Rowley couple’s 3D statue business goes on the road

ROWLEY - When Brian and Vicki Norris of Rowley were initially looking for an industrial quality 3D printer, they weren't thinking about creating 3D statues of people.

'We were planning to build a carwash in Independence, and we wanted to print a 3-D model,” Vicki said. 'We looked at some of the consumer-grade printers, and we didn't like the quality they produced.

'Brian began looking at professional-grade printers, but they are extremely expensive. We began thinking about what we could print besides the carwash.”

Brian's online research turned up photographs of detailed ceramic statues created by industrial 3D printers.

'He found that there are very few companies worldwide who do it and most of them are in Europe,” Vicki said. 'There's only a couple of companies who do it in the states, so we felt this was something we could do.

'We started digging into what it would take, and we decided to put the carwash on hold.”

The couple launched 3DYou Today in January with a notable difference from other companies in the business.

'We wanted to take the technology available to capture the human form in a studio setting and make it mobile,” Brian said. 'We wanted to take it into sporting events and other venues, such as the Comic Con in Chicago.

'We created an octagonal-shaped booth that we could assemble and tear down. It has 72 cameras with lighting and takes about four hours to set up.”

The booth fits in a 10-by-10-foot space - the standard size of a display area at Comic Cons and similar events. Multiple photos from a variety of angles are used to create a computerized rendering of the human form.

Brian said the printer, which cost in excess of $100,000 and weighs more than 1,000 pounds, is in the couple's Rowley home. It spreads powder in a tenth of a millimeter as it creates each layer of a statue or any other object.

It takes 10 layers to create the width of a dime. The statues are printed horizontally and several can be created simultaneously.

'When a statue comes out, it's still fairly pliable,” Brian said. 'We take it into a chemical bath that changes the composition of the powder into a gypsum. It adds a molecule and a half of water and crystallizes the powder.”

Vicki said a statue becomes very hot during the chemical bath process. The colors become vibrant in the chemical bath.

'The detail is just amazing,” she said. 'It picks up virtually everything, including wrinkles in a uniform and a scuff mark on a shoe.”

A finished statue requires several days for the printing and 'curing” process after the chemical bath. The statues are available in 6-, 8-, 10- and 12-inch sizes ranging in price from $250 to $600.

Earlier this month, 3DYou Today set up in the U.S. Cellular Center concourse during the Iowa Girls High School state volleyball tournament. That's where Jane Willms, 13, of Amana, modeled for a statue.

'I couldn't believe how detailed it was,” said Teresa McNabb, Jane's mother. 'I didn't expect it to be that good. When we saw the finished product, Jane was so excited. She couldn't believe that you can see her cellphone in her back pocket.”

As for the future, Brian said 3DYou Today is working on a contract with the St. Louis Cardinals and ESPN radio to create statues of up to 200 mostly inner-city kids during a baseball camp next spring.

'We also would like to franchise the business at some point,” Vicki said. 'We think there are a lot of opportunities to take the technology to other parts of the country.”