Unream

Voxel Printed Lamp for MIT HCI Engineering Group

In the daytime, Unream is an artifact that reflects sunlight to display dynamically; at night, it uses artificial lights to create a fantasy-like atmosphere. With Unream, the designers hope to blur the line between the digital and physical world, bringing impossible materials to real-world product design. Unream is the first 3D printed object that displays dynamically by itself. With multi-material voxel printing, the designers expand binary material presence to dynamic material experience, reimagining the relationship between human, space, and objects.

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Unream by Jiani Zeng

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Voxel Printed Lamp by Jiani Zeng

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Jiani Zeng Unream

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Jiani Zeng Voxel Printed Lamp

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Jiani Zeng Interview

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Unream Voxel Printed Lamp Press Releases

Press releases tailored for Unream are available in the languages: English.

Unream Voxel Printed Lamp Media Articles

Ready-to-feature articles on Unream are available in these languages: Spanish, Italian, German, French, Portuguese, English, Chinese (Mandarin), Hindi, Indonesian, Dutch, Turkish, Korean, Japanese, Russian and Arabic (Standard), for your convenience.

Unique Properties

Unream is the first 3D printed object that displays dynamically by itself. With the most advanced multi-material voxel printing technology, we create 'dream-like' materials that used to exist only in the digital world. Covered by lenticular lenses, Unream is a daytime artifact and night lamp revealing dynamic colors in different viewing angles. With Unream, we reimagined the relationship between human, space, and objects by expanding binary material presence to dynamic material experience.

Tags

3D printing, Multi-material printing, voxel printing, lenticular effect, lighting design, dynamic material, material interface, illusory material, optical textiles

Production Technology

Most of the material is a single layer of a separate entity that only exists uniformly on a product surface. With Unream, we break this inertial thinking by embedding information into three-dimensional matter (voxel) and assign different material properties to each voxel in multi-material printing. Designers can use our computational workflow to create object interfaces with various material distributions that can display unique material expressions.

Design Challenge

Structural textures are extremely hard to be applied on a free-form model using 3D printing. With our workflow, not only structural textures but also optical textures can be applied on any 3D surface. With Unream, we've developed a computational workflow that can assign different material properties to each voxel in multi-material printing.

Project Duration

The project started in June 2019 at MIT and finished in February 2020 at San Fransisco.

Operation Flow

When walking pass the object, it looks like a digital screen with ambient animation.

Research

Unream is one of the products designed with "illusory material": a MIT research about 3D printing lenticular effect. The lenticular effect people can create, and the quality of optical aberrations is highly restricted by existing manufacturability in optical lens and printer resolution. Normally, the making of lenticular sheet and content images are separate and handled by different people. With multi-material 3D printing, we can design the optical lens together with the image content, experimenting with different shapes and depths of the lens, surface form, and even the transparency and hardness of the image content. At the product/object level, it is possible to apply the lenticular effect on any form, manipulating the optical properties of any object surface.

Inspiration

There are increasing conversations around interactive and responsive materials, most of them require additional medium like electronic input. We want to create a new material organization that responds directly to user intervention or the environment. With multi-material 3D printing, we envision a future where designers can manipulate color, texture, and reflectivity of materials freely, creating objects with unique optical expressions that can be never achieved with other methods.

Image Credits

Jiani Zeng

Project Overview

Unream Voxel Printed Lamp has been a Platinum winner in the 3D Printed Forms and Products Design award category in the year 2019 organized by the prestigious A' Design Award & Competition. The Platinum A' Design Award is recognized for honoring designs that stand at the forefront of creativity and innovation. It is the highest accolade bestowed by the A' Design Awards, acknowledging works that blend remarkable innovation with impactful societal contributions. These designs not only showcase exceptional artistic and technical proficiency but also highlight their creators' commitment to advancing the boundaries of art, science, design, and technology. Recipients of this award are celebrated for their role in shaping the aesthetics and trends of our time, contributing significantly to the enhancement of quality of life and promoting sustainable development.

Platinum Recognition

Jiani Zeng was recognized with the coveted Platinum A' Design Award in 2020, a testament to excellence of their work Unream Voxel Printed Lamp.

Jiani Zeng Press Releases

Attention press members and journalists: We offer a collection of press releases on Jiani Zeng and their notable work, available for your unrestricted use. For immediate journalistic use: 1 press releases are available right now.

Unream: A Groundbreaking Voxel Printed Lamp Redefining Material Expression

Introducing Unream, the first 3D printed object that dynamically displays itself, redefining material experience through multi-material voxel printing.

Jiani Zeng Newsroom

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