I just sat in a professional development workshop geared towards 3d printing. Although we do not have a 3d printer in the art department, the technology department has one they would be willing to lend us for a collaborative project. Our facilitator today discussed how students are applying engineering design processes to their art projects and executing their ideas into scientific demonstrations. II never really explored media arts until today but I learned that 3d printing is a great resource as it allows the art to come to life right before their eyes!

The only discouraging element with 3d printing is that the process is very long. We watched a video where the CAD program was utilized to design a boat propellor to optimize speed.. students were building prototype boats then the math teacher stepped in to cover mathematical concepts such as ratios, density, geometry and buoyancy…. another video demonstrated where students deigned a ball launcher- it took students 18 hours to print 16 parts!!

Hopefully someday in the future we will really be professionally trained to use these for classroom use. We used laser cutters actually in our studio class at new paltz, using pine I think? Anyway, just wanted to share this !