
This piece entitled Wind was created on a computer using Photoshop tools that mimicked acrylic painting. Raymond Alvarez is the artist who is exploring 3D printing for production of his many art images.
By Raymond Alvarez – Artist/Ruby programmer
Forgive me for being an optimist amid all the trending gloom, but 3D printing could lift the economy as well as bring about impactful and meaningful change. Whether you hate energy companies, or not, my simple analysis will give you a smile. Energy companies will be getting fewer consumer dollars. But that’s just the start.
Did you know that you can write a computer program to fire a canon? The demonstration I witnessed involved a T-shirt and a “potato gun.” Potato guns have been around since I was in college (more than 20 years ago). Basically, it is a plastic pipe that has been converted to fire tennis balls.
The military won’t be interested. They wouldn’t be impressed by the gun I saw. It was just one T-shirt gently floating on Boulder’s October air, but it hit me right between the temples. An armload or two of cotton ammunition found its way to a recent Ruby conference. I’m happy for the folks who watched the demonstration because what that demo did for me is fire up brain cells.
Last December, I graduated from the Davinci Coders program. I know a little Ruby on Rails. I know enough to start doing some interesting projects of my own…