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Professor Olaf Diegel from The University of Auckland's Creative Design and Additive Manufacturing Lab Photo: Diana Hu
In what's believed to be a New Zealand first, musicians have played all 3D-printed instruments in a live concert.
The concert was held at Depot Artspace in Devonport, which is hosting an interactive exhibition of the instruments called Synthesis as part of New Zealand Music Month.
The instruments' creator, Professor Olaf Diegel from The University of Auckland's Creative Design and Additive Manufacturing Lab, told Standing Room Only that 3D-printing technology had advanced to the point where the unique instruments sounded like regular electric guitars, basses and drums.
"It's bringing art into engineering and science," Diegel said of his designs.
"Some of [the instruments] are printed in metal ... some in plastic ... and the most recent one I've done is actually 3D-printed in wood, which makes it a bit different as well and very interesting."
He said the range of materials that can now be used in 3D-printing has allowed the production of acoustic instruments.
"For electric instruments, it does make a small difference, the material, but relatively little; as soon as you start looking at acoustic instruments - so acoustic guitars or wind instruments - then the material plays a huge difference."
The process to create a wooden 3D-printed instrument required sawdust, Diegel said.
"It's basically waste material from the wood industry, so you spread a layer of wood sawdust ... and then you inkjet print a bio epoxy, so it's an epoxy resin - made from also waste material, from lignin - and that effectively creates a very, very high-end MDF (medium-density fibreboard)."
He said because different coloured epoxy could be printed, it was possible to print the wood grain and the structure back into the wood, allowing control of the finished instruments' colours and resonances.
One of the musicians from the concert, Liam Barr Jones, said the 3D-printed guitar he had played felt "strangely familiar" to the more traditional instruments he was accustomed to.
He said the guitar was heavier than he'd expected it to be and that it had an excellent tone.
"The feel of the materials and obviously the designs that Olaf had made and has used was just fantastic," he said.
"We were all a bit gobsmacked actually, at just how well and how beautiful all these instruments have been crafted and designed."
Photo: The University of Auckland’s Creative Design and Additive Manufacturing Lab
The instruments that particularly impressed the band were the drums, the appearance of which initially gave them pause.
"The bodies of the drums are printed in nylon, in this case, and the design is literally, it's almost like a Swiss cheese," explained Diegel.
"They're full of holes, but acoustically, they sound surprisingly much like a drum set."
Barr Jones was positive about the potential future of 3D-printed instruments.
"I feel like having these instruments and being the first to play them, which is a huge privilege, is just like the first stepping stone," he said.
"Everybody seemed to really enjoy it and we had a quick listen to the recordings of it as well and, honestly, I couldn't say that there was any difference between a wooden instrument and a 3D-printed instrument."