It’s like a big, online living room full of designers.

The image currently featured on DesignersCouch showcases some designs you might be familiar with. Your’s truly recently authored a post for DesignersCouch entitled 10 Services That Turn Your Designs Into Real Stuff.

But articles on design are just one of the features of this fast-growing, online community for creatives. There’s an active crowd of design professionals and students showing off their own work, engaging in critique, and sharing the incredible work of others that inspires them.

DesignersCouch lets members build a profile and add projects. Posting your work not only shows the larger creative community what you’re up to and fosters constructive critique, it also lets people looking to hire find you in the categorized “Find a Creative” search.

You can form relationships with other designers by following them on DC and search the collected designs gallery to find out what’s inspiring people. (The latest includes a collection of lamp designs.) There’s also a job board.

Joining DesignersCouch is free, but membership is available through invitation only. A current member can invite you or you can submit your email address for consideration.

And please check out my article. Combing through over two years of contributing to the Ponoko blog, this really is my Top 10 for sites and services that let anyone with creative drive make real things.

Posted in Digital Fabrication, Kristen Turner, Tools + Apps by Kristen Turner | Comments are off for this post

Make your own stuff using: 3D Printing, Laser Cutting, CNC Routing, App Gateway

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Call for work deadline extended to 20 September 2010.

FABRICATE is an International Peer Reviewed Conference with supporting publication and exhibition to be held at The Building Centre in London from 15-16 April 2011.

The conference will focus on such themes as: “how digital fabrication technologies are enabling new creative and construction opportunities, the difficult gap that exists between digital modeling and its realization, material performance and manipulation, off-site and on-site construction, interdisciplinary education, economic and sustainable contexts.”

Projects exploring these themes can be submitted until 20 September 2010. CLICK HERE for more details.

via Duann

Posted in Events, Kristen Turner by Kristen Turner | Comments are off for this post

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built in 3D printing support

It’s not the latest news, but just wanted to share a quick video that demonstrates the 3D Printing support feature integrated into AutoCAD 2010. The 3D Print command gives you a high-quality STL file, a Help window for setting up your file for a 3D printing service, and an auto-launched browser window with links to 3D printing services. Read the Autodesk guide HERE.

via Duann

Posted in 3D Printing, Kristen Turner, Software, Tools + Apps by Kristen Turner | Comments are off for this post

Make your own stuff using: 3D Printing, App Gateway

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Make it brighter, sharpen it up, and size it right.

Everyone likes beautiful product photography. Designers like it; your customers like it; and bloggers LOVE IT.

I always try to open up my posts with a great photo, because it makes the blog look good and it gets people’s attention. Now, I’m not pointing any fingers, but not all of you wonderful crafters out there are equally skilled at taking pictures.

So, I’m going to share 3 super simple quick & easy Photoshop tricks you can use to make even some of the worst product photos look way better.

These are 3 steps I almost always take when adjusting photos to publish on the blog. They’re easy to remember too: curvy, sharp, size.

A Photoshop beginners’ tutorial of tricks after the jump. And for those that don’t need this tutorial, check out Smashing Magazine’s latest post on product photography.
(more…)

Posted in Kristen Turner, Various How-To by Kristen Turner | Comments are off for this post

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New York architect Donald Rattner discovered Ponoko while searching for a way to make wall art pieces that he designed for himself.  The result of that discovery is a comprehensive catalogue of modular wall art designs.

The search process also led the architect to immerse himself in the universe of New Industrialism – mass customization, on demand production, digital fabrication, co-creation and all the other computer-driven technologies that are altering the way we make things.

When did you start making with Ponoko and what type of products do you create?

My firm – which now operates both an art and architectural studio – started designing pieces about 15 months ago, and rolled out our first portfolio last March at a popup store in Brooklyn. We’re continuing to design works of modular art in various formats – hanging wall sculptures, rotational paintings, tapestries, modular artist’s books and wallpapers.

How would you describe your creative process?

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Posted in Architecture, Art, Digital Fabrication, Interviews, Thoughts + Opinions, Laser Cutting, Maker Stories, Materials, Yana Skaler by yana | Comments are off for this post

Make your own stuff using: 3D Printing, Laser Cutting, CNC Routing

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Small business is beautiful and booming at the Melbourne trade show.

I hadn’t heard of Life Instyle until I picked up on a tweet from Ponoko user Melanie Gray Augustin. She posted a couple of photos of her Life Instyle trade show booth which incorporated red, lasercut felt flowers she made with Ponoko. The result was a Japanese-chic space with her Kimono Reincarnate jewelry line displayed on graphic, cherry tree branches.

I was really impressed with Augustin’s booth and decided to check out more photos from Melbourne’s Life Instyle trade show that just wrapped up yesterday. What a gorgeous event! All of the booths are so creative and inviting!

