The Thing-o-Matic machine is an amazing piece of technology that can be a great tool for art and also for every day life. To create an object on the Thing-o-Matic machine, you first need to draw the object that you want to print on Google Sketchup. Google Sketchup is another great tool that can be used from art to architecture. To draw the object, you must first think of an idea. After you have envisioned what you want to create, you begin on Google Sketchup by first drawing a square, circle, or triangle. Once the first shape has been created, you can then push or pull the object to make it three dimensional. Once this is done, detail can be added to make it better. Once you have made the object that you envisioned, you must make the object compatible to the Thing-o-Matic machine so it can be printed. First you must go to a website and download a file that allows you to save your object on Google Sketchup to make it compatible to the Thing-o-Matic machine. Once this was done I saved my object using the file that I saved to Google Sketchup and sent it to be printed on the Thing-o-Matic machine.
The object that I created on Google Sketchup and that was printed on the Maker-bot was a ring. Thing ring has writing on the top. It says Brophy Basketball and has my number 43. I created this because I thought that it was a cool idea. The writing on the top was fairly small and I knew that it might be hard to print but I went for it. Unfortunately, the writing did not print because it was too small. Even though the writing did not print, the ring still came out very good and the size is perfect. My measurements were very accurate and it fits my finger very well. I enjoyed learning how to use the Thing-o-Matic machine because it taught me much about art using technology. This project also increased my knowledge in computers because making my Google Sketchup object compatible to the Maker-Bot was very challenging.