A gradient-based framework for 3D print appearance optimization

Abstract

In full-color inkjet 3D printing, a key problem is determining the material configuration for the millions of voxels that a printed object is made of. The goal is a configuration that minimises the difference between desired target appearance and the result of the printing process. So far, the techniques used to find such a configuration have relied on domain-specific methods or heuristic optimization, which allowed only a limited level of control over the resulting appearance. We propose to use differentiable volume rendering in a continuous material-mixture space, which leads to a framework that can be used as a general tool for optimising inkjet 3D printouts. We demonstrate the technical feasibility of this approach, and use it to attain fine control over the fabricated appearance, and high levels of faithfulness to the specified target.