SLIC3R vs Cura vs KISSlicer

SLIC3R, Cura, and KISSlicer are all slicing programs.  Their job is to take a three dimensional computer model and slice it into layers to provide a 3D printer the instructions it needs to print the model.  So far I haven’t been able to get KISSlicer to actually work.  It either locks up while performing whatever calculations it needs to do or it gives my printer worthless instructions that don’t accomplish anything other than my print head slamming into the end stops over and over again.  This is probably a set up issue and is something that I will figure out sooner or later, but with the basic settings enabled KISSlicer is worthless to me.  Cura and SLIC3R both provide usable prints.  I started out using SLIC3R as that was what was recommended by the company I bought my printer from.  I was pretty happy with it until recently.  The first photo will be a model sliced with SLIC3R and the second will be done with Cura.

Ya… see the difference.  The Cura print actually looks like the 3D model.  SLIC3R simplified things rather a lot and even adjusted the attitude of the head.  There are some things that I like better about SLIC3R.  The support material it prints (so that you can print overhangs) is much easier to remove than the support material printed by Cura.  This is probably also something that I will be able to adjust.  I just haven’t figured out how yet.  For the moment I will probably use SLIC3R for easy stuff and Cura for more complicated or curvy objects.  I was really discouraged when I discovered how bad a job SLIC3R was doing as I had really liked it up to this point.  But adapt and overcome I guess.  The KISSlicer won a number of comparison tests and is a current favorite as best I can determine.  I will have to devote some brain cells towards figuring out how to finagle it into working.  One of the things that I do really like about Cura and KISSlicer are that they show the 3D model in full within their program whereas SLIC3R just shows the footprint of the model.  It makes it much easier to rescale or orientate models on the print bed for easier printing.

Ender’s Game vs Starship Troopers

I just saw Ender’s Game.  It was well done.  Harrison Ford was excellent in it as were the rest of the actors.  I think the film stayed true to the book despite having to leave stuff out to fit into one movie.  Boiled down to it’s basics the premise does seem a little sillier than in the book.  The thing that struck me were the similarities with Starship Troopers.  I think most people would agree that Ender’s Game is a more sophisticated book. The basic plots are very similar though.  Alien bugs attack humanity and we are forced to defend ourselves.  In both books it turns out that humanity is the aggressor. In Ender’s the aliens attempt to colonize our planet first whereas in Starship Troopers we start things by trying to colonize their world.  In both movies the military and the government are not telling the general populace the whole story.  The big difference is that, in Ender’s Game the reader (and now the watcher) are beat over the head with the fact that humanity is the bad guy and in Starship Troopers you are expected to read between the lines and figure this out for yourself.  The movie made it a more obvious than the book did for Troopers.  What I find interesting is the book that is more complicated (and sophisticatedly written) gives it’s readers less credit for being able to figure things out than Starship Troopers did.  Ultimately it seems to me that Starship Troopers was written for a smarter audience. Troopers at least gave it’s readers credit for being smart enough to figure things out without everything being spelled out in huge blinking neon letters.

Movies

I came home today and decided I was just going to stay in this evening and watch a couple movies.  I started with Lincoln Lawyer.  It was really good.  It doesn’t do anything spectacular and doesn’t break any new ground but it was solid.  The script was good and the acting was excellent.  I started to watch Shopgirl after that.  I only got 35 or 40 minutes into it before turning it off.  I expected a light romantic comedy and that is essentially what it is i guess.  But it was done in such a way that it was just a series of awkward moments.  My life has enough of that as it is,  I didn’t need to spend my evening watching somebody else go through it.  So even though I like Steve Martin and Claire Danes, I just turned it off.