Ever wonder what a year of 3d printing by one dude looks like? Here is what a full year of 3d printing in 2017 went for me (Year #2)

Many of you may recognize me from this build I did a few years ago which was a fully 3d printed set of T-60 armor that I posed a build log here: https://imgur.com/a/1Ivf0

And I went on to build several other large mostly or completely 3d printed projects.

At the start of 2017 I was incredibly fortunate to be featured and able to display some of my prints from 2016 at the Monoprice suite at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas

I displayed a variety of props from my then recent Reaper cosplay and T-60 armor which both had been printed on my pair of Monoprice Maker Selects.

Pretty much a few days after CES I actually relocated to Columbus OH for a short term work contract and I got access to some amazing workspaces and big printers while there.

At first I tested made small and cute things..

The sky was literally the limit...

You can tell I'm obsessed with low poly objects and pokemon

I was experimenting with IC3D Printers that they had generously provided me for the T-60 build and a few other assorted projects I had worked on.

Fidget spinners were all the rage at the time too in early 2017.

Then I started making progressively bigger things using the large format printers I had access to.

I might have dabbled in multi extrusion printing too...

It's amazing what subtle differences different printers have Lulzbot vs. Monoprice vs. custom printers..

In short I learned a ton about printing during these times.

The first big con for me was C2E2 and being one of the lucky few chosen to compete in the Crown Championships of Cosplay in Chicago.

I actually managed to take 3rd place in larger than life category in my 3d printed set of T-60 armor

What you don't see in this pic is that my intense look is really me being in massive pain after wearing the 90ish or so lbs of armor for 6 hours that day

Here is the shiny medal I ended up with.

In the early spring of 2017, I was interviewed and featured in a video by Inverse and that video sorta went viral with about 860,000+ views, 7,500 shares, and getting featured by the official Fallout facebook page. things kinda got crazy for a while (and it was a challenge to stay humble)

After wearing T-60 I decided it was time for me to retire it and start on a new 3d printed cosplay. Genji Shimada from Overwatch!

First I modeled up the helmet and printed it on the large format printer.

After countless coats of filler primer I finally got it looking super smoooooooooth and shiny.

Assembling the sword was a interesting challenge

The sword came out sooooooo shiny and awesome with airbrushed Alclad gold paint

Gotta pay my cat tax if you made it this far... (more cat taxes to come). This is not my cat but belonged to my roommates.

With the exception of the helmet and props, the majority of Genji's armor was printed with semi transparent Sainsmart TPU. Having experienced breakages with PLA I wanted a material that was flexible and robust so I could be both comfy and not break things when I posed for a pic.

Sanding TPU is virtually impossible so I ended up building up the surface with coats of Acrylic Varnish and Plastidip to make the lines go away. It sorta did the job (I've since figured out better methods).

The fun part of using plastidip as the coating is I could easily cut into it with a razor and peel away the areas I wanted LEDs to shine through.

I managed to do a fit test and I was pretty satisfied with how well the prints fit the silhouette. Little did I know that.

Like Genji from Overwath

in the end it all came together and I was able to compete at the cosplay contest with my group. (we sadly did not place)

After that I sorta went crazy designing and printing props to learn more about printing for cosplay. Here I designed and printed Tracer's Uprising Skin pistols.

Devil/Imp Mercy Wings (my file design)

Sombra's backplate thingy (my file design)

Sombra's Machine pistol (file on thingiverse)

Tyene's Daggers from Game of Thrones (file on thingiverse)

Ana's Rifle (file on thingiverse)

Moar pics of the devil mercy wings

McCree's belt buckle (my file design)

Fallout 4 Assault Rifle

Junkrat's chest grenades (and wallet/key holders for cosplayers)

Power Ranger flute sword (file on thingiverse)

Blackwatch Genji sword

Junkrats Grenade launcher for a friend (Obsydiann Props' 3d model)

Fire Emblem Chakrams

Swords inspired by the ones seen on Game of Thrones (my design)

By this point I was very good a modeling things faster than I could print them like this Huntress Widowmaker rifle

Or blaster from Star Wars

Or the Fallout 4 Minigun.

Tesla Rifle

N7 Helmet

Fallout New Vegas 9mm SMG

Fallout 4 Assault Rifle

Halloween Skin McCree Peacemaker

T-51 shoulder plate

Genji deflections swords

Crusader Shotgun from Mass Effect

Bunny Riven Sword from League of Legends

Warhammer 40k Bolter

Also my T-60 Armor got to sit on display at the 2017 Ohio State Fair in conjunction with IC3D Printers at the Ohio State Government booth (or something like that I was just the talent lol). Damn it was popular.

