Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Hi!

I've just started a crowdfunding for 15 models in digital, not printed... the backgroun story isnt the main thing here, if you are interested on it please read it at the KS page...

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/395604309/scifi-miniatures-alien-and-human-complete-army/description

The question here is... Are there a market for digital sculpting without printing? of course, we need to consider the advances done in 3D printing in the past five years, so, should we wait too long before this come to a reality, and people will buy directly the models in digital?

Saludos,


PS - If you want to know wich things we already released for the Total Extinction game for free, go to https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/30/617368.page#top

Hmm
...

Interesting.
You buy files and can print many or as few as you like...

Very small niche market, yes.

Consider that you are marketing miniatures (niche market) to those who also have access to 3d printing (smaller niche) and willing to pay for the files as opposed to a physical product (smaller niche).

 jmurph wrote:
Very small niche market, yes.

Consider that you are marketing miniatures (niche market) to those who also have access to 3d printing (smaller niche) and willing to pay for the files as opposed to a physical product (smaller niche).

Files may seem cheap but if you end up having to pay commercial for a 3d print run, and pay someone to doit.
They likely cost as much as buying em pre made...

 jhe90 wrote:

 jmurph wrote:
Very small niche market, yes.

They likely cost as much as buying em pre made...

That's my big "?" there, because I also think this is like buying the whole thing at once, but without the risk that, for example, the Total Extinction backers, run in that crowdfunding... Could it be that there's a market here, but still isn't really assumed?

 MkultraStudios wrote:

That's my big "?" there, because I also think this is like buying the whole thing at once, but without the risk that, for example, the Total Extinction backers, run in that crowdfunding... Could it be that there's a market here, but still isn't really assumed?

I think jmurph is correct. There is a market, it is just small. Given the advances in 3D printing in the last 5 years, I think the market will grow as 3D printing improves and becomes cheaper.

I know some have theorized that this method of miniature distribution could be the wave of the future, but I don't think we are there yet. Perhaps when the technology allows home printers priced at $1000 or so to produce models that $20k printers produce now, then players and collectors might start printing their own minis. The printed results would have to be worth the effort, though. Since these games rely on aesthetics, the models need to be close enough to traditionally produced miniatures to really gain a foot hold in the market place. A lot of 3D printed models that I have seen don't look high enough quality for me to want them in my collection. They often have strata from the printing process that detracts from the model. But again, with advances in printing technology that issue could likely disappear.

One issue that seems immediate to me is: How do you prevent piracy of files?

A re-cast miniature often (not always!) has telltale signs of being a knock off. Such signs are: double mold lines, use of inferior casting materials, flash that is cast in place to the model, etc. Also, there is a learning curve to casting your own models. Its labor intensive, you need to buy specialized equipment, and the materials one uses for metal and resin casting are toxic. Aside from needing specialized equipment (3D printer) those other obstacles are not in place for someone who desires to make pirated copies of 3D printed models. All they need is a printer and the model files and they are set.

How would a studio prevent a 3D file they sold from being reprinted by a non-buying user? I admittedly know very little of the technology behind 3D printers so perhaps there is an obvious safeguard to prevent such misuse, but my impression at least from MkultraStudios' KS, is that the backer would get files for the models and could presumably pass them on to someone else. Which then makes me wonder how a company like Questron could generate repeat business outside of creating new designs.

 DarkTraveler777 wrote:

 MkultraStudios wrote:



One issue that seems immediate to me is: How do you prevent piracy of files?

I've registered the sculpts... but I can't really do nothing to prevent piracy...

 DarkTraveler777 wrote:

 MkultraStudios wrote:

A re-cast miniature often (not always!) has telltale signs of being a knock off. Such signs are: double mold lines, use of inferior casting materials, flash that is cast in place to the model, etc. Also, there is a learning curve to casting your own models. Its labor intensive, you need to buy specialized equipment, and the materials one uses for metal and resin casting are toxic. Aside from needing specialized equipment (3D printer) those other obstacles are not in place for someone who desires to make pirated copies of 3D printed models. All they need is a printer and the model files and they are set.

