Custom Unique figures made on high-end 3D Printer


B

Bluebox

New Member
I am new to the forum and railroading in general. I am considering creating unique custom figures for model railroading using very high end 3D printing. I created a female character for a beach scene as seen here in O and HO scale. I started just for fun but I wanted to see if there is a market for unique figures?

As I am new to this scene I would like to ask experts a few questions
1. Who makes the best figures for modeling?
2. What is the best scale to make figures at if you want to sell your work?
3. Should the figures be painted or left unpainted?
4. What era or theme should I work on?
5. Where would be the best place to sell unique custom figures? currently my first figures are on eBay

http://www.ebay.com/itm/140906550347

Looking forward to your opinions.

Regards
Bobby
 
Impressive work for a 3D printer. She is very attractive, but Preiser (and other manufacturers) make so many figures in HO scale and O scale that, this one isn't all that unique. Preiser has several similarly contoured figures in a variety of poses both with and without the bikini.
If you are to market unique figures, you'll need to come up with figures that are doing unique activities that other manufacturers haven't done yet. One HO scale example could be contractors using power tools. As far as I know, the only figures available anywhere as carpenters appear to be Amish and use hand tools only.
This is a little off topic for this forum, but one scale you might consider making, is 1/18 scale for the diecast car collector. Though there are plenty of beautiful women in bikini figures available in 1/18 scale (by Motorhead), there are very few figures available as passengers or drivers of the collectable diecast cars, or even as pedestrians. Likewise, there are collectors of larger scale diecast cars in 1/12 scale that might be a good market for realistic bikini clad figures (might even get some 1/12 scale doll house builders who don't want to populate their creations with a toy-like child's doll). Much in the diecast farm equipment collectibles is in 1/16 scale. Farm workers and tractor drivers in 1/16 scale might be a market for you as well.
 
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Looks alright and I see you have a bidder already. I'd like to buy some sets of modern day railroad workers. Short sleeves, day-glo yellow vest, hard hat on backwards, with a pair of Oakley M frames on. Something belivable. Every thing available looks like it's from the 50's.
 
Thank you for the input so far. The amazing thing about 3D printing is I can make any number of characters in any style/pose I want. I simply create them in a modeling software and sculpt new features.

My initial models were just made to test the resolution of the system.

The sky is the limit so I am really looking for ideas on what people would find valuable and what others cant do with traditional methods.
 
I would be looking for sports teams in action. Woodland Scenics makes a few baseball players, but not enough to depict a full game on the field. One team would need 9 guys int the field (pitcher, catcher, infielders and outfielders), while the other team would need a batter and possibly baserunners. Also guys sitting on the bench, waiting on deck, or standing in the dugout. Maybe umpires too. (They could be adults, but Little League-sized kids might be more popular.)

You might also look into doing football and soccer players, too. And maybe even basketball or hockey players to be put on outdoor courts/rinks.

Maybe some spectators as well.

(If you do any of these, let me know. I also have ideas about the details of these if you are interested.)
 
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Great figures, but you've left out the most important thing - what would be the cost of custom figures? I can't imagine the cost being any where near currently available figures, so someone might only want to get a few, depending upon the price. Would someone pay a large sum for an entire sports team?
 
Michael J--here's a picture I took at the Springfield MA show a few years ago, of a scene that I thought was very intriguing. Apparently there are soccer players available from somewhere, Preiser maybe. What the guy did was take a set of players and paint their clothes green in the front and blue in the back. Then he placed them on a field with a mirror down the middle, so you see both sides and it looks like two teams facing each other. It took me a while to figure it out!

http://files.myopera.com/John98wbr/albums/661338/soccer.jpg
 
Railphotog said:
Great figures, but you've left out the most important thing - what would be the cost of custom figures? I can't imagine the cost being any where near currently available figures, so someone might only want to get a few, depending upon the price. Would someone pay a large sum for an entire sports team?
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Railphotog, it all depends on what the price is. I know some modelers who invest heavily in their projects. Or perhaps for a club layout, where members will split the cost. And then if there is enough demand, the price will come down simply due to volume. Also, everyone has their own idea of what a "large sum" is.

