Animation software gets '3D Print' button

A group of graphics experts led by computer scientists at Harvard have created an add-on software tool that translates video game characters, any other three-dimensional animations, into fully articulated action figures, with the help of a 3D printer, writes Science Daily.

The project is described in detail in the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) Transactions on Graphics and will be presented at the ACM SIGGRAPH conference on 7 August.

According to Giz Mag, the team from Harvard's School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, the Technische Universit"at Berlin and Cornell University demonstrated the software by building models of creatures from Spore, an evolution-based video game in which players create animated animals with virtually any combination of physical features.

Taking a digital model as a starting point, the program first determines where the joints should be located, based on the way in which the creature moves in its virtual world. It then tweaks the size and locations of those joints, taking into account the laws of physics that the plastic model of the creature will have to follow in the real world.

It can create both hinged and ball-and-socket joints, and builds in a bit of friction within them, so that the models will be able to hold their poses. The software is also able to analyse the often roughly-defined virtual skin texture of a computer model, and refine it into a higher-resolution skin surface on the action figure.

Pop Sci reports that at present, the figurines are limited to one material, so they can't be squished or stretched beyond their moving joints, according to a Harvard news release. But the techniques for 3D printed elastic objects exist, so it's feasible that someday soft-bodied action figures could pop out of a 3D printer.

Harvard filed a patent application for this technology and hopes to license it or spin off a small company, which could conceivably make action figures on demand.