Generating cost-effective models for 3D printing

Abstract

3D printing techniques are becoming popular and common. They provide a nice and simple solution to convert a digital model into a physical model. In 3D printing, additive processes are used where successive layers of materials are laid down under computer control. 3D printing can print out objects of almost any shape or geometry specified by a 3D model or other electronic data source. As a result, 3D printing techniques have been applied in various areas including design visualization, prototyping architecture and healthcare. However, 3D printing also has its limitation of being time-consuming and wasting printing material. Compared with traditional manufacturing which takes minutes to produce one object, 3D printing usually takes from several hours to several days to print, depending on the size and material. [1] In this project, we will investigate techniques that convert a given 3D mesh model into a cost-effective model for 3D printing. In particular, we will study how to remove some interior parts of a 3D model to save the cost of material and printing time as well. Particularly, we will look into 3D geometry processing and STL file generation. At the end, a web-based system will be developed to implement the processes of taking OBJ file as input and outputting a cost-effective 3D model in STL format.