Theatrical plays with 3D printed props and decorations

Seeing a play always provides a distinctive and special form of entertainment. Listening to the songs, enjoying the storyline and getting an amazing visual background with the stage props all count for a unique and unforgettable experience. You do not even recognize it, but the costumes and the decorations of each scene grant a huge part of the involvement you have with the play.

Yet, have you ever wondered how the props and decorations are made? How many hours does it take to create a background decoration lamp? What techniques and technologies are used to create them?

Read on and get to know how Craftbots are used in theatrical environments.

In 2019, The Lir Academy entered into a new exciting partnership with Craftbot. As part of their educational outreach, Craftbot supplied them with two Craftbot Plus 3D printer. This has enormously enhanced the learnings and possibilities of output for their students and design teams. The use of 3D printing significantly amplifies the skill-sets their students learn at the Academy, helps them explore their creativity and are a welcome addition to the workplace when they finish college. The students have been combining their knowledge in AutoCad, Vectorworks and 3D modelling and prop-making

Maree Kearns, Head of the Master of Fine Arts (MFA) in Stage Design, which focuses on stage, lighting and costume design, is enthusiastic about the possibilities that this printer holds.

As she notes, for model-making it is "It is amazingly time-effective, in terms of productivity we gain speed, we get through more work and achieve more output, thinking and class time with access to this equipment. Making 6 chairs by hand takes an entire day, making a window takes hours, particularly if it is intricate. With a 3D printer you just set it to go, even with complex pieces, leave it overnight if you need to and you can focus on your other work."

It is also not just model design that she sees it in use for. For costume designers is can be used to make fabric and layovers for fabric, accessories, medals, pins and buttons. "For a costume designer, that’s an amazing thing to be able to engage actors and the rest of the team in the work because it’s really precise as to what it will be. It’s completely invaluable, you can’t overstate it."

Maree also told us that the Craftbot Plus printer is much easier to use than other 3D printers she has experience with. "Each step in the process made sense, it was glitch-free and it was fast"

She thinks that the Craftbot is accurate, simple to use; the instructions are clear and jargon free, easy to troubleshoot, something that uses multiple types of filaments, whether its plastic, wood resin or metal.

Bill Woodland, is The Lir’s Technician and has been coaching students in using the machines. He also has been exploring how the Academy can use the printers to support the students in other ways to maintain equipment in a cost-effective way. This included repairing the tools that they use for model making.

One of the other major benefits of using a Craftbot he sees is the safety benefit. "For example, if you’re making a teeny tiny intricate prop. I have stabbed myself in the thumb with a scalpel blade many, many times. You can be out of commission and not able to work while you heal."

Alongside the significant cost savings that are to be made when a kilo of plastic is 15-20 euro, this could be even more cost effective with recycled material as well as neutralising the carbon footprint.

Speaking on the specific advantages of the Craftbot printers, Bill outlines that "The heated bed feature on the Craftbot Plus printer is extremely important. One of the most difficult things in the process of 3D printing is keeping the piece you are making adhered to the bed. It’s hard anyway, but the heated bed makes it so much easier."

He also mentioned that "The Craftware slicer software is really excellent, very straightforward, I was impressed with it. The way that it is set up with an ‘easy’ mode and ‘expert’ mode is really good for students."

During the Academy’s 2020/2021 semester, the students managed to put the printer to fantastic use. In the followings there will be in focus two of their students who really enjoyed the opportunity to trial ideas and produced some amazing results.

Through his studies, Mark Jackson has been drawn to model and prop making. Mark said that "The Craftbot printers are exceptional. They are much faster than other machines, they deliver results in about half the time of other printers and they are really precise. I especially like the fact that they come with their own enclosures so that the fumes are contained." Mark used the 3D printer for the work he did on a recent production of Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice. He was tasked with creating 3 caskets for the production that had specific text to be written on them.

Mark Jackson

Using the Craftbot made this process much easier than searching for 3 identical caskets or trying to completely build them using his model making skills, which would have taken weeks instead of days. Instead, he designed and printed them, then painted and customised the decoration.

When the lead designer on the show saw how straight-forward this was, he asked if they could look at fabricating more elements of the design including lamp posts and decorative pieces that were proving tricky to source or replicate such as the tops of railings. He was very excited by the possibility that the technology proposed and incorporated more of it into the set design.

Mark also created the lamps that you can see in the photo below.

Mark was so encouraged by the experience that he has bought his own printer too. He generally uses white PLA filament, but he is excited about the possibility of using metals, particularly aluminum and trying it out.

"It just makes life so much easier and cheaper than buying something. I can create my own design or find thousands of designs online. It feels that this is the way forward for the future".

He has big ambitions for what it could do with the printer and costume design. Mark feels that training in 3D printing technology is really important as an Assistant Stage Managers in order to make props.

Chris Merton Also working on The Merchant of Venice was student Chris Merton. Chris’ main focus is on props and stage management. Chris has a keen interest in tech and had built his first 3D printer when he was 16. Chris mentioned that "Sometimes, working in film and theatre you are required to work under short deadlines so you don’t have time to do much tweaking which is why the Craftbot Plus is a great printer." He also feels that the benefits of this technology is being able to create and experiment with shape and texture, and having the ability to print and test your ideas is a unique way of learning and developing skills.

In particular with the Craftbot Plus printer, he found that "Having built my own printers throughout the years I found that most of my time was taken up by fixing bugs in the code or rebuilding parts and constantly recalibrating but with Craftbot it’s a lot easier to just plug and print which has always been the dream."

He took the opportunity to use the Craftbot printer to create these telephones below – a key element of the set design for the recent production, Tennessee Williams’ Summer and Smoke. They were made using real candlesticks and salt and pepper shakers. The joints and microphone clips were designed and 3d printed.

Chris also designed and printed the McVitie’s logo to be pressed into salt dough to create these faux biscuits for the recent production The Unreturning.

He also used 3D printing for the costume design of this armour for Shakespeare’s Pericles. He 3D printed the barnacles and lettering for 9 of these armors which were weathered with paint and cinnamon to create a rust effect.

Chris has really engaged with using the Craftbot 3D printer and takes the opportunity to try new things whenever possible. This includes these 3D fabric pieces below. "The fabric was a thing I was experimenting with to find a way to merge the fluidity of fabric with the rigidness of plastic. These are some samples I made to demonstrate how it would work."

Chris feels that "the quality of my work definitely improved with 3D printing, I was getting offered a lot more work by just mentioning that I can 3D print and design. I feel it’s definitely something especially at the moment most employers are looking for in the prop industry."

As 3D printing is becoming more mainstream, students need to know how to use it. The Lir Academy is an amazing example of showing the wide range of applications of 3D printers in an educational environment. The Academy and Craftbot have a lot more plans for the future to commonly educate the future generations to explore the high-end technology.