Is AI in 3D printing actually useful – or just hype?
Hey everyone,
After posting recently about experimenting with ChatGPT for 3D printing help, I’ve been thinking more about the feedback here. Some of you mentioned that AI advice can be misleading or a waste of time and filament. Others flat out avoid AI altogether — whether because of trust issues or just because it doesn’t seem worth it.From my own experience, I see both sides: It can be handy for quick things like finding G-code commands or brainstorming ideas when stuck.But for actual troubleshooting or tuning prints, nothing beats experience and community-driven advice — which is why we’re all here in the forums, right?Has anyone found specific ways where AI tools like ChatGPT genuinely save time or improve your workflow?I’m especially interested in real, practical cases rather than just “AI is cool” hype.
AI may have some use if asked: "Design a superhero gerbil drinking celebratory hot chocolate from the skull of a fallen enemy in 3D" - but don't expect it to be printable. OTOH, if trying to give it exact specifications for a practical part it is probably quicker and more likely to succeed if you just design it yourself.
It probably will happen, just not yet.
Cheerio,
RE: Is AI in 3D printing actually useful – or just hype?
I fondly remember the day when we called this stuff "machine learning". There's really not much true "intelligence" in all this.
I for one have fond zero value in what people call "generative AI", but I have found tools such as Perplexity or ChatGPT have completely replaced Google for me to look up facts or to create conglomerates of facts. In that sense, yes, I've used it to help me look up definitions of GCODEs, or OpenSCAD language questions. But I don't see it as useful (at this point) for model design.
Another area where AI could be useful is monitoring prints, to check the video stream for signs of issues such as models coming loose or layer shifts.
Formerly known on this forum as @fuchsr -- https://foxrun3d.com/
RE: Is AI in 3D printing actually useful – or just hype?
There is absolutely nothing of ai in the things we have now, its just a marketing that totally altered the meaning of the word. We are just experiencing machine learning which was trained on massive amounts if data, some of which were plain wrong and unfortunately models are just repeating it, the more frequently it happened in the documents the more it clings to it.
Sute it helps, but make really sure to check if it is not feeding you nonsense, do a fact checking.
See my GitHub and printables.com for some 3d stuff that you may like.
RE: Is AI in 3D printing actually useful – or just hype?
All my own work, honest!
Quod erat demonstrandem.
... and why does AI always get the fingers wrong?
Cheerio,
RE: Is AI in 3D printing actually useful – or just hype?
Not always, newer models have it fixed (and other things fixed as well).
😉
See my GitHub and printables.com for some 3d stuff that you may like.