In the Lord of the Rings fandom there’s a persistent debate whether balrogs, or Durin’s Bane specifically, have wings. The text in Fellowship is ambiguous whether what it is describing are literal wings or something else wing-like.

  • papalonian@lemmy.world
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    12 days ago

    and I think you really have to be good at making your own stuff for a printer to be a good purchase.

    It really depends on what you want to use it for. I have the skills to make decently complicated parts to print, but 9 times out of 10 I’ll just see if someone has already made something similar and use that instead. If you know you’re gonna be prototyping a bunch of things or testing weird shit out then yeah you should probably know how to operate a CAD program, but if your use case is, “this plastic thing on my very common appliance broke, I wonder if I can print a replacement?” or “these little flexible dragon things are cute” then you just need to know how to use a search bar and your slicer.

    • early_riser@lemmy.worldOP
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      12 days ago

      if your use case is, “this plastic thing on my very common appliance broke, I wonder if I can print a replacement?” or “these little flexible dragon things are cute” then you just need to know how to use a search bar and your slicer.

      I’ve designed a few things, like these pill bottle holders.

      Red 3d printed pill bottle holder

      I’ve also “reverse engineered” (It’s literally just a wedge) a doorstop that works surprisingly well. I keep misplacing ours at work.

      • papalonian@lemmy.world
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        12 days ago

        Those simple designs are the foundation of the more complex ones you will create in the future. If you have need and determination, you can design anything!