The slice-viewer can actually display the slices in 3D and may be rotated freely. In fact, as it turned out, the CMB Viewer allows to browse all information stored in the CMB files. In addition, the View/Info/CMB… menu shows some meta-information. In the (somewhat hidden) CMB Viewing Options pane (menu View/Controls/CMB…) you can choose among the different kinds of toolpaths to display. Using the home, end, page-up and page-down keys, you can conveniently step through all slices. This is basically a slice viewer, displaying toolpaths of one build-slice. The co-installed utility program CMB View allows closer inspection of the CMB file (amongst other file formats). Catalyst ® ex only shows the 2D footprint on the building platform and statistics about the amount of building material and time needed. Unfortunately, Stratasys does not offer any kind of 3D preview. So simply doing a test-print was not an option. After all, our largest print took over 36 hours, and despite the low printing fees, it is not that cheap at all. staircase artifacts on slightly uneven horizontal surfaces). Before starting the print job, I wanted to make sure that the model was nice enough, for the printing resolution, and that the printer did not introduce strange artifacts (e.g.
But well, if it is the standard, I will stick with it, as long as I don’t have to read it back.īut, what annoyed me even more is that there is no possibility to preview the 3D printed version. They just could have chosen any then established format from the computer graphics of CAD communities.
Nobody knows why the 3D printing guys back then invented this stupid format not containing any connectivity information or vertex indices. One thing that annoyed me is that the program only reads STL files, which is aa really terrible 3D file format. You choose an STL file containing your 3d model, choose the orientation, scale and position on the building platform, and some basic build options (layer resolution, model interior fillings and type of support structure) and it generates the data for the machine stored as a CMB-File. For production of scaled down tactile models, we chose a Stratasys Dimension BST 768 printer (a FDM rapid prototyping system) because of it’s relatively durable output and simply because we had one available for a comparably low printing fee.Īfter many hours of correcting, re-sculpting and tweaking around the digital models, I went to the catalyst ® ex program to create the toolpaths for the printer. The models were created using photogrammetric reconstruction, based on hundreds of photos of the large-scale exhibits. Way back I did a project involving 3D printed reproductions for visually impaired visitors of a science museum.
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