Well, my first thought was people going to shapeways and Moddler, and places like that...

 DarkTraveler777 wrote:

 MkultraStudios wrote:

How would a studio prevent a 3D file they sold from being reprinted by a non-buying user? I admittedly know very little of the technology behind 3D printers so perhaps there is an obvious safeguard to prevent such misuse, but my impression at least from MkultraStudios' KS, is that the backer would get files for the models and could presumably pass them on to someone else. Which then makes me wonder how a company like Questron could generate repeat business outside of creating new designs.

I really rely on people's good trust... I mean, in the KS I specified that these models are only for personal use... Beyond that...


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I've updated with two free miniatures already ready for download

https://mega.nz/fm/AORyjSJb


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I've updated the project with two models ready to download, here...

"Get a sample of our work here... that way, you'll be able to know (more or less, because it depends of the size) how much would cost you to print these miniatures... to check our sculpt quality... among other things...

This kind of files can be read by Windows 10.

https://mega.nz/fm/AORyjSJb"

I could see this working with an different business models. Give away the files for a lot of the miniatures for free, so people could print their own models. It would be done to quickly build a player base for the game. It would work much like heavily discounted starter boxes work now. You then start to get some cash back by selling elite units and special character models.

But even that model is dependent on the price and quality of 3d printing coming way down.

Not at the moment. 3D printers right now are incapable of competing with traditional casting in terms of both miniature quality and cost effectiveness. If you have a cheap 3D printer that most people have access to, the miniatures are gonna be crap. To get miniature detail to the standards they were ~10 years ago, you're gonna be needing an insanely expensive 3D printer. And in neither case will actually making the miniatures be fast.

IMO, I think the practicality of 3D printers is way overhyped. I really doubt that they'll replace the way we get miniatures now. You simply cannot get volume of production, quality of the work, and keep costs down at the same time. We're not going to just print out a new army any time soon when we decide to start a new faction. Currently, even the best 3D printers will take hours to make a really crappy detailed miniature, while a detailed metal or plastic mold can make multiple miniatures in less than a minute.

The whole idea behind this business model essentially relies on every potential customer owning a piece of equipment that costs many thousands of $$$, when currently only the smallest portion of potential customers would even know someone who has a 3D printer capable of making decent miniatures.

It depends, I've seen people produce 15mm tanks from a 3d printer which look just as good as the cast ones. Still not fast, though.

Relying on people's good will for keeping your files safe? With all respect, don't be silly. The minute, hell the second something hits the net, it's shared. You'll have to accept that for every one file you sell, there will probably be hundreds, if not thousands of copies floating around.

There's a major example of it on this very site in the form of the 40k rumour thread with all the file sharing of the leaked rulebook and indices.

Herzlos wrote:
It depends, I've seen people produce 15mm tanks from a 3d printer which look just as good as the cast ones. Still not fast, though.

This is why the best use for a 3d printer is for making the MASTERS for a mould, which you can then crank out castings with is the better approach.

It's pretty much replaced the hand-sculpting thing in many miniatures companies now. Gone are the 3-up greens for the most part.

 chromedog wrote:

Herzlos wrote:
It depends, I've seen people produce 15mm tanks from a 3d printer which look just as good as the cast ones. Still not fast, though.

This is why the best use for a 3d printer is for making the MASTERS for a mould, which you can then crank out castings with is the better approach.

It's pretty much replaced the hand-sculpting thing in many miniatures companies now. Gone are the 3-up greens for the most part.

Depends how many you want and how much effort you put in. A 3d printer might take a few hours to produce a mini, but you don't need to supervise it. Making a master mould and casting involves a lot more effort (and learning curve). If you only want 1 or 2 of something, then a printer is fine, if you want hundreds you'd be mad not to cast it.

Cool stuff. Maybe the far future. The cost of printing these models (awesome models btw) would just invalidate the initial saving.

