v1.18 and Earlier

Hello. Thanks so much for your ongoing feedback and engagement with our teams. We’re learning from your experiences and working on a combination of long-range and immediate improvements.

This release, you’ll notice these new features and improvements:

You’ll also see some bug fixes: we limit Advanced Supports results to the printable area of your machine. We’ve also added two warnings before you submit to Advanced Supports and we’ve fixed a problem in fence support generation.

We can’t wait to hear from you about this release.

Keep printing great parts and sharing your feedback. We appreciate it, and it makes our products better.

If you have any questions, please contact the Carbon Service Team at [email protected].

Improvements To Layout Mode

Thanks for sharing your ideas for feature improvements with our service team, for taking the time to talk to the software team, and for wanting to get the best use of your printer. We’ve added features this release to help you more efficiently prepare your platforms to print.

When you’re in layout mode, we won’t force your camera view to the top down view. We’ve heard from you that you’d like to be able to look around your platform from other angles, to verify that your parts and supports aren’t intersecting.

Of course, the top down view is still useful when working on your layout. You can use the camera view control (in the lower left of your screen) to quickly switch to that view. You can also use the arrow keys to quickly change your camera view, shift + up arrow to move by 90º, or up arrow to move by 45º.

In the Layout panel, your part location will now be locked to the printable area of your platform. Many people have found this useful for laying out platforms to use the maximum build area.

If you’d like to move parts off the platform, use the Part Dragging toggle to move your parts off the platform.

Auto Layout will sometimes spin parts to fit more of them on the platform. Now, if you’d like to lock the orientation of your parts, we’ve added an option for that to the Auto Layout tool.

We’ve heard from many of you that you’d like to be able to spin your parts around the z axis in the Layout panel (rather than switching back and forth between Orientation and Layout), so we’ve added a spin tool to the Layout panel.

Scaling Your Parts

As we’ve been working with all of you on production jobs, we know that sometimes scaling is required to achieve specified tolerances in a repeatable way. With v1.17, we’ve integrated a scaling tool into the Carbon app.

We recommend first orienting, supporting, printing and characterizing your part before applying scale factors. As you know, changes in orientation, supports, and print profiles will impact your part’s dimensions and therefore any scale factors you’d want to apply.

Once you’ve determined the scale factor to use, you can enter it for just one direction or the same factor applied in all directions. As scaling will remove your supports, you can try downloading your part and its supports as an STL and scaling them all together. We’ve found this works when applying accuracy scale factors, on the order of .05%.

We also recommend adding Part Labels after you’ve scaled your parts. (The labels will be lost when you scale your part.)

You’ll notice scaling changes by checking the size of your part’s bounding box.

A few notes about Scaling

New Tools On Your Part List

We’ve added a new way to lock your camera to the center of your part. We’ve also moved the model units setting to make them more accessible. You’ll find both on the Part List.

From the Part List, select a part, then click on the zoom to part icon. As you move around the camera view around, the center of rotation will be the selected part, even as you use the arrow keys/camera view controls in the lower left of your screen. You can toggle this on and off on the Part List.

We’ve moved where you set your model units. (We hope you’ve set defaults for your parts in your Preferences.) Access and set your units from the Part List.

Default Settings By User

For customers who often use the same Resin, Print Profile, Slice Thickness or Auto Support method, you can set defaults in your user account.

Each user in your company who wants to set these defaults should visit the Preferences section of their Account to set these defaults.

You can also set preferences for Auto Support method and for Print Profiles. And, on a project by project basis, you can always override these defaults.

A Few Fixes

We’ve found that fence generation can run indefinitely or an error might pop up in some cases. We’ve fixed these issues. If you run into any problems creating fences, please let us know.

Thanks for your feedback

We love hearing from you about your workflow, your parts, and how to improve. Keep your insightful feedback and ratings coming. We read them carefully and follow up when you request that we contact you. If you prefer real-time feedback, you can always email [email protected].

Hello. Thanks so much for your ongoing feedback and engagement with our teams. We’re learning from your experiences and working on a combination of long-range and immediate improvements.

This release, you’ll notice these new features and improvements:

You’ll also see a fix to manual bar support contact points, an improvement that allows you to add fences to more surfaces, and a little change to the on-printer display text.

We can’t wait to hear from you about this release. In fact, so much so that we’ve added a way to send feature feedback from within the Carbon app. We’d love to hear from you anytime. You should still continue to contact the Carbon Service Team if you need immediate help with a print or printer issue.

Keep printing great parts and sharing your feedback. We appreciate it, and it makes our products better.

If you have any questions, please contact the Carbon Service Team at [email protected].

Selecting Multiple Parts We’ve heard from many of you that since we’ve added the ability to import many STLs and duplicate parts that you’d like to be able to work on multiple parts at a time, especially when laying out your platforms. We’ve focused on making it easy to quickly duplicate, move, and delete groups of parts.

You can select and work on multiple parts in the Orient and Layout modes. Select parts using the Parts List or by shift-clicking a part or by clicking and dragging on an area of your platform.

Notes:

Multiple parts in the Layout Panel: moving, deleting, and duplicating parts Once you have a group of parts selected, you can:

Notes:

Orienting multiple parts After selecting a group of parts, you can use the orientation tools to change all of their individual orientations in the same way. You can set their orientation using the x, y, and z axis fields or click and drag to rotate them.

We’ve also changed the Snap to Platform tool so that you can work on any of the parts on your platform. You’ll notice that all parts are green in this tool, and you can snap any part to the platform.

A few notes about multi-select:

Please let [email protected] know if you have any questions or feedback on working with multiple models.

Adding A Part Label We’ve long thought that tracking products from their creation through to the final usage is so hard in existing tools that many people who would like to do this just can’t. With this release, we’ve made it easy enough to do this on any part. With a couple clicks you can dynamically generate a number for each print (or just the printer serial number, print number, or project ID). Later, with this serial number, you can tie the part back to the date, time, material used, and print settings used for the part.

To begin, click the Part Labels icon in the toolbar. In order to start creating a label, click on the location where you’d like your label to begin. You’ll need to click a second location to set the direction of the text. The second point doesn’t limit the length of your label.

On a curved surface, the distance between the points can make a difference, depending on the sharpness of the curve. As you position your point, the line and text is drawn in to help you predict how the text will follow the surface.

After specifying your points, you can edit the label text, whether you want an embossing or engraving, the label depth, and the text size in the panel on the right. Be sure to click Save when adding or editing your labels.

After you’ve saved your labels, they’ll show as either light gray (embossed) or a darker gray (engraved).

We created tokens you can use to add a serial number to your part or build a number from dynamic data:

Editing labels To edit a label, you’ll first need to make sure none are currently being added or selected by clicking the Esc key. Next click on the label text to select it. You may edit any of the attributes of your label (text, depth, size, or emboss/engrave). You can change the location of your label by clicking on the label and dragging it around your part. Remember to click Save after any edits. You can also change the direction of the text by clicking points and dragging them around or by adding points to the current line. To delete a point, click the point and press the Delete key.

Default settings for Part Labels We’ve added default user preferences for Part Labels. For new labels you create, the label fields will be auto-populated with the preferences you have specified. And, you can always change them if you like.

A few notes about Part Labels:

Additional Changes

Adding short manual supports We heard from you that you’ve got locations that are close to the platform where you’d like to add supports, so we’ve added the ability to support these regions with manual bar supports.

