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Post by rattokan on Dec 15, 2016 13:24:11 GMT -9
Hi there! I joined the papercraft community 3 years ago and found that it is a very interesting hobby and I improved my RPG experience with a lot of cool stuff Now it seems that a lot of people a jumping on the 3D-Printing train (i.e. Fatdragon) and I have the impression that people (casual gamers in my groups) are thinking of this as being the future. I would just like to hear your opinion on that? Are a lot of you guys thinking about switching in the future? Or doing both? looking forward to the discussion cheers, rattokan
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Post by kgstanley81 on Dec 15, 2016 13:33:19 GMT -9
I think 3d printing if I can get one, will be to just add to what I have, paper crafting is a lot easier to get what you want on the table quickly
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Post by squirmydad on Dec 15, 2016 13:49:29 GMT -9
3D printing is pretty cool and I plan to do both. I don't see Papercraft going away, but it's real heyday was about eight years ago. What I see now is that after the surge finished it found it's niche. I'm sure 3D printing will do the same; right now it's surging.
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Post by wyvern on Dec 15, 2016 13:52:42 GMT -9
As a model-maker and gamer, I've no interest in 3D printing at all presently, since from what I've seen it's very expensive (in terms of materials, power, cost of a printing machine, and most especially time), plus the home-print technology is nowhere near reliable enough as yet. It's much more cost-effective still to buy cast metal, plastic and resin 3D scenery and minis right now than start up your own 3D home "printworks", and in some cases, it's actually cheaper to buy pro-painted castings than chance the 3D technology.
If you're wanting to design your own terrain and minis, 3D printing certainly has advantages, especially if you're intending to create the masters to make moulds from and sell cast 3D pieces. Several professional mini manufacturers are already doing this, using pro-3D-printers to create the masters from, for instance.
For small quantities of special items - one-off minis, or a key tabletop set-piece say - 3D printing might be worth it. I know some railway modellers have gone down this route as the only way to find very specific, one-off locomotives, or building fixtures, generally ones for which they've designed the items required using 3D printing CAD software themselves. That's quite a level of commitment, of course.
So far though, I've seen nothing in 3D printing to tempt me away from papercraft or professionally-designed and manufactured cast metal, resin or plastic items. In future, who knows though?
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Post by Punkrabbitt on Dec 15, 2016 13:52:47 GMT -9
I much prefer papercrafting to 3D printing. I enjoy the tinkering and modifying of the kits almost as much fun as building them. Plus, I really dislike painting scenic items.
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Post by Vermin King on Dec 15, 2016 15:00:57 GMT -9
I don't see any threat to paper models until they have 3d printer/painters that do fold-flat.
There will be a place for both, but for me, designing and building is half the fun.
And I really hate to paint
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Post by mproteau (Paper Realms) on Dec 15, 2016 15:09:42 GMT -9
I was able to try 3D printing for 14 days before returning the printer. The five dungeon bits I was able to print are great, but they took ages to print, I still have to learn how to paint them, and I still can't even make a room. I love the minis it printed though.
In the time it took to print one 2" dungeon tile, I could have made a LOT of TerrainLinx bits that were fully colored.
Where I am excited is in the props. I look forward to producing lots of intricate props to complement the paper terrain. And maybe I'll get good at plastic terrrain and combine them too.
I'm just saying I can get a good multi function inkjet, five sets of 3rd party ink carts, matte photo paper, pens for edging AND a machine cutter, and it'd be cheaper than a 3D printer, with less frustration.
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Post by cowboycentaur on Dec 15, 2016 17:08:18 GMT -9
The whole reason I got into papercraft was so I wouldn't have to learn to paint minis, so I doubt I'll be learning how to paint 3D printed ones.
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Post by oldschooldm on Dec 15, 2016 18:49:29 GMT -9
A few things:
1) Rich color textures right out of the PDF and onto my paper. 2) No painting (well, much less 'painting' if you edge, like you should!) :-) 3) Fold-flat, baby!
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Post by nolabert on Dec 15, 2016 19:41:50 GMT -9
I'll offer something else. And that's how much I like paper. It is a renewable resource unlike plastic. Also, in the USA it is an important domestic manufacturer. I also live in a state that has historically had a strong paper industry. If i decide I don't want my papercraft anymore I can easily recycle it. I'm not against 3D printing. I even own a 3D printer file for minis which I may print in the next few weeks (at a library or some such source since I have no intention of buying a 3D printer). I actuallly like painting metal minis but it is much slower than papercraft.
