I have very important information to why your country is not eligible.
The short answer is, "Your government says we can't."
I'll believe it. If there's one thing the internet has taught me, it's that the Australian government hates porn & video games; the most basic human needs next to sleep, food, water, & beer.
I say let the Aussies join anyway. The government in their country has made it painfully clear that they don't actually represent their own people.
Make texture packs? Tired of people telling you to upload better screencaps? Send me a message with a link to your pack & I can help. (Check my Planet Minecraft blogs for photography examples). http://www.planetminecraft.com/member/likalaruku/
Not that I know of - while a good texture pack (or even mod) can make for a really sweet build, keep in mind that any 3D prints of said model might not be quite as detailed - the placed blocks themselves are usually a solid color when printed.
Yes, Mineways handles texture packs just fine. Right now you need to extract the terrain.png file from the texture pack and point Mineways at it; I'm working to make this a bit more seamless in the future.
3D color printers are in their infancy, so the texture resolution is not as high as you might like. I've found printing at a size of 3 mm/block makes the textures pretty clear, see here. The default export size is 2 mm/block (you can adjust this). You can, in fact, just set the price you want for the model and Mineways will scale your creation accordingly. Anyway, you can check out how textures print by looking at the Mineways Flickr Pool.
b ) Does it have to be made in the current version of Minecraft or can it be made in the 1.4 pre-release?
Whatever is best for you!
Yes, I've updated Mineways to include as many of the 1.4 beta blocks as possible. Note that things like flowers, which are just thin billboards in the game, get stamped onto the ground. There are other simplifications. Also, the "lesser blocks" feature in Mineways, which lets you print out fences and other detailed geometry, is (sadly) not entirely supported by Shapeways yet - I would stick with building using full blocks. Basically, you can export and upload your model or any test scene to Shapeways using Mineways and see what the preview looks like - it's free to do this. Note that you want to make your model in a single-player world, or in a multiplayer one where you have access to the world's save files; Mineways needs these to operate.
Really, the process is pretty easy, just follow the quickstart steps near the top of the Mineways page. I run through the whole procedure - install, export, preview, and upload - in two minutes in .
c ) Can the build be made using MCedit or other tools like it? (Like those voxel importer things)
Sure, go for it! The only requirement is that it be awesome.
... but not too huge. Well, actually, you can make it as huge as you want, but you have to make sure that the walls are not too thin, so that the model is strong enough to be printed. Think, "would I feel safe in an earthquake in this construction?" That said, you also don't want to waste material on what never will be visible - 3D printing costs are based almost entirely on volume, not complexity. So, make it hollow, like a cheap chocolate Easter Bunny. Or better yet, don't, come to think of it: Mineways will automatically hollow out the bottom of any model you make (assuming it's not floating in air) and will keep the wall size thick enough to print.
Rule of thumb: at a print size of 2 mm/block it costs $6 per 1000 blocks. So a $300 model will consist of 50,000 blocks. A wall thickness of a single block is fine at this size. This sounds like a lot of blocks, but blocks add up quick - here's a typical $300 model. At 1 mm/block, you can make something with 8 times as many blocks, 400,000 blocks total. But, you'll want to make sure all walls, floors, and roofs are 2 blocks thick. If you want to go for a model where the textures are more visible, 3 mm/block means you get just 6250 blocks to use.
Check my "how I make an export" steps to get some idea of the process I go through.
Good luck to all who enter - I'll definitely be happy to help the winner turn their project into a good printable model. Mineways does most of the work for you automatically, but there are a few options (like "lesser blocks") worth trying out.
I had nothing to do with this contest, by the way, and have no affiliation with Curse, Shapeways, WoW, etc. It was a pleasant surprise to see; someone at Shapeways let me know it was going on.
Maybe they should say that people in Arizona, Massachusets, and Canada aren't allowed to join. I read the rules and terms, that's what it says! I BUILT THIS MASSIVE Pandaria scene, and I live in Arizona. Thanks Curse.....
can you use minecraft mods in this contest as well or does it have to be vanilla minecraft?
Vanilla - if your world can't be read by a vanilla Minecraft executable (the 1.4 beta's fine, by the way), then Mineways won't be able to convert it to a 3D model for printing. Otherwise mods for building, moving, etc. are fine, as are texture packs.
I hope they have another contest without WoW in it....Plus the stupid pandas. When I first saw the ad for it I thought "oh no, Kung Fu Panda 3"...Then I thought it was some sort of panda, but then I saw it was an expasion pack...Seriously? Who wants pandas....Big fat lazy things....And yes I know Curse is built around making addons for WoW..But it's still called MinecraftForums....
Just to give you something to measure your efforts against, I imported two Pandaria-themed buildings from Planet Minecraft. Find them here (along with all other properly-tagged entries, i.e., none at this point). Really, I think that link can be used to vote for your favorites, once there are more available.