I think it's the future, but a distant one. There are some cheap 3D printers (cheap meaning $500+) that can do some terrain pieces decently, but to be able to do the kind of detail level we want for our miniatures you're going to need to spend $4000 or more, and those are the "cheap" printers with steep learning curves. And it takes the better part of a day to print just 1 mini. 3D has been great for miniatures sculpting though, but we're still stuck with "old fashioned" resin or metal or plastic for production, and it's going to be like that for a long time.

The only way it would take over for regular joe gamers to print their own armies, would be for 3D printers to get very cheap (like under $500) and be able to have super detail for a teeny price, and also be able to print a lot faster. I just don't see that happening anytime soon.

Personally, I'd find a way to invest in high detail printer if they could print fast enough for production for my games. I'd love to never need to make molds for anything again and just go from 3D file to all 1-piece plastic mini, then just stuff em in the box and shrinkwrap it and done. I mean, you could do that now, but you'd be producing like a whole 5 minis per day if you're lucky and the resin costs would be silly.

Herzlos wrote:
It depends, I've seen people produce 15mm tanks from a 3d printer which look just as good as the cast ones. Still not fast, though.

Vehicles, especially Tanks, aren't high detail models.



You are not going to get anywhere close to this level of detail with a 3D printer. Probably not till we're all long dead.

 Grey Templar wrote:


You are not going to get anywhere close to this level of detail with a 3D printer. Probably not till we're all long dead.

I think you're vastly underestimating the speed of progress. We've gone from dot matrix to basic 3D printers in 3 decades. I bet we will be able to 3D print basically whatever we want when I am an old man.

Whether home 3D printing will overtake traditional factory or garage casting methods is debatable, but the fact is digital design is certainly the future.

No, normal people will never have 3D printers at home.

 lord_blackfang wrote:
No, normal people will never have 3D printers at home.

Just like Bill Gates knew that people wouldn't ever need more that 640k of memory, right?

 feeder wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:


You are not going to get anywhere close to this level of detail with a 3D printer. Probably not till we're all long dead.

I think you're vastly underestimating the speed of progress. We've gone from dot matrix to basic 3D printers in 3 decades. I bet we will be able to 3D print basically whatever we want when I am an old man.

Whether home 3D printing will overtake traditional factory or garage casting methods is debatable, but the fact is digital design is certainly the future.

Totally agree. I think the technology will get there eventually. I'd guess in the next 10-20 years, but I am an optimist when it comes to speed of progress.

 lord_blackfang wrote:
No, normal people will never have 3D printers at home.

My totally boring, normal friend has a 3D printer at home. He makes (among other things) 15mm Rhinos and Vindicators with it.

I do think most people will have 3d printers eventually. Just not ones capable of making a gaming miniature of any reasonable quality. They'll be able to make stuff like phone covers or little plastic doodads, but they're not going to be good for high precision or detail work.

Basically, we're never going to print out our 40k dudes out at home.

Maybe you could make a 15mm scale game work, but the minis wouldn't be any better than crappy board game level quality.

 Grey Templar wrote:
I do think most people will have 3d printers eventually. Just not ones capable of making a gaming miniature of any reasonable quality. They'll be able to make stuff like phone covers or little plastic doodads, but they're not going to be good for high precision or detail work.

Basically, we're never going to print out our 40k dudes out at home.

Maybe you could make a 15mm scale game work, but the minis wouldn't be any better than crappy board game level quality.

Free your mind, man. Think about video games when you were a kid. Now I can traverse the whole of Middle Earth in glorious real life HD.

 feeder wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
I do think most people will have 3d printers eventually. Just not ones capable of making a gaming miniature of any reasonable quality. They'll be able to make stuff like phone covers or little plastic doodads, but they're not going to be good for high precision or detail work.

Basically, we're never going to print out our 40k dudes out at home.

Maybe you could make a 15mm scale game work, but the minis wouldn't be any better than crappy board game level quality.

Free your mind, man. Think about video games when you were a kid. Now I can traverse the whole of Middle Earth in glorious real life HD.

