Loonsbury has created a Python script that calculates the costs of printing your designs in 3D at Shapeways. Even if you don't use Shapeways it's an interesting script because it'll calculate the volume of any closed surface. It comes with some nice features such as a manifold check (checks if the object has a closed surface), polygon counter and changeable material prices. More information on the Shapeways forum.
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About the Author
Bart Veldhuizen
I have a LONG history with Blender - I wrote some of the earliest Blender tutorials, worked for Not a Number and helped run the crowdfunding campaign that open sourced Blender (the first one on the internet!). I founded BlenderNation in 2006 and have been editing it every single day since then ;-) I also run the Blender Artists forum and I'm Head of Community at Sketchfab.
7 Comments
so you'll know Google brings 3D to the web with a new open source plugin. have a virus downloader avoid this site. I know but better safe than sorry.
@RNS: eh, I have no idea what you mean..
Neither do I
:)
Aw man, and there I was with important things to be getting on with this afternoon! Great way to make Shapeways even less resistible (you evil geniuses!) A fantastic script - I'll just be off to try it out on every blend file I've ever made now... :D
this is cool, but ditto to RNS, all your base r belong to us?
Great idea!
I've been itching to write a tutorial on how to get a 3d model printed, as I think there's a lot of confusion around the idea. So this script will definately come in handy. Nice work :)
Hm, I have no doubts that this is pretty useful, however, the script still has many flows, like a blocking gui. So everytime, when I make changes to a model and then calculate the costs, I have to do all settings again. I guess the gui should be made more efficient, using less space and put inside the script window with an recalculate button, which works on the selected object.