3D print of my skull
- CategoryFor fun
- Project dateSummer 2022
- Skills requiredRhino, Blender, SLS printing, CAD, slicing with InVesalius
About this project
In November 2022, I crashed my bike and hit my head on the concrete. I was picked up by MIT’s EMTs and rushed to the Massachusetts General Hospital in an ambulance. After getting 6 stitches to the chin and a CAT scan, I did what any normal person would: I asked the radiologists for a copy of my scan so I could make a print of my skull.
Anyways, this is a life-sized model of my skull SLS-printed in nylon.
After pulling off all 278 image files from a CD, I used InVesalius as a slicer to create a 3D model of my skull. I tried to also create a model of my brain, but unfortunately because I got a CAT scan, not an MRI, the soft tissues were not high enough contrast to separate out my brain from my spinal fluid very well. But no worries, I got around to making a print of my brain eventually!
I think it turned out pretty cool, with my top few vertebrae also appearing in the scan. And because I had gotten scanned with a mask on, you could actually see the metal piece that went over my nose in the scan!
But there was a problem here: because the scan stopped just short of the back of my head, there was actually a giant hole on the back of the skull. In order to patch this, I had to pull the model into Blender and do some sculpting to smooth out the back. And while I was at it, I blended out some strange noise in the model, especially on the teeth.
Finally, I used Rhino to detect and remove naked edges, transforming the noisy model into a continuous piece that could be printed.
This SLS nylon printer was awesome, with extremely high tolerances that could even enable you to print a ball and socket joint. You could also print pieces inside of other pieces, which is super cool.
Overall, I thought the skull turned out really nice, with very high detail!