These sorts of discussions always get bogged down by people insisting that the current technology level won't change, or refusing to acknowledge that even a few years can bring tremendous leaps forward in various technologies.

I posted a thread in OT a while back about a KS using 3D printing for cityscapes, and wondered if down the road the same approach could be used for making gaming boards and was basically told "no, printers can't do that now, and the current method of making game boards is more cost effective." For a forum full of imaginative nerds, sometimes the capacity to wonder about the future seems frustratingly stymied by the here and now.

 DarkTraveler777 wrote:

 feeder wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
I do think most people will have 3d printers eventually. Just not ones capable of making a gaming miniature of any reasonable quality. They'll be able to make stuff like phone covers or little plastic doodads, but they're not going to be good for high precision or detail work.

Basically, we're never going to print out our 40k dudes out at home.

Maybe you could make a 15mm scale game work, but the minis wouldn't be any better than crappy board game level quality.

Free your mind, man. Think about video games when you were a kid. Now I can traverse the whole of Middle Earth in glorious real life HD.

These sorts of discussions always get bogged down by people insisting that the current technology level won't change, or refusing to acknowledge that even a few years can bring tremendous leaps forward in various technologies.

I posted a thread in OT a while back about a KS using 3D printing for cityscapes, and wondered if down the road the same approach could be used for making gaming boards and was basically told "no, printers can't do that now, and the current method of making game boards is more cost effective." For a forum full of imaginative nerds, sometimes the capacity to wonder about the future seems frustratingly stymied by the here and now.

Sure, technology can advance by leaps and bounds. It can also hit a hardcore roadbloack.

Remember that 50 years ago people thought that flying cars and jetpacks would be commonplace. That we'd have cities in space. And many other wildly absurd things.

Damn Jetsons, man.. I was totally expecting flying cars and maid robots. Instead we have peeping tom drones and iRobot vacuums. Baby steps I guess.

 Grey Templar wrote:

 DarkTraveler777 wrote:

 feeder wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
I do think most people will have 3d printers eventually. Just not ones capable of making a gaming miniature of any reasonable quality. They'll be able to make stuff like phone covers or little plastic doodads, but they're not going to be good for high precision or detail work.

Basically, we're never going to print out our 40k dudes out at home.

Maybe you could make a 15mm scale game work, but the minis wouldn't be any better than crappy board game level quality.

Free your mind, man. Think about video games when you were a kid. Now I can traverse the whole of Middle Earth in glorious real life HD.

These sorts of discussions always get bogged down by people insisting that the current technology level won't change, or refusing to acknowledge that even a few years can bring tremendous leaps forward in various technologies.

I posted a thread in OT a while back about a KS using 3D printing for cityscapes, and wondered if down the road the same approach could be used for making gaming boards and was basically told "no, printers can't do that now, and the current method of making game boards is more cost effective." For a forum full of imaginative nerds, sometimes the capacity to wonder about the future seems frustratingly stymied by the here and now.

Sure, technology can advance by leaps and bounds. It can also hit a hardcore roadbloack.

Remember that 50 years ago people thought that flying cars and jetpacks would be commonplace. That we'd have cities in space. And many other wildly absurd things.

And a lot of the gak on Star Trek are now common place consumer goods or heavily relied upon daily technology. Just saying, the chorus of "NO!" that erupts in these sorts of discussions is frustrating.

 DarkTraveler777 wrote:
These sorts of discussions always get bogged down by people insisting that the current technology level won't change, or refusing to acknowledge that even a few years can bring tremendous leaps forward in various technologies.

Yeah, I think a lot of people don't realise how economies of scale work with technology. The default assumption is either a declining improvement in the product, or at best a straight line - that the tech can't make sudden improvements in cost and quality. What they don't get is that as tech improves as it opens out to a bigger market, which encourages more investment in research and development, which increases the rate of improvement, leading to the product being viable for more people, and so on. This tends to lead to a model where progress is slow until it reaches a tipping point and suddenly market expansion and product improvement take off hand in hand. This doesn't happen for every product for both tech and economic reasons, but it has happened to a very large number of manufactured goods that are now just an assumed part of life, but were once dubious new tech of doubtful mainstream value, from cars to solar panels.

