3D PRINTING

3D Printing my Comic Book Characters

Although the Lord of the Dragons project has been in progress now for a long time, from the moment 3D printers became available in a wide stream way, I knew I wanted to create models of all the characters in my comics and share them with the world.

When I first started 3D printing (and if I am honest in reflection) I spent too much time trying to get my Ender-3 to print models and I didn't really understand 3D printing the way that I do now. Four years later in 2024, 3D printing is incredible and it still makes me smile to see a character from a comic book in my head, 3D printed and standing on my desk. For anyone thinking about 3D printing, there are so many printers now which auto calibrate and make printing a joy by removing all the things which used to be tricky - so it's easier than ever to bring your creations to life!

3D Printing Process

Early 3D printing was a relatively steep learning curve and (in reality), the technology around it even now is still evolving now at a blistering pace in 2024. Taking 3D models in Blender (which is just such an incredible program for 3D animation and so much more) I experimented with so many things which now were so obviously wrong in retrospect. Early 3D printers require you to have an intimate knowledge of things like print speed, bed levelling, correct file formats, supports, how to correctly store filament, bed and nozzle temperatures and so much more, that in honesty in hindsight was a massive distraction from working on my actual story. The thing was that when I first got into 3D printing, it required such a lot of understanding about different things and different software that I went down a bit of a rabbit hole to learn things. Fast forward to now and after a few years' experience, I have really started to get in my stride with 3D printing my characters in quality PLA with nice bases and creating figures which I'm really pleased with. You can see more of my character models on my Instagram account @lordofthedragons_

3D Printing Learning Curve

Some of the biggest things I have learnt with 3D printing have often been the things that in honesty have been solved more by advancements in technology than my understanding of them. One of the earliest models I had created for one of my characters called "Master Roon" was ultimately beautifully printed as a prototype from my Crealty Enter-3 printer, but blood sweat and tears went into it to get there, which with a modern printer would be a simple task!

To get the first print right, I must have had a dozen or so failures due to things like the bed not being level, supports which didn't stick properly to the base plate (due to the way the printer moved) and things like contraction of the model during cooling (because some models took 24-hours to print and I couldn't do them all in one go and had to stop them overnight!). With my latest Flashforge 5M printer, the bed automatically levels itself without adjusting knobs, the base plate moves up and down and the printer head moves (rather than the base plate) which makes supports failing less of an issue. And I can print things in about 1/3rd of the time, meaning and even my most complicated 15cm tall model to date only took about 8 hours, not 24. So in comparison, my latest model once adjusted took just 2 prints to perfect, not the dozen or so on my earlier printer.