3D Sculpting vs 3D Printing
|
3D Sculpting
3D Sculpture is a subtractive process. Large blocks of foam are sculpted into shape by CNC wire cutters or routers. |
3D Printing
3D Printing is an additive process. Special 3D printing material is laid down and formed into shape inside a 3D printer. |
Customers often ask us: "So are you a 3D printer?" or "Why don't you do 3D printing?"
The short answer is we wanted to make things BIG and it's really difficult and expensive to 3D print on a grand scale. Prohibitively expensive when it comes to our clients budgets. That doesn't mean 3D printing is bad or unrealistic, it just isn't the best option for what we do.
Why the cost difference? Materials. 3D printable material costs 10 times what foam costs. From there the cost to coat and finish each piece will be the same.
3D Printers excel at making smaller, intricate objects. 3D Digital Sculpture produces large-scale, attention grabbing projects. It's not just the difference in material cost. Large, open machines like our wire cutter and router make it easier to create large projects than smaller, closed 3D printers. Our CNC Wire cutter can cut out a 4 foot 3D Letter in a fraction of the time it would take a printer to create anything of the sort. Projects like the cosmetics bottle in the video below would use a great deal of 3D printed material instead of inexpensive foam.
The short answer is we wanted to make things BIG and it's really difficult and expensive to 3D print on a grand scale. Prohibitively expensive when it comes to our clients budgets. That doesn't mean 3D printing is bad or unrealistic, it just isn't the best option for what we do.
Why the cost difference? Materials. 3D printable material costs 10 times what foam costs. From there the cost to coat and finish each piece will be the same.
3D Printers excel at making smaller, intricate objects. 3D Digital Sculpture produces large-scale, attention grabbing projects. It's not just the difference in material cost. Large, open machines like our wire cutter and router make it easier to create large projects than smaller, closed 3D printers. Our CNC Wire cutter can cut out a 4 foot 3D Letter in a fraction of the time it would take a printer to create anything of the sort. Projects like the cosmetics bottle in the video below would use a great deal of 3D printed material instead of inexpensive foam.
