You know the old expression, “they don’t make things like they used to”? Well, Grandpa was right. They don’t make things like they used to, but that’s not such a bad thing.
For instance, people used to make houses by laying brick. Actually, they still do, and it takes about three to six months to build a house this way. Now, you can print a house on a 3D printer. Seriously. There’s a company in Austin that can print an 800-square-foot house in a single day. A house! Austin’s Icon came up with the idea to print tiny houses as a solution to the housing crisis, according to a 2018 article in WIRED. Each house costs about $4,000 to build.
People used to draw letters by hand for advertisements. Good luck making copies. Now, graphic designers use software programs like Adobe Illustrator to generate easy-to-reproduce logos that can be used in magazine ads, on business cards, fliers and more.
Before digital photography, and even before film, photographers had to coat a metal plate with chemicals before sliding it into a camera and taking a picture. Afterwards, you had to do even more chemistry, in a darkroom, to develop the image. Now when we take a photograph with our cell phones or digital camera, we don’t have to develop the photographs in a dark room. Instead, professional photographers use programs like Adobe Lightroom and PhotoShop to perfect their images, while everyone else uses Instagram filters.
The world is changing. You can either change with it, or get left behind with all the journalists. While I write 700-word articles for the last 56 people who still read newspapers, the University of Tampa and the Morean Arts Center are moving forward. This spring, both UT and the Morean are debuting spaces for their students to explore more modern ways of making things.
Why? Because, as the examples above indicate, technology is changing the way we make things.
According to Forbes, 3D printing will “transform the way we make everything from clothes to ancient monuments destroyed in conflicts, reducing waste, energy, and water use along the way.”
3D printing could even change the way we memorialize our loved ones and engage in political protests. Cathy Salustri recently reported on Parkland dad Manuel Oliver memorializing his son, Joaquin "Guac" Oliver, with a 3D printed statue that stood in Washington DC during the January 15 rally for stricter gun laws.
GE and Siemens are already manufacturing parts with 3D printers. But 3D printers and their associated digital fabrication labs are still quite rare in a university setting. According to a press release issued by the University of Tampa, only four percent of colleges and universities in the U.S. have a digital fabrication lab, aka a "fab lab."
The University of Tampa will be joining the ranks of universities with fab labs this spring. This new development will allow UT students to turn their digital designs into realities. A digital fab lab connects computers to machines that can build things. First you generate a 3D model of what you want to make using computer software. Then a CNC router converts this design into a code that a machine, like a 3D printer, can read. And before you know it, you’ve actually made something.
The University of Tampa’s Bailey Art Studios rebuild also includes a new photography studio and darkroom, a re-imagined printmaking studio with more digital tools, and enhancements to the Scarfone/Hartley gallery.
Across the bay, the Morean Arts Center recently upgraded their digital lab to include the latest Apple hardware and Adobe software for budding designers, illustrators, and photographers. The upgrades have allowed the Morean to offer new classes in Photoshop, Adobe InDesign, and web design.
The future is here, and it’s digital as hell.
UT FABLAB open house
Scarfone/Hartley Gallery, University of Tampa, 310 North Blvd., Tampa | Mar. 22, 5:30 p.m. | 813-253-6217 | ut.edu/scarfonehartleygallery
Photography & digital classes at the Morean
Morean Arts Center, 719 Central Ave., St. Petersburg | Feb. 25-Apr. 7; Spring session: Apr. 15-May 26 | 727-822-7872 | moreanartscenter.org/classes-2/digital
This article appears in Jan 24-31, 2019.