I actually have permission from the creator to enter the Galidin build in the contest, so will probably do this to beat any "I built a panda with 12 blocks" entries.
Idiots. Curse owns Minecraft forums and curse built their corporation around making addons for WoW. Get educated!
Yeah, but regardless of what they used to do, this is the Minecraft Forums, and if they want to run the minecraft forums, they should really be focusing on Minecraft. I don't care about WoW.
I would love to join but I am not in illegible country. Now I do have solution, I could ask a trusted friend to enter for it for me and have all the risks of my friend running away of it to be my responsibility but that means I have to questions:
1. Is it allowed to have someone to submit for you and so the prizes is sent to him/her
2. Can I retain the ownership-- as in, if I win, it is me which is announced as winner, not my friend
3. How about a build by a team? Can we all get the recognition as winners?
4. How much approx the pricing to 3d print these creatures I post and how do I make it 'efficient to print'?
I will be entering a piece, but im worried that it may be too complex for mineways, or even more so for the printing process...
so i have two questions....
1. How does Mineways handle stairs?
2. Nothing in the rules says it has to be printable, clarify please?
I will be entering a piece, but im worried that it may be too complex for mineways, or even more so for the printing process...
so i have two questions....
1. How does Mineways handle stairs?
2. Nothing in the rules says it has to be printable, clarify please?
Mineways can handle stairs (in fact today I updated to the Week 39 stairs algorithm, which I think will upset some builders - existing structures with stairs will actually change form in the game if this new stairs feature is released - so I'm going to make it optional in Mineways). The main problem is that Shapeways can't perfectly handle stairs. It comes down to Mineways making geometry that Shapeways then has to merge together, and Shapeways doesn't do this that well. Lately, Shapeways *has* improved their importer, they handle stairs OK here, while their older importer used to fail, shown here. Note they don't handle snow well, though.
The basic thing: try it out! Make something with stairs and then use Mineways. Turn on the "lesser block" export feature when exporting. Upload to Shapeways, and see.
That might be what we think, but is that what they think.
That's what society's smartest minds think, Not us.
But WoW in Minecraft. Lets make a contest to replicate a game that has turned horrible and its even worse expansion in a good game.
If Minecraft went the way of WoW or were bought by Blizzard or even Curse(In fact I have tailored my adblock so the only curse related things I see are my login and message bar) Sadly years of WoW has made the side strips scream "Curse Website", I would stop playing out of spite.
For the Record it has nothing in any way shape or form to do with our Government, Many US to AU contests are held digital goods, Physical goods and many times paraphernalia(Which is illegal to sell in this state but not illegal to ship) are given away.
There may be certain laws you must adhere to but if small time Pokemon websites and Paraphernalia forums can abide by them why cant you guys?
... I can't help but notice in that tremendously large list of participating countries including some very remote locations... seems to be either Europe or US. So, they seem to be excluding Australia... and Australia isn't very small, and I miss out.
I would love to join but I am not in illegible country. Now I do have solution, I could ask a trusted friend to enter for it for me and have all the risks of my friend running away of it to be my responsibility but that means I have to questions:
1. Is it allowed to have someone to submit for you and so the prizes is sent to him/her
2. Can I retain the ownership-- as in, if I win, it is me which is announced as winner, not my friend
3. How about a build by a team? Can we all get the recognition as winners?
4. How much approx the pricing to 3d print these creatures I post and how do I make it 'efficient to print'?
These are great builds! That said, there might be some problems with thin wings and tails if you try to print them out. Imagine your models as being made of some sort of stone. Would they collapse under their own weight? If so, then the model's unlikely to print OK (printed models don't collapse under their own weight, but areas where the material is too thin are likely to break during the cleaning process). Maybe a better mental test is "would this model hold up in a hurricane?"
I can't answer the first three questions, that's for someone like Sacherverell (but I must say, if there's a risk your friend is going to steal the prize, you might want to re-evaluate if he's a friend).
I can answer the fourth, since I'm the author of Mineways. Here are tips on how to make sure your model is printable and no more expensive than needed. Here's some information on cutting costs (but a $300 print size is quite large, your models should fit that constraint). By default, the export block size is 2 mm/block, which is usually thick enough to ensure most models are strong enough to print. Things like ship masts or other extremely thin features are still in danger of breaking, so don't make these types of structures.
Also, when you export, you can instead choose the price you want - the main problem with this option is that if the block size used to fit that constraint is less than 2 mm/block, the walls or other features may be too thin to successfully print.
You could look at my (non-profit) shop here for some examples, which should give you a sense of how large models are and what they'll cost. Most models in my shop should be printable.
p.s. If your world is somewhere for download, pm me and I can try exporting your models (don't worry, I won't rip you off).
Does it need to be a structure or can it be a landscape with small villages/houses and landmarks?