Fix for manual support bar contact points Thanks to those of you who gave us feedback after our last release. In v1.15, we had made a change to how we showed the contact points for both polylines/fences and bar supports. For v1.16, we returned the contact points for bars to their prior functionality, not resizing as you zoom your camera. (As a note, the size shown on the screen is not exactly as they will print, and it never was. However, they will return to being close to the actual size and should allow you to place supports more accurately.)

Add fences to more surfaces We heard that you’d like to add fences to more surfaces than we originally allowed. We’ve increased the angle to surfaces that are up to 80º (relative to the platform).

Change to on-printer display As we continue to add to our production capabilities, we’ve made some small changes to your on-machine displays. When your printer is ready to print, it will say “Printer is available,” like Smart Washers also tell you when they’re available.

Thanks for your feedback

We love hearing from you about your workflow, your parts, and how to improve. Keep your insightful feedback and ratings coming. We read them carefully and follow up when you request that we contact you. If you prefer real-time feedback, you can always email [email protected].

Hello. Thanks so much for your ongoing feedback and engagement with our teams. We’re learning from your experiences and working on a combination of long-range and immediate improvements.

This release, you’ll see two new options for supporting your parts:

Additionally, we’ve improved how our slicer handles projects with many parts. You’ll find that slicing is much faster when working with many parts. Also, we’ve resolved the error you might have run into when slicing a project with many parts.

Lastly, although it doesn’t require updating your printer software, we hope you’ve noticed that you can see a consolidated list of projects, across your fleet of printers, on your Carbon Dashboard.

We can’t wait to hear from you about this release. Keep printing great parts and sharing your feedback. We appreciate it, and it makes our products better.

If you have any questions, please contact Carbon Support at [email protected].

Supporting your parts in the Carbon app With this release, we have rounded out our support offering. We now offer a variety of automated and manual tools so that you can print your parts easily the first time, or spend time manually optimizing supports for material usage or minimizing your part’s need for post-processing.

We recommend working this way:

Advanced auto supports

Much better parts We’ve been testing Advanced auto supports for months, printing hundreds of parts, both internally and with the help of Early Access Program customers.

Said simply: the parts you’ll make using Advanced auto supports are better than those supported with Basic auto supports. The supports are easier to remove. The structures are tuned based on the mass of your part (so Advanced auto supports will place fewer supports on thin walled models). And, we’ve found the support structures are usually better than those placed by trained people because Advanced auto supports diligently supports all features of a part.

The structures placed by Advanced auto supports are better too: the tips have been optimized for easy removal, for strong support, and for better final surface finish. And, as you expect from Carbon, the unique characteristics of each material in their green states are considered.

Simulation backed Advanced auto supports simulates the forces your parts undergo during the printing process, uniquely by material, using finite element analysis. Based on these simulations, Advanced auto supports identifies the areas of your part where supports are needed to buttress the part against the forces encountered.

Fast and secure These simulations require lots of computing power. To speed up these simulations, we use an elastic, cloud-based computing architecture. Comparative services that simulate other plastics manufacturing methods can take days to run. Our analyses finish in hours, and often in 90 minutes.

We are leveraging the existing Carbon architecture: a secure, encrypted tunnel to access the Carbon Advanced Auto Support service (part of the Carbon-managed servers in the cloud). This is the same architecture covered by your printer’s subscription agreement, and includes the protections of the NDA that both Carbon and your company have signed.

Fitting into your workflow The average length of jobs that Early Access customers have submitted is 1.5 hours. Of course, parts with many triangles and features, or that are quite large and tall, can require more processing. Additionally, parts being printed in Elastomeric materials can take longer to simulate as they behave in a more complex way.

To use Advanced auto supports, select a part, its position (On or Above platform), and then click the Generate button. You won’t need to set Advanced each time, as it’s the default. You can submit one part at a time, and your project will be locked while the part is analyzed. We’ll send you an email when we’re done supporting your part.

There are several ways to submit multiple parts or orientations of a part at the same time. Either duplicate your project and submit another part from that duplicate project. (You will need to export that part and its supports as an STL and combine it with the original project later.) Or, you can create one STL with multiple parts or with multiple orientations of the same part.

A few notes on using Advanced auto supports

Please let us know if you have any questions about Advanced auto supports.

Manually create fence support structures

Create fence supports We’ve added a new type of support structure: fences. To create a fence, start by clicking on the Fence icon in the manual support mode (enter this mode by clicking on Manually Add button (or Edit once you’ve added supports). Your cursor will change to a + when hovering over the part, then start clicking to add points that will define a polyline.

You can create multiple fences by using the Esc key. After you’re done creating your first polyline, hit Esc, and begin creating your next fence.

The active polyline is always green. To edit another polyline, hit Esc again and then hover over a point on the line you’d like to edit and click the fence to select it. Then, while hovering over a point, hold down the e key. The point will turn white and you can move it to a new location.

We recommend placing your points more closely together (about every 2 mm) when the surface your supporting is curved. And when you’re supporting a flat surface along a straight line, you can space the points that define your polyline further apart.

When you’re ready to create support structures, hit the Generate button (or the Return/Enter key also works). You can also add bar support contact points and generate both kinds of supports at once.

A few more notes about getting the most from manual support mode

Better slicing performance when working with many models

Slicing can be 50% faster When you have a project with copies of one part, you’ll find that slicing is much faster. We’ve seen improvements from 15% to 80% faster than in the last software release.

Fewer errors when slicing many models And, if you’ve ever gotten an error when slicing a project with many duplicates of a part, we’ve fixed this problem. If you run into any issues in the slicing, please continue to email [email protected]. We continue to analyze and improve our slicing.

Search consolidated projects from your fleet

Fleet Projects We hope you’ve noticed the changes to your Carbon Dashboard. Recently, we’ve added a consolidated list of the projects in your fleet. You can search your projects by user, resin, project name, or printer. Just start typing in the search bar and the search suggestions will help you find your project.

If you have other ideas for how we can help you manage your printers, please email [email protected].

Thanks for your feedback We love hearing from you about your workflow, your parts, and how to improve. Keep your insightful feedback and ratings coming. We read them carefully and follow up when you request that we contact you. If you prefer real-time feedback, you can always email [email protected].

Release Film B We are excited to announce the availability of a new release film for the build platforms of your M1 and M2 printers. Release Film B is a thin plastic sheet that covers your build platform’s surface, enabling printed parts to be removed more easily.

For more information, please read the FAQ below or contact Carbon Support at [email protected].

Frequently asked questions:

What are the benefits of Release Film B and why should you use them? The release film is useful for:

How do I purchase Release Film B? Release films will be available for ordering on the Accessories & Supplies page. You will have the option to select the correct size (M1 or M2) based on your printer. International customers (and those others that prefer to use Purchase Orders) may contact Sales Ops.

How do I apply Release Film B? Comparable to how cell phone screen protectors are applied, the release film is applied by hand with the help of a credit card or similarly shaped plastic edge to remove bubbles. This will be very similar to how the previous release films were applied. See Release Film for more information.

What are the downsides of Release Film B?

How much does Release Film B cost? In the US, $45 for a pack of 50 M1-size films and $57.50 for a pack of 50 M2-size films, which includes ground shipping. International customers may contact [email protected] for a quote.

Is Release Film B reusable? No. Each release film is designed for a single print.

Is Release Film B compatible with all Carbon resins? Yes. The part adhesion has been improved with all Carbon resins in this new blue release film; however, please consider the z-height accuracy issues mentioned above for your specific part geometry.

