3D Design and Modelling - Inquiring and Analyzing

 

Johannes Gutenberg was a German inventor who had invented the printing press

process in the 1450’s. His invention allowed the printing of many books. Theprinting press process was a machine that was operated by hand which transferred writing and images/pictures. Basically how it worked was that a frame was used to set groups and of type blocks, these blocks had letters on them and they were placed in reverse. A sheet of paper was laid on the inked blocks, and then the paper and the blocks passed through a roller which made sure that the ink was transferred onto the paper. When the paper is lifted, the reader can see inked letters. The first book to ever be printed was a Latin language Bible, printed in Mainz, Germany; the Bible was then named after him ‘The Gutenberg Bible’.  Johann was in born in 1938 to a very wealthy family, he had a very nice childhood; he got taught to read and write. But the books that he read were written by hand and were only available to rich families as at that time, books were really expensive. Johann wanted to find a way so everyone could have books to read. He moved to Strasburg, Germany and did many experiments to find a faster way of printing. Johann soon ran out of money so he moved back to Mainz (his home city) where he found a layer called Joahann Fust, who gave him the money to continue his experiments. Johann, again, used up a lot of money and Joahann was not happy about it, because he said that Johann was just waisting it and wasn’t getting anywhere. Joahann sewed Johann and took everything away from him. But the printer evolved and spread around Europe and soon hundreds of books were printed. Johann died in Mainz in 1468.

There are two types of printers; the first one is called impact printer and the second is called non – impact printer. An impact printer is a printer that makes contact with paper. It forms the print images/ characters when a print hammer or wheel is pressed against an inked ribbon. As a result of that an image is left on the paper. This kind of printer is usually found in typewriters and Dot Matrix Printers. Non – impact printers are faster and quieter than impact printers because they don’t have as much parts that move as well they don’t hammer against the paper. They print characters and images without the need to have direct contact with printing mechanism and the paper (no pressing or thumping/hammering). Below are a few examples of non – impact printers.

Disadvantages & Advantages of Each Printer:

 Thermal Printers

Advantages:-

•         They are fairly inexpensive
•        They are easy to use
•         They are quiet and don’t make a loud noise when printing

Disadvantages:-

•         If the machine is too hot then more ink will come out
•        They are not always precise and neat; they can smudge
•        They are almost completely monochrome printers
•         The high heat used in the printing process can damage the print head meaning that the owner has to pay more money to get it fixed = waste of money 

 Dot Matrix Printer

Advantages:-

•         They are inexpensive and are easily available in the market
•         Used to make carbon copies
•        The ink ribbon of the printer is cheap and lasts longer than most of the ink of the other printers
•         The maintenance price is low
•         The ink doesn’t become empty suddenly, it slowly starts fading so you get more time to go and change the ribbon

Disadvantages:-

•         The printing quality of this printer is low
•        It makes a very loud noise when it is printing
•         The pins bend easily which the destroy the print head
•         This printer is very low at printing comparing it to other printers
•         Paper jams are very hard to fix 

 Daisy Wheel Printer

Advantages:-

•         The quality of the final print out is very high
•         It’s not overly expensive
•         Low maintenance needed

Disadvantages:-

•         They make a lot of noise when printing
•         They are slow at printing
•         You have to change the ink ribbon frequently 

 Inkjet Printer

Advantages:-

•         They are not expensive
•         You can create images/documents at high quality – before they were blurry and bad quality
•         They don’t take up too much space
•         They don’t require so much time to print
  

Disadvantages:-

•         The cartridge is not really  cheap
•         You can only print a certain amount of documents
•         The ink sometimes gets clogged
•          Documents get smudged if you don’t let them dry
•         replacing the cartridge can cause some problems to the printer

Laser Printer 

Advantages:

•      They print at a fast rate
•         They don’t make a loud noise when they print
•         Colour printing is possible
•         Printing quality is good

Disadvantages:-

•         They are more expensive than other printers
•         They use complicated technology
•         Fixing any broken parts is expensive
•         They are dangerous to the health and atmosphere 

     References 

       

       The Great Idea Finder (2007) History: Inventions: Printing Press

http://www.ideafinder.com/history/inventions/printpress.htm
[Accessed on 27^th September 2015]

Great Site (n.d.) Home: English Bible History:  Johann Gutenberg

http://www.greatsite.com/timeline-english-bible-history/gutenberg.html

[Accessed on 27^th September 2015]

