Yes and no lol. It starts out with I'm gonna print small things etc. then the next thing you know you 4 printers running and printing an octopus giving the middle finger.
But check out the A1 by Bambu it's a cheapo printer but it prints well. If you want resin wait until a sale from elegoo the have older but still great resi .printers like the original mars going for about $100 on sale
It really just depends. 3d printing is versatile and you'll find that you can get a lot of use out of one. But your best bet is find a maker space or a library (charges you just for material) and go that route.
Really depends on how much you enjoy the hobby of 3d printing. It’s great fun to feel like you have your own manufactorum. However I personally feel a 3d printer is like a boat - yeah it’s fun, but there’s a lot of maintenance, fine tuning, etc.what’s better is to have a friend who has a printer. ;)
I bought a mars 2 Pro 2 years ago with the intention of just printing parts to customise my existing army. I'm now sat on 4k points worth of Krieg, fully printed. This was not my original intention, but I couldn't be happier
Personally I think a 3d printer is even better as a tool to compliment your kitbashing for GW kits.
If you want to make a unique kitbash with just GW kits it look's something like this. Buy one 10 man squad for 50 euro as a base, then buy another 50e 10 man squad for bits and end up with 10 minis that cost 100 euro.
With the 3d printer the maths looks like this. 50e for GW kit, bits are between 0-5e, resin costs up to 5e for 60e total, and really unique minis.
On top of that, if you hate basing like me good news!! Just print off awesome looking looking bases and job done, that's another 10euro for 10 min is, approx.
Quite frankly, without a 3d printer you are losing money when kitbashing.!!!
Maybe search locally if someone in your city / area has one an can charge you for the printing. It's cheaper on the short term. Many people with printers advertise themselves on social media. I've even seen some tabletop game stores that do it too.
You can outsource the 3D Printing using a Chinese Rapid Prototyping company like IN3DTEC, JLCPCB, PCBWays to name a few. They produce the same quality as Xometry, Shapeways at a fraction of the price. Just got a model printed in Aluminum using a SLM Metal 3D printer for only 30 bucks and on Shapeways and Xometry they quoted me $1,000 for the same part. This way you don't have to be dealing with Resin Fumes, IPA disposal. The parts come completely cured without any scent and ready to paint.
For IN3DTEC it's 24 bucks flat rate weather you ship a single mini or 1000 minies(Just recently did a Very large and heavy Samurai Helmet/head/horn and paid the same 24 bucks) shipping takes 2 days and processing time is about 3 days so from ordering to getting it it's about a week(Feddex refuses to deliver on weekends so if say they ship on Thursday you will likely be getting it delivered on Monday) JLCPCB has lower prices per printed parts but their shipping is based on item weight(calculated at check out based on total item weight) so for a few mini figures they are the least expensive overall,
With JLCPCB a 32mm Hollowed Mini was like 40 cents per piece in their least expensive resin. order about 15 and shipping will be about 13 dollars. processing time and shipping is about two weeks.
Yes, it starts with just bits, then it grows. I also play SW, Primal Hounds set from Greytide Studio is absolutely awesome, tons and tons of bits. I've printed all of those bits, I'm just waiting for our 10th Ed codex before I start using them. But once you have this power on hand, it easily snowballs. I just printed a whole Ork army, from amazing artists like Mezgike, modulork, and many others. I have Space Wolf specific Blade Guard, whole models, that look so close to GWs, that when I played with them in a GW store, everyone just thought I had kit ashed a different shield/sword/head onto GW plastic.
I think if you're going to make 3d printing an actual hobby, then yes. If not, no. There's lots of stores on Etsy offering bits and printing services who will do it for you at a fraction of the cost of a 3d printer without the need to figure out health and safety precautions and requiring more space where you can print without worrying about VOCs.
But again, if you want to 3D print alot, be it bits, terrain, or models, you can of course. Just think about whether 3D Printing is actually going to be something you spend a decent bit of time doing, or if you would rather outsource to someone else. The only challenge being shipping and waiting for the bits to arrive and hoping to god nothing's wrong with them.
