i3 - January/February 2016 - 25

At CES 2016, visit
the 3D Printing
Marketplace,
presented by
TCT Magazine +
Personalize, The
Sands, Level 2.

WHEN FORM IS FUNCTION

A STARTUP EYES THE 4D WORLD

Starting out at MIT in 2011, Formlabs has been on the forefront of the 3D printing movement, bringing engineers and artists together to create sophisticated
projects using additive technology. Jennifer Milne, who works in product
development for Formlabs in Somerville, MA, shares what we might see coming from the industry.
How do you predict that 4D printing will be used?
Self-assembling structures are emerging as an interesting solution to build
large structures in an economical way within a small build volume. We love the
work coming out of the self-assembly lab and the Mediated Matter group at
MIT.

NO ASSEMBLY
REQUIRED

KINEMATICS PRINTS THE ULTIMATE
FASHION STATEMENT
The Kinematics dress has been making headlines for good
reason. It is not your typical fashion statement. The dress, created by Nervous Systems, a design studio in Massachusetts, is
among the first made from 4D printing technology.
"We refer to Kinematics as a 4D printing system," Nervous
Systems Creative Director Jessica Rosendrantz explained in a
recent interview, "because it generates compressed objects
that unfold into their intended shape after printing. The garments we've designed can only expand to their full size after
being removed from the printer and they do so automatically,
no assembly required."
The dress is composed of more than 2,000 pieces that are
connected by tiny hinges, which caught the eye of curators at
the Museum of Modern Art who acquired it for its upcoming
exhibition, "This is For Everyone: Design Experiments for the
Common Good," which opens in February.
"We sometimes forget that new technologies are not
inherently democratic," says MOMA. "Is design in the digital,
so often simply assumed to be for the greater good, truly for
everyone?"

What's the most interesting way it's being applied?
We have seen interesting projects like Hyperform, where a team printed the
world's longest chain (more than 50 feet) on a Form 1+. Folding algorithms are
being created that can reorient articulated geometries to fit within a smaller
build volume, and the 3D printed dress from Nervous System is another great
example. In the next few years more complex and elaborate projects will
emerge, and there will be interesting implications for architecture and fashion.

Courtesy of n-e-r-v-s-o-u-s

What will it take for 4D printing to create the interest needed to grow?
4D printing has implications on printing efficiencies. While there is always a
race to make 3D printers print faster, and at the highest possible resolution, 4D
printing provides a path to manipulate the object to be printed in such a way
that it will use materials, print time, and print volume most efficiently. Packing
the 3D model in such a way can create an object that is quite complicated to
print, and so it is important to create increasingly capable printing technology
that is up to the job. There is also a need for advanced printing materials that
can be programmed and manipulated in new ways.
What is Formlabs working on in this realm?
Formlabs is focused on creating increasingly capable and accessible highprecision desktop 3D printing. We recently announced the Form 2, which
we're excited to showcase at CES. The Form 2 is the most advanced 3D
printer on the desktop with a 40 percent bigger volume and host of new
features. We're excited to see people push applications like 4D printing even
further.
C TA . t e c h / i 3

JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2016

http://n-e-r-v-o-u-s.com/ http://n-e-r-v-o-u-s.com/ http://www.moma.org/calendar/exhibitions/1501?locale=en http://formlabs.com/ http://www.moma.org/calendar/exhibitions/1501?locale=en http://thecreatorsproject.vice.com/blog/plus-size-printing-with-hyperform http://CTA.tech/i3

i3 - January/February 2016

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