Idyllically located on Shaw Pond in the deep woods of the Berkshires, Camp Lenox, recently received a new 3D printer from NVBOTS. One might wonder why a summer camp would need a 3D printer, but with over 400 children coming each summer, there’s a lot of creativity to be unleashed, and a 3D printