skip to main content
10.1145/3242587.3242659acmconferencesArticle/Chapter ViewAbstractPublication PagesuistConference Proceedingsconference-collections
research-article
Open access

Dynablock: Dynamic 3D Printing for Instant and Reconstructable Shape Formation

Published: 11 October 2018 Publication History

Abstract

This paper introduces Dynamic 3D Printing, a fast and reconstructable shape formation system. Dynamic 3D Printing can assemble an arbitrary three-dimensional shape from a large number of small physical elements. Also, it can disassemble the shape back to elements and reconstruct a new shape. Dynamic 3D Printing combines the capabilities of 3D printers and shape displays: Like conventional 3D printing, it can generate arbitrary and graspable three-dimensional shapes, while allowing shapes to be rapidly formed and reformed as in a shape display. To demonstrate the idea, we describe the design and implementation of Dynablock, a working prototype of a dynamic 3D printer. Dynablock can form a three-dimensional shape in seconds by assembling 3,000 9 mm blocks, leveraging a 24 x 16 pin-based shape display as a parallel assembler. Dynamic 3D printing is a step toward achieving our long-term vision in which 3D printing becomes an interactive medium, rather than the means for fabrication that it is today. In this paper, we explore possibilities for this vision by illustrating application scenarios that are difficult to achieve with conventional 3D printing or shape display systems.

Supplementary Material

suppl.mov (ufp1499p.mp4)
Supplemental video
MP4 File (p99-suzuki.mp4)

References

[1]
Haruhisa Akiyama and Masaru Yoshida. 2012. Photochemically Reversible Liquefaction and Solidification of Single Compounds Based on a Sugar Alcohol Scaffold with Multi Azo-Arms. Advanced Materials 24, 17 (2012), 2353--2356.
[2]
Jason Alexander, Anne Roudaut, Jürgen Steimle, Kasper Hornbæk, Miguel Bruns Alonso, Sean Follmer, and Timothy Merritt. 2018. Grand Challenges in Shape-Changing Interface Research., Article 299 (2018), 14 pages.
[3]
Byoung Kwon An. 2008. Em-cube: cube-shaped, self-reconfigurable robots sliding on structure surfaces. In Proceedings of the 2008 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA '08). IEEE, 3149--3155.
[4]
Kenneth C Cheung and Neil Gershenfeld. 2013. Reversibly assembled cellular composite materials. science (2013), 1240889.
[5]
Bruno R. De Araùjo, Géry Casiez, and Joaquim A. Jorge. 2012. Mockup Builder: Direct 3D Modeling on and Above the Surface in a Continuous Interaction Space. In Proceedings of Graphics Interface 2012 (GI '12). Canadian Information Processing Society, Toronto, Ont., Canada, Canada, 173--180. http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=2305276.2305305
[6]
Sean Follmer, Daniel Leithinger, Alex Olwal, Akimitsu Hogge, and Hiroshi Ishii. 2013. inFORM: Dynamic Physical Affordances and Constraints Through Shape and Object Actuation. In Proceedings of the 26th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (UIST '13). ACM, New York, NY, USA, 417--426.
[7]
John Frazer. 1995. An evolutionary architecture. (1995).
[8]
Kyle Gilpin, Ara Knaian, and Daniela Rus. 2010. Robot pebbles: One centimeter modules for programmable matter through self-disassembly. In Proceedings of the 2010 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA '10). IEEE, 2485--2492.
[9]
Seth Copen Goldstein and Todd C. Mowry. 2004. Claytronics: A scalable basis for future robots. (Nov 2004).
[10]
David H Gracias, Joe Tien, Tricia L Breen, Carey Hsu, and George M Whitesides. 2000. Forming electrical networks in three dimensions by self-assembly. Science 289, 5482 (2000), 1170--1172.
[11]
Jonathan Hiller. 2011. Digital Materials: Voxel Design, Rapid Assembly, Structural Properties, And Design Methods. (2011).
[12]
Jonathan Hiller and Hod Lipson. 2009. Design and analysis of digital materials for physical 3D voxel printing. Rapid Prototyping Journal 15, 2 (2009), 137--149.
[13]
Jonathan D Hiller and Hod Lipson. 2009. Fully recyclable multi-material printing. In Solid Freeform Fabrication Proceedings. Citeseer, 98--106.
[14]
Hiroshi Ishii, Dávid Lakatos, Leonardo Bonanni, and Jean-Baptiste Labrune. 2012. Radical Atoms: Beyond Tangible Bits, Toward Transformable Materials. interactions 19, 1 (Jan. 2012), 38--51.
[15]
Hiroo Iwata, Hiroaki Yano, Fumitaka Nakaizumi, and Ryo Kawamura. 2001. Project FEELEX: Adding Haptic Surface to Graphics. In Proceedings of the 28th Annual Conference on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques (SIGGRAPH '01). ACM, New York, NY, USA, 469--476.
[16]
Mustafa Emre Karagozler, Jason D Campbell, Gary K Fedder, Seth Copen Goldstein, Michael Philetus Weller, and Byung Woo Yoon. 2007. Electrostatic latching for inter-module adhesion, power transfer, and communication in modular robots. In Proceedings of the 2007 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS '07). IEEE, 2779--2786.
[17]
Mustafa Emre Karagozler, Seth Copen Goldstein, and J Robert Reid. 2009. Stress-driven mems assembly+electrostatic forces= 1mm diameter robot. In Proceedings of the 2009 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS '09). IEEE, 2763--2769.
[18]
Brian T Kirby, Burak Aksak, Jason D Campbell, James F Hoburg, Todd C Mowry, Padmanabhan Pillai, and Seth Copen Goldstein. 2007. A modular robotic system using magnetic force effectors. In Proceedings of the 2007 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS '07). IEEE, 2787--2793.
[19]
Ara Nerses Knaian. 2010. Electropermanent magnetic connectors and actuators: devices and their application in programmable matter. Ph.D. Dissertation. Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
[20]
Collin Ladd, Ju-Hee So, John Muth, and Michael D Dickey. 2013. 3D printing of free standing liquid metal microstructures. Advanced Materials 25, 36 (2013), 5081--5085.
[21]
Mathieu Le Goc, Lawrence H. Kim, Ali Parsaei, Jean-Daniel Fekete, Pierre Dragicevic, and Sean Follmer. 2016. Zooids: Building Blocks for Swarm User Interfaces. In Proceedings of the 29th Annual Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (UIST '16). ACM, New York, NY, USA, 97--109.