The other thing a lot of people miss is how an expanding tech opens up new businesses, and creates new markets, and naturally finds its own niches that people could never have predicted. That a lot of various economic behaviours act off and reinforce each other. Video players were originally developed and thought of just being a large, expensive product for tv and media companies. But some improvements in size and cost led to them being picked up 'home enthusiasts' who mostly used the new machines for mail order video. This was extremely niche movies, mostly the various exploitation kinds and of course porn, playing to a small number of people chasing a small number of films. But that demand increased the supply of those kinds of movies, which made the video players desirable to more people, which provided a revenue base that drove improvements in VCRs. That made the machines viable to more consumers, which attracted more films until they became noticed by mainstream studios who realised the potential of home video as a new revenue stream, and then suddenly we're off to the races, with tech and market expansion going hand in hand. The point being that the economics that can drive improvement and expansion of a tech is largely unknowable ahead of time.

I posted a thread in OT a while back about a KS using 3D printing for cityscapes, and wondered if down the road the same approach could be used for making gaming boards and was basically told "no, printers can't do that now, and the current method of making game boards is more cost effective." For a forum full of imaginative nerds, sometimes the capacity to wonder about the future seems frustratingly stymied by the here and now.

That's the kind of thing seems ripe for 3d printing. Maybe the detail might not be as good, and the price might be a bit more. But there is so much scope to customise your own unique board. It's amazing that some people miss that potential.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Grey Templar wrote:
Sure, technology can advance by leaps and bounds. It can also hit a hardcore roadbloack.

Remember that 50 years ago people thought that flying cars and jetpacks would be commonplace. That we'd have cities in space. And many other wildly absurd things.

The lesson you should take from that is that tech developments are unpredictable. The lesson you have taken is that some things didn't work out like people thought, therefore you can be confident in making big predictions that specific techs will not work out.

Yeah, it really boils down to economics. The big pushes in tech we have seen have largely been in communications and entertainment. Transportation, while it has certainly been improved, has not seen the same radical changes, for example (but even that will likely change as automated driving rolls out...). Since Americans have pumped billions into entertainment, it has pushed development of smaller, faster, higher quality platforms from reels to tapes to CDs to streaming digital media. Likewise, display devices have improved on both the larger and smaller displays. Data storage and transfer has had huge improvements over the last 50 years.

The question is whether there are the same kind of incentives for 3d printing. Home paper printing has not seen the same kind of explosion, with dot matrix giving way to ink jets then lasers, etc. Even so, it is still largely bottom end driven. 3d printing offers more options, but still not something that is readily useful to the average consumer. It doesn't help them get entertainment any faster or better. It doesn't provide food. It is a niche product that appeals to certain hobbyists, even if it were fast and high res. It doesn't have the appeal to business and manufacturing interests that spurred CAD automated machines, either. So it will likely remain a niche product.

Hasn't there been a couple of kickstarter for 3d printed terrain an Australian company you pledged for the files they were pretty successful

In the next generation (25 years) it will be the default method for getting physical products. Home machines will be ubiguitous and will be yet another challenge to normal retail.

Basic things like toys, home goods, small parts, etc will all be producable by the consumer on demand. It will be some sort of conglomerate spin-off like Netflixs but instead of movies you will be downloading and printing item designs like custom light switch covers, door hinges, board games, tools, custom flatware, etc.

The technology will only improve and be more ubiquitious as it removes much of the infrastructure a company needs to be successful. They will no longer need to manage materials, supply, logistics, etc. Instead, they sell the designs straight to consumers who self-print the products at home.

It is like a strange mix of Amazon, Netflix, and IKea and it is only matter of time before it is the new normal. There are too many business advantages of the model for it not to expand. Such businesses will easily compete with and stomp out normal retail since the underlying framework is so much cheaper.