Paper Info
Title
Understanding Newcomers to 3D Printing: Motivations, Workflows, and Barriers of Casual Makers.
Abstract
Interest in understanding and facilitating 3D digital fabrication is growing in the HCI research community. However, most of our insights about end-user interaction with fabrication are currently based on interactions of professional users, makers, and technology enthusiasts. We present a study of casual makers, users who have no prior experience with fabrication and mainly explore walk-up-and-use 3D printing services at public print centers, such as libraries, universities, and schools. We carried out 32 interviews with casual makers, print center operators, and fabrication experts to understand the motivations, workflows, and barriers in appropriating 3D printing technologies. Our results suggest that casual makers are deeply dependent on print center operators throughout the process from bootstrapping their 3D printing workflow, to seeking help and troubleshooting, to verifying their outputs. However, print center operators are usually not trained domain experts in fabrication and cannot always address the nuanced needs of casual makers. We discuss implications for optimizing 3D design tools and interactions that can better facilitate casual makers' workflows.
Year
DOI
Venue
2016
10.1145/2858036.2858266
CHI
Keywords
Field
DocType
3D printing, casual makers, 3D modelling, learning barriers
Troubleshooting,Computer science,Knowledge management,3d design,3D printing,Casual,Workflow,Multimedia
Conference
ISBN
Citations 
PageRank 
978-1-4503-3362-7
27
0.90
References 
Authors
25
3
Name
Order
Citations
PageRank
Nathaniel Hudson1393.76
Celena Alcock2270.90
Parmit K. Chilana325120.61