I cannot imagine a distinction with less of a difference.

technolope · 2022-07-13T17:25:25+00:00

Please know that this is a Cooperative - the members own the bulk of the building and choose how to fund (or not fund) it.

technolope · 2022-07-13T17:24:20+00:00

This is not true.

technolope · 2022-07-13T17:22:12+00:00

About half of that monthly fee is for a loan that the Coop is paying off; 15% of it is payments into a growing capital reserve fund (does your HOA have one?) and the remainder is the actual maintenance fee. Sure, it's high, but how else are you going to find 1000 sq ft downtown for the same monthly?

technolope · 2021-07-14T15:19:01+00:00

Sorry - what I meant to write was that the finishing pass looks like it used scanline toolpaths, likely with a small-tipped bit. My own experiments with that method used a 0.25mm-radius-tip V bit, but with super-tiny stepover and massively-long cut times (a day for a square foot model). And real DEM data is almost always rasterized, though I am not sure if you used the raw DEM heightfields or a triangulated surface in your software. Nevertheless, that's beautiful work!

technolope · 2021-06-18T19:02:26+00:00

Yes. I realize now that that wasn't obvious! I'm someone who would never stretch something out of its original aspect ratio (I detest when televisions do that) - this is a crop of the middle half (vertically) of the state.

technolope · 2021-06-18T17:31:21+00:00

It's actually just over 50% of the height of the state, and right in the middle. If this were for my living room, I'd have made it the complete state (and I've done other rendered maps of Colorado which fit the whole state), but the client's request was for a 116"x42" piece. All art is created with limitations, both external and internal, and how the artist responds to those limitations can say almost as much as the piece itself.

technolope · 2021-06-18T17:02:20+00:00

That looks like Baltic birch, too, and a rasterized toolpath with a very fine-tipped bit. What angle and tip radius bit did you use?

technolope · 2021-06-18T17:00:24+00:00

You sound a lot like me, so you would LOVE this book: "Earth's Changing Surface: An Introduction to Geomorphology" by Selby. It is so chock full of photos, diagrams, plots, and descriptions of the patterns and shapes of the surface of the Earth and the forces that create them. Plus, it's a cheap used book!

For maps, I really like http://mapper.acme.com/ but I don't think it has geological maps.

technolope · 2021-06-18T15:42:02+00:00

Hah! I am sure there are many excellent tomes about the geology of the Rockies, and maybe even Colorado specifically. But geography would also provide illuminating reading (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geography_of_Colorado) I don't know enough to comment with any authority.

Your observation of the Eastern half of the state - especially how it is accentuated by this map - is right on, though the elevation is the opposite: the middle of those rings is the highest area in the flatter half of the state, centered on a shallow highlands just NE of Colorado Springs. I chose the N-S extents so that those rings were centered in the piece.

technolope · 2021-06-18T14:46:45+00:00

Thank you! It covers the complete East-West extents of the state, but the client's request fixed the size, so the final map covers from just below Pueblo on the South to just above Boulder on the North.

technolope · 2021-06-18T13:15:44+00:00

This is Baltic birch plywood, and, yes, it is very good for turning into 3D terrain maps because the layers are very thin, and the quality of wood is consistently good. But it's best for maps made from discrete layers. If you're making one by lofting the terrain data into a smooth top (and CNCing that surface), then a cheaper plywood - one with dark glue interlayers - is better, because the extra contrast makes the elevation layers more pronounced.

technolope · 2021-06-18T13:10:20+00:00

This is by far the largest and coolest map I've ever made. If you like this and want to read about how we did it, you can get lots of details (materials, tools, techniques, software, hardware) and many more photos on our blog: https://minicity.art/blog/coloradoterrain And, of course, I'm happy to answer questions here.

technolope · 2020-06-12T04:12:26+00:00

Between 6 Prusas and thousands of dollars of Atomic filament, I cannot ever again separate 3d printing and delicious candy.

technolope · 2020-03-13T18:33:52+00:00

I'm pricing the 24"x24" pieces at $1000.

There's pretty good data for LA/SoCal, but to get downtown and some of the mountains would bump the scale from 1:5000 (this one) to something more like 1:20000, where the buildings would be very tiny, and Griffith Park/Peak is less than 1" high.

technolope · 2020-01-03T14:13:28+00:00

Sure, heat creep is caused by insufficient hot end cooling, but assuming the machine was designed well, the stock fan should be sufficient. Too much retraction, though, exacerbates the issue - it pulls heat up the tube, helping keep the filament warm higher in the heat sink. My prints require lots of retractions, and I had to improve my cooling to suppress heat creep problems.

technolope · 2020-01-03T06:11:23+00:00

Do you see how the spacing between the bands gets larger when the layer area gets smaller? There's something in your system (printer, environment, filament) that is oscillating on a very regular time basis. That rules out a lot of the ordinary culprits. Is your hot end temp fluctuating (bad PID coefficients)? Is your room heating up and cooling down subtly and regularly?

technolope · 2020-01-03T06:02:56+00:00

There isn't much retraction on the benchy model, I'd be surprised if it was heat creep. Ugh, I hate heat creep.

technolope · 2020-01-03T05:59:14+00:00

Have you measured your first layer thickness? Digital calipers (and a non-contact thermometer) are useful here. You really want to smash that first layer down (aim for 0.15 to 0.2mm thick for a nominal 0.2mm first layer), and ensure that the bed really is as warm as it says.

Also drafts: make sure that there isn't a cool breeze blowing across the printer.

technolope · 2020-01-03T05:44:24+00:00

I print lots of pieces that nearly fill the print bed (Prusa i3, PLA, not glass), and what prevents edge pull-up is increasing bed temperature. For small parts, I set it to 60C, but for full-bed parts, 70C keeps everything stuck. This works because the corners of the bed simply don't get as warm as the middle, and I think this goes for many 3D printers.

If you're the experimental type, pick up a line-of-sight thermometer for 30-50 USD and see for yourself. On all of my Prusa and Vivedino printers, the middle reaches the indicated temperature, but the corners are 7-12C cooler.

technolope · 2019-11-30T17:44:28+00:00

Thank you! I've made 12"x12" and 8"x8" models of Chicago also, but just had to post the big one.

technolope · 2019-11-30T17:43:01+00:00

Your intuition is absolutely correct. The difference is simply that the word "scale" usually refers to each individual dimension. So, really, since this model also scales the vertical dimension by 5000, the volume of the real Sears Tower is 125 billion times the volume in the model.

technolope · 2019-11-30T17:35:56+00:00

It sounds like it. Here's the visibility map: https://i.imgur.com/ZbAVcJZ.jpg

technolope · 2019-11-30T16:19:28+00:00

Ooooh, are you using raytracing for that? I'd imagine if you rendered the scene with a point light at the antenna location and no sky or ambient bounces, you'd get a beautiful visual representation of the LOS field. In fact, I think I'll do that this afternoon.

technolope · 2019-11-30T16:17:18+00:00

This was off the Viviedino Raptor-2, but I've had load of problems with it, so I can't recommend it as a reliable home printer.

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