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Post by Christopher Roe on Dec 15, 2016 21:45:06 GMT -9
I agree with Squirmydad, the "golden age" of papercraft ended roughly 8-10 years ago. It began around 2001-2002 when new artists decided to start pushing the capabilities of inkjet printers, peaked around 2008, tapered off by 2010, and then sort of flatlined at a super niche level. It's been kind of shambling on like a zombie, with a much smaller fan base and a much lower degree of community traffic.
3D printing right now is sort of like where Microtactix was in the early 2000s: a borderline practical hobby, novel enough to show promise, a bit expensive to get into, and the market chiefly consists of fairly simple things with little to no color variation because of hardware constraints. I've got a Monoprice Maker Select Mini and am planning to make some 3D printable models in 2017, but there are some pretty stiff constraints to what I can pull off with the current technology.
I imagine when there's an affordable desktop 3D printer that can print in full color with a reasonable amount of strength, we'll start seeing a hobby revolution similar to what papercraft went through in the early 2000s. That is probably several years out, and in the meantime, it's more likely that we'll start seeing more affordable and practical SLA printers that can do tabletop quality miniatures at a price that won't completely break the bank first. That's more likely to appeal to people who don't mind painting their own stuff, I think.
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shep
Eternal Member
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Post by shep on Dec 15, 2016 23:16:51 GMT -9
I like 3D printing, but right now, it is too expensive for me to use it regularly. A home printer is beyond my budget, and Shapeways is too expensive to print everything I'd like to have. Papercraft is my budget way out. I can print most stuff myself or have it printed in the copyshop around the corner. The costs are peanuts compared to 3D printing… PLUS, I can store tons of fold-flat and flat papercraft, but only a limited amount of white metal/plastic/resin minis or stuff, not to mention the 3D printed things. And that makes my wife happy! So, papercraft is my choice for the time being...
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Post by wiesel on Dec 16, 2016 0:06:01 GMT -9
I was a little bit late for the golden age of papercraft. I do papaercraft for about 1,5 years now (and it all starts with The Maiden) per accident because I searched for terrain to build a 3D Sopwith boardgame (an golden oldie of the 70th... I simply liked to pimp it but still searching for the right material) and I stuck to this hobby because it's extremely cheap to produce (my last calculation was a prinitng cost of only 4 - 6 Euro-cent per page) and there is so a great community with loads of ideas, tips and real kindness (thank you all for that)! I am no good painter (tried to paint some orc miniatures for Blood Bowl some years ago... it was a horrible and fiddeling experience...) so It's better for me to print in colour and to fold it flat for storage. I have no grafik skills with gimp or so but can do a lot of "hardware" kitbashing with paper that would be impossible for me with plastic. I think paper has a lot of advantages in comparison to other material. I am a boardgame fan and it's funny to see the faces of other players when they see what is possible to do with paper (EDDNIC is one of my heroes by the way) and often say that this paper stuff is much more interesting to play with than with plastic. Happy Holidays to all!
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Post by vwilliams32407 on Dec 16, 2016 11:06:58 GMT -9
Reasons I'm sticking with paper craft: 1. Cost, it's been explained before 2. Time, there's not a lot of free time to devote to building and paper is pretty quick. I can stop for 30 minutes here and there and work on a few pieces. I used to conduct marathon building sessions when I was out of work a few years ago. I was able to build up a nice stock pile of pieces so now I can spend time on building scenario specific pieces or kitbashing to fit my needs. 3. No desire to learn to paint (see time) or buy paint supplies (see cost) 4. 3D printer learning curve, again time. I've been watching the forums over on FDG's since their release of 3D products and there seems to be a lot of trial and error involved and I tend to get frustrated with technology when it's not plug and play.
I'm not knocking 3D printed products, they look great. For me paper does the trick and I enjoy the meditative state I get into while scoring, cutting, and gluing. Just my two cents worth.
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Post by gilius on Dec 16, 2016 12:56:55 GMT -9
3D printing is pretty cool and I plan to do both. I don't see Papercraft going away, but it's real heyday was about eight years ago. What I see now is that after the surge finished it found it's niche. I'm sure 3D printing will do the same; right now it's surging. I share this opinion. IMO there are things that are so much easier and cheaper to get done with paper (e.g. buildings) with great results, that it will be hard to replace them.
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Post by rattokan on Dec 16, 2016 13:27:30 GMT -9
Thnx a lot for your replies so far!
I do share a lot of the opinions that have come up. I also heard a lot about this trial, error and frustration thing about 3d printers when I talk to coworkers who are into building copters and drones.
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Post by Vermin King on Dec 16, 2016 15:17:45 GMT -9
Well, I've only had experience re-skinning a helicopter in paper (and the helicopter was dead before the paper shell died), but I would think that 3D printing would be great for that type of thing.