[22]
Haeshin Lee, Bruce P Lee, and Phillip B Messersmith. 2007. A reversible wet/dry adhesive inspired by mussels and geckos. Nature 448, 7151 (2007), 338.
[23]
Daniel Leithinger and Hiroshi Ishii. 2010. Relief: A Scalable Actuated Shape Display. In Proceedings of the Fourth International Conference on Tangible, Embedded, and Embodied Interaction (TEI '10). ACM, New York, NY, USA, 221--222.
[24]
Daniel Leithinger, David Lakatos, Anthony DeVincenzi, Matthew Blackshaw, and Hiroshi Ishii. 2011. Direct and Gestural Interaction with Relief: A 2.5D Shape Display. In Proceedings of the 24th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (UIST '11). ACM, New York, NY, USA, 541--548.
[25]
Rong-Hao Liang, Kai-Yin Cheng, Chao-Huai Su, Chien-Ting Weng, Bing-Yu Chen, and De-Nian Yang. 2012. GaussSense: Attachable Stylus Sensing Using Magnetic Sensor Grid. In Proceedings of the 25th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (UIST '12). ACM, New York, NY, USA, 319--326.
[26]
Yusuke Maeda, Ojiro Nakano, Takashi Maekawa, and Shoji Maruo. 2016. From CAD models to toy brick sculptures: A 3D block printer. In Proceedings of the 2016 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS '16). IEEE, 2167--2172.
[27]
Stefanie Mueller, Tobias Mohr, Kerstin Guenther, Johannes Frohnhofen, and Patrick Baudisch. 2014. faBrickation: Fast 3D Printing of Functional Objects by Integrating Construction Kit Building Blocks. In Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '14). ACM, New York, NY, USA, 3827--3834.
[28]
Satoshi Murata, Eiichi Yoshida, Akiya Kamimura, Haruhisa Kurokawa, Kohji Tomita, and Shigeru Kokaji. 2002. M-TRAN: Self-reconfigurable modular robotic system. IEEE/ASME transactions on mechatronics 7, 4 (2002), 431--441.
[29]
Jonas Neubert, Arne Rost, and Hod Lipson. 2014. Self-soldering connectors for modular robots. IEEE Transactions on Robotics 30, 6 (2014), 1344--1357.
[30]
Martin Nilsson. 2002. Heavy-duty connectors for self-reconfiguring robots. In Proceedings of the 2002 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA '02), Vol. 4. IEEE, 4071--4076.
[31]
Michael T Northen, Christian Greiner, Eduard Arzt, and Kimberly L Turner. 2008. A Gecko-inspired reversible adhesive. Advanced Materials 20, 20 (2008), 3905--3909.
[32]
Hyunjoo Oh, Tung D. Ta, Ryo Suzuki, Mark D. Gross, Yoshihiro Kawahara, and Lining Yao. 2018. PEP (3D Printed Electronic Papercrafts): An Integrated Approach for 3D Sculpting Paper-Based Electronic Devices. In Proceedings of the 2018 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '18). ACM, New York, NY, USA, Article 441, 12 pages.
[33]
Simon Olberding, Sergio Soto Ortega, Klaus Hildebrandt, and Jürgen Steimle. 2015. Foldio: Digital Fabrication of Interactive and Shape-Changing Objects With Foldable Printed Electronics. In Proceedings of the 28th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software & Technology (UIST '15). ACM, New York, NY, USA, 223--232.
[34]
Fabrizio Pece, Juan Jose Zarate, Velko Vechev, Nadine Besse, Olexandr Gudozhnik, Herbert Shea, and Otmar Hilliges. 2017. MagTics: Flexible and Thin Form Factor Magnetic Actuators for Dynamic and Wearable Haptic Feedback. In Proceedings of the 30th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (UIST '17). ACM, New York, NY, USA, 143--154.
[35]
Benjamin J Peters. 2011. Design and fabrication of a digitally reconfigurable surface. Ph.D. Dissertation. Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
[36]
George A Popescu, Tushar Mahale, and Neil Gershenfeld. 2006. Digital materials for digital printing. In NIP & Digital Fabrication Conference, Vol. 2006. Society for Imaging Science and Technology, 58--61.
[37]
Ivan Poupyrev, Tatsushi Nashida, Shigeaki Maruyama, Jun Rekimoto, and Yasufumi Yamaji. 2004. Lumen: Interactive Visual and Shape Display for Calm Computing. In ACM SIGGRAPH 2004 Emerging Technologies (SIGGRAPH '04). ACM, New York, NY, USA, 17--.
[38]
Majken K. Rasmussen, Esben W. Pedersen, Marianne G. Petersen, and Kasper Hornbæk. 2012. Shape-changing Interfaces: A Review of the Design Space and Open Research Questions. In Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '12). ACM, New York, NY, USA, 735--744.
[39]
John W Romanishin, Kyle Gilpin, and Daniela Rus. 2013. M-blocks: Momentum-driven, magnetic modular robots. In Proceedings of the 2013 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS '13). IEEE, 4288--4295.