PsPrint (n.d.) General: Design and Printing: The Invention of the Printing Press

https://www.psprint.com/resources/printing-press/

[Accessed on 27^th September 2015]

3D Printing 

3D printing is the process of of making 3 dimensional objects from a digital file, it basically adds volume to your print out/images. There are two kinds of 3D

printers, resin and non - resin. The resin kind of 3D printer uses laser technology which solidifies layer by layer to create the objects. This kind of printer is very expensive and it uses lights and chemicals which are sometimes harmful to the environment. On the other hand the results are more precise than non - resin printers. Non - resin printers are more popular, instead of using chemicals and lasers, this kind of 3D printer uses plastic, food, ceramics or other materials like that. This adds layers on top of layers to create the wanted object. 

The 3D printer starts by creating a virtual sketch of the object which the person wants to create. The virtual design is created using a 'computer aided design' file which uses a 3D modeling program or with a 3D scanner. The 3D modeling program is used when the user wants to create a totally new object, instead with the scanner the user uses it to copy an existing object; the 3D scanner then creates a digtial copy, in 3D of the object wanted by the user. 

In simple steps this is how a 3D printer works:

1. The user creates his idea in a computer file
2. The computer file is prepared from the machine 
3. The computer file travels to the 3D printing machine 
4. A layer of powder is spread out in the 3D printer 
5. Then the temperature of the machine is increased 
6. A laser hardens the hardens the powder and the model gets its' shape
7. Another layer of powder is spread out in the 3D printer
8. And the process is repeated many times until the object is completely finished 
9. Then the model is lifted out of the 3D printer and cleaned

Not all the 3D printers use the same technology; there are several ways to print . Certain methods melt or soften the material which produces the layers; these are specific names SLS (Selective laser sintering), FDM (Fused deposition modeling) and SLA (stereolithography). 3D printing is used for rapid prototyping (first version of a product), architectural scale models, maquettes (a sculptors first sketch),  healthcare, entertainment (e.g. props), the reconstruction of fossils, replicating ancient artifacts (archaeology), reconstructing very damaged evidence from crime scenes, business and industrial equipment, education and other consumer - product industries. 3D printers are used by students, businesses and designers. 3D printers make it possible to experiment with e.g. fashion and architecture (buildings, houses etc.)  

References 

Kids Code Computer and Science Magazine (2015) February 2015 Issue: What is 3D printing?

https://www.kidscodecs.com/what-is-3d-printing/

[Accessed on 30 September 2015]

3D Printing (n.d.) Home: Articles: What is 3D printing?

http://3dprinting.com/what-is-3d-printing/

[Accessed on 30 September 2015]

3ders - 3D printer & 3D printing news (n.d.) Home: 3D printing 

http://www.3ders.org/3d-printing.html

[Accessed on 30 September 2015]

Reflection 

This research task was very interesting because I learnt many new things about the history of printing in general but as well I learnt about modern printing and how it has evolved throughout these past years. In addition I have discoverer 3D printing, which I never new existed, and I also learnt how the 3D printer works and what it is used for, for example, a 3D printer can be used by students, business and/or designers for certain things like fashion and architecture. I found this lesson very interesting and fascinating especially because I learnt something different and it wasn't just the usual research about boring things. In addition to learning something new, I got the chance to practice my referencing skills (Harvard way) which is always a good thing because even though I know how to reference it is always good to have a little practice especially because I don't only need to reference in ICT, I need to know how to do it in all my subjects. I really enjoyed this lesson and hope we do lessons similar to this in the future. 

Computers & Technology – Digital Design Essay

Introduction About Me 

y name is Federica  and I study in Emirates International School, and I am part of the digital design class. I have created this blog to tell and show you what I do in my class, I am very interested in IT and Digital Design so I am looking forward to learning new things this year. This term I will be looking at 3D Printing - Design and Modelling, which sounds really interesting and I very excited to improve my knowledge on IT.  

Digital Design Article - Computers which have failed in the years 

Computers and technology have developed through the past years. They have changed how human-kind acts, thinks and does things. In this essay I’m going to tell you why computers have changed people’s lives as well as why they sometimes don’t work the way you want them to.

