{"id":32803,"date":"2020-07-28T20:23:37","date_gmt":"2020-07-28T20:23:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.padtinc.com\/2020\/07\/28\/printing-3d-texture-on-fdm-3d-printed-parts-it-can-be-done\/"},"modified":"2022-02-09T20:30:40","modified_gmt":"2022-02-09T20:30:40","slug":"printing-3d-texture-on-fdm-3d-printed-parts-it-can-be-done","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.padtinc.com\/2020\/07\/28\/printing-3d-texture-on-fdm-3d-printed-parts-it-can-be-done\/","title":{"rendered":"Printing 3D Texture on FDM 3D Printed Parts \u2013 it can be done!"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

While many examples exist of impressive texturing done on 3D\nprinted Stratasys<\/a> PolyJet<\/a> printed parts (some\nwild examples are here<\/a>), I\nhave to admit it took me a while to learn that true texturing can also be added\nto Stratasys Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM<\/a>) parts. This blog post\nwill walk you through adding texture to all faces or some faces of a solid\nmodel, ready for FDM printing. You, too, may be surprised by the results.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I know that complex texturing is possible in a graphics\nsense with such software packages as Rhino<\/a>,\nPhotoShop, Blender<\/a> and more, but I\u2019m going to show you\nwhat you can achieve simply by working with SolidWorks, from Rev. 2019\nonwards, as an easy starting point. From there, you can follow the same basic\nsteps but import your own texture files.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Example <\/picture>
Example of Stratasys FDM part set up to print with a checkerboard surface texture. (Image courtesy PADT Inc.)<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

SolidWorks Texture Options<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

First off, let\u2019s clarify some terms. Texture mapping has\nexisted for years and strictly speaking creates a 2D \u201ctexture\u201d or pattern. If I\nwere to wrap that imagery around a 3D CAD model and print it on, say, a PolyJet\nmulti-color 3D printer, I\u2019d get a 3D part with a flat or perhaps curved surface\ndecorated with a multi-color \u201cpicture\u201d such as a map or a photo of leather. It\ncould conform, but it\u2019s still basically a decal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A 3D texture instead is more properly referred to as Bump\nMapping (not to be confused with \u2026..too late\u2026.bit mapping). Bump mapping interprets\nthe color\/contrast information of a 2D image such that it renders light and\nshadow to give the illusion of a 3D part, while remaining in 2D. Taking this\nconcept one step further, 3D CAD software such as SolidWorks can apply rules\nthat convert white, black and grey shades into physical displacements,\nproducing a kind of tessellated topology mapping. This new information can be\nsaved as an STL<\/a>\nfile and generate a 3D printed part that has physical, tactile variations in\nmaterial height across its surface. (For a detailed explanation and examples of\ntexture versus bump-mapping, see the GrabCAD Tutorial \u201cAdding\nTexture to 3D Models<\/a>.\u201d)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For FDM parts, you\u2019ll get physical changes on the outer\nsurface of the part that appear as your choice of say, a checkerboard, an\narrangement of stars, a pebbly look or a series of waves. In the CAD software,\nyou have a number of options for editing that bump map to produce bigger or\nsmaller, higher or lower, finer or coarser variations of the original pattern,\nprior to saving the model file as an STL file.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Stepping through SolidWorks 3D Texturing<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The key to making this option work in SolidWorks 3D CAD\nsoftware (I\u2019m using SolidWorks 2020), is in the Appearances tab. Here are the\nsteps I\u2019ve taken, highlighting the variety of choices you can make. My example\nis the Post-It Note holder I described in my PADT blog post about advanced\ninfill options in GrabCAD Print<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

  1. Open Post-It note CAD file, select Solid Bodies\n(left menu) and select Appearances (in the right toolbar). <\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n
    \"A <\/picture><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
    1. Expand Appearances and go all the way down to Miscellaneous, then click to open the 3D Textures folder.<\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n
      \"A <\/picture><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
      1. Scroll down to choose one of the more than 50 (currently) available patterns. Here, I\u2019ve chosen a 5-pointed star pattern. <\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n
        \"A <\/picture><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
        1. I dragged and dropped that pattern onto the part body. A window opens up with several choices: the default is to apply the pattern to all faces:<\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n
          \"A <\/picture><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

          However, you can mouse over within that pop-window to select\nonly a single face, like this:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

          \"A <\/picture><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
          1. When you\u2019ve applied the pattern to either all faces or just one or two, you\u2019ll see a new entry in the left window, Appearances, with the subheading: 5-pointed Star. Right-click on those words, and choose Edit Appearance:<\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n
            \"A <\/picture><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

            Then the Appearances window expands as follows, opening by\ndefault to the Color\/Image tab:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

            \"A <\/picture><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

            In this pane, if desired, you could even Browse to switch to\na different pattern you have imported in a separate file.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

            1. Click on Mapping, and you\u2019ll see a number of \u201cthumb wheel\u201d sliders for resizing the pattern either via the wheel, clicking the up\/down arrows, or just entering a value.<\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n