How do I distinguish between Release Film B and the previous release film? Release Film B is blue, whereas the previous release films were clear.

Is Release Film B compatible with the Smart Part Washer? We’re optimistic that the release film will be compatible with the Smart Part Washer. We are working to validate this in our labs and will provide an update when we know more.

Hello. Thanks so much for your ongoing feedback and engagement with our teams. We’re learning from your experiences and working on a combination of long-range and immediate improvements.

Here’s a summary of the latest improvements:

We can’t wait to hear from you about this release. Keep printing great parts and sharing your feedback. We appreciate it, and it makes our products better.

If you have any questions, please contact the Carbon Service Team at [email protected].

Part list shows all the parts in your project

Part List We’ve added a list of all the parts in your project. As a start, you can select and delete parts using the collapsible left side panel. We have heard that you’d also like to translate and delete multiple parts at a time. Please let us know if you have other multi-part requests.

We’ve also moved notifications to this panel, which will let you know if your project is decimated or if trusses are hidden.

Project analysis helps you detect issues before printing

New Project Analysis Panel There is a new mode available, Print Stats and Project Analysis, where we look for things that might cause print defects, as well as estimate print times and identify unvented volumes. We recommend always running the analysis before you print.

Unvented volumes visualization If we find that your parts have large unvented volumes which may negatively impact print quality or print time, we’ll help you visualize where these areas are. Use the slider to browse through the part; the trapped volumes are marked in red.

If we don’t detect any large unvented volumes, you’ll see that in the results too.

To vent trapped volumes, we recommend changing your part’s orientation, adding a vent hole to the area, or raising your part off the platform. Learn how to avoid unvented volumes or you can reach out to the Carbon Service team.

We’ve moved the Blank Slices notification to this Analysis panel too.

And, as a reminder, when you print, a warning dialog will still be displayed if your project has a fully blank slice. If you have not analyzed your project before printing, it can take a few minutes for this warning to display on your printer. To learn more, see blank slices.

Highlight critical angles

Evaluate your part’s orientation or supporting strategy by showing overhangs You’ll find a new tool for viewing your part’s overhangs in the bottom toolbar. You can change the range of angles that are highlighted using the slider.

This view of your part should help you evaluate possible orientations (ideally finding one with fewer overhangs) and check your support strategy to confirm that you’ve supported the overhangs. You’ll also want to consider islands and cantilevers when supporting your parts. To learn more, reference overhang detection.

Protect your projects

Lock your projects against accidental changes We’ve heard from a few of you that you have projects that you print over and over and you’d like to make sure that you don’t accidentally make any changes to the project. Now, you can toggle on and off the Lock/Unlock setting for your projects. Look for it in the upper right corner of Project Settings. You’ll also see a locked badge on your project list.

Search consolidated prints from your fleet

Fleet Prints We hope you’ve noticed the changes to your Carbon Dashboard. Along with the new left-side navigation, you can now see and search all the prints in your fleet. You can search your prints by user, resin, project name, printer, rating, or feedback. Just start typing in the search bar to find your printers and the search suggestions will help find your print.

If you have other ideas for how we can help you manage your printers, please email [email protected].

Thanks for your feedback We love hearing from you about your workflow, your parts, and how to improve. Keep your insightful feedback and ratings coming. We read them carefully and follow up when you request that we contact you. If you prefer real-time feedback, you can always email [email protected].

Hello. Thanks so much for your ongoing feedback and engagement with our teams. We’re learning from your use and working on a combination of long-range and immediate improvements.

Here’s a summary of the latest improvements:

We can’t wait to hear from you about this release. Keep printing great parts and sharing your feedback. We appreciate it, and it makes our products better.

If you have any questions, please contact the Carbon Service Team at [email protected].

More accurate parts

More accurate parts, especially for negative features oriented in the z-direction We’ve made a noticeable improvement in the accuracy of your parts. We’re now controlling for extra curing through slices, perpendicular to the build platform. (You might have heard us call this cure-thru.)

You’ll notice this change most with negative features (like holes) oriented in the z-direction, with improvements between 35 to 300 µm, depending on the material.

If you have any questions about this change, please email [email protected].

If you want to insulate a project from this change, you can use Reprint or email [email protected].

Performance improvements

Faster to work with copies of a part We’ve optimized how we handle multiple parts to make it faster to duplicate and work with copies of a part. You’ll see that it’s much faster. In some cases, we’ve seen it save 20 minutes of ‘preparing project’ time.

New design notifications

Warnings when we detect an empty slice One implication of printing more accurately is that prints with empty slices will be more likely to fail.

We’ve added a feature to detect fully empty slices and notify you before you print. When we slice your model, we’ll show you a warning, whether this happens when you are estimating Print Stats or starting a print from the Carbon app or at the printer. You can override this warning and continue to print.

Lastly, this warning notifies you when a slice is fully blank, not yet when there are partially empty slices or other possible sources of print errors at the slicing level.

Note: Sometimes there is a delay before we can show this warning

We recommend that you always repair your model before printing. Errors in the STL are the most common reason for an empty slice, however there are occasionally issues with how we’ve sliced your part. Please let

User preferences

Set your default model units We have a new user preference for model units. This will apply to all STLs and all projects you create. You can always override this default value by part (as you do now in Project Settings).

Thanks for your feedback We love hearing from you about your workflow, your parts, and how to improve. Keep your insightful feedback and ratings coming. We read them carefully and follow up when you request that we contact you. If you prefer real-time feedback, you can always email [email protected].

Hello. We’ve been hard at work making sure our SpeedCell is ready, while also improving our prepare-to-print software.

Here’s a summary of what you’ll see in this release:

We can’t wait to hear from you about this release. Keep printing great parts and sharing your feedback. We appreciate it, and it makes our products better.

If you have any questions, please contact your Carbon Technical Partner or email us at [email protected].

New, faster ways to orient your parts

Align a surface and snap, if possible, to the build platform After uploading your part, you can now quickly align a surface to the platform. Just click the ‘Select Surface’ button, then click the surface on your part that you’d like to align to the platform. You can use this shortcut to either snap to the platform, or use it to align an internal surface parallel to the platform.

Orienting a part in two ways using Snap to Platform

Find the orientation for your part that minimizes its footprint on the platform Here at Carbon, we often start our exploration of how to orient a part by finding the orientation with a minimal x-y area on the platform (so that you can fill the build platform with more parts). We then look at the part’s features to further refine the orientation. This new orientation tool gives a good starting point for a production-optimized orientation.

Select the part you’d like to orient, and then click the Minimize Footprint button.

Improved tools for working with your parts

Measure from point to point on your parts We’ve also added a measurement tool, for use in evaluating your part and how to best print it. Just click on the ruler in the toolbar, and then select two points on your part. To measure another feature, just click on a new location on your part. To stop using the ruler, click the icon again.

Use the ruler to measure features on your part. It doesn’t allow you to measure the size of your support structures or between your part and the supports.

More improvements

Required resin estimates are 20 mL lower In talking to many of you and looking at the thousands of prints in our lab, we heard consistently that our required resin amount was too much, so we’ve removed 20 mL from the amount.

As background, we previously calculated the required resin volume by adding:

Now, starting with version 1.12, we won’t add the final 20 mL of estimated resin.

Printer door safety Beginning with v1.12, if you manually force the door open during a print, your print will be aborted.

As discussed in our last update, for operator safety, you will need to close the printer’s door before you start a print. If you need to open the door, please use the override feature. Hold down the top button (of the four buttons next to the display) on the printer while using the door switch to override the safety feature. Please hold the button down until the opening door passes the cassette latch. And, you’ll need to use the button while using the door switch to close the door again.

