It looks like 3D is headed in a more practical direction whereby it is easier to sell 3D printable models or schematics to be developed into toys, gadgets or real life objects.
Examples of this would be Apple products, watches, earrings, bracelets, tablet accessories, toys and other things like house hold objects you can't find in stores.
Does that mean that the regular 3D era has ended?
Have we come to the point where regular 3D models can only be given out for free and be used as samples to attract buyers to our 3D prints?
3D models future is ahead, 3D printing just opens one more possibility. From just selling stock models you will not be able to learn a living, but there will be more and more people who will need custom made models.
Generally if the suckers do not start WWIII we have a great chance to have a good and cozy life from 3D modeling business :)
At the moment I am thinking on the Chines market, as that's where the future is. Maybe will start to learn Chines :)
Virtual reality will become the biggest market for 3D content, period.
Regarding the 3D printing, coincidentally just yesterday heard the founder of materialise talk about the future of 3D printing (materialise is one of the world leading companies in 3D printing located in Belgium).
He told that 3D printing will not become a wide spread consumer activity as predicted (in near future).
The reason is, you still need a fair amount of technical skills to operate the printers successfully. That means investment of time to gain experience, time most people do not want to spend (most people want instant entertainment, no troubleshooting).
The consumer printers are also still fairly expensive and limited in what they can do. On the other hand specialized companies like materialise have lots of experience and are always getting the best printers the industry spits out. So by the time one can afford a general 3D printer, those companies print in full color in much more exquisite detail (using most advanced printer technologies available).
He also pointed out that more "small" companies in 3D printing are entering market, (as a result of startups ho gained foothold/experience through the use of those early consumer printers) and that they will dominate 3D online printing services for at least next 10 years.
So it may seem mass consumer 3D printing had some liftoff, it was actually the start of a professional market of services and product developers. So the 3D contend is made and printed by professionals, not consumers (for next 10 years).
Most of these small startups are listed here (https://www.3dhubs.com/) amongst them are in fact small (garage big) startups hoe actually have laser sintering 3D printers.
I did a 3D print myself via one of those hubs, and fairly speaking that went so well I don't even consider baying a low grade 3D printer myself.
Of what the man was telling I could understand It's a falls believe to think that consumers are going to massively buy 3D printers and then go online to search for things to print.
The gadgets and printing will all be part of online professional product developers services/startups, and they will be the ones hoe buy 3D printers and stay on top of the technology and pull the technology forward so that it eventually will become mature as a mass consumer product (10 years away).
On the other hand consumer viable Virtual reality is a different story, it is about 1 to 2 years away and it will deliver instant entertainment strait out of the box, and it is going to be affordable and very easy to use. It will be a booming market so big that it has seen no equal. VR and augmented reality is truly something that everyone is going to do (mark my words).
Note: these are opinions expressed by people, reality is unpredictable and remains to be seen.
Out of the Asian Languages Chinese is most definitely the more lucrative when it comes to business yet for westerners it also is the hardest to learn. Phonetically Japanese and Thai are far easier for us to pronounce. I have made a few attempts myself at learning the language through music but am far from reaching my goal of speaking the language... Pin Yin is awesome because it helps a lot but good luck with memorizing characters... I will try that too in time but it has been a lost battle thus far.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r7eFBvJptDo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jh_twaMEE7Y
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zK524x2zMvY
As far as the 3D printing goes as iterateCGI said the future isn't in buyers owning their own 3D printers because not everyone has the time or interest in tinkering with a technology which on the low end produces less than perfect results.
The cheapest printers on the market go for around 300 plus dollars and their prints are less than adequate if compared to what you can get at the store when you buy your 5 dollar toy.
However what will be the future will be small businesses that will print custom toys that you can't get in stores and that make unique special gifts for children or adult enthusiasts.
Imagine all those Tamiya enthusiasts who spend fortunes on their remote control cars or mini 4D vehicles, if they could get custom shells produced of any vehicle they wanted including vehicles from their favorite movies and anime. So long as one could print them at a comparable price they would make a killing.
That is just an idea but there are so many other applications and ways of making a fortune with 3D printing by building things that no one else is making and that people would love to own.
Thanks for the links, I have here a different possibility, there are lot of Chines in my country (have their shops), so for small fee I will find someone to help me :)
As for virtual reality, I already did some projects for Augmented reality, but am also working on a product for OculusRift. Big possibility give new web browsers and new game engines, who give you possibility to have a very good looking 3D model viewed in a simple web browser.
As for 3D prints, I already have an idea for to start the business, but my country low sucks and stops me from selling stuff to individuals abroad. But a big market for 3d prints are gamer community. You can print their character or vehicle, and have it painted manually (already have some artist who can do this). Not shore on legality of all this as even if the character in game is created on the idea of the gamer it self (talking about new RPGMMO) I suppose that those are still intellectual property of the game developer. Again this has to be checked as those are unclear waters.
The same goes for most 3d models we make. For example we make a 3D model of a Mercedes, but the design of that car is intellectual property of that company. Apple got an approved patent on shape of the box whit round corners (just in US but still WTF), but there are tons of other company's who just took something what is in use for ages and they pay a corrupt official to approve the patent on that in their name. So every time you model a box whit round edges in US you have to ask Apple for approval :)
Those are extremes but still that puts us in a very strange position, as one day you can adjust polygons on your model and the next day you will become a criminal.
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