              Mapping: this moves the pattern \u2013 you can\nsee it march left or right, up or down. I used it to center the stars so there\naren\u2019t any half-stars cut off at the edge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

              \"A <\/picture><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

              Size\/Orientation: You can also try \u201cFit width to selection\u201d or \u201cFit height to selection,\u201d or experiment with height and width yourself, and even tilt the pattern at an angle. (If you don\u2019t like the results, click on Reset Scale.) Here, I\u2019ve worked with it to have two rows of five stars.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

              1. Remember I said that you can also make the pattern higher or lower, like a change in elevation, so that it stands out a little or a lot. To make those choices, go to the Solid Bodies line in the Feature Manager tree, expand it, and click on the part name (mine is Champfer2). <\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n

                In the fly-out window that appears,\nclick on the third icon in the top row, \u201c3D Texture.\u201d This opens up an expanded\nwindow where you can refine the number of triangular facets that make up the\nshape of the selected texture pattern. In case you are working with more than\none face and\/or different patterns on each face, you would check the box under\nTexture Settings for each face when you want to edit it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

                \"A <\/picture><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

                Here is where you can flip the\npattern to extend outwards, or be recessed inwards, or, if you brought in a\nblack\/white 2D pattern in the first place, you can use this to convert it to a\ntrue 3D texture.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

                I\u2019ll show you some variations of\noffset distance, refinement and element size, with exaggerated results, so you\ncan see some of the possible effects:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

                \"A <\/picture><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

                In this first example, the only\nchange I made from the default was to increase the Texture Offset Distance from\n0.010 to 0.200. The stars are extending out quite visibly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

                Next, I changed Texture Refinement\nfrom 0% to 66.7%, and now you can see the stars more distinctly, with better\ndefined edges:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

                \"A <\/picture><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

                Finally, I am going to change the\nElement size from 0.128 to 0.180in. It made the star edges only slightly sharper,\nthough at the expense of increasing the number of facets from about 24,000 to\n26,000; for large parts and highly detailed texturing, the increased file size\ncould slow down slicing time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

                1. To make sure these textured areas print, you have to do one more special step: Convert to Mesh Body. Do this in the Feature Manager by right-clicking on the body, and selecting the second icon in the top row, \u201cConvert to Mesh Body.\u201d You can adjust some of these parameters, too, but I accepted the defaults.<\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n
                  \"A <\/picture><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
                  1. Lastly, Save the file in STL format, as usual.<\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n

                    At my company, PADT<\/a>, my favorite FDM printer is our F370, so I\u2019m going to set this up in GrabCAD Print<\/a> software, to print there in ABS, at 0.005in layers:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

                    \"A <\/picture><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

                    You can definitely see the stars popping out on the front\nface; too bad you can also see two weird spikes part-way up, that are small\nbits of a partial row of stars. That means I should have split the face before\nI applied the texture, so that the upper portion was left plain. Well, next\ntime.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

                    Here\u2019s the finished part, with its little spikes:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

                    \"A <\/picture><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

                    And here\u2019s another example I did when I was first trying out a checkerboard pattern; I applied the texture to all faces, so it came out a bit interesting with the checkerboard on the top and bottom, too. Again, next time, I would be more selective to split up the model. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

                    \"A <\/picture><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

                    NOTE: It\u2019s clear that texturing works much better on\nvertical faces than horizontal, due to the nature of the FDM layering process \u2013\njust be sure to orient your parts to allow for this.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

                    For More Information on Texturing<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

                    SolidWorks offers a number of tutorials on the texturing\nset-up process, such as http:\/\/help.solidworks.com\/2019\/english\/solidworks\/sldworks\/c_3d_textures.htm<\/a>,\nand Shuvom Ghose at GrabCAD gives even more details about what to expect with this\nprocess in his post https:\/\/grabcad.com\/tutorials\/how-to-3d-texture-your-parts-for-fdm-printing-using-solidworks-2019<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

                    There will also be a general Stratasys webinar on The Benefits of 3D Printing Physical Textures<\/a> on July 29 at 9am PT.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

                    Commercial aircraft companies are already adding a pebble\ntexture to flight-approved cosmetic FDM parts, such as covers for brackets and\nswitches that keep them from being bumped. If you try this out, let us know\nwhat texture you chose and send us a photo of your part. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

                    PADT Inc. is a globally recognized provider of Numerical\nSimulation, Product Development and 3D Printing products and services, and is\nan authorized reseller of Stratasys products. For more information on Stratasys\nprinters and materials, contact us at info@padtinc.com<\/strong>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

                    While many examples exist of impressive texturing done on 3D printed Stratasys PolyJet printed parts (some wild examples are here), […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":32804,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[2279,2398,2399,596,2305,483,2400,598,2401,544,520],"post-podcast":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.padtinc.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32803"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.padtinc.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.padtinc.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.padtinc.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/20"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.padtinc.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32803"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.padtinc.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32803\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.padtinc.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32804"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.padtinc.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32803"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.padtinc.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32803"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.padtinc.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32803"},{"taxonomy":"post-podcast","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.padtinc.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/post-podcast?post=32803"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}