Digital fabrication: Toy Car Gift
A toy, a box, a gift! This project, developed during the SUPSI Summer School back in 2013, represents my first attempt at digital fabrication. It is a box that can be opened, filled with candies and gifted to a friend.
Learning Objectives
Understanding how Rhinoceros works and face a project of digital fabrication. The project has been publishe MAKE Magazine blog. Being the first project I’ve ever done in the field of digital fabrication, I wanted to create a simple but playful one that can be adapted to different occasions and even user mood.
The base is a box. To add the playful feeling, I’ve added four wheels and a helicopter blade. This makes it almost like a toy, like the ones we had as kids. This time though, being a hand-made object, it fits into a global culture that tends to rediscover traditional values such as organic food and sustainable lifestyle. With these ideas in mind, my object is not just a toy but an object with a practical use, since the top-front panel can be opened. This is a real box that can be used to stock any items.
- If the box is open: anyone can store any common objects.
- If the box is closed: the toy becomes a secret treasury box.
Not only: the original idea includes the possibility to put a custom plate/mask, therefore customizing the obj the specific aim. If I put a skull-shaped mask and fill the box with candies, the object easily becomes a halloween gift. The object can be used for a marriage proposal by inserting the rings. Therefore, with the help of a anyone can build new custom front masks.
To develop my project, I’ve faced two main issues:
- my still growing skills with Rhino so ware posed many problems in achieving tasks done quickly,
- my lack of engineering experience has been the main drawback. The gears mechanism and the top pan suffered from these limitations.
