Shapeways, what are they like?

[Rikard]

I'm curious here, but does anyone have any experience, buying, selling or using shapeways?

Link here: https://www.shapeways.com/marketplace/miniatures/scifi?li=featured&s=52#more-products

From the outset, they're a company that you send minis too (after making your own page) and they handle everything, casting, selling, etc and you get a percentage of each mini.

I'm only toying with the idea, sculpting is still hard at the moment, it didn't help that I had another negative run in with a particular company, but withdrew before any damage or losses were caused.

 

[Tk'ya'pyk]

Ah. I can help a bit on that. I actually have several hobbies, one of which is model trains. I use Shapeways to print off parts for freight cars and locomotives. Like all such companies, they have their good points and their bad points. Cost is one of the bad points. The real question is: How much sanding do you want to do?

White Natural Versatile Plastic (their cheapest stuff) is cheap, lightweight, a little brittle, and has the texture of fine sandpaper. If you don't mind sanding the parts to a smoother finish when you get them, it is great. I have them print most of my stuff in this, as I'm doing an industrial railroad and want things to look rusty and old.

Smooth Fine Detail is better, costs between 10% to 50% more, but requires less sanding. Smoothest Fine Detail will give you the best finish but costs easily twice what the White Natural does.

Shapeways is a little picky about printing fine detail bits. If a part is thinner than a certain size, they flat out won't print it. If you're planning on something with long rods, I would actually recommend making a socket and using a piece of brass rod instead anyway. The brittleness of the printed material can be detrimental to finer detail parts. That said, most of the stuff I've had them print for me looks good and does what I need it to.

These are archbar trucks that shapeway printed. As a helpful note, the flat spot at the end of this printing? Less than an inch wide.

Flat car, also printed from shapeways. This is their White Natural cheap stuff. I can't really justify anything more pricey since I'm just going to make them look rusty and worn out anyway. As you can see, the detail isn't bad. This flat car, for size comparison, is about 3" long and just over an inch wide.

Hope this helps.

 

[Tk'ya'pyk]

Sorry, forgot this pic. Close up of one of the archbar trucks from that first picture. Detail is pretty fine, but they're all short runs. The whole piece is a little larger than one of the keys on my keyboard, side-to-side and with the wheels about a quarter of an inch tall, so they'll print things pretty fine. You do something get a kind of step-pyramid-edge effect on some slopes though with the cheap plastics, so be warned you may need to clean that up. I would recommend the Smooth or Smoothest plastics for wargaming minis, but you could use the White Natural like this for terrain features and maybe things like shields. I don't recommend White Natural for anything with little spikey bits as it is brittle and those bits WILL chip off with handling.

Oh, shipping. Forgot about that. They're usually pretty good on shipping. It can take a while sometimes as they actually have to MAKE the stuff they're shipping to you, so expect a week minimum before your order arrives (two weeks is pretty normal, I'm afraid). They use standardized box sizes, with plenty of packing material to keep things from jostling around during shipping, and everything is additionally packed into little ziplock baggies so you don't lose any bits. I haven't had anything get damaged during shipping yet, and while the box did get SOAKING wet one time from rain, the contents were fine and still dry in that baggie.

 

[Rikard]

It does, it all does, you've been really clear.

my main reason was more so if I wanted to use them to sell minis.
<- (Case in point, gubbins of this nature)

 

[Tk'ya'pyk]

They're not a bad way to go. Prices might be a little higher than people want to pay for the good printings, but they do decent work in a reasonable amount of time. Any chance you're making an Ancient Salamander?

 

[Crowsfoot]

It does, it all does, you've been really clear.

my main reason was more so if I wanted to use them to sell minis.
<- (Case in point, gubbins of this nature)

Maybe have a chat with @Xlanax_lot he is in the process of getting a mini 3D printed from the same company that @woogity used.

I think he has it all sorted without any problems, maybe that could be a possibility, if you don't want the hassle of taking orders etc maybe a third party could handle that for you.

 

[Rikard]

Maybe have a chat with @Xlanax_lot he is in the process of getting a mini 3D printed from the same company that @woogity used.

I think he has it all sorted without any problems, maybe that could be a possibility, if you don't want the hassle of taking orders etc maybe a third party could handle that for you.

I'll give him a tinkle,

I'm actually REALLY angry at the moment after another butting of heads with a particular miniature company who once again have harped on about how much better they now are before reveling how much WORSE they've actually gotten.