Thanks for your feedback We love hearing from you about your workflow, your parts, and how to improve. Keep your insightful feedback and ratings coming. We read them carefully and follow up when you request that we contact you. If you prefer real-time feedback, you can always email [email protected].

DPR 10

Dental Production DPR 10 is the first member of a new family of dental resins at Carbon. This resin is ideally suited for dental models, featuring high accuracy and fast printability. It is available in a stone color appropriate for dental and orthodontic applications and has an extended pot life allowing for cost-effective use.

If you have any questions about using DPR 10, please email us at [email protected] or talk with your Carbon Technical Partner.

Key benefits and uses

What to watch for

Our software accounts for slight variations in production lots. Therefore, it is imperative that you select the correct resin and with corresponding lot number from the drop-down menu. Make sure you put unused resin back in the bottle it was poured from.

Additionally, if you experience any delamination or failed prints, we recommend you filter the remaining resin before starting another print to ensure no debris or print artifacts are left in the cassette or attached to the window.

Lastly, we recommend you start with Carbon-tuned settings in your dental design software and carefully follow the post-processing protocols to ensure your final parts are as clean and accurate as possible.

Material properties

To compare the properties of DPR 10 with other resins, reference Dental Materials.

Designing

For design recommendations specific for this resin, see DPR 10.

Preparing to print

Adding supports Supports are not generally needed to print dental models, but you can use them for particular geometries if necessary. We recommend printing with the base of the model directly on the platform.

Orienting We recommend starting with the orientation in the STL export from your dental design CAD software and double-checking to ensure the base is flat against the platform without any angle.

Placing models on the platform You can print multiple parts together on the platform. See DPR 10 for more information.

Printing

Follow the dispensing procedure for one-part resins. Based on your desired surface finish and available time, you can select Standard or Fine slicing, but we recommend against using the blur setting as this may affect your part accuracy.

Finishing

To finish parts, see DPR 10.

Ordering supplies

You will purchase your resin through our e-commerce site by visiting shop.carbon3d.com.

To order additional accessories, check out our Accessories & Supplies page.

Before you go

We hope you are as excited about our latest resin and our introduction of the Dental family as we are! Our Carbon website has additional videos and dental case-studies If you’d like to learn more.

If you have any questions, please email us at [email protected] to talk with your Carbon Technical Partner (CTP).

We enjoyed seeing so many of you in person at AMUG in March and getting the chance to share our new products. While there was much work to support our new printer and the Smart Part Washer this release cycle, we also continued improving our printing software so that you can make better parts more easily.

Here’s a short summary of what you’ll see in this release:

We can’t wait to hear from you about this release. Keep printing great parts and sharing your feedback. We appreciate it, and it makes our products better. If you have any questions, please contact your Carbon Technical Partner (previously RM) or email [email protected].

Improved part accuracy

Tuned how we print Fine and Super-fine slices for better accuracy When you use these slicing options, you’ll find your parts are more accurate. Based on our studies, we’ve adjusted how we print Fine and Super-fine sliced parts so that the accuracy approaches that of standard slice thickness.

Better accuracy across the build platform While this improvement is not dependent on a software upgrade, we did want you to know that we’re going to make configuration changes to increase the consistency of your part accuracy across the build platform. You should only notice this positive change when measuring parts printed at different locations on the build platform.

If you’re in the middle of a characterization study, or for some other reason would like to delay this change, please email [email protected].

Easier to work with multiple models

Duplicate Now, you can use duplicate to make one or multiple copies of the selected model. Just enter how many copies you’d like to make (or use the arrow controls to increase or decrease the amount).

Copies are made and placed at an offset from the original part. Parts that don’t fit on the platform are highlighted in red.

Auto Layout We’ve added a new feature to our Layout mode. To arrange all your models, just click the Auto Layout button. We recommend leaving at least 5 mm between parts to avoid printing defects like veining, but you can customize this amount. Any parts that don’t fit are shown off the platform, in red, and you can delete any extra parts using the ‘Delete extra parts’ link.

Auto Layout is a very quick way to arrange your parts on the platform. It uses the bounding box of the part (when not supported) or the part and its supports (when supported). Auto Layout will spin parts (90º around Z-axis) to try to fit more parts on the platform.

You can use Auto Layout before or after supporting your parts. If you have supports on your parts and Auto Layout spins its rotation, it will keep the supports. However, you won’t be able to manually edit the supports after the part has been rotated. (If you’d like to be able to edit the supports in a future release, please let us know.)

Please note: If you support your parts after you use Auto Layout, you will usually find that supports will intersect with nearby models. If you are going to use auto-supports, we recommend adding them before using Duplicate and Auto Layout, although, it’s easy to use Auto Layout again, after you add supports.

If your parts require orientation changes in more than the Z-axis to fit on the platform, on upload, they will be shown off the platform and in red. Of course, by re-orienting them, you may be able to fit them on the platform.

Upload multiple models at once Lastly, we’ve enabled selecting multiple models when uploading (both when creating a new project and in subsequent uploads).

When starting a project, we’ll also Auto Layout the parts you’ve uploaded.

Incremental improvements to auto-supports

While we spent more of our time in this development cycle on some long range improvements that you’ll start to see in the next release, there are still incremental improvements in auto-supports this release.

More clearance between supports and parts, better intersection detection, and better support of small features We’ve tuned a few of the parameters for auto-supports:

We had some reports of supports fusing along edges, and have added padding to avoid this in v1.11

We love hearing from you about your prints, and work to improve our software based on this feedback. Please keep sharing your results.

More improvements

View slices If you’d like to check the slices for your part before printing, you’ll find a new option in the Project Settings menu, View Slices. We recommend checking slices this way whenever you’re working with a new model.

When you select this, we’ll create a movie of your slices that you can play right from within the Carbon app. You can stop/start the animation by clicking anywhere on the frame. Also, we’ll show the slice’s z-height position so you know where to look for any errors in your STL. Also, you can download the animation (in MP4 format).

New PR 25 parameters for better prints We’ve optimized how we print the family of PR 25 resins, adding specific entries for the various colors and updating the parameters for all. You’ll see fewer delaminations mid-part with these new resin options.

Please start using the new options AFTER you install the v1.11 software update (which has optimized supports tips for easier removal).

During this transition, we’ll label all the PR 25 options with their target software version so they’re easier to find.

In your resin dropdown, you used to see two PR 25 options:

Starting on 4/20, you’ll see these options, separated by software version:

Printer door safety We’re rolling out a new safety feature (that will also be available on M2 machines) in this release. To ensure that printer operators don’t injure themselves, you’ll now need to close the printer door to start a print. Additionally, the door switch will be disabled during the print.

If you need to open the door during a print and accept the safety risks, you can hold down the top button (of the four buttons next to the display) on the printer while using the door switch to override the door lock. Please hold the button down until the door begins opening, until it’s past the cassette latch.

And, you’ll need to use the button while using the door switch to close the door again.

Slicer fixes, especially for models in inches We appreciate the reports you’ve sent us when you run into slicing errors (on otherwise clean STLs). We’ve used these reports to make some fixes to our slicer, especially when you’re using STLs with parts in inches.

Thanks for your feedback We love hearing from you about your workflow, your parts, and how to improve. Keep your insightful feedback and ratings coming. We read them carefully and follow up when you request that we contact you. If you prefer real-time feedback, you can always email [email protected].