A lot of articles about computer failure came up when I searched them up on Google but one caught my eye; ‘Flights disrupted after computer failure at UK air traffic control center’. The computer failure that happened on the 12^th December 2014 had affected tens of thousands of people who had been stuck in the airport for hours without going anywhere. The problem was caused by a technical fault in the flight data system and was reported by the National Air Traffic Services. In addition to the workers trying to figure out why there had been a problem, the government also intervened and stated that ‘the disruption was ‘unacceptable’ and demanded a ‘full explanation’ of what had gone wrong’.

The glitch had caused problems at airports all around the country. Some of the problems included: delays at Heathrow and Gatwick airports, 84 flights were cancelled at Heathrow and delays were under an hour.  At Heathrow, 84 flights out of 1300 flights were cancelled, at London City there had been cancellations and delays, at Bristol there were many delays but no cancellations and at Glasgow there had been some delays to arrivals and departures. Those are just some of the complications that happened because of the computer failure. Some of planes had to circle around for hours before they could safely land. The Nats (National Air Traffic Services) stated that an investigation had been carried out to find out the reason of the glitch; the managing director Martin Rolfe identified both a computer hack and a power outage as possible causes. Even though there was an investigation going on, once the air traffic control has a problem nothing is allowed to take off because it could cause another problem. As a result of the problem the passengers were very annoyed, angry and upset, since some of them had to stay the night in the airport and a lot of them missed their flights and could not reach their destination on time as I previously wrote.

There are a lot of advantages of using computers, well to start off it just makes life so much easier. What I mean with that is that it saves time and effort to finish/complete a task, before computers people wrote essays or just simple notes of what they had to do for the day on paper now thanks to technology and computers we take simple seconds to type it up and that’s done, you don’t waste paper and any unnecessary time that you might need to do other things. Another reason why computers are great and help us in everyday life is that people use computers to pay bills, managing home budgets or just having a break and watching a movie, listening to music or playing computer games. Also a lot of organizations such as banks use computers to keep track of accounts and managing financial dealings. Many of these banks provide the facility of online paying. Also today you can just switch on your computer and open an application such as Skype or Facetime and in a blink of an eye you can talk to your friend that lives on the other side of the planet. Or other social media like Facebook or Twitter where you can just open up the computer and see what is happening around the world. Computers are also an educational tool because students have access to any information on the internet making research and doing projects much easier for them.

Even though there are quite a lot of advantages, with every advantage comes a disadvantage. As it shows in the research I’ve done and the article that I have written about, computers don’t always work the way you want them too and have created some problems in the society. First of all many people use the computers in the wrong way or without a positive purpose, e.g. they play games and chat in the wrong time when for example they are doing homework. This is wasting precious time and energy and can cause stress. Unfortunately the young generation, including myself, spend more time more time on social media websites like Facebook, Instagram etc. or texting friends while you should be doing homework or be sleeping which is bad for both studies and health. Data or important importation is not always safe and sometimes hackers hack and steal this information, this can cause serious and dangerous problems for the data security. This brings me on the topic of privacy violation, so if people put up information about them or pictures that they don’t want to be put but still post them anyone can see it even if you delete it, someone has still seen it. Since computers store important details, for example private pictures or simply passwords for accessing things, if the information is not protected properly then it can be violated and hacked and can end up in the wrong hands. Using computers constantly can result into injuries or disorders of hands, wrists, elbows, eyes, necks and back. That’s why it is recommended to take few minute breaks if you’ve been on your computer for 30 minutes or so.

To conclude I think that, not only computers but technology itself has improved the way humans think and act, it has be us become more aware of things as well as made us become more open minded about the world around us. Technology has made things possible that we didn’t think were possible before e.g. by simply opening your devices you can soon see what is going on around the world. To the point, basically they do a lot of the work that we don’t want to do. On the other hand, as I found out, computers are not always on your side. Since they are machines, they can easily break, cause problems and lose important data – that’s why it is often told to have an extra copy of files just in case some crash or get deleted. Finally I truly think that computers have changed and had a massive impact on the society and the world we know today, and I’m sure that technology is going to keep progressing and developing; who knows what they will create next.

 References:

BBC (2014) BBC: News: UK - Flights disrupted after computer failure at UK control centrewww.bbc.com/news/uk-30454240

[Accessed on 19 September 2015]

Byte – Notes (2013) Home: Introduction to computing - Advantages and disadvantages of computers

http://www.byte-notes.com/advantages-and-disadvantages-computers

[Accessed on 19 September 2015]