kmanstudios

Ummm, like 99.9%.... So, you are asking for the slicers out there to envision every instance to compensate for modeling? At which point does the slicer become more modeling software than slicer? I do not see it as offensive, but slicers are trying to be the best at slicing, not model compensation. Things like mesh modifiers do their job very well as they are designed to do. Vary the infills, wall counts, voids, etc. I use them all the time for the purpose of modifying the way the existing mesh prints, not to compensate for modeling choices. This has been an ongoing debate for a long time. And for many people I see, it is a reason for not working on solid modeling skills. Look at how bad many models are out there for the taking. Maybe someone will combine a modeling program and slicer, but until then, they are two separate skill sets. And, I for one would rather the slicer people focus on solid slicing to produce the best prints, with the best ecosystem for materials and not launch into endeavors that take away from that. Just an opinion.

I am of the school of thought: Make the object the way you want it to print.

I am not sure what the bottom image is...sorry. But I can (hopefully not confuse you) with the brightness issues. It has to do with antialiasing and such. All the image has to do is have a few pixels that are not the same value to make the levels not smooth. You may not see it, but it can be in there. As for thin walls, yes, Cura can only slice for print down to a certain thickness. Try turning on 'print thin walls.' Or just make the image a tiny bit thick in those thin wall areas so Cura can see it for your nozzle size.

I would first assume that there is a difference in colours not perceptible by the naked eye. Was this made with a vector program or bitmap program?

For the setup of what I will be showing next, I would like to take a minute to go over the two types of ecosystems you should be aware of. Material Ecosystems are the basic use of the types of paint you wish to use. Oil based such as traditional enamels Solvent based like lacquers Water based like acrylics Traditional enamels are the type of paint that can go over an acrylic. If there is an enamel based paint that has an acrylic painted over, it will cut loose over time. So, always, water based and then traditional enamels. If you are using enamels, then you need an enamel clear. There are Acrylic enamels. Say whaaaat? Technically, it is a water based paint, but is called an 'enamel' because it dries to a nice, hard shell. So, read the labels or product info to make sure you are not using the wrong paint. Acrylics in general are pretty much the same in theory. But, there is a reason paints are sold as grades of quality such as student grade or professional grade. I gave up on student grade a long time ago. They are great to learn with, but light fastness can be a problem (will fade when exposed to light), coverage and grittiness of the paint pigments. Lacquers are solvent based. This means that it is what is referred to as being 'hotter' than other paints. I can cause cracks, wrinkles and other yucky results. In general theory, you can mix the types if they are applied in proper order. Water based first oils or solvent on top. I use mostly acrylics and acrylic enamels. And then there are brand ecosystems. There can be some issues as the base (The pigment suspension medium) itself may vary in compatibility. This would usually present as being streaky in applications if it is not a good suspension medium. But, usually they are very forgiving, especially when you have a bit of practice. There are always exceptions to the rule. But be careful in practice as it may not only ruin the paint job, but the print itself and that is a lot of lost materials in filament and paint and finally time.

Thanks for providing links for him. I could not think where I found it before.

Ayup 🙂 👍

Or you can use the search tool at the top of the settings panel. Personally, I am all for the show all settings. It is a lot, but, can open a lot of tweaks as you learn.

I am not sure where to find the info...I think @fbrc8-erin had a series of instructions concerning this. I tagged her so that she can hopefully gather the links for you.

Very nice 🙂 I never think of cool ideas like that.

Doh!! 😖 That totally slipped past me.....

Great work 🙂 I do not know the building, but I am now hearing The Who's '5:15' in me wee little noggin 🙂

Did you do a really good hot and cold pull to make sure the CPE+ was fully out of the core?

That is nice 🙂 I like the design. Yours or based off of a real building?

Glad it got sussed out 🙂

I wash the prints with a degreasing dish soap and then thoroughly rinse to remove all traces of PVA as well as oils from the hands. There are times the print is soaked a lot in a vat of water with just a tiny bit of dish soap. But it will always get a final rinse and scrub. But binding is increased by spraying lightly and building up layers. And, then for some things like the critter above, at a certain point, I am really flooding the surface with paint. This is a basic tutorial for painting rattle cans over plastics (model building focused, but it applies to the materials I am using to print with. Mostly TPLA these days and not specialty filaments. I am thinking of doing a step by step of a piece from raw print to final paint. I had not thought of the paint swatches. Mainly because they look radically different on flat surfaces and different surfaces have different properties. And, honestly, money for materials is tight, so I am doing straight on the model based on experience. Also, I am focused on ecosystems at this time and I have to replace almost all my specialty paints.