[40]
Shohei Saito, Shunpei Nobusue, Eri Tsuzaka, Chunxue Yuan, Chigusa Mori, Mitsuo Hara, Takahiro Seki, Cristopher Camacho, Stephan Irle, and Shigehiro Yamaguchi. 2016. Light-melt adhesive based on dynamic carbon frameworks in a columnar liquid-crystal phase. Nature communications 7 (2016), 12094.
[41]
Behnam Salemi, Mark Moll, and Wei-Min Shen. 2006. SUPERBOT: A deployable, multi-functional, and modular self-reconfigurable robotic system. In Proceedings of the 2006 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS '06). IEEE, 3636--3641.
[42]
Philipp Schoessler, Daniel Windham, Daniel Leithinger, Sean Follmer, and Hiroshi Ishii. 2015. Kinetic Blocks: Actuated Constructive Assembly for Interaction and Display. In Proceedings of the 28th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software & Technology (UIST '15). ACM, New York, NY, USA, 341--349.
[43]
Keita Sekijima and Hiroya Tanaka. 2015. Reconfigurable Three-dimensional Prototype System Using Digital Materials. In ACM SIGGRAPH 2015 Posters (SIGGRAPH '15). ACM, New York, NY, USA, Article 89, 1 pages.
[44]
Alexa F. Siu, Eric J. Gonzalez, Shenli Yuan, Jason B. Ginsberg, and Sean Follmer. 2018. shapeShift: 2D Spatial Manipulation and Self-Actuation of Tabletop Shape Displays for Tangible and Haptic Interaction., Article 291 (2018), 13 pages.
[45]
Evan Strasnick, Jackie Yang, Kesler Tanner, Alex Olwal, and Sean Follmer. 2017. shiftIO: Reconfigurable Tactile Elements for Dynamic Affordances and Mobile Interaction. In Proceedings of the 2017 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '17). ACM, New York, NY, USA, 5075--5086.
[46]
Ivan E Sutherland. 1965. The ultimate display. Multimedia: From Wagner to virtual reality (1965), 506--508.
[47]
Ryo Suzuki, Jun Kato, Mark D. Gross, and Tom Yeh. 2018. Reactile: Programming Swarm User Interfaces Through Direct Physical Manipulation. In Proceedings of the 2018 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '18). ACM, New York, NY, USA, Article 199, 13 pages.
[48]
Ryo Suzuki, Abigale Stangl, Mark D. Gross, and Tom Yeh. 2017. FluxMarker: Enhancing Tactile Graphics with Dynamic Tactile Markers. In Proceedings of the 19th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS '17). ACM, New York, NY, USA, 190--199.
[49]
Yuki Uno, Hao Qiu, Toru Sai, Shunta Iguchi, Yota Mizutani, Takayuki Hoshi, Yoshihiro Kawahara, Yasuaki Kakehi, and Makoto Takamiya. 2018. Luciola: A Millimeter-Scale Light-Emitting Particle Moving in Mid-Air Based On Acoustic Levitation and Wireless Powering. Proc. ACM Interact. Mob. Wearable Ubiquitous Technol. 1, 4, Article 166 (Jan. 2018), 17 pages.
[50]
Lei Wang and Jing Liu. 2014. Liquid phase 3D printing for quickly manufacturing conductive metal objects with low melting point alloy ink. Science China Technological Sciences 57, 9 (2014), 1721--1728.
[51]
PJ White, Kris Kopanski, and Hod Lipson. 2004. Stochastic self-reconfigurable cellular robotics. In Proceedings of the 2004 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA '04), Vol. 3. IEEE, 2888--2893.
[52]
Karl D.D. Willis, Cheng Xu, Kuan-Ju Wu, Golan Levin, and Mark D. Gross. 2011. Interactive Fabrication: New Interfaces for Digital Fabrication. In Proceedings of the Fifth International Conference on Tangible, Embedded, and Embodied Interaction (TEI '11). ACM, New York, NY, USA, 69--72.
[53]
Zhou Ye, Guo Zhan Lum, Sukho Song, Steven Rich, and Metin Sitti. 2016. Phase change of gallium enables highly reversible and switchable adhesion. Advanced Materials 28, 25 (2016), 5088--5092.
[54]
Mark Yim, David G Duff, and Kimon Roufas. 2000. Modular reconfigurable robots, an approach to urban search and rescue. In Proceedings of the 1st International Workshop on Human-friendly Welfare Robotics Systems, Taejon, Korea.
[55]
Mark Yim, Wei-Min Shen, Behnam Salemi, Daniela Rus, Mark Moll, Hod Lipson, Eric Klavins, and Gregory S Chirikjian. 2007. Modular self-reconfigurable robot systems {grand challenges of robotics}. IEEE Robotics & Automation Magazine 14, 1 (2007), 43--52.
[56]
Yiwei Zhao, Lawrence H. Kim, Ye Wang, Mathieu Le Goc, and Sean Follmer. 2017. Robotic Assembly of Haptic Proxy Objects for Tangible Interaction and Virtual Reality. In Proceedings of the 2017 ACM International Conference on Interactive Surfaces and Spaces (ISS '17). ACM, New York, NY, USA, 82--91.