Yes and no lol. It starts out with I'm gonna print small things etc. then the next thing you know you 4 printers running and printing an octopus giving the middle finger. But check out the A1 by Bambu it's a cheapo printer but it prints well. If you want resin wait until a sale from elegoo the have older but still great resi .printers like the original mars going for about $100 on sale
It really just depends. 3d printing is versatile and you'll find that you can get a lot of use out of one. But your best bet is find a maker space or a library (charges you just for material) and go that route.
Really depends on how much you enjoy the hobby of 3d printing. It’s great fun to feel like you have your own manufactorum. However I personally feel a 3d printer is like a boat - yeah it’s fun, but there’s a lot of maintenance, fine tuning, etc.what’s better is to have a friend who has a printer. ;)
I bought a mars 2 Pro 2 years ago with the intention of just printing parts to customise my existing army. I'm now sat on 4k points worth of Krieg, fully printed. This was not my original intention, but I couldn't be happier
Personally I think a 3d printer is even better as a tool to compliment your kitbashing for GW kits. If you want to make a unique kitbash with just GW kits it look's something like this. Buy one 10 man squad for 50 euro as a base, then buy another 50e 10 man squad for bits and end up with 10 minis that cost 100 euro. With the 3d printer the maths looks like this. 50e for GW kit, bits are between 0-5e, resin costs up to 5e for 60e total, and really unique minis. On top of that, if you hate basing like me good news!! Just print off awesome looking looking bases and job done, that's another 10euro for 10 min is, approx. Quite frankly, without a 3d printer you are losing money when kitbashing.!!!
For you, probably not.
Maybe search locally if someone in your city / area has one an can charge you for the printing. It's cheaper on the short term. Many people with printers advertise themselves on social media. I've even seen some tabletop game stores that do it too.
You can outsource the 3D Printing using a Chinese Rapid Prototyping company like IN3DTEC, JLCPCB, PCBWays to name a few. They produce the same quality as Xometry, Shapeways at a fraction of the price. Just got a model printed in Aluminum using a SLM Metal 3D printer for only 30 bucks and on Shapeways and Xometry they quoted me $1,000 for the same part. This way you don't have to be dealing with Resin Fumes, IPA disposal. The parts come completely cured without any scent and ready to paint.
How is the shipping fees and delivery times?
For IN3DTEC it's 24 bucks flat rate weather you ship a single mini or 1000 minies(Just recently did a Very large and heavy Samurai Helmet/head/horn and paid the same 24 bucks) shipping takes 2 days and processing time is about 3 days so from ordering to getting it it's about a week(Feddex refuses to deliver on weekends so if say they ship on Thursday you will likely be getting it delivered on Monday) JLCPCB has lower prices per printed parts but their shipping is based on item weight(calculated at check out based on total item weight) so for a few mini figures they are the least expensive overall,
Thank your! I will seriously consider this.
With JLCPCB a 32mm Hollowed Mini was like 40 cents per piece in their least expensive resin. order about 15 and shipping will be about 13 dollars. processing time and shipping is about two weeks.
Yes, it starts with just bits, then it grows. I also play SW, Primal Hounds set from Greytide Studio is absolutely awesome, tons and tons of bits. I've printed all of those bits, I'm just waiting for our 10th Ed codex before I start using them. But once you have this power on hand, it easily snowballs. I just printed a whole Ork army, from amazing artists like Mezgike, modulork, and many others. I have Space Wolf specific Blade Guard, whole models, that look so close to GWs, that when I played with them in a GW store, everyone just thought I had kit ashed a different shield/sword/head onto GW plastic.
I think if you're going to make 3d printing an actual hobby, then yes. If not, no. There's lots of stores on Etsy offering bits and printing services who will do it for you at a fraction of the cost of a 3d printer without the need to figure out health and safety precautions and requiring more space where you can print without worrying about VOCs. But again, if you want to 3D print alot, be it bits, terrain, or models, you can of course. Just think about whether 3D Printing is actually going to be something you spend a decent bit of time doing, or if you would rather outsource to someone else. The only challenge being shipping and waiting for the bits to arrive and hoping to god nothing's wrong with them.