We appreciate the time you take to share your feedback with us, specifically that so many of you completed our Q4 survey. We have reviewed your feedback carefully and are planning improvements across the CLIP process to help you create amazing parts.

Many of the changes you told us were important were already under way, and, in this software release, you’ll see improvements in these areas:

We can’t wait to hear from you about this release. Keep printing great parts and sharing your feedback. We appreciate it, and it makes our products better. If you have any questions, please contact your Carbon Technical Partner [email protected].

Improved part accuracy

More accurate in x,y-plane This release, you’ll notice that, on average, your parts will be more accurate in the x,y-plane, smaller by 20 µm per edge, or 40 µm per dimension. You’ll see this improvement in all materials.

This change also impacts the dimensions of your supports. We’ve optimized the supports in v1.11 of the Carbon app (both auto and manual supports) for this change.

When you want to reprint a part that was successfully printed in a prior software version, you could use the new “Reprint” feature (which will not apply the accuracy improvement), or you could regenerate the support structures for your part.

If you support your parts in 3rd party software, please update the size of your supports so that they still provide adequate support. We recommend increasing support tip radii and necks by 40-60 µm.

Note: As the result of another improvement, you should also notice that your parts, when printed directly on the platform, will be 100 µm taller in the z-direction. (For parts printed on supports, the improvement will be in the length of the supports.)

We encourage you to share the studies you’re doing We have ongoing studies in-progress and are planning more improvements to part accuracy. We’re happy to share our study results and would love to know about and support your studies as well. Email

Better parts, more often

We’ve changed the way we print to improve the chances that your part will come out successfully. In our analyses, we’ve seen that this change addresses about 25% of typical failures.

Printing this way can increase print times, from negligibly (2-3%) to nearly doubling them.

This change will help avoid some common failures:

Dynamic print profile also available If you have become confident printing and are experiencing few print failures, you can use the Dynamic Print Profile, which you can select from the Print Profile menu in the Print Controls tab. This profile will print parts similarly to the way they used to print in v1.9.

Often, this profile will print your parts more quickly, but not always. The dynamic profile still considers unvented volumes, part geometry (particularly wall thickness), resin properties and flow and tunes the speed of the printer to handle these conditions.

Further customization is possible Lastly, we want to make sure that you all know that we have application engineers that can help create Custom Profiles for your production jobs. Please be in touch if you’d like help optimizing a print for a production job.

Recreate previously printed parts

Reprint a previous print If you’d like to recreate a previous print (using the slices and the print profile details from that point in time), you can now reprint from the print page. We’ll also remind you of this option when you print from a project with prior prints.

“Reprint” is designed for use when you want to recreate the part as you printed it previously. Please continue to use “Print” if you’d like to take advantage of software improvements made for things like accuracy or slicing.

Changes in the hardware will impact how precisely you can recreate a print. We’ll warn you if you’re using a different cassette and anything else that we can detect is different. Our recommendations for when to use new printing options

Continued improvement in supporting your parts

Three modes for editing supports

Select a mode from the 3 at the top when editing supports

Add multiple supports more quickly To speed up manually placing supports, you can now select where on your part you’d like supports without having to wait for the full structures to generate. Once you’ve placed all the contact points you’d like, click on the Add Supports button to batch generate the structures.

Select contact points, in manual mode

Or, after auto-supporting, select additional contact points

Then, after hitting the Add Supports button, support structures are created

Smarter support bars provide better support, especially for tough materials Support bar thickness is now selected based on additional parameters, like the other supports that are nearby, the geometry of the area where the supports are placed, and the properties of the material you’re using. You’ll notice the improvement most in Epoxy and Cyanate Ester materials.

Support for EPX parts in v1.10, with thicker bars

Support for EPX parts in v1.9

Clustering of supports for easier removal In our experiments, we’ve found that ‘bouquets’ of supports are easier to remove (thick center bars, connected with trusses to groups of thinner supports). In this release, we apply this structure to our auto-supports (whenever it still provides adequate support). We’re also adding braces to support structures to improve your final parts.

Better support for your Rigid Polyurethane parts We’ve continued the work we started in v1.9 to make sure that the support structures for our Rigid Polyurethanes are adequate, so the improvements are now made for RPU 60, 61 and 70. This should strictly improve the quality of your printed parts, while being judicious about the increase in material used. In our tests, we find that the supports are still easy to remove and allow for adequate fluid to flow around your part.

If you are currently supporting your parts manually and are happy with the quality of your parts, you do not need to change the density of your supports.

Other improvements based on your feedback

Better required resin estimation We’ve adjusted how we estimate the required resin amount to handle cases where you’ve got nested shells (particularly in support structures) that were leading to some extreme over-estimation. Required resin amounts should be very similar to prior software versions for most STL’s.

New feedback form We’re so grateful for the time you take to tell us about your prints, and share your models when you can. We can make our printer better by seeing and working to improve how we print these parts.

We’ve made a couple changes to how you provide feedback: when you’re done rating a print or providing feedback, you’ll see the Save Feedback button become active. Please remember to click it to save your feedback. Also, you can still ask for help or share a model with Carbon. These are now buttons rather than checkboxes, but they’ll work the same way (notify your CTP/RM and share your model with the Carbon team for review and troubleshooting).

Ease of use improvements in multi-part selection Thanks for using and sharing your feedback on our new multi-part features. We heard from a few of you about things that would make your lives easier: to automatically select the model you’ve just uploaded. This worked for the first model you uploaded, but not subsequent uploads. We fixed this.

Also, we’ve made it easier to select and move a model in the layout mode. Now, you can click on the model and start moving it. (It used to be that you had to click it to select it, then click it again to start moving it.)

Lastly, we’re interested in your thoughts on our multi-part features as we are making plans for more improvements.

Thanks for your feedback We love hearing from you about your workflow, your parts, and how to improve. Keep your insightful feedback and ratings coming. We read them carefully and follow up when you request that we contact you. If you prefer real-time feedback, you can always email [email protected].

CE 221

CE 221 is the newest member of the Cyanate Ester family, with material properties comparable to glass-filled Nylon. With a 230°C Heat Deflection Temperature, strength, and stiffness, CE 221 is perfect for applications that need long-term thermal stability, like under-the-hood components, electronics assemblies, and industrial products. Compared to CE 220, CE 221 has major benefits: improved printability, reduced cracking, more consistent surface finish, and simplified post-processing.

If you have any questions about using CE 221, please email us at [email protected] or talk with your Carbon Technical Partner.

Key benefits and uses

CE 221 shares exceptional properties with CE 220. They are both stiff, strong and have very high temperature resistance. CE 221 also has the following benefits over CE 220:

If you use CE 220 now, we encourage you to switch to CE 221 to take advantage of these significant improvements. Please let us know, however, if you do find a part you normally print with CE 220 that doesn’t turn out so well with CE 221. If for some reason you can’t switch from CE 220 to CE 221 right away, we recommend that you adopt the CE 221 bake schedule (detailed below), if you are experiencing cracking in your CE 220 parts.

What to watch for

Material properties

Compared with CE 220, minimum feature sizes in CE 221 are improved. In particular, the size of the smallest holes you can make in the x,y-plane (negative space) are significantly smaller due to CE 221’s reduced sweating.

To compare the minimum resolvable feature sizes of CE 221 with other resins, see the recommended feature sizes.. To compare the material properties of CE 221 with other resins, see the Rigid Materials.