Cited By

View all
  • (2025)ShyPins: Safeguarding User Mental Safety From The Forcible (Dis)Appearance Of Pin-based Controls By Using Speed ZonesProceedings of the Nineteenth International Conference on Tangible, Embedded, and Embodied Interaction10.1145/3689050.3704940(1-16)Online publication date: 4-Mar-2025
  • (2024)Popping-Up Poster: A Pin-Based Promotional Poster Device for Engaging Customers through Physical Shape TransformationProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/36981388:ISS(283-300)Online publication date: 24-Oct-2024
  • (2024)MagneDot: Integrated Fabrication and Actuation Methods of Dot-Based Magnetic Shape DisplaysProceedings of the 37th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology10.1145/3654777.3676427(1-18)Online publication date: 13-Oct-2024
  • Show More Cited By

Index Terms

  1. Dynablock: Dynamic 3D Printing for Instant and Reconstructable Shape Formation

    Recommendations

    Comments

    Information & Contributors

    Information

    Published In

    cover image ACM Conferences
    UIST '18: Proceedings of the 31st Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology
    October 2018
    1016 pages
    ISBN:9781450359481
    DOI:10.1145/3242587
    This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution International 4.0 License.

    Sponsors

    Publisher

    Association for Computing Machinery

    New York, NY, United States

    Publication History

    Published: 11 October 2018

    Permissions

    Request permissions for this article.

    Check for updates

    Author Tags

    1. digital materials
    2. dynamic 3D printing
    3. shape displays

    Qualifiers

    • Research-article

    Funding Sources

    • NSF CAREER award
    • The Nakajima Foundation
    • JST ERATO

    Conference

    UIST '18

    Acceptance Rates

    UIST '18 Paper Acceptance Rate 80 of 375 submissions, 21%;
    Overall Acceptance Rate 561 of 2,567 submissions, 22%

    Upcoming Conference

    UIST '25
    The 38th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology
    September 28 - October 1, 2025
    Busan , Republic of Korea

    Contributors

    Other Metrics

    Bibliometrics & Citations

    Bibliometrics

    Article Metrics

    • Downloads (Last 12 months)359
    • Downloads (Last 6 weeks)40
    Reflects downloads up to 28 Feb 2025

    Other Metrics

    Citations

    Cited By

    View all
    • (2025)ShyPins: Safeguarding User Mental Safety From The Forcible (Dis)Appearance Of Pin-based Controls By Using Speed ZonesProceedings of the Nineteenth International Conference on Tangible, Embedded, and Embodied Interaction10.1145/3689050.3704940(1-16)Online publication date: 4-Mar-2025
    • (2024)Popping-Up Poster: A Pin-Based Promotional Poster Device for Engaging Customers through Physical Shape TransformationProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/36981388:ISS(283-300)Online publication date: 24-Oct-2024
    • (2024)MagneDot: Integrated Fabrication and Actuation Methods of Dot-Based Magnetic Shape DisplaysProceedings of the 37th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology10.1145/3654777.3676427(1-18)Online publication date: 13-Oct-2024
    • (2024)StructCurves: Interlocking Block-Based Line StructuresProceedings of the 37th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology10.1145/3654777.3676354(1-11)Online publication date: 13-Oct-2024
    • (2024)SHAPE-IT: Exploring Text-to-Shape-Display for Generative Shape-Changing Behaviors with LLMsProceedings of the 37th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology10.1145/3654777.3676348(1-29)Online publication date: 13-Oct-2024
    • (2024)From Conventional to Programmable Matter Systems: A Review of Design, Materials, and TechnologiesACM Computing Surveys10.1145/365367156:8(1-26)Online publication date: 26-Apr-2024
    • (2024)Entering the 3D printer: negotiations of imprecision in making.Proceedings of the 2024 ACM Designing Interactive Systems Conference10.1145/3643834.3660758(1148-1161)Online publication date: 1-Jul-2024
    • (2024)Shared, Shaped, and Stolen: Tracing Sites of Knowledge Transfer across Creative Communities of PracticeProceedings of the 16th Conference on Creativity & Cognition10.1145/3635636.3656199(638-650)Online publication date: 23-Jun-2024
    • (2024)Shape Estimation Algorithm for Collective Shape-Changing Interface Using Wirelessly Connected ComputersProceedings of the Eighteenth International Conference on Tangible, Embedded, and Embodied Interaction10.1145/3623509.3635267(1-7)Online publication date: 11-Feb-2024
    • (2024)Flushner: A 3D Printing Technique That Inserts Stepped Objects to Achieve Surface Uniformity and High SpeedExtended Abstracts of the CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems10.1145/3613905.3648653(1-5)Online publication date: 11-May-2024
    • Show More Cited By

    View Options

    View options

    PDF

    View or Download as a PDF file.

    PDF

    eReader

    View online with eReader.

    eReader

    Login options

    Figures

    Tables

    Media

    Share

    Share

    Share this Publication link

    Share on social media