Creating A New Offering Of Electric Football Players

After years of designing, creating, testing, printing and distributing custom 3D Printed Table Soccer Figures, I have decided to expand the offering on www.3dsports.ca by entering into the Electric Football market.

Here's brief description of the process I take in creating a custom figure

Starting with a custom sculpted NFL Player I refined this mesh to prepare it for successful and predictable 3D Printing by ensuring that each mesh was closed in 3DSMax. I then rigged and skinned this mesh and began posing the figure using Biped.

The next step was to snapshot this character, subdivide the mesh and then apply high detailed displacement maps to get the required surface details. Further refinements are made to the geometry in order to correct imperfections due to the pose and skinning imperfections.

Finally a figure that I can print! The next step is to bring these figures into a slicing program for 3D Printing where the figures are angled appropriately for effective 3D Printing and supports are added to catch potential overhang meshes. The figures are then sliced and the files placed onto a thumb-drive and taken to the printers.

The printing takes roughly 2 hours for a set of figures after which they are carefully removed from the build plate and then placed in isopropyl alcohol. The figures are then placed in warm water for a final rinse and to make the removal of supports a little easier. Once the supports are removed the figures sit to dry and then are placed under UV Light to do a final cure of the resin to make them safe for handling. I finally apply a light coating of primer to each figure to help prepare them for custom painting.