John P said:
Michael J--here's a picture I took at the Springfield MA show a few years ago, of a scene that I thought was very intriguing. Apparently there are soccer players available from somewhere, Preiser maybe. What the guy did was take a set of players and paint their clothes green in the front and blue in the back. Then he placed them on a field with a mirror down the middle, so you see both sides and it looks like two teams facing each other. It took me a while to figure it out!
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That is ingenious, John P! It does work, especially since soccer has such a large field compared to other sports.

I like the fact that they are in uniforms, too. The Woodland Scenics baseball players are in street clothes, like a pick-up game in a park. My goal is to model something more "organized".
 
Still no mention of a cost. So what would be the cost for one of the HO and O scale female shown in your original post? If Preiser painted figures are available for say$2.00 each, what would one of yours cost? And by "large sum", I'm talking about $10 -15 -20 or more. Would this be in your range? Or more? Tossing out your ideas with no indication of what sort of price is not liable to generate a lot of interest. What it is the price for volume figures? What volume are we talking about here? Who would prepare the original computer drawings/designs for your machine? So many questions and so few answers!
 
Railphotog, give some time. Bluebox only posted the original message yesterday afternoon, and may not have seen our responses yet.
 
Pricing for 3d Printed people

3d Printing is a new field. I happen to have access to a very high end machine. The cost for me to make them one off would be $10-$20 each. The material costs are quite low actually but the amount of time it take to make virtual models of the figures is high. I am just testing the idea right now. The cool thing is that I can do some amazing things. I can make almost anything and I can vary them any way I want. If a person submitted a picture to me they could have a mini me in their hand in a few days.

My question is if you had the power to make any figure or thing you wanted what would people like. What would be worth the time to make. What doesn't exist that would be hard for companies to do.
 
Yeah, that would be a high price. And I think companies could make sports figures if they wanted to, but they have chosen not to for some reason.
 
Bluebox said:
3d Printing is a new field. I happen to have access to a very high end machine. The cost for me to make them one off would be $10-$20 each. The material costs are quite low actually but the amount of time it take to make virtual models of the figures is high. I am just testing the idea right now. The cool thing is that I can do some amazing things. I can make almost anything and I can vary them any way I want. If a person submitted a picture to me they could have a mini me in their hand in a few days.

My question is if you had the power to make any figure or thing you wanted what would people like. What would be worth the time to make. What doesn't exist that would be hard for companies to do.
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Love the detail of the figure you have done.
Now having a model of yourself on the layout would do wonders for the ego. I can just immagine everyone sending in thier best photo from 10 years ago just to get themselves in the scenery.Or how many brownie points would a married man get for modeling his lovely wife into the layout?
I have an idea of a scene Involving a boy about to dive into the water but have never seen a suitable figure to use, lots of modelers will have something similar that they havent been able to find.
 
Michael J said:
Railphotog, give some time. Bluebox only posted the original message yesterday afternoon, and may not have seen our responses yet.
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Since you had posted several messages talking about the process, I thought you were the one making them, that's why I asked. I would not have posted had I realised the OP had not returned to the thread at the time.

Now that the price has been suggested, I'm curious how a model of a real person could be made from one photo? Seems to me at least two photos - front and back - would be a minimum requirement. And of course the photo would need to meet certain requirements.
 
I think a profile photo would be necessary also, in order to get certain features (ears, nose etc) accurate.
 
So Bluebox, you are saying that if there was volume demand for something, you could design it and the price would come down, because it is the original creation that costs most, not the replication?
 
My question is if you had the power to make any figure or thing you wanted what would people like. What would be worth the time to make. What doesn't exist that would be hard for companies to do.
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The Idea that I could submit photos of my family and friends and have us re-created in HO scale is very appealing. However the cost of 10-20$ per figure would limit your production.
That being said an RCMP figure is something I've alays wanted but it's never been made.
 
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