The best way to learn about 3D printing is via different social media platforms, like
Mastodon
People to follow:
- Adrian Bowyer: researcher/academic/pioneer
- Vik Olliver: pioneer
- Josef Prusa: pioneer
- Marlin Firmware: low-level firmware
- Octoprint: middleware
- Joel Telling: 3d printing enthusiast
- 3DPrint.com
During spring & summer 2023, with the takeover by Elon Musk of Twitter in 2022, the 3D printing community disintegrated slowly there as many influential developers left to Mastodon but audience did not follow.
Twitter
People to follow:
Richard Horne @RichRap3D: pioneerAdrian Bowyer @adrianbowyer: pioneer, wide range of topicsJosef Prusa @josefprusa: pioneerJoel Telling @joeltelling: 3d printing issuesJeremie Francois @tridimake: makerDizingof @dizingof: artistic 3d printing, “likes” on political posts
YouTube / Podcasts
3D printer design and operational dynamics is a complex subject and capturing action in video and analyzing and solving problems, along with Open Source designs, YouTube played a significant role to drive the Open Source innovation. A few regular shows arose out of countless 3D printing video blogs:
- CNC KItchen (★★★★★): detailed study of particular issues along CNC and 3D printing with Stefan, mainly reviews but also innovates
- Podcast: 3D Printing Today (★★★★☆): excellent podcast on 3D printing (weekly), on-topic with Andy and Whitney, technical details and general review of 3D printing scene, not entirely up-to-date (months behind actual developments)
- 3D Printing Nerd (★★★★☆): feel-good more popular / entertaining approach to 3D printing with Joel
- RCLifeOn (★★★★☆): remote controlled toys with 3D printing, great humor
- Teaching Tech (★★★★☆): on-topic featuring many issues/reviews/how-tos on 3D printing, technical details
- Chris’s Basement (★★★★☆): early reviews of new approaches, designs, hardware etc with Chris, quite informative
- Podcast: Hackaday (★★★★☆): informative, but only occassionally 3D printing topics, worth considering for overall tech/maker news
- The Infill Podcast (★★★★☆): video & audio podcast, informative due good interviewing guests
- Vector 3D: (★★★☆☆): technical discussions, good Formnext 2019 interviews with Adam, british understatement
- Tom Sanladerer (★★★☆☆): experienced engineer addresses many 3D printing related topics since years, professional appearance, dry personality and presentation
- Maker’s Muse (★★★☆☆): 3D modeling and printing, passionate presentation
- 3DMN (★★★☆☆): reviews and how-tos, passionated presentation, feel-good personality, less technical depth
- Meltzone (★★☆☆☆): with Tom Sanladerer and CNC Kitchen’s Stefan, promising but early episodes were off-topic a lot, since episode #30+ a bit better, still slow paced (listen/watch at 1.5x speed), verbose, rambling, hardly making a point on any topic – dis-appointing / missing the points and indecisive
- Podcast: 3DPOD (★★☆☆☆): unprepared / unprofessional appearance, bad audio quality of recordings, but professional & corporate guests unlike all other channels
- Podcast: GoAdditive (★★☆☆☆): unfocused, verbose, too long for the actual content, sales talk, pearls spread out, decide if it’s worth your time to find
Once you start to watch 3D printing videos on YouTube, its recommending algorithms will give you further content.
Blogs
- Chris Palmer aka NopHead, RepRap pioneer
- NopSCADlib, comprehensive OpenSCAD library
- Richard Horne aka RichRap, RepRap pioneer