Mosaic Manufacturing, the makers of the Palette will release a multi-material software platform later this year called CANVAS.
3D Printing Industry took a look at Palette to see how the system works side by side with a FFF 3D printer to create multi-material objects in up to four different colors.
In a video from Mosaic Manufacturing the CANVAS platform appears to be another promising step forward for the FDM market. The software is compatible with Mosaic’s hardware, and works with a number of multi-color solutions on the market – including the Ultimaker 3, BCN3D Sigma, and upcoming Prusa i3 MK2 Multi-Material Upgrade.
If you’re familiar with multi-color desktop 3D printing of today, you’ll know that the software is far from ideal. From complicated methods of dissecting 3D models into separate solids – to exporting these solids as different .stls – to importing them into your slicer, creating new processes, and assigning these processes to different portions of your models.
To add to these complexities, there is only a small selection of multi-color and multi-material models available for download. This restricts what users can print and limits the usefulness of every multi-color technology on the market.
CANVAS looks to solve these issues – giving users a more streamlined workflow for slicing, and ways of easily adding color to existing models. In a recent blog post, Mosaic states, “At the beginning, the focus will be on simplifying the user experience that comes with multi-color and multi-material printing. This will be as a result of focus on the CANVAS multi-material slicer, intuitively allowing the addition and assignment of color.”
Mosaic illustrate the coloring process in their video – something that shows how regular 3D printing users can create new content, not just those with advanced modeling skills.
The company will also release a customization tool based on a CAD engine. “The CANVAS customizer unlocks nearly endless control over products that are on the platform. It is being developed with designer friendly tools and a simple interface. This provides the complete power of 3D printing to everyone, not just CAD experts,” Mosaic say.
Mosaic states that CANVAS will be available late in 2017.
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Featured image shows a Squirtle army 3D printed on single nozzle Dremel using Mosaic Manufacturing Palette color mixer. Design by Flowalistik. Photo by Michael Petch