By mid July I was getting and using filament spools that looked like this so I would have to change less often. These are 20 lbs spools made by IC3D Printers

Or Lannister armor from Game of Thrones

Like my other designs I started out with 3d modeling it all, this time including Zbrush in the mix for the organic details.

Modeling out the gorget plating in Fusion. Given the angle of the reference pic I had to take some liberties with the angling/sizing.

I own a CR-10s5 with a very luxurious 500mm x 500mm x 500mm build envelope so I could easily print the helmet in a single part. The total print time was about 6 days.

This was my second try...

Sadly there was a small layer hiccup but nothing I could not sand down. Curse PLA for being hard to sand. Still... T-60 and I were delighted!

Adding the finer details to the helmet and acetone smoothing some of the armor parts..

Masked off most of the helmet.

Scroll work printed very nicely on my Monoprice Maker Select Plus

Riveting the leather together

And painted them with a light dusting of gold.

So shiny and new. perhaps too new. I ended up weathering it down with a few Citadel ink washes like Nuln Oil (literally the most expensive paint I ever used)

The belt decorations lined up, painted, and weathered

And the last shot of the armor before I packed all up to go to DragonCon.

All in all I was pretty damn happy how it came out when I wore it at DragonCon 2017. If you want to learn more about this build I actually have an album for this one too here: https://imgur.com/a/w0k13

I even took 2nd place in the Master Category at DragonCon which was a awesome surprise.

Also at DragonCon I got to revisit my partially 3d Printed Reaper Cosplay

And even sexy T-60 Power Armor got a showing at DragonCon

On the heels of my Lannister Armor build I decided I wanted to revisit my Fallout 4 Power Armor and make a different set. This time I decided I wanted to do it right from the ground up starting with the Power Armor frame and off I went with my prints.

Arm handle for the Power Armor frame

Part of the chest (sadly if failed mid print)

Weird chest part

I sadly had to put this build on hold as in September I had to relocate back to Vegas. I'm resuming this build early in 2018.

Not long after I returned to Vegas I got the chance to work on a once in a lifetime project: getting sponsored by Monoprice to build something cool to display at CES 2018 using their entire line of printers and a few KGs of filament.

This is what all the printers Monoprice makes looks like in box form.

It unpacked nicely in my dedicated print room

Wide angle pic of print room

But one thing I realized I did not really talk about is the modeling process and how I actually learned to 3d model with mostly brute force of trying to make as many things as possible and occasionally doing a google search for "how do I do X in fusion 360". I know there were tons of youtube tutorials but I found I learned best by doing stuff--even if I made mistakes in the process.

So this is my story of how I went from being rubbish to more competent in 3d modeling with a CAD software called Fusion 360

During the Holidays 3d printers were invaluable for printing gifts for friends.

That day I learned that I could print ABS with this tiny Delta.

While I love ABS, it is a pain in the butt to print during the winter (even with a well insulated enclosure) so I ended up having to pick the least bad prints sometimes and do extra post processing.

Adding acetone slurry to fill in the cracks and seams not only filled it but made it much stronger. After the acetone evaporates it was easy enough for me to sand it smooth with a low powered sander

More examples of the delamination before I fixed it with acetone slurry.

And after sanding off the ABS slurry and painting it. Also a good base coat and dry brushing can make all the difference.

More Cat tax, Cat could not understand why she was not as cute as the newly printed Porgs and immediately went to start knocking them off every raised surface.

Tried out different printing configurations for the head. Ended up printing it entirely hollow.

Coming together

Early stages of post finishing the Torso

Primer stage a few days before CES

Painted and weathered torso

Can't be skipping leg day progress

Moar legs...

Adding spackle to those legs...

Tol legs (I'm 6" tall). This was also the point where I realized I had printed the legs 12% too large. (oooooops!)

And finished and delivered to its display spot at CES 2018. Holy cannoli this thing was huge. It was a blast to work on and was really a perfect capstone to an awesome 2017 for printing.

I am truly excited for the tentative plans I have for 2018, and I hope to be back here again next year with a full recap of it.

As a Imgurian, I honestly don't make these posts to shill for subscribers and I don't give a f*ck if you like my work or follow me or not. I just really like making and 3d printing cool sh*t.

That being said, a ton of you PMed me in past posts wanting to know if I had a youtube channel or social media you could follow to see more of my work. I listened to y'all and started a youtube channel at http://www.youtube.com/hirocreations or if pictures is more your speed I have an instagram http://www.instagram.com/yasutano .

Feel free to follow my old and new builds there... Or not. :)

A final cat tax, and huge thanks if you made it all the way down there. I'm happy to answer any questions about any of the builds or 3d printing in general.