Designing

If you can influence the design of the part, you can take advantage of the improved feature resolution of CE 221 by using holes as small as 0.70 mm in the x,y-plane. Of course, you’ll need to know how you’re going to orient the part on the platform before you can design for the x,y-plane in the model.

Preparing to print

Adding supports You may notice that the software’s auto supports option adds more and thicker supports for CE 221 than CE 220. If you’re using third-party software to add supports, you may want to increase the number and thickness of the supports you add.

Orienting To make use of the smaller minimum feature size, consider orienting parts on the platform so the smallest holes lie in the x,y-plane.

Printing Follow the procedure for dispensing two-part resins. For this resin, remember to use a 1:1 dispenser with green tips and not a 10:1 dispenser with white tips.

Finishing To finish parts, see washing and curing protocols specific to CE 221. With CE 221, you must use a new washing solvent for our resins, a 50/50 mixture of IPA and Propylene Glycol. The previous IPA/water solvent blend will not get your parts clean. You may also need a refresher on programming your oven for CE resins.

As mentioned above, we recommend the CE 221 curing protocol for your CE 220 parts as well.

Ordering supplies To use the new resin, make sure you have:

Note: Don’t mix the solvents by weight. As they have different densities, mixing equal weights gives the wrong solvent ratio, which reduces washing effectiveness.

Before you go

We’ve worked hard to integrate your feedback on CE 220 into CE 221, which we think pushes the state of the art forward in high temperature, high resolution 3D printing. We’re printing amazing parts in CE 221 in our design studio, and we hope you do to.

If you have any questions, please email us at [email protected] or talk with your Carbon Technical Partner.

EPX 81

We’re introducing the first member of a new material family: Epoxy!

EPX 81 is our most accurate high strength engineering material, with mechanical properties comparable to 20% glass-filled PBT. It has a Heat Deflection Temperature of 140°C and excellent abrasion resistance, making it useful in a variety of automotive, industrial, and consumer product settings. It has strength comparable to CE 221 but increases elongation at break by 58% and adds 53% higher impact strength

If you have any questions about using EPX 81, please email us at [email protected] or talk with your Carbon Technical Partner.

Key benefits and uses Epoxy has a number of benefits, including:

These properties mean that EPX 81 is the best choice when you need highly accurate, rigid parts, with toughness that exceeds CE 221. If you need rigid parts that can withstand very high temperatures, use CE 221. If you need rigid, impact-resistant parts that will be used at lower temperatures, use RPU 70.

What to watch for

Material properties

EPX 81 has properties in between CE 221 and RPU 70. You might find it helpful to compare their properties in this table.

Note: For more detailed data and information about how we collected it, see the relevant technical data sheet.

To compare the material properties of EPX 81 with other resins, see the Rigid Materials. To compare the minimum resolvable feature sizes of EPX 81 with other resins, see the minimum feature size table.

Designing

If you can influence the design of the part, you can take advantage of the great feature resolution by using holes as small as 0.6 mm in the x,y-plane or z-direction. Of course, you’ll need to know how you’re going to orient the part on the platform before you can design for the x,y-plane in the model.

Preparing to print

Adding supports When adding supports with third-party software, use more supports and thicker support tips for EPX 81 compared to other resins. Parts separate from their supports when the support tips are insufficient.

Orienting When printing mating fixtures or connectors, be sure you use the same orientation (parallel) so the surfaces experience similar forces. When possible, it’s best to print mating parts at the same time.

Printing

Dispensing resin Before starting the dispense procedure, if you’re using EPX 81 for the first time, make sure you:

The procedure for dispensing EPX 81 is a little different from that of other two-part resins. The differences are crucial for success, so make sure you follow the dispensing protocol carefully.

Once dispensed, EPX 81 has a pot life of two weeks when stored in the dark. We recommend storing unused resin in an opaque bottle and not in a covered cassette. Remember to always shake the bottle and stir the resin with a silicone spatula before every print.

Finishing With EPX 81, you’ll use a new washing solvent for our resins, called Green Power Rapid Resin Clean (RRC, part number #003). See the washing and curing protocols specific to EPX 81 for more details and ordering information.

Ordering supplies To use the new resin, make sure you have:

You can order more RRC using one of these links:

Before you go

EPX 81 is the first resin in our newest chemical family, Epoxy. We’re excited by the potential for this family to open up new opportunities in high strength, high elongation materials.

We’d love to hear from you about how you’re using EPX 81. Please share your experiences by emailing [email protected] or talking with your Carbon Technical Partner.

UMA 90

We are excited to introduce you to our newest resin, UMA 90. It has a great combination of properties — the ease of use of a single-cure resin with improved toughness versus PR 25.

If you have any questions about using UMA 90, please email us at [email protected] or talk with your Carbon Technical Partner.

Key benefits and uses

UMA 90 is a tough one-part resin that you can pour straight from the bottle into the cassette. It is an easy-to-use, fast printing resin with a long pot life. We make it in gray as well as the CMYKW printing colors (cyan, magenta, yellow, black, and white). Use this resin for manufacturing fixtures and prototypes that need to be tough and able to withstand moderate impacts.

What to watch for

Material properties

UMA 90 has a high impact strength of 33 J/m (Notched Izod, ASTM D256). It also has high resistance to breaking, with an ultimate tensile strength of around 46 MPa.

Clicking a link in the table opens a ZIP file with the TDS and SDS for the resin.

Note: For more detailed data and information about how we collected it, see the relevant technical data sheet.

The minimum resolvable feature sizes of UMA 90 are slightly different for the black and white versions, with black allowing slightly smaller features. For a full comparison with other resins, see the minimum feature size table.

Preparing to print

If you add supports with third-party software, we recommend using trussed supports, and adding more, and thicker supports than you might normally use for PR 25.

Printing

Follow the procedure for dispensing one-part resins .

Finishing

See the washing and curing protocols specific to UMA 90.

Before you go

If you’re planning to scale parts made from UMA 90, please let us know how they turn out by emailing [email protected] talking with your Carbon Technical Partner. The software automatically scales for the effects of thermal expansion and contraction in the z-direction, so we expect the results to be good, but we’d really like to hear your feedback.

Thank you for your use and support of Carbon’s CLIP technology. We’re excited to tell you about the latest improvements in our software.

We’ve focused this release on a couple themes: allowing you to load, arrange, and work with multiple models, improving part accuracy, and continuing to improve auto-supports.

Here’s a full list of the improvements:

We can’t wait to hear from you about this release. Keep printing great parts and sharing your feedback. We appreciate it, and it makes our products better.

If you have any questions, please contact your Carbon Technical Partner or email us at [email protected].

Work With More Than One Model

One of the first things you’ll notice when you update your printer is that you have a new pane where you can duplicate, add models, and translate them to new places on the build platform.

When you have more than one model, you’ll need to select a model before performing any actions on it. To do this, just click on the model you want to orient, support, or layout. Selected models are highlighted blue, unless they’re outside the platform, when they turn red but are still selected and movable. For this initial release, you cannot perform actions on multiple models simultaneously.

Also, as a note, your project will inherit the name of your first STL. You can always rename the project if you like.

Duplicate a model You can duplicate a model two ways. After selecting the model you’d like to duplicate, you can use the Duplicate button, or, if you prefer keystrokes, just use the shift + d keys. (As a reminder, all of the available keyboard shortcuts are listed in the information window, accessed by clicking the question mark in the lower left corner.)

Your duplicated model will appear, offset from the model you copied, and will become the selected model.

