Future Now
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Gathering Experts to Explore the World of Open Fabrication
During the one-day session on April 19 at the AutoDesk Gallery, experts, researchers, and guests explored the many different frontiers where 3D printing and open manufacturing are changing the way that things are made. Among the topics that were explored were:
- The affordances that fabrication offers for the unprecedented personalization of products. Scott Summit from Bespoke Innovationsdemonstrated the work they are doing to revolutionize medical prosthetics.
- Creative and artistic applications of 3D printing, including Bathsheba Grossman’s overview of new viral art forms that could not be physically produced in any other way.
The great potential for open, local and modularized production processes with Humblefacture. - The sobering intellectual property issues that next generation manufacturing will trigger with Michael Weinberg of Public Knowledge.
Autodesk’s own ongoing work in 3D printing, including their fabrication of a full scale model of a turbo prop engine and 7-foot tall Lego dinosaur.
Researchers from IFTF's Technology Horizons program also shared our forecasts on the future of Open Fabrication, including Research Manager Mathias Crawford's experience building and using a Makerbot Thing-O-Matic. Research Director Anthony Townsend discussed the human side of fabrication, including how people will respond to a world where they can fabricate for themselves. Finally, Program Director Lyn Jeffery explored the communities are arising around open fabrication, particularly in China.
By the end of the workshop, it was clear that many of the opportunities in open fabrication can be found in the tension between this technology’s incredible potential and its very real limitations. It was also apparent that the open manufacturing revolution that it is enabling is poised to dramatically change the world of production in both very predictable and very unintuitive ways.
To learn more about IFTF’s Technology Horizons Program, contact Sean Ness at [email protected].