In 1981, I was doing a study on printers. During the research, I came across a prototype from Fujitsu of what was deemed a laser printer that could fit on the desktop. In those days, most laser printers were the size of a small closet. That lead me to put into the report a line that said, “If this comes to market, we could see people actually publishing documents on their desktop. It could have a major impact on the publishing world.” I have been told by many that this appears to be the first reference to the concept of desktop publishing and, two years later, Apple licensed this technology from Fujitsu and created their first laser printer. Once they linked it to Pagemaker, desktop publishing was born, put the Mac on the map, and accelerated Apple’s position in computing substantially.
I believe Apple may be poised to try and do to 3D printing what they did to desktop publishing given a recent patent I saw pop up on a UK news site.
3D printers have fascinated me since HP showed me a prototype of one about eight years ago. At that time, they were really expensive and very primitive but it gave me a glimpse into the concept and allowed me to dream of what they could do in the future.
Today, you can buy a basic 3D printer for about $1000-$1500. The low end printers are great for makers and hobbyists and are even being eyed to help prototype products for small companies that eventually can be manufactured for broader use by all types of customers.
The folks at the Daily Mail uncovered an Apple patent I think is quite interesting and needs to be watched closely. It talks about a new way Apple could integrate lasers into their mobile products to map images.
According to the story, “Apple’s patent suggests the lasers could be mounted behind existing openings like the camera (label 20) or have its own dedicated opening (12) in the side of the phone that would then be pointed at walls or objects. The laser would be mounted inside the iPhone and used together with the inbuilt motion sensors to generate a map of any surface it is pointed at.
“An iPhone-mounted sensor would detect any light bounced back to the device and provide information about the surfaces of objects around it.
“This would allow the iPhone to be used to measure distance and create 3D maps of rooms and even buildings – something that currently requires bulky equipment.”
I also imagine it could be focused on an object and a person could bring that object into an app that allows it to be fine-tuned and printed on a 3D desktop printer.
Keep in mind, Apple introduced desktop publishing to the market, a concept that made the Mac famous. This patent suggests Apple has 3D imaging capture in mind for future products.
Given Apple’s past, I believe Apple may place a solid bet on 3D image capture innovation and take advantage of the trends in 3D printers that are poised to go beyond the world of hobbyists in the near future.
However, if Apple shows their hand on this soon I don’t think the rest of the market will sit back and let them drive it by themselves as they did during the first four years of desktop publishing. In fact, I think we will see the first 3D cameras embedded in some laptops by next fall that would allow a person to hold an object up to the camera and map it into a program that would allow it to be printed on a desktop-sized 3D printer.
At first, they would be aimed at hobbyists but, once the software community kicks in, they could bring to market some creative 3D creation apps and tools that could make these printers attractive to people well beyond the maker and hobbyist audience.
Apple’s approach, according to this patent, would be quite different and more expansive but could have similar results — at least for smaller objects that could be created on a desktop 3D printer. Instead of a 3D camera, they appear to be using lasers to map out even large areas in 3D and deliver them to some type of app that could map them in real time to create 3D images or objects within this type of program. For those doing projects at home or even on jobs where taking precise measurements is important, this could be quite a cool feature of any iPhone or iPad.
I don’t expect Apple to replicate their success with desktop publishing in the arena of 3D printing but this patent suggests Apple is at least thinking of ways to link 3D to a whole host of apps and even large and small 3D printers in the future. This could be another feature that helps distinguish thems from the competition.