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Post by squirmydad on Dec 16, 2016 20:29:12 GMT -9
I use my 3D printer to make nozzle variations for my icing and filling caulking gun. I'm doing an experiment, slowly right now making the same vehicle in 3d printing and as a paper-model.
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Post by nolabert on Dec 17, 2016 6:25:13 GMT -9
I guess something else no one said, the other reason to choose papercraft is the art! There are awesome artists making such great art. Not to knock the artists who create cool sculpts for 3D printing, just saying that there is art you are only going to get as papercraft and it's worth it.
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Post by jeffgeorge on Dec 17, 2016 10:16:28 GMT -9
I don't see 3D printing as a major threat to papercraft modeling any time soon, because as cool as current 3D printers are at the moment, they don't print in color. Until they do, papercraft models have the massive advantage of not needing to be painted. Yes, there are more man-hours involved in assembling a papercraft model than printing out a plastic 3D model, but you've got many hours of printer time for each model, and when that's done, all you've got is a monochrome plastic model.
The hobby niche that is currently threatened by 3D printing is the cast-your-own-terrain-in-resin arena dominated by Hirst Arts, which also has you making your own models that must be painted. Although the initial investment to get into 3D printing is higher than to get into Hirst Arts terrain, there are lots of free or inexpensive digital models available for download, whereas each Hirst mold costs on the order of $30, and you frequently need several molds to make a single project or terrain set. If you got serious about Hirst Arts terrain, you could very quickly spend more money on that than it would have cost to get heavily into 3D printing.
My sense is that Hirst better get very busy converting their silicone molds to digital files, or they're going to be in a world of hurt within 3 years. But papercraft is safe from direct threat by 3D printers at least until full-color 3D printers are available for the home market for less than $500...and that is at least ten years away, if not more.
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Post by hackbarth on Dec 17, 2016 17:17:21 GMT -9
3d printing isn't much the reason that papercraft isn't growing anymore. The maturity of gaming tools for roleplaying, like skype, hangouts, roll20, fantasy grounds and others is more a factor. Today it's more practical to assemble a gaming group online than in person. But that precludes using miniatures.
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shep
Eternal Member
Red Alert! Shields up! LENS FLARE!!!
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Post by shep on Dec 18, 2016 6:16:11 GMT -9
3d printing isn't much the reason that papercraft isn't growing anymore. The maturity of gaming tools for roleplaying, like skype, hangouts, roll20, fantasy grounds and others is more a factor. Today it's more practical to assemble a gaming group online than in person. But that precludes using miniatures. Yup, nowadays, people use online options to stick with their original gaming group when moving, instead of searching for a new group in their new vicinity... I don't say that that's a bad thing, but it seems (at least to a certain measure) that it keeps the community from spreading / breeding new groups with new players.
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Post by lightning on Dec 18, 2016 23:29:06 GMT -9
I have been paper modelling since I was a kid (talking about the 70ies). So for me the golden age has never stopped :-)
I think "new" kids grow up with new toys and are expecting their games to be digital these days. But all the kids that come to our home are fascinated with the paper models they see here and immediately want to build something tangible. Esp the young ones don't wanted painted versions but white ones, they want to paint on their own!
There are different crowds for paper modelling. The tabletop RPG/war-gaming is just one of them. Then you have the intricate church builders and the many WWII ships, tanks and plane builder and others. Some of the models are crazy detailed. Others are very easy. When you look what guys in Czech and Poland do, it just mind blowing. Of course that is a more master builder category.
With paper being such a affordable and versatile material I can only see "aliveness" for paper crafters. Maybe it is "dying" for the gaming crowd but even there I believe there will always be gamers who prefer to have something tangible on their gaming table.
My Samurai Castle wouldn't be doable with 3D printing for a long time and would cost so much more than the paper version. Maybe the market (if you are thinking commercially) is small, but I love to do it. I try to improve with every model and will be happy with everybody who enjoys my models.
Maybe new 3D paper printers will become a household thing and that will change things. I can see making little details and greebles to enhance the broad structures of paper models.
Life goes on and we will adapt. Like we always have :-)
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Post by wyvern on Dec 19, 2016 6:16:54 GMT -9
Yep, must admit that as a paper modeller of now 50+ years standing, I too have been puzzled by the talk here about some kind of "golden age" having been only very recent, and also now being passed! Perhaps it depends what sort of use you put paper models to, or whether you're trying to sell them to a specific audience, but from what I've seen down the decades, it's never gone away, and appears to be no less diverse now than it was back in the 1960s, or indeed long before then. The current ability to download and print your own paper models is merely the most recent aspect to all this, and no one should be fooled into thinking it is, or ever has been, the ONLY way to do paper modelling!