As an aside and back to chrome paints: If you are looking at the Spaz Stix line of paints (and they have some really cool paints 🙂 ), this vid demonstrates why I do not use their chrome based paints. And, yes, I have tried their chrome. Their Chrome is to be used on the inside of the transparent body. It works spectacularly well for what they are designed for. For the best Chrome review I have found for our applications (on top surface and not under transparent plastic), this is the link to @cloakfiend's review of chrome paints. I will be trying the Molotow Chrome soon for my own feel of the paint's properties. Gotta touch the paints to get a real feel for them. And Chromes are notoriously difficult to get right.

When the model scales by that amount in the slicer, it means the scale is off. Where did you get the model? Or did you make the model itself? I am downloading it so that I can look at it later and let you know what I have found.

Paints usually belong in an eco-system: Acrylics with acrylics and solvent based with solvent based. Also, making sure what will bind, will bind well. Also there are brand based ecosystems. Also, usually you can paint acrylics on a good primer base and then solvent based on top of that will usually work. This allow me to paint with an acrylic primer and then paint with any solvent based paint. In this print I used only the paints with the same base properties (as well as a brand based eco-system). These paints are part of the Dupli-Color anodized paint series. They provide a metallic look. They are part of the metal cast paint line. The far right bottom pointy things are the base coat that they provide with the system. It works best with their paints. Again, self enclosed ecosystem. I did violate one of the rules here though. The abalone hair is acrylic slowly built up over the solvent based paint. A lot of patience can go a long way here. But it is the only space that I did this. I guess I will see if it flakes off in few years. But experience says it will not. I cannot explain why, But I have found a few exceptions over the years and when properly applied. With the hair, I had to lay a lot of layers to get it to stick properly. Once I had the paint ready to stick, I could layer transparent colours until it build up properly. The only other exception of going out of a brand's ecosystem (But still solvent based rattle can) was the Venus character herself. I printed her and the base separately. First to make sure that the base and figure could be treated differently should I run into printer issues. With a 23.5 day print on the base, and the figure being the possibly most problematic (And, she was having to print her twice) I wanted to avoid having to print the whole thing again.. I did use a basic spray gold misted over the Dupli-Color base coat. I misted from top to bottom so that by the time the knees get painted, it fads out to the base coat. I misted only enough to make for a warmer colour and not gold itself. I use misting a lot. Sometimes, it works and well, sometimes it can get out of hand and resulting in painting colours in and out until you get the colours you wanted. I did this to bring out the warm tones on the figure to 'bounce' out from all the cool colour range of the blues and bluish silvers. As a final touch, I used the last of the Holographic paint I had on hand. Not much, but barely enough. These paints are part of the Spaz Stix line of paints. These paints are solvent based and not the same as having a holographic powder. As an overcoat, it provided the colour reflections in this pic. All those nice colours of blues and purples are the result of the holographic paint. As the object turns, the colours play over the surface. And, they allow the base paint to be seen.

OK, so I tried something different: Ornaments. My first ones were primed and painted with Krylon's original Chrome. The spiral ornament was left alone, but I shot some anodized paint over it.....meh..... So, I started to put washes of Pthalo Blue and Unicorn Milk. I built that up until it was a very deep, rich blue with pearlessence. The silvering parts were done with Semple's Holographic powder (Technicolor). But, shooting clear over the ball softened the out layers of paint and, well, let us just say that you should not drop them or it will tear until it is solidly dried and bind again to the silvering paint layer: Then I painted the spiral. This one worked much better and only had the silvering layer first. Again, Pthalo Blue mixed with the Unicorn Mil in thin washed layers until I got the brilliant metallic blue I wanted. Then I used the Mirror Chrome from Semple's line of paints mentioned above. Even though it worked, I switched tact on this to just a black primer over painted with gold pray. That did not work. It was just too dull. So, I went back to the black and used mica powders and that really worked much better. It was hard to get a good red out of it. But, also being so reflective it picked up the gold and further diluted the color red saturation. The powders were mixed with Unicorn Milk as the finding medium. Then I put that gold mixture over this ball completely and then washed some Pthalo Blue and Unicorn Milk until I got the green I wanted. By using the Gold all over the ball and washing over the blue, it was going to carry a 'matching' component since it is partly the same color after all.

😁

I concur. Having looked at many models here to help, this type of issue is as @Smithy said percentage wise. I would go as far as to say 100% 😆

😂 Me too.... If I am reading this right, the moire pattern is a result of the pixel resolution of the screen attempting to display the really tight lines in the preview. I imagine they go away once you zoom in. Now the print; are the lines matching up to the internal support structure? They remind me of leaf veins. Seams would not do that. Seams make straight lines.

I stopped using priming towers after about my first 8 months. If you are having issues with your PVA (and yeah, it is a pain to print with) you should evaluate your room humidity levels. That is the biggest issue when printing with PVA. And minimize retractions to say about 10 or 12.

I did notice, That is why I was so surprised that the model was spot on for 3D printing. But I have no idea beyond the model itself. Basically, the rest is up to someone who is more technically adept than I.