Photographer Claudio Oyarce took lots of great photos that are up on the Life Instyle blog. Some shots of my favorite products after the jump.

(more…)

Posted in Design, Events, Fashion + Textiles, Kristen Turner, Laser Cutting, Toys + Games by Kristen Turner | Comments are off for this post

Make your own stuff using: Laser Cutting

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Following on from my previous post on selling to Major Retailers, a common misconception about selling to them is that you have to be a large established company in order to sell to them.  This is absolutely not the case! The truth is that there are many small start-up companies with just one product SKU that have gotten their products into Major Retailers.  They had limited cash flow and very little marketing exposure but had a cool product concept and more importantly a conviction to succeed.  And that’s what matters!

My experience as a Manufacturer’s Rep has taught me that Buyers actually care more about finding the next cool new product concept than they do about working with a large established company.  The reality is that Major Retail Buyers are always seeking new products and inventions because they need to deal with the insane amount of competition that they are constantly up against.  This is why Major Retailers have special sections in their store to showcase new product concepts.

For instance, if you’ve ever walked into a Bed Bath and Beyond Store, you will you will notice that there are always new and interesting products around the counter area that you’ve probably never seen before.  Bed Bath and Beyond actually have specific buyers designated to finding new products.   And the reality is that most Major Retailers actually set up various events throughout the year to meet new potential vendors.   So you see, Major Retailers are always on the lookout for new product concepts!

What most people do not know is that if a buyer likes your product, they will find a way to make it happen.  Yes, you will need to ensure that your product is ready to be sold to Major Retailers prior to a buyer making a purchasing decision.  But please note that Buyers WILL buy your product if it is something that they believe will sell in their stores. And either way, they will probably only start out by buying and testing a small quantity of your product to ensure that there is an interest in the market place.

So if you have a product that you think would be perfect for Major Retailers, please don’t hesitate to try and make this happen.  You could be the next million dollar new product success story!!

If you would like to learn more about how to sell your products to major retailers, please join us for a FREE 2 HOUR WEBINAR hosted by Ponoko on Saturday, September 11^th, from 1-3pm PST.

Space is limited.
Reserve your Webinar seat now at:
https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/974838481

About the author: Karen Waksman (www.productforprofit.com) is a Successful Manufacturer’s Rep turned Author, Speaker and Consultant. She has written a step-by-step guide called ‘How To Sell Your Product, Invention or Craft to Major Retailers…No Sales Experience or Existing Buyer Relationships Required!’

Posted in Events, Karen Waksman, Selling + Business Tips, Various How-To by Karen | Comments are off for this post

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CNC Carves Out New Life for Old Doors

From Emerald City (that’d be Seattle, WA) comes this interesting use of digital manufacturing technology to give a new lease on life to reclaimed timber doors.

Husband and wife team Jonah and Mackenzie Griffith together form Object Creative, a design house that specialises in bringing humour and simplicity to fully functional design.

The reDoor project takes traditional domestic doors that have been reclaimed through salvage, and extends their lifecycle. The magic happens when a CNC router is used to cut designs and patterns into the wooden doors. A little lacquer and a lick of paint later, and you have a portal that is sure to be the envy of all your neighbours.

There’s a touch of the mesmerising look we saw with smArchitecture here, although this time around it is much more accessible to everyday folk like you and me.

Object Creative

Posted in Architecture, CNC Routing, Digital Fabrication, Guy Blashki by Guy Blashki | Comments are off for this post

Make your own stuff using: 3D Printing, Laser Cutting, CNC Routing

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free printing & shipping for just one day

Spoonflower is offering 24 hours of free swatch ordering! Get a single free, custom fabric swatch for 24 hours between noon EST on Thursday, 26 August and noon EST on Friday, 27 August.

This awesome offer also comes with the option to donate $5 (or any amount you wish) to Heifer International.

To learn more about Spoonflower, check out our interview with company founder Stephen Fraser.

Posted in Events, Kristen Turner by Kristen Turner | Comments are off for this post

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laser engraved leather slip covers

Being a design blog, talking about Moleskine in some way or another is inevitable. And actually, we already featured Engrave Your Book here on the blog, but that was way back when we didn’t have a tweet button.

So here’s the redux version.

Engrave Your Book lets anyone upload a design to be laser engraved on a leather notebook cover. The covers are made to fit perfectly over Moleskine’s “legendary” notebooks. And each one is handmade from vegetable tanned leather in Portland, Oregon.

The artist series features artwork from designers like Christopher Bettig, Cole Gerst, Dan Funderburgh, and Justine Ashbee. But my favorite designs are in the customer-made gallery.

(more…)

Posted in Functional Art + Objects, Kristen Turner, Mass Customization by Kristen Turner | Comments are off for this post

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