It could be a landscape, but you'd have to make sure the buildings were all sturdy enough to print, i.e. thick enough walls. See my comments here about size, for question "c". There's also a half-million polygon limit (or something like that) for models you upload to Shapeways, and each exposed block counts for 6 polygons, so you could well make a model that's too large to process. I'd aim for buildings; take a look here for models which definitely worked.
Thanks for the compliment and answer. Hmm yeah, I guess considering there is no 'wiring' inside the model, it would be tricky. I will make sure the one I'm making to be balanced. I am curious though if your heaven's teardrop is fragile.
p.s. If your world is somewhere for download, pm me and I can try exporting your models (don't worry, I won't rip you off).
That actually give me idea to start a shop but I'm lazy and I probably won't print a thing considering the costs is high for my currency. Let's write a pm then!
I will be entering a piece, but im worried that it may be too complex for mineways, or even more so for the printing process...
so i have two questions....
1. How does Mineways handle stairs?
You inspired me to dump most everything I know about how Mineways handles the various block types into a long table. It's here. This was worth going through, as it made me think how I could improve export in the future (already I'm going to change export of fire for printing).
Only three entries? I'm quite confused with all the hate comments about WoW, if this isn't your thing, then why take the time to comment?
I'm still entering, i'm about 60% done with my build. I've been taking it slow, since they gave us the time, making sure i'm okay with the way it looks before i go too far and can't fix it. I'm pretty happy about how decent it's turned out so far.
I hope to see more entries in the coming weeks, and less hate,
if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all.
and a thanks to Eric, for all his help to the community on this project
I'll believe it. If there's one thing the internet has taught me, it's that the Australian government hates porn & video games; the most basic human needs next to sleep, food, water, & beer.
I say let the Aussies join anyway. The government in their country has made it painfully clear that they don't actually represent their own people.
Yes, Mineways handles texture packs just fine. Right now you need to extract the terrain.png file from the texture pack and point Mineways at it; I'm working to make this a bit more seamless in the future.
3D color printers are in their infancy, so the texture resolution is not as high as you might like. I've found printing at a size of 3 mm/block makes the textures pretty clear, see here. The default export size is 2 mm/block (you can adjust this). You can, in fact, just set the price you want for the model and Mineways will scale your creation accordingly. Anyway, you can check out how textures print by looking at the Mineways Flickr Pool.
Yes, I've updated Mineways to include as many of the 1.4 beta blocks as possible. Note that things like flowers, which are just thin billboards in the game, get stamped onto the ground. There are other simplifications. Also, the "lesser blocks" feature in Mineways, which lets you print out fences and other detailed geometry, is (sadly) not entirely supported by Shapeways yet - I would stick with building using full blocks. Basically, you can export and upload your model or any test scene to Shapeways using Mineways and see what the preview looks like - it's free to do this. Note that you want to make your model in a single-player world, or in a multiplayer one where you have access to the world's save files; Mineways needs these to operate.
Really, the process is pretty easy, just follow the quickstart steps near the top of the Mineways page. I run through the whole procedure - install, export, preview, and upload - in two minutes in .
... but not too huge. Well, actually, you can make it as huge as you want, but you have to make sure that the walls are not too thin, so that the model is strong enough to be printed. Think, "would I feel safe in an earthquake in this construction?" That said, you also don't want to waste material on what never will be visible - 3D printing costs are based almost entirely on volume, not complexity. So, make it hollow, like a cheap chocolate Easter Bunny. Or better yet, don't, come to think of it: Mineways will automatically hollow out the bottom of any model you make (assuming it's not floating in air) and will keep the wall size thick enough to print.
Rule of thumb: at a print size of 2 mm/block it costs $6 per 1000 blocks. So a $300 model will consist of 50,000 blocks. A wall thickness of a single block is fine at this size. This sounds like a lot of blocks, but blocks add up quick - here's a typical $300 model. At 1 mm/block, you can make something with 8 times as many blocks, 400,000 blocks total. But, you'll want to make sure all walls, floors, and roofs are 2 blocks thick. If you want to go for a model where the textures are more visible, 3 mm/block means you get just 6250 blocks to use.
Check my "how I make an export" steps to get some idea of the process I go through.
Good luck to all who enter - I'll definitely be happy to help the winner turn their project into a good printable model. Mineways does most of the work for you automatically, but there are a few options (like "lesser blocks") worth trying out.
I had nothing to do with this contest, by the way, and have no affiliation with Curse, Shapeways, WoW, etc. It was a pleasant surprise to see; someone at Shapeways let me know it was going on.
Vanilla - if your world can't be read by a vanilla Minecraft executable (the 1.4 beta's fine, by the way), then Mineways won't be able to convert it to a 3D model for printing. Otherwise mods for building, moving, etc. are fine, as are texture packs.