You can duplicate your models at whatever stage you like. You can:

Arrange your models After duplicating your model (or adding a new STL), you can move the model to a new place on the platform either by using your mouse to drag the model or using the x and y coordinates (where 0,0 is the center of the platform and the shown coordinates are for the center of the part) to nudge the model around the platform. Or, on your keyboard, you can use w, a, s, and d keys to move the model in the up, left, down, and right directions. You can always re-center a model using the Center button.

We have left layout options flexible so that you can nest models in the x, y-plane. You’ll want to make sure that your parts and their supports don’t overlap and that they have enough room between them for good fluid flow.

As a reminder, we recommend leaving double the wall thickness between parts.

Upload multiple STLs In addition to duplicating and laying out multiple models, you can also upload other STLs. You’ll find this in the top navigation bar (Upload STL). The upload works just like initial upload.

You can upload models one at a time, from any pane (Orient, Support, or Layout), and new models are loaded in the center of the platform.

Feedback welcome As we hope you know, we’re eager to hear from you as you use the new duplicate, layout, and multiple STL features. We can imagine many ways to improve this feature, but we’d love to hear how you use it and what would help you make better parts.

Contact your Carbon Technical Partner or email us with suggestions at [email protected].

Improved Part Accuracy

Corrections for shrinkage in the z-direction for PR resins We now take thermal expansion into consideration when printing your parts in PR. You should see all your final parts be more accurate in the z-direction. As you’d expect, this effect scales with part height, so you’ll notice the improvement most on taller parts.

Also, you might notice that a part that was previously (before v1.9) at the boundary of the build envelope (in the z-direction) will now show as too large and be unprintable. This is the result of scaling the part.

If you’ve told your engineers to scale their models or done it for them, you’ll want to adjust those factors now that we’re scaling automatically. Email [email protected] if you’d like to know the formulas for scaling for PR.

Slice sampling point changed In the interest of accuracy, we’ve also changed the point at which we sample parts when slicing. With this change, your part will be more accurate in the z-direction, on average.

Continued Improvement in Auto-Supports

Supports tuned for thin features In this release, we’ve tuned support tips and their depth based on the geometry of your part so that they no longer go through thin features.

Stronger support for overhangs close to the platform We more thoroughly support overhangs that are close to the platform. We’ve changed our trussing rules so that they provide more stable support and better adhesion for short support structures.

Denser support structures for RPU 61 and 70 As you also see above, we’ve increased the density of supports for RPU 61 and RPU 70 when we detect that a region might require more support to avoid sagging. This should strictly improve the quality of your printed parts, while being judicious about the increase in material used. In our tests, we find that the supports are still easy to remove and allow for adequate fluid to flow around your part.

If you are currently supporting your parts manually and are happy with the quality of your parts, you do not need to change your support parameters.

Easier to add small supports manually You should see fewer errors when adding small supports manually to your models.

Auto-supports generate more quickly In addition to making improvements in the quality of the support structures, we’ve also tuned auto-supports so that they generate more quickly (up to 50% faster).

Other Improvements Based on Your Feedback

See estimated resin volume on printer display For those of you who like to work from the on-printer display, in addition to showing the resin used, you can now see the required resin volume, as long as you have previously generated Print Stats.

Please note: please keep the resin estimates accurate by re-running print stats right before you send the job to the printer.

Work with large models (allow your browser to display models that have a very high triangle count) We’ve seen cases where your models had too many triangles for the browser to display. We’ve fixed this by simplifying how much detail we display. You’ll see a note in the upper left corner reminding you that the model has been simplified to show in the browser.

Don’t worry: this is only a change to how the model is shown by your browser. Your print will still use the high resolution STL for your part. Also, remember, when you’re zoomed in on a part that’s simplified some of the detail in the display, what you’ll see in the browser is a close approximation (no longer the actual geometry) of your part.

Platform and cassette ID included in CSV export (of print history) We’ve heard from a few of you that it would help to include the number of the cassette and platform used for each of your prints. Now, when you export your print data (by clicking on Export to CSV), they’ll be included for all prints after you upgrade to v1.9.

Continue working with your printer when your network connection is flaky

Our printer is now more resilient in the face of temporary internet connectivity issues. In particular, a new print can now frequently be started even if there are network connectivity issues. (As before, network issues will never interrupt a print already in progress.) Most of the time, this improvement doesn’t require you to do anything. Your use of the printer should feel uninterrupted. However, if you have trouble starting a print during a local network outage, please contact your Carbon Technical Partner.

Thanks for your feedback We love hearing from you about your workflow, your parts, and how to improve. Keep your insightful feedback and ratings coming. We read them carefully and follow up when you request that we contact you.

If you prefer real-time feedback, you can always email us at [email protected].

Thank you for your use and support of CLIP. We’re excited to tell you about the latest improvements in our software.

We love hearing about the parts you’re printing and learning how we can help make it easier to print great parts. We’ve focused this release on a couple themes: helping you get better parts through improving auto-supports and making it simpler to use the Carbon app to prepare your prints.

Here’s a full list of the improvements:

We can’t wait to hear from you about this release. Keep printing great parts and sharing your feedback. We appreciate it, and it makes our products better.

If have any questions, please email us at [email protected].

Better Parts Through Smarter Supports

Better support for thicker sections of your parts We’ve improved our auto-support calculations to consider the density of the section of the part when applying supports. We can now print auto-supported parts with thick sections, like the one below, that previously needed manual supports added.

Each release, we continue to improve how we support different geometries in specific materials, so please continue to provide feedback on your prints. If you can, it certainly helps to share your models with us so we can use them to test improvements to auto-supports. Thank you for your engagement with our software team.

Improved support along the edges of your parts We’ve also tuned auto-supports to better recognize the edges of your parts. You can see the improvement in finding edges in the examples below.

As we said above, we continue to tune auto-supports and benefit each time you share your models and feedback. Please continue to tell us about geometries where we can improve.

Simpler to Work on Your Models

Multi-delete of supports In working with many of you, we found that you’d like to delete supports in bunches. To select a group of supports, just click on an area and drag the selection rectangle over the supports to highlight them, or use shift + click. Then, use the delete key to delete the group. You can always add to the selected group of supports by using shift + click or shift + drag. And, to deselect a support from the group, use option + click.

Actual dates and times on your lists We’ve had a few requests to show the dates and times of your projects and prints, and now you’ll see the last updated date of your project or the time of your print on your lists. During the current day, we’ll show the timestamp. And, if you like to see all the time and date information, hover over the field to see the date, and time.

The date and time shown are for your local timezone. (If the timezone doesn’t look right, check your computer’s settings to see where it thinks you’re located.)

Unified access to view controls We’ve added to the ways you can view your parts while you work on them. As we made this change, we put the controls together into a bottom bar where you can find, on the left: the keyboard shortcut menu and the bounding box dimensions of your part. On the right, you’ll find the support (discussed below) and part opacity, as well as the clipping plane tool and the platform toggle. You’ll also find the undo and redo controls.

We’ve added to and changed the keyboard shortcuts this release. You’ll find them all by clicking on the question mark in the lower left corner.

Support opacity options We’ve added the ability to control the opacity for your support structures, so you can see through the supports. You’ll find it in the bottom bar (the triangle icon). You can also use a keystroke to access it, the ‘S’ key.

You might notice that you can’t use support opacity while you’re using the clipping plane.

We’d love to know if this is an important feature for you; email us at [email protected].

