Why This 3D Sculptor Is Moving From FDM to Resin 3D Printing

One of the best things about 3D printing is that almost anything is possible! In just a couple of hours, you can have a functioning design in your hand–or a cool tabletop miniature to start painting. For 3D sculpture artist Theis Haagh Jakobsen from Arbiter Miniatures, it’s always been about rapid prototyping and the constant pursuit of creating the best physical sculpture possible. In the past three years, his focus has been on perfecting the art of supportless miniatures in FDM 3D printing and pushing the limits of what is possible in that field.

Despite the limitations of supportless designs, he has been able to produce amazing designs with dynamic posing and incredible attention to detail. However, with more and more demanding models that he wishes to work on, the limitations of supportless miniatures started to hold Arbiter Miniatures back creatively and forced him to explore new options.

Opportunities for Total Creative Freedom

After seven successful Kickstarter projects, Arbiter Miniatures has now decided to move from exclusively creating supportless designs to pre-supported models for resin printing. The primary reason for the change is to open new opportunities for future projects. This allows him to explore new and total creative freedom for Arbiter Miniatures' style of 3D printable miniatures since he's no longer bound by the need to create supportless designs.

Changing to pre-supported designs will remove the limitations that have previously been holding back Theis’s artistic design. He mentioned that “at first, it felt like a risky leap of faith moving into the world of pre-supported miniatures, but it didn't take long before I could clearly see how my designs were given new life and endless new possibilities. I feel truly liberated, and I cannot wait to see how far I can push the miniature designs and my personal style”.

Benefits of Printing Pre-supported Miniatures Design with Resin 3D Printing

The biggest difference between designing supportless and pre-supported miniatures is the limitations on posing and design implementation on the models. To keep a model supportless, no detail can form an unsupported island and all steep overhangs must be avoided. Traditionally, these limitations have caused most designers to create very upright, static, and conservative designs.

Arbiter Miniatures always put emphasis on dramatic poses and epic designs first, which means it always takes a significant amount of time to solve the technical limitations to maintain the supportless design of his models. Every single detail of the model needed to be carefully posed while maintaining the action, so it won’t resolve to a boring and lifeless pose.

Theis also sees more benefits of designing pre-supported designs as it gives him more time to explore other creative outlets. Now that he is no longer forced to spend time fixing these supportless models' issues, he has recently chosen to take up miniature painting. This new venture allows him to create designs not only from the perspective of a digital sculptor but also as a painter. For example, he now groups details in ways that are easy to hit with a brush. Or he modified parts that would obscure brush access so it can be printed as separate parts with perfect fitment.

Changing his main gears to resin 3D printers allowed him to do more exaggerated poses with pre-supported designs. He can also see how the details in his prints are becoming more apparent, especially with precise joint fitment for when he needs to separate the model into different parts.

“To sum it up, I started to feel like I had pushed the boundaries for what was achievable with supportless design. Switching to resin 3D printing and these modern high-resolution printers, I’m so excited to see how much drama and presence I can infuse the models with, and I basically want to see how ‘crazy good’ I can make them look on the table”, Theis says.

Who Is Behind Arbiter Miniatures?

Theis Haagh Jakobsen is a Danish graphic designer turned digital sculptor. After working with some of the world’s largest consumer brands, he turned into the world of sculpture and concept art and has illustrated and sculpted concepts for clients such as HBO (Game of Thrones), Lego, EA Games, Games Workshop, and Coca-Cola. When he founded Arbiter Miniatures three years ago, his main target was to push the limits of what is possible in miniatures design.

If you are interested in following Theis' creative journey and seeing him explore all these newfound possibilities, you can do so at www.arbiterminiatures.com. Or check out his eighth Kickstarter campaign: Hellgate. Make sure to set your reminder to catch him launch the campaign on February 8th!