Category: 3D Printing

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Laser Engraving at American River College

The Design Hub of American River College conducted one of the first projects using the Laser Engraver.  Shailza, one of the laser engraver interns working on this project, demonstrated how it produces the gentle, artistic shades of black and white on the sturdy wooden boards.  Plywood is used as the canvas, and the laser carves in its drawings. The Laser Engraver obeys the commands sent by the software on the computer to create whatever artwork the intern orders it to.  For this particular project, the deliverables are name tags made of wood for all the interns who are working for the Design Hub.

This project of engraved name tags gives all the interns a sense of community, since we are always collaborating and working together to contribute each unique skill set to the various projects.  The original idea for this project was right at the beginning of this spring semester because it gives a feeling unity and family to the new incoming interns just now joining the team. The engraved name tags were completed a couple of weeks ago, and can be viewed in the Design Hub lab.  Even though the actual project for the engraved name tags is complete, the Laser Engraver will be frequently used during the full course of this semester. 

The Full Spectrum Laser Retina Engrave 3D software orders the laser to cut out the name tags. The shaded pink section we can see in the photo to the left is the area that the laser already engraved, and the white areas are what is left to be carved until the project is finished.

 Shailza, a hard-working intern trained in the art of laser engraving, showed a one-on-one demonstration of the laser engraver in action!  First, you open up the file in the special software, Full Spectrum Laser Retina Engrave 3D. She showed the computer settings required for the engraver.  

FUN FACTS:

  • Whatever image that the intern wants to print must be in xps format
  • The raster power CANNOT be at 100%- we have found it most effective to be set at 65-70% for the best wooden artwork.
  • The raster speed is set between 45-50%, and the vector layers power is set at 70%. The IP address should show up on the laser screen.
  • And “Slow jog” isn’t just something a student does when they’re late to class on a Monday morning after sleeping through their alarm, it’s also the setting on the control panel to give the intern more control over the laser so it doesn’t go flying off in a frenzy.

Once the settings are properly set, the wood is positioned to be carved into, and watch the time at the bottom of the screen allows the students a time frame for when their project should be completed.  The average time is 7-8 minutes- like for the name tag project- but it depends on the size of the wood/project.

The laser engraver, Photo by photography intern Angelique Doty

The next project also on the Laser Engraver leads us to meet Jacob Olson, who brings ideas to life through the art of 3D printing and laser engraving.  He is trained in laser engraving and is a solid modeler for the Design Hub. He also tutors design technology programs such as Autocad, Revit, Sketchup. 

Jacob takes family photos, and creates images printed onto wood through the scientific world of computers, cyberspace, and LASER TECHNOLOGY (cue the “Twilight Zone” theme song).  

Jacob is providing this project with his own family photos of his great grandparents, inspired by his father’s idea, and giving them as a present to his grandpa. The end product will be a collage of family photos laser engraved in the plywood.  Jacob showed us around the laser engraver to get a feel for it and showed me exactly how the machine works: the water filter from the bucket pumps up water and keeps the laser tube cool while the exhaust fan pulls out smoke and filters out the exhaust to prevent turning the interns’ hard work into a barbecue.  There’s a cycle of water that goes from being pumped from the bucket, to the laser tube and back to the bucket in a little circle of life. 

The artists of the Design Hub have an ongoing task of creating new ideas to contribute to being engraved into wood using the Laser Engraver.  There has been extensive training to prepare the interns on how it’s used, including training sessions they attended, as well as sample tests before running the actual name tag project.

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ARC Design Hub Drones Take to the Sky!

Photo by photography intern Angelique Doty

On March 2, 2018, middle school and high school students from Heritage Peak: Pacific Charter Schools visited the ARC campus to view the demonstration of drone flying put on by the drone-flying interns of the Design Hub: Sean, Jason, Shane, and Allan.  Jason demonstrates the flying of the drones using remote controls, while Sean presents the technique of using hand gestures to direct the drone on where to fly. The basic ground rules for the drone flying demonstration in the gym was for all people in the gym who are not currently involved in the drone flying to stay behind the blue line, except for the individuals who are either showing the students how to fly the drones, or the students actually participating in flying the drone. Angelique, one of the Design Hub’s photography interns, had the opportunity to fly the drone. “Jason showed me how to guide the remote control to direct the drone to wherever I wanted it to go. It was like a real life video game!” She tells us afterwards.

Angelique is the Design Hub intern behind capturing the photos of these drones, and is our eyes and ears for fantastic events like these. She is one of the several very talented photographers we have on our team, and is an integral part in bringing the Design Hub stories to life. She takes our articles to a whole other level, because without pictures these pieces would be all bark and no bite. Here is a quick thank-you to her!

This event Angelique covered was made possible by the CTE department reaching out to the drone flying interns of the Design Hub through Randy Schuster, who put this event together. This event was put in place to encourage more students to discover all the different educational opportunities that ARC has to offer. There will be further development and a build of programs, especially in the photography and agriculture departments.  The drones will be flown on campus in certain areas. For this event, it was held in the gym and on the neighboring field. Due to restricted airspace, there are regulations for how far the drones can be flown in the air. They are in the process of setting up another drone flying event on a specific day during the month of April, and are working on getting certain days set up to fly the drones during the semester. 