I actually have permission from the creator to enter the Galidin build in the contest, so will probably do this to beat any "I built a panda with 12 blocks" entries.
Yeah, but regardless of what they used to do, this is the Minecraft Forums, and if they want to run the minecraft forums, they should really be focusing on Minecraft. I don't care about WoW.
I would love to join but I am not in illegible country. Now I do have solution, I could ask a trusted friend to enter for it for me and have all the risks of my friend running away of it to be my responsibility but that means I have to questions:
1. Is it allowed to have someone to submit for you and so the prizes is sent to him/her
2. Can I retain the ownership-- as in, if I win, it is me which is announced as winner, not my friend
3. How about a build by a team? Can we all get the recognition as winners?
4. How much approx the pricing to 3d print these creatures I post and how do I make it 'efficient to print'?
Thank you!
so i have two questions....
1. How does Mineways handle stairs?
2. Nothing in the rules says it has to be printable, clarify please?
Mineways can handle stairs (in fact today I updated to the Week 39 stairs algorithm, which I think will upset some builders - existing structures with stairs will actually change form in the game if this new stairs feature is released - so I'm going to make it optional in Mineways). The main problem is that Shapeways can't perfectly handle stairs. It comes down to Mineways making geometry that Shapeways then has to merge together, and Shapeways doesn't do this that well. Lately, Shapeways *has* improved their importer, they handle stairs OK here, while their older importer used to fail, shown here. Note they don't handle snow well, though.
The basic thing: try it out! Make something with stairs and then use Mineways. Turn on the "lesser block" export feature when exporting. Upload to Shapeways, and see.
Eric
That's what society's smartest minds think, Not us.
But WoW in Minecraft. Lets make a contest to replicate a game that has turned horrible and its even worse expansion in a good game.
If Minecraft went the way of WoW or were bought by Blizzard or even Curse(In fact I have tailored my adblock so the only curse related things I see are my login and message bar) Sadly years of WoW has made the side strips scream "Curse Website", I would stop playing out of spite.
For the Record it has nothing in any way shape or form to do with our Government, Many US to AU contests are held digital goods, Physical goods and many times paraphernalia(Which is illegal to sell in this state but not illegal to ship) are given away.
There may be certain laws you must adhere to but if small time Pokemon websites and Paraphernalia forums can abide by them why cant you guys?
These are great builds! That said, there might be some problems with thin wings and tails if you try to print them out. Imagine your models as being made of some sort of stone. Would they collapse under their own weight? If so, then the model's unlikely to print OK (printed models don't collapse under their own weight, but areas where the material is too thin are likely to break during the cleaning process). Maybe a better mental test is "would this model hold up in a hurricane?"
I can't answer the first three questions, that's for someone like Sacherverell (but I must say, if there's a risk your friend is going to steal the prize, you might want to re-evaluate if he's a friend).
I can answer the fourth, since I'm the author of Mineways. Here are tips on how to make sure your model is printable and no more expensive than needed. Here's some information on cutting costs (but a $300 print size is quite large, your models should fit that constraint). By default, the export block size is 2 mm/block, which is usually thick enough to ensure most models are strong enough to print. Things like ship masts or other extremely thin features are still in danger of breaking, so don't make these types of structures.
Also, when you export, you can instead choose the price you want - the main problem with this option is that if the block size used to fit that constraint is less than 2 mm/block, the walls or other features may be too thin to successfully print.
You could look at my (non-profit) shop here for some examples, which should give you a sense of how large models are and what they'll cost. Most models in my shop should be printable.
p.s. If your world is somewhere for download, pm me and I can try exporting your models (don't worry, I won't rip you off).
It could be a landscape, but you'd have to make sure the buildings were all sturdy enough to print, i.e. thick enough walls. See my comments here about size, for question "c". There's also a half-million polygon limit (or something like that) for models you upload to Shapeways, and each exposed block counts for 6 polygons, so you could well make a model that's too large to process. I'd aim for buildings; take a look here for models which definitely worked.
Thanks for the compliment and answer. Hmm yeah, I guess considering there is no 'wiring' inside the model, it would be tricky. I will make sure the one I'm making to be balanced. I am curious though if your heaven's teardrop is fragile.
That actually give me idea to start a shop but I'm lazy and I probably won't print a thing considering the costs is high for my currency. Let's write a pm then!
You inspired me to dump most everything I know about how Mineways handles the various block types into a long table. It's here. This was worth going through, as it made me think how I could improve export in the future (already I'm going to change export of fire for printing).
Population of Australia (ineligible): 22,744,183
I'm still entering, i'm about 60% done with my build. I've been taking it slow, since they gave us the time, making sure i'm okay with the way it looks before i go too far and can't fix it. I'm pretty happy about how decent it's turned out so far.
I hope to see more entries in the coming weeks, and less hate,
if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all.
and a thanks to Eric, for all his help to the community on this project