HowDIY: Towards Meta-Design Tools to Support Anyone to 3D Print Anywhere

Abstract

The promise of anyone being able to 3D print anywhere relies on both technological advances and incremental shifts in social organizations to trigger changes in human behavior. While much research has focused on how people learn aspects of predefined printing processes, such as expressively utilizing particular design-software (e.g. CAD) and fabrication-machinery (e.g. 3D Printers), this work explores how anyone may gain an understanding of what can be 3D printed through dynamic-processes in computationally-guided exploration of online resources and 3D printing facilities. Investigations surrounding online printing services reveal accessible 3D printing processes that do not require end-users to have experience with design-software or fabrication-machinery, only requiring end-users to specify printable ideas. We present these accessible printing processes alongside associated technologies in a meta-design framework for supporting end-users’ specification of 3D printing ideas. Informed by this framework and a series of formative studies, we designed the website HowDIY to introduce anyone to 3D printing by encouraging and facilitating the intelligent exploration of various online resources. HowDIY was deployed over several weeks with diverse newcomers to 3D printing, validating that intelligent user interfaces can support anyone to participate in the utilization and design of 3D printing tools and processes.