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Post by Rhannon on Dec 19, 2016 9:25:01 GMT -9
OK, wyvern has already explained my opinion even better ( I suppose ). Papercraft, as also paper soldiers, are old passions. If we have to give them a start date I say around the second half of the nineteenth century. Easily before. If you consider papercraft only as an accessory to other hobbies ( RPGs, wargaming ... ). A tool to make game pieces for other hobbies ... then, perhaps, between a long time (others have explained well, cost, time ...), it could be supplanted. And it will be having met the described conditions. But papercraft is for many an autonomous passion. The pleasure of cutting, pasting, build with their own hands (... study and test the assembly, about some pieces, see architectural buildings for example, discover their history ...) ... You can update a tool ( switch from one printer to a 3D printer, in the future, perhaps, even with colors ... ) but this doesn't mean that also you must upgrade must change a passion. I have never heard that a printer is a passion.
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Post by aleks on Dec 20, 2016 2:08:23 GMT -9
But papercraft is for many an autonomous passion. The pleasure of cutting, pasting, build with their own hands (... study and test the assembly, about some pieces, see architectural buildings for example, discover their history ...) ... I totally agree with Rhannon. Papercraft as form of "scale modelling" will probably last longer than its functional role for RPG and wargames. I've started about 30 years ago with plastic ariplane, then switch to starship, then switch again to miniatures until I discovered papercraft as alternative way to build star wars models. Finally comes Dave Graffam and many others, and my passion is still growing... I hope to build again and again, until my hands and eyes let me do it. (sorry for my e horrible english!!!)
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Post by cowboyleland on Dec 20, 2016 5:04:42 GMT -9
"horrible" is too far, aleks. There are only one or two very small errors in your post. We are glad to have you here.
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Post by jeffgeorge on Dec 20, 2016 7:22:40 GMT -9
You can update a tool ( switch from one printer to a 3D printer, in the future, perhaps, even with colors ) ... This may have been an off-hand comment, but it's really profound to me. From a certain point of view, a shift from making models out of paper from a 2D printer to making models out of plastic from a 3D printer is really the same hobby using a different tool. The difference between a finished paper-crafted mini and a finished 3D-printed mini is really no more profound than the difference between a watercolor painting and an oil painting. Sure, the media are slightly different, and artists and observers will have varying degrees of experience and affinity with those media, but the final product is essentially the same--a 2D image in the case of the paintings, and a 3D model in the case of the minis. If you focus on the product and not the tool, you realize that 3D printing is really just adding another tool to the model-maker's kit. It's certainly not one "hobby" displacing or eliminating another one, if you look at it that way.
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Post by Rhannon on Dec 20, 2016 11:53:12 GMT -9
Hi jeffgeorge, often my English too simple and rough doesn't allow me to express what I want exactly. I'm sorry. I completely agree with your conclusion. At least in general. But the perfect sentence ( it also says in essence what I would have liked to say ) is this: "... It's certainly not one "hobby" displacing or eliminating another one ...". You're absolutely right when you say that we need to focus on the product ( final model ) and not the tool ( paper sheets or 3D print ) but, regardless of that the title of the topic, although it'sa question, is " Is papercraft dead?" and that, with my understanding limit, so my fault, I felt that topic was going into "tool", however I believe that even intermediate steps that lead to "final model" are part and identify a hobby. Well I stop here, because I'm messing with words and especially because I become incomprehensible. But sometime the differences between a watercolor painting and an oil painting are many more of how much they may seem at a first glance. Of course both are paintings, both may represent the same thing ... then the differences begin.
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Post by Christopher Roe on Dec 20, 2016 21:20:20 GMT -9
Yep, must admit that as a paper modeller of now 50+ years standing, I too have been puzzled by the talk here about some kind of "golden age" having been only very recent, and also now being passed! Perhaps it depends what sort of use you put paper models to, or whether you're trying to sell them to a specific audience, but from what I've seen down the decades, it's never gone away, and appears to be no less diverse now than it was back in the 1960s, or indeed long before then. The current ability to download and print your own paper models is merely the most recent aspect to all this, and no one should be fooled into thinking it is, or ever has been, the ONLY way to do paper modelling! The golden age I referred to is specific to the niche I entered as a commercial producer in the early 2000s--digital downloads of models primarily intended for gaming. Scale models and architectural models are a whole another market entirely, those were around long before that and will be around for a long time to come!
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