Skylander Toys are Prototyped with 3D Printing — Watch How

YouTuber SkylanderDad from his TheSkylanderBoyandGirl video channel took a trip to the Toys For Bob design studio where the prototypes for their toy and videogame hybrid are created. Sky Dad spoke with one of the games designers about the rapid prototyping process and demonstrated how to clean a 3D print from an Objet Eden260V.

Skylanders is a videogame available for all of the major consoles that interacts with toys that a player can purchase that allow them to use different characters within the game. Each plastic toy has a corresponding character in the game that has different abilities. So the more of the figures that you collect, the more options gamers have for playing and beating the game. It’s sort of a combination of a playable videogame with a collectible card game like PokeMon. It sounds really expensive [Ed: It is!], but from a purely tech standpoint it’s pretty cool.

The Sky Dad runs a YouTube channel documenting game tips, tricks and unboxing videos of new characters, skits and gameplay footage. He recently paid a visit to the Skylanders game creators studio Toys For Bob where the Toy and Character Director I-Wei Huang demonstrated the studios in house Objet Eden260V.

Most videos showing the Objet and other industrial 3D printers in action are generally marketing videos that tend to gloss over the realities of 3D printing, even for rapid prototyping and industrial manufacturing. Sky Dads video wasn’t being controlled by a marketing department trying to sell anything, so we get a pretty unobstructed view of what using the machine is really like. Including a look at what is exactly involved with cleaning off support structures and finishing the model.

If you haven’t seen a PolyJet 3D printer working before then here it is, warts and all, but just a warning there is some unfortunate usage of “peace out” by a white dude near the end:

Of course rapid prototyping is still an incredible time saver, and personally I would rather spend a few hours cleaning away clumpy plastic than wait a month for a traditionally made prototype any day. But videos like this remind me how little actual footage of professional 3D printers is available that hasn’t been curated by someone in marketing.