about. i'm going with a 50/50 split (fanboy/don't know what you're talking about).

@sho220 I don't think you know what your talking about. Really what was the point of your post? Do you even know what I'm saying, nor did i bash kinect. What i wasn't to see for it is a sold 3d scanner which i haven't seen yet. I want to be able to scan life size cars and use the model in a program like Rino or Sketchup to modify. I know kinect can do this. And a much better job, i mention the eye and fanboys like you self jump all over it.

@mmmfishtacos
you said:
"They've been doing this with the PS eye for long time now."
you can create 3d images with any two webcams using the method that's outlined in those links you provided. however, it is not the same as kinect. so saying, "They've been doing this with the PS eye for long time now", is definitely incorrect.

@sho220 google is your friend, go learn.

I can see this in being in some stores as souvenirs, if they can make it fast enough

@Prboi Not going to happen until printers come way down in price. Right now a speedy 3d printer goes for about $10,000, and the cheapest you can get fully assembled printer for is between $800-1400, depending on how quickly you need it.

@Shadsy Maybe for mail order. "Speedy" printers still take several hours to print off a few square inches.

@Prboi

I went to the Zoo many years ago, and they had these vending machines where you'd put in some money, and they'd create a plastic figure of whatever animal the machine was near. It'd make it right there in front of you, it was pretty cool.

/randomstory

Custom Real Dolls based on anyone you can get in front of a camera by 2020. You heard it here first.

@(Unverified)

I can not wait to hear about the lawsuits on that one.

@Xoonaka
My Marylin Monrobot.

@(Unverified) I can't wait for my Bill Gates and Phil Molyneux (or whoever runs sony) action figures to come!

@(Unverified)
custom lifesize..... >.> 6.6

@VeeDeeVee Good luck getting her in front of the camera.

Oh geeze, you know people ae going to be making nude statues of themselves with this XD

@killer rin - If David can be immortalized in nude statue form, so too can I, good sir!

I have one of these printers! I am so doing this!! just need to buy a kinect...

So we can soon print our own carbonated Han Solo?

@VampireHunterZ Carbonited?

@Flapjackal
Nah, it's carbonated. Everyone wants a fizzy Han Solo.

Pretty soon young boys and girls will be taking snapshots and printing out sex toys.

NEXT ON FOX NEWS

@Anticrawl
Your hatred for Fox News makes you look like a bigger idiot than Fox News.

@Special Agent Steve

Who said I hated Fox News? I'm just enacting a likely future scenario.

Way to jump to conclusions - makes you look like an ass.

@Special Agent Steve ...You probably never watched FOX News before, or you actually believe the stupid shit that they might or might not feed you.

@BlackLuigi7

Maybe if I said "NEXT ON MSNBC" he wouldn't have lost his shit so easily?

All news stations are the same, they love glamorizing non-issues.

Would be cool if people got imaginative with it, as in, not just taking a picture of themselves. I can imagine people making cool ones like they had at E3 (09?) when they first showed the Kinect and made an elephant.

But it would have to be something you can have in your house. Kinect is still amazing, can't wait for when these get used by developers.

@Snappyguy

HELL YES! I'm going to hold some of my miniatures up the kinect and 3D print them

This will be awesome for the Shadowrun Minature boardgame I'm making.

@jmood88 Click the links above they've been doing it for quite some time.

Flapjackal sorry, youre correct I'm an idiot.

And how soon before 3D penis printouts?

@Shadsy
that's what i thought until i remembered what one of those things costs. Even if they do get cheaper I'll still probably have to sell my second kidney for one.

Breaking News

Kinect plus 3D printing equals instant miniature you

Reader Comments (44)

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 4:34PM Robborboy said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 4:37PM Xoonaka said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 4:43PM Ranko said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 5:37PM Robborboy said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 4:58PM mmmfishtacos said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 5:53PM Flapjackal said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 6:17PM Raffi256 said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 6:56PM BlackLuigi7 said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 8:16PM mmmfishtacos said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 8:19PM mmmfishtacos said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 8:33PM jmood88 said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 10:47PM Mouthsmasher said

Posted: Feb 28th 2011 12:26AM PoisonedAl said

Posted: Feb 28th 2011 1:12AM sho220 said

Posted: Feb 28th 2011 1:22AM mmmfishtacos said

Posted: Feb 28th 2011 5:02AM sho220 said

Posted: Feb 28th 2011 3:47PM mmmfishtacos said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 5:07PM Prboi said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 5:31PM Faceless Troll said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 6:38PM Faceless Troll said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 6:44PM Ezio Auditore da Firenze said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 5:18PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 5:31PM Xoonaka said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 6:42PM VeeDeeVee said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 6:59PM BlackLuigi7 said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 9:38PM darkfocus said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 10:40PM WiNGSPANTT from TopTierTacticsco said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 5:23PM killer rin said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 7:12PM BananaBoat said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 5:24PM AntiVillian said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 5:39PM VampireHunterZ said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 6:03PM Flapjackal said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 6:16PM sadistic freek said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 6:09PM Anticrawl said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 6:51PM Special Agent Steve said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 6:52PM Anticrawl said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 7:01PM BlackLuigi7 said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 7:04PM Anticrawl said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 7:14PM Snappyguy said

Posted: Feb 28th 2011 4:03AM AntiVillian said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 8:24PM Anticrawl said

Posted: Feb 27th 2011 8:39PM mmmfishtacos said

Posted: Feb 28th 2011 1:14AM JonahFalcon said

Posted: Feb 28th 2011 12:30PM Che J P said

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