Yeon Poche and Yvonne Yu: Project 4 -- Serial Slicing

Concept: Inspiration

We went through a few different sketches during the brainstorming phase. When we asked for feedback in the class discussion board, the majority of people told us to pick our other ideas since they would definitely be much easier to execute. Even though that was true, we liked this idea the most because it felt the most unique. When creating the sketch, we drew the most inspiration from cute cartoon characters that we like, and while, originally, he wasn't intentionally inspired by Animal Crossing, we later realized that the style and scale was similar. 

Concept Sketch

Research/Inspiration

Process: Modeling

While modeling the bunny, OSnaps were extremely important. Only a few of the default shapes were what we needed for the model, so I had to use a lot of tools to create these unique shapes. Making sure that the objects were snapped correctly was important in making sure the model would combine correctly. 

For the head and body, I first created a curve that aligned with his silhouette. Then, I would use the revolve tool. I used this method for these kinds of shapes that were the same around the entire object. Figuring out how to make the "cut" side of the body was a bit difficult, but I ended up cutting the model in half with trim and duplicating the curve along the body to be offset by 1 inch. I had to tweak some of the settings and fix a few of the inner corners before the model looked right, but I liked this shell effect. For his bones, I created simple shapes and used boolean union to combine them into one object. While these were originally meant for the render only, we ended up using these models to 3D print the bones so that they would exactly fit into his body. His innards/guts were created using a railsweep and the heart was a mirrored curve, plus the fillet tool for a small bevel. Registration rods were created by boolean difference-ing out a long cylinder that matched the width of our dowels.

 

3D Model Orthographic Views

Process: Serial Slicing 

After modeling, I used Contour to create the layers of our model. I then used Extrude to extrude the contour lines and create the sliced version of our model. 

When preparing the layers for the laser cutter, I used the provided Grasshopper file to lay out each of the layers of our model. I set up 19, 24x48 inch rectangles on a cyan layer to represent each of the cardboard sheets needed for cutting, We had trouble getting the layer numbers to work, so we created our own numbers on each of our parts on the red, raster layer. On the blue, vector layer I set up the holes for the dowels to go through. Each of the layers of our sculpture where put onto the magenta layer. As I laid out each of the pieces, I left a half inch border around each of the sheets to account for warped cardboard or misalignment.

Contour Orthographic Views

Laser Cut Lines

Rendering & Fabrication: Materials 

When rendering in Keyshot, I played around with a lot of different materials and chose to test colors and materials that would make out sculpture look like a chocolate bunny. For the bones and the main body of the model, I used Drywall to keep a matte, satin feel with subtle highlights. I chose brown for the body to mimic milk chocolate. For the intestine and the heart, I used a Plastic Towel material to give a toy-like, candy effect with a bit of fuzziness.

Perspective and 2D drawings

Extruded Render Orthographic Views

Once our cardboard was cut, we matched the pieces together and taped them together with masking tape. We decided to keep our sculpture separated into parts to make paper macheing and painting easier. After taping our entire model, we added three layers of paper mache to each of the parts of our sculpture (ears, top half of the head, bottom half of the head, the body, and the legs). Then, we used two layers of Shellac to seal each part of our model and used a brown enamel paint to cover the outside of our sculpture. However, since the enamel paint was shiny, we later used a satin brown spray paint to go over the enamel paint and make the sculpture matte. We used a flat white spray for the skull and the pelvis bone.

 

Final Environment

Final Orthographic

After painting each part, we used masking tape and dowels to attach the parts together and blend the seams. We sprayed the sculpture with more satin brown spray and then lined the sculpture with beige and black sherpa fabric. The bones in the ear, arm, leg, and the teeth were 3D printed and sprayed with a Triple Thick Clear spray. The intestine was made by crocheting a fluffy, pink yarn into a tube and stuffing it. We cover a heart google with purple fabric to act as a candy heart. We inserted two stones behind the pelvis to add weight and act as "kidney stones". 

Using MDF, scrap wood, and cardboard we created a box for our sculpture to stand in. Since our sculpture is heavier on one side, we used the dowels and stones to balance our sculpture out. We covered the box in green felt to make our creature look like he is standing in a small patch of grass and add to the softness of our sculpture.

Final Perspective