I LOVE HALLOWEEN, I am a giant child! So, I decided to play around with some of the different technologies that we offer here at TriMech.

Two major products I work with are SOLIDWORKS 3D CAD software and Artec 3D scanners. Artec 3D scanners are great not only because of their accuracy and portability (these are handheld scanners!) but because they can capture full color and textures. So I thought scanning a pumpkin would be a good test of the Artec’s capabilities. We painted a goofy looking Frankenstein face on the pumpkin using several different colors, so we could pull in all of the great color data. I used the Artec Eva, which made quick work of the project.

I used Artec Studio software to scan the pumpkin and to clean up the scan data to create an STL file from the mesh points.

Once the scan was uploaded into Artec Studio I directly exported it into SOLIDWORKS using their convenient button. I used GeoMagic for SOLIDWORKS to turn the STL file into an actual solid model. GeoMagic for SOLIDWORKS is an add-in which works right inside of the SOLIDWORKS interface. This makes it easy to work with because you get to use the interface you know and love as well use the amazingly powerful tools of STL mesh modeling from GeoMagic.

Once I created my solid body in GeoMagic I decided to make it my own by virtually carving my pumpkin. I started by hollowing out the inside using a nice revolve cut. Then I cut a hole in the base for a battery-operated tealight. Finally, I carved the pumpkin’s eyes and mouth using a combination of mouse, keyboard, touch screen and pen.

After I finished virtually carving my pumpkin in SOLIDWORKS, I knew I didn’t want it to just be a digital thing, I wanted to have a physical object. So, I asked Rich Aninno in the back of our office to 3D print my new jack-o’-lantern on the Fortus 380mc. To my luck, Rich was excited to print it for me. First, we wanted to do a test print in FDM (Fused Deposition Modeling) but in the future we are planning on sending it to our PolyJet printer to get a higher resolution print. I had a little help removing my 3D printed pumpkin from the printer by none-other than John S. Pumpkins himself.

Following our FDM print, we decided to take this to the next level and print the scan in full color using our brand new Stratasys J750! Since all Artec scanners pull in color data, we can export that as a VRML from Artec Studio and bring that right into GrabCAD Print, and the final version of the pumpkin that we made is AMAZING! 

>> Click here to read more about the J750 and what it can do for you

The pumpkin came out great and it this was such a fun blog to write. Hopefully, if you have a scanner you can make a sweet 3D scanned pumpkin to have of your own. Happy scanning and most importantly happy Halloween!

Click here to watch the step-by-step process of how I created my pumpkin:

Check out our 2-part Video Tech Tip to learn how to use SOLIDWORKS Weldments for a spooky craft!