Part opacity options We’ve also increased the options for viewing your part’s opacity (not just x-ray), with the same slider options as for supports. Click on the circle icon, and, just like with clipping plane or the support opacity slider, you can increment through the slider by using the < > keys.

Automatic optimization of support types As our auto-supports consider the resin you’re using and the forces that your part is subjected to and can do so for each section of your part, we’ll pick the best support type automatically rather than asking you to pick trees or trusses for the overall part. Before adding auto-supports, just select whether you’d like your part to print on the platform or above it.

Undo and redo have a longer memory Undo and redo now remember what you did across work sessions. (It used to be that you could only undo and redo during one session.)

Duplicate from Project Settings We’ve added the ability to duplicate a project from the Project Settings menu.

Some auto-support generation times are longer As we tested this software release, we’ve found that auto-support generation is generally the same (sometimes even faster than before), but occasionally supports take longer to be created. You’ll find that parts with many thick sections can take longer to run, as there are many more locations where we’re placing supports. As with all aspects of our supports, we are continuing to tune and find ways to optimize our auto-supports in future updates.

Bone mesh demo no longer printable Your original bone mesh demo will no longer work after v1.8. If you’d like to print this demo, please email us at [email protected].

Trouble deleting supports In a few usability sessions here, we’ve seen the way some people click makes it hard to delete supports. As we now notice the click and drag (to select a group) gesture vs just a single click, you’ll need to keep your cursor still when deleting an individual support.

Thanks for your feedback We love hearing from you about your workflow, your parts, and how to improve. Keep your insightful feedback and ratings coming. We read them carefully and follow up when you request that we contact you.

If you’d like to schedule a demo of the new release, please email us at [email protected].

Thank you for your use and support of CLIP. We’re excited to tell you about the latest improvements in our software.

We’ve seen the use of auto-supports increase and want to further encourage your use by adding even more improvements. We’ve improved how you navigate around your models, added a clipping plane tool and a fully manual model for adding and deleting supports, and improved the supports and their tips.

We also continue to help you use your printer(s) most efficiently. We can send notifications when your print jobs are finished. And, if you want to move a project (with all its information) from one printer to another, you can export the full project (which is a .carbon file).

We’ve snuck a few other changes in too; we’ve improved how we print models with unvented volumes. (Note: we still very much recommend venting your cavities, but we do recognize that there are situations where this is challenging.) And, we’ve also worked on our slicer to handle over cure on the last slice and models with multiple shells.

Here’s a full list of the improvements:

For MacBook Pro users

We can’t wait to hear from you about the improvements in this release. Keep printing great parts and sharing your feedback. We appreciate it, and it makes our products better. If you have any questions, contact your Carbon Technical Partner or [email protected].

Adding supports to your models

We’ve added the ability to manually support your models, without auto-generating supports first.

To work in manual mode, just select your part’s placement (on or above the platform), and trussed supports (only trusses are possible in manual mode), and click Manual.

Note: When you use auto supports, they will override any manually placed supports. So, if you want auto-generated supports, add them first, then switch to manual mode to add more supports.

Viewing your models

Clipping plane tool To support viewing and adding supports inside your parts, we’ve added a clipping plane that you can use in various orientations. This tool is available in all modes: viewing, orienting, supporting, or settings.

To use the clipping plane, first set the camera angle of the part from which you want to view the sections of the part. For example, if you’d like to step through the part in the way its sliced, start your camera at the bird’s eye view. Then, click on the accordion icon in the lower right of your screen. You can step through your part by using the slider or, if you’re not orienting or supporting your part, you can use the forward and backward arrows on your keyboard.

To set your clipping plane parallel to the build platform, which lets you step through your part in the Z direction, start with your camera view in the bird’s eye position.

More responsive panning and rotating of your parts As you are supporting and orienting your parts, we know you need to pan and rotate and zoom and we want to keep up with the speed and intent of how you’re working. We’ve made improvements to how we pan your view of the model: panning horizontally and vertically go at the same rate (vertically used to be slower) and follow your cursor. And, when rotating, we’ve worked to rotate around the section of the part you are looking at; this works best if you have it in the center of your view. Lastly, you can click the middle and right buttons on your mouse to pan (rather than need to use the shift key and the right button on your mouse).

inverted triangles in your model If your model has inverted triangles, we mark them in red in the model view. Our slicer does a good job of preparing a print when there aren’t many inverted triangles or the triangles themselves are small. If you see many inverted triangles or large inverted triangles, you should fix your STL file (using B9 Creator, NetFabb, or other software) and then start a new project with a clean STL. 3D Model software will identify places where the normals are flipped in your model and step you through fixing them.

Supports for your models

Small supports As you’ll see in both manual and auto support mode, you can now add small supports. These small supports are especially useful for when supporting features with the part itself (rather than connecting them to the trusses/trees or platform.

Support Tips Optimized for more materials, RPU 61, Elastomers, CE, and PR We began optimizing our support tips in v1.6 for our Rigid Polyurethanes, and in v1.7 we’ve continued our optimization for more resins: Prototyping Acrylates, Cyanate Ester, and our Elastomers. When removing the supports, these new tips should not leave pits in your parts.

Stronger supports for Elastomers Your printing and feedback continue to inform our experiments. Based on both, we’ve further optimized the supports used for Elastomers to improve adhesion to the platform and support for overhangs. In our testing, we can now print parts in Elastomer that were previously unprintable.

Email notifications

With the update, we’ll automatically subscribe you to receive notifications on your prints. You can also get notifications for all prints, if you like. If you want to change your Notification settings, find them in your Account settings by clicking on your username in the top navigation bar.

Move a project from one printer to another (import and export a .carbon file)

If you’d like to move a prepped project from one printer to another, you can now export the full project information, in a .carbon file, and re-import on another printer. This file contains the setup information you created in the project, including the resin, the history of your support iterations (so you can step through the options with undo/redo), and any print stat calculations you’ve done. These files can get large. If you just want the STL used in the project and its current supports, continue to export the STL only.

To import on another printer, select the .carbon file when you start a project. You’ll see them along with STL’s, and the filename contains the original project id.

Unvented volumes detection and print speed adjustment

We are taking a first step in a series of features that should help you recognize, vent, and more successfully print parts with unvented volumes. This release, when creating a print plan, we notice when your models have unvented volumes and change how we print them. Your printed parts will look better and print more successfully, but your prints with unvented volumes will usually be slower (how much slower depends on how large the unvented cavity is).

Important note: we still suggest venting the trapped volumes. However, we recognize that there are cases, such as when you printing directly on the platform, when adding vent holes can be impossible.

More commonly, this change will improve the surface finish of your part, but, to have a successful part, we’d recommend changing the orientation or adding more venting.

As we are continuing to work on tools to help you print parts with cavities, we’d love to hear from you. Email [email protected].

Slicing fixes

Eliminate over cure on last slice We had noticed some surface finish defects, especially on the tops of curved parts. We’ve made changes that should eliminate these defects.

Better support for multiple shells We’ve received a few example models from customers that helped us improve how we slice STL’s that contain multiple shells. While we still recommend that you unify your shells before creating an STL, we wanted to do better in the cases where you can’t regenerate the STL.

File formats

Support for ASCII STL You can now start projects with files in ASCII STL format.

We’d love to hear from you if you’re using other formats that STL. Please email

Thanks for your Feedback

We love hearing from you about your workflow, your parts, and how to improve. Keep your insightful feedback and ratings coming. We read them carefully and follow up when you request that we contact you. If you prefer real-time feedback, you can always email [email protected].