SliceHub: Augmenting Shared 3D Model Repositories with Slicing Results for 3D Printing

TL;DR

SliceHub enhances shared 3D model repositories by providing real-time slicing results, enabling users to efficiently explore print configurations based on time and material constraints.

Contribution

We introduce SliceHub, a system that augments repositories with real-time slicing data and a user interface for exploring different print configurations.

Findings

Real-time slicing data improves user decision-making.

Parallel and interpolated slicing accelerates result generation.

User interface integration facilitates configuration exploration.

Abstract

In this paper, we explore how to augment shared 3D model repositories, such as Thingiverse, with slicing results that are readily available to all users. By having print time and material consumption for different print resolution profiles and model scales available in real-time, users are able to explore different slicing configurations efficiently to find the one that best fits their time and material constraints. To prototype this idea, we build a system called SliceHub, which consists of three components: (1) a repository with an evolving database of 3D models, for which we store the print time and material consumption for various print resolution profiles and model scales, (2) a user interface integrated into an existing slicer that allows users to explore the slicing information from the 3D models, and (3) a computational infrastructure to quickly generate new slicing results, either through parallel slicing of multiple print resolution profiles and model scales or through interpolation. We motivate our work with a formative study of the challenges faced by users of existing slicers and provide a technical evaluation of the SliceHub system.