COMPUTATIONAL



CRAFT

CNC Milling machine

First ideas how to play around with the CNC milling machine

MATERIAL EXPERIMENTS - teamed up with Wilem

Plaster + metal shivers
in CNC while centre still wet

-too bad you don't see the metal shivers in the end result
-really cool the shape in centre
-play around with drying time plaster
-play around with concentration plaster/water

Wood + relief + wood shavings&wood glue combo + vernis

Make our own drill bit

-Mitchel gave us an introduction
-made this bit with him
-think it will be too time consuming to go on with this idea

because we keep changing the materials, we wanted the CNC-file to be our constant

so the layered circle is our design

data visualization

https://www.haascnc.com/nl/video/tipoftheday/hzijet0bma4.html

'The art side of the field refers to the scope for unleashing design flair and encouraging innovation, where you strive to design communications that appeal on an aesthetic level and then survive in the mind on an emotional one'
https://hogeschoolrotterdam.on.worldcat.org/oclc/837635476


http://www.interaction-design.org/encyclopedia/data_visualization_for_human_perception.html

https://www.instructables.com/id/3D-CNC-Relief-Sculpture-Fusion-360/

https://www.renderforest.com/template/melodic-vibes-visualizer
https://www.ultimatesolver.com/en/midi2gcode

Here we let the plaster dry completely, it also had some sawdust in it. But it did nog turn out interesting, also kind of sad you don't really see the marble vibe we were trying to accomplish

one here a bit

Gcodes 1
y=10
x=10
z=10

Gcodes 2
y=5
x=5
z=0.5

Gcodes 3
y=100
x=100
z=100

Gcodes 4
y=70
x=70
z=70

Wilem started playing around in fusion to translate the music/audio file to an black and white image to a 3D sculpture in fusion

Idea to do this with the CNC in foam

Here I could finally got the line to be not extremely high and keep climbing up

lasercutted the iPad

was not as interesting as we had hoped, so we decided to break it in half... also not so excited as we had hoped

Fusion model of Wilem

Other fusion model by Wilem

Wilem found the concept of having coordinates in a different way for the CNC interesting.
meaning that it would for example be how a dog runs through a park for a day.
how his cousin leaves lego strategically in certain places in the house.

I was thinking of drawing something, making that into coordinates and using that. then I thought it would be interesting to listen to music, draw blindly and put that into coordinates.

then we fused our interests together and came up with translating music into a 2D image, turing that into a 3D fusion model and let the CNC carve that out of foam

I found a website where you can upload a midi audio file and translate it into Gcodes.

I uploaded the Gcodes and made a file to test uit if I could make something to tell the CNC what to do; the biggest problem was that the Z had an extremely high value, which the CNC can't reach

Wilem and I met up with Emiel through teams to discuss how we were gonna be able to translate this fusion model into a file the CNC will understand.

He told us as well that PU foam will work perfectly and quickly so we would be able to do a lot of tests.

TEST 1 - 8mm drill bit, pheonix v1.stl

cura

Can you use foam as a mould?

What would happen if you pour plaster in it?

The wood and glue compost that I made looks pretty cool, but the rest is not that interesting

Wilem found a way through fusion that we could use to make an 2D image 3D

I mean it is cool that we managed to get the CNC to do something, but it is not that interesting to look at

TEST 2 - 3,5 mm drill bit, phoenixv1.stl

Test 1

Test 2

Half way through we thought it was taking too long, so we adapted the space between the lines to make sure it would mil quicker. Then we saw the difference between the sides. It leaves way more of a structure if you make the space between the lines bigger, which we find more pleasing

Here you see there is more of a structure

Here you see there is not that much structure

Between test 1 and test 2 you see a big difference regarding the sharpness/pointyness. Test 2 is more aggressive than test 1.

Between the first part and the second part of test 2 the difference between the intensity of the structure is obviously there as well

TEST 3 - 3,5 drill bit, mountain v0.stl, more linespace

A part of the foam did not get cut away/modified

we didn't understand at first but then we noticed that the drawing in VCarve also did not have anything there, it was just a white piece. So that's why we think nothing happend there.

TEST 4 - 5,6 mm drill bit, more linespace, bit that is not totally curved, positive of the design of test 3

This drilling bit was not curved all the way and the line space was less on this side

you can see how aggressive the bit was cutting the foam

Here we changed the line space, made it a bit better to see if the drill bit would be less aggressive, but it still was quite intens

TEST 5 - 8mm drill bit

2D visual file - that is transformed to black and white and then to 3D fusion model

2D visual file - that is transformed to black and white and then to 3D fusion model

The different images that translate music and the top three are the ones we milled (krater, phoenix, mountain)

2D visual file - that is transformed to black and white and then to 3D fusion model

Wilem and I discovered that if light shines through the foam it has a very pleasing effect on the back side

Testing the mould making - I made new structures in the foam to experiment what would work best as a protection layer in between the foam and the casting material

For these experiments I used plaster as the casting material

TEST 1 - MALLENVET

TEST 2 - BLANKE LAK

It was actually not that hard to get the plaster out of the mould. The plaster did observe the skin of the foam, which gives it a furry/spider type of feeling - which looks pretty sick

In total the their are 4 layers of the blanke lak

TEST 3 - NOTHING

I thought it would be way harder to get the plaster out of the mould, but it went ok. I did break the mould in two pieces. And it not all the foam let go, some pieces stayed in the plaster. This test has an even beter furry effect than the first one.

TEST 4 - PLAKAATVERF

I did not do enough layers I think, because the plaster absolutely did not want to let go of the foam

TEST 5 - Algenaat

INTERFERING WITH FILE

ODD MATTERS & INTERVENTING INBETWEEN

Reflection

(a&b) Wilem and I teamed up for the Computational Craft assignment regarding the CNC milling machine. We were most interested in the idea of interfering with the Gcode. Talking about this we ended up with the subject music. If there could be a way to translate music into something that the CNC milling machine would understand and could create.

(c) We started with online research to see what are possibilities are. I found a software to translate midi files into Gcodes, but it was not very intriguing. Wilem found a way to translate greyscale images into surface maps. Wilem used a VLC audio visualiser to generate some visualisations and took the greyscale image from there. Then from fusion to Vcarve to generate a Gcode that the milling machine can read.

(d) Its potential is to create an efficient way to make moulds and create quicker. Milling various different materials. And maybe you could start a small business; let people choose a song/music and create an art piece from it.

Making mould with CNC - rough cut 5,6 mm bit / detail finish 5 mm bit

ADAPTION-ish

the CNC first cut a rough layer of before the finishing layer, we both really like the design

Wilem and I decided in the end that it would be easiest to make the positive from plaster already to have a mould

The only thing missing is the fluffy/spider effect the negative will get if the positive is from foam