Photo by photography intern Angelique Doty

Flying these drones isn’t the only thing our Design Hub interns get to do, either. We actually make them by hand here in the Hub’s maker space! Every piece is designed on the computer by our modeling interns, and sent to be 3D-printed in our 3D printing lab. From there, the pieces are assembled by hand, and the tech needed to fly the drone is inserted into the drone body. Then, voila- we have a drone that is ready to fly! No drone kits required. Here at the Design Hub, our students really take pride in their work, and are happy to share with others and inspire younger students like the ones at Heritage Peak. If we left at least one inspired student from this visit, we consider that a win, and we hope to see that inspiration someday flourish into something great.

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Exploring Language Through Technology and Art at the Design Hub

American River College’s Spanish 361 class, led by Professor Currea, is about learning and applying the student’s knowledge of Spanish through conversation. Rather than just studying and learning phrases, Professor Currea challenges her students to learn a new skill all while speaking Spanish. The class attended the Kaneko art gallery- American River College’s art gallery on campus that houses all of our student artwork. They observed and conversed in Spanish about their thoughts and impressions of the artist’s work. Afterwards, each student was asked to choose a word that best described what they felt or took away from the experience. This past week, the new skill that the class was taught in Spanish was how to prepare their chosen Spanish word from the art experience for laser etching. The students were each asked to pick a word that represented all of the emotions, experiences, and thoughts about the artist’s work, and how that could be generated and laser etched by the Design Hub. This project then given back to the artist, bringing the experience full circle as the students show their appreciation through their application of the Spanish language.

Photo by photography intern Kyle Chan

On Thursday, February 22nd, the class was brought into the Design Hub, where Sean gave a tour of where lab and a demonstration of how the 3D printer works so the students could see all that the Design Hub has to offer.

During this visit, we had the opportunity to conduct some quick interviews with some of these students.

 

Peter Brixie, Spanish 361 student at ARC

One of them was Peter Brixie, their word: Hermosa. Peter has greatly enjoyed Professor Correia’s class. The most helpful part about having to constantly converse with others in Spanish is that it helps make speaking in Spanish second nature. For Peter, thinking about the translation between English and Spanish all in his head was the most challenging task for him. Having the class focus more on conversing has been greatly beneficial and fun for Peter learning Spanish. His word that he chose to add to the word cloud was “hermosa”, meaning “beautiful”.

Exploring language via technology

Another student, Theresa Pavale had the word “la vida”. Theresa told us she is studying to be a nurse practitioner in the trauma center, and was really impressed when Randy showed how the Design Hub is able to 3D print bones and anatomical models for her department. She was also impressed by the amount of resources that the Design Hub would be able to provide students like her with. The word that she chose was “la vida”, meaning “life”. She was very taken with the painting titled, “Water of Life” and the meaning of the painting: that if there is life, there will be water and how you cannot have one without the other.

It was great to hear from these students and to get the opportunity to introduce them to our Design Hub community. As well as hearing how they applied the Spanish language to art, it serves as an example that being able to use different ways to communicate about things can be a force to broaden our understanding and perspective on the world.

We appreciate Professor Currea and the wonderful Spanish 361 class for visiting, and allowing us to share our beloved corner of campus.

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Art Meets Science Here at American River College’s Design Hub

The Design Hub here at American River College is a strong proponent of multidisciplinary collaboration. At the Hub, team-building across all planes is valued and celebrated. It is a place where the arts and sciences come to eclipse, and the outcome is something truly spectacular.

Artist intern Erika hard at work. Photo by photography intern Angelique Doty

Here, we meet Erika Gonzalez to learn more about about her job as an artist for the Design Hub. Her current project: to paint the cell membrane models for the Science Department.  These little cell membranes required the help of Erika’s excellent painting skills, 3D printing, the Science Department, and 3D modelers to create the cell membrane structure. Erika is the lucky intern who was chosen to complete this project. ARC’s Science Department ordered the models of the cell membranes from Randy Schuster, the head supervisor of all the interns that make up the Design Hub. He has made sure to connect with nearly every department on campus, and runs the Design Hub in such a way that allows ARC’s campus to benefit from all of the hard work, talent, and innovation that comes out of the Hub.

The painted cell. Photo by photography intern Angelique Doty

The diagram of the model was sent from the Science Department to the 3D modeling interns at the Design Hub. They then transformed the structure into a file format that the 3D printers could handle.  From there, the files were transformed into printable structures, and were given to Erika to paint and bring to life. She had to paint each minute crevice in the same way as the 3D printed grain, paying a lot of attention to detail. She is painting the cell membranes with acrylic paint, then sealing it with Mod Podge to prevent the acrylic paint from chipping. This project will be housed at the Design Hub lab room 311, and it will be on display in the Science classrooms. It will also be used as a class reference for the Science Department.  The Design Hub is very proud of the collaborative efforts of our many talented 3D printing modelers, our artist intern Erika, as well as the Science Department. When art marries science and design, the possibilities are truly endless!