Jo Ratcliffe is a London based art director, illustrator and animator. Her in-house team studio consists of a specialist team focusing on illustration, animation, logo design and various other disciplines.
I was given the unique opportunity to work alongside Jo and her team to produce a three dimensional zoetrope which would exhibit at Somerset house London.
Animator Klaas-Harm de Boer had the task to translate Jo's unique illustrations into 3D models.
Jo's female illustrated character Zoe
Once Klass had finalized the animation sequence myself and Klass went through
the process of the adapting his models for 3D printing.
Designing models for 3D printing can be a challenging task if you don't know the proper guide lines, what makes sense for a 3D model on screen may not translate well for an actual manufactured piece.
Using a program called Netfab I assessed each of the 32 models and ran diagnostics.
I checked each model for inverted faces, multiple shells, holes, flipped triangles and for general errors.
Printing each of the 32 models in one go is wishful thinking as FDM 3D printing technology
still has some kinks which can cause print failures to occur on long prints.
After my assessment I advised Klass to slice each model into three parts to reduce
the chance of a print failure occurring.
the process of the adapting his models for 3D printing.
Designing models for 3D printing can be a challenging task if you don't know the proper guide lines, what makes sense for a 3D model on screen may not translate well for an actual manufactured piece.
Using a program called Netfab I assessed each of the 32 models and ran diagnostics.
I checked each model for inverted faces, multiple shells, holes, flipped triangles and for general errors.
Printing each of the 32 models in one go is wishful thinking as FDM 3D printing technology
still has some kinks which can cause print failures to occur on long prints.
After my assessment I advised Klass to slice each model into three parts to reduce
the chance of a print failure occurring.
Before & After spliting
Torso, Legs and head orientated on Makerbot print bed
After running several test prints I determined that the orientating the torso facing upwards, the legs facing with the hip flat on the bed and with the head facing upright was ideal for achieving the best results in terms of quality. The models in this set orientation required little support material and printed well at 200 microns in resolution.
After each print finished I sanded down and removed excess build material so that Jo's team could get straight to work with the finishing.
I suggested the use of an epoxy resin to secure each part together with an additional wire tube for each model which would be inserted in both the head and shoulder section for added strength.
After each print finished I sanded down and removed excess build material so that Jo's team could get straight to work with the finishing.
I suggested the use of an epoxy resin to secure each part together with an additional wire tube for each model which would be inserted in both the head and shoulder section for added strength.
Post Production
Enjoy this video we made to share our experience of animating, printing and gluing together our first 3D printed Zoetrope.
It was a great privilege to work along side Jo and Klass and even more rewarding to see the Zoetrope in action at Somerset house. I look forward to more projects that use 3D printing in this innovative way.
