V-Day | 3D Printed Rose
It’s Valentine’s Day, so you know that’s a time for blah blah blah - let’s get on with some 3D Printing.
I’m quite fond of SolidWorks as my CAD modelling program, but I can’t say I feel the same about its surface modelling features. Don’t get me wrong, I think they’re perfectly fine, but when it comes down to organic modelling, I like to use Rhino3D.
That being said, I do enjoy a challenge, so I wanted to try and experiment with designing a rose in SolidWorks: the task being the creation of a model with minimal effort and maximum aesthetic appeal. Please note that this isn’t a tutorial in any way - just a quick breakdown on how I produced the final model.
The process ultimately involved creating the cross-sections for each layer of petals (on the Front Plane), and then using the ‘Sweep’ function to create a solid shape. Creating a central axis, each petal was rotated around the point of origin, and being a sucker for geometric symmetry, I ended up with a beautiful design that cycled petals in factors of 3.
The leaves and stem were created in a similar process, and the final model was printed in ‘Strong and Flexible’ Plastic from Shapeways.
All in all, the design took under 20 minutes which was great - it can be a little tricky getting the petals to ‘flow’ in a somewhat natural and organic fashion, but a convincing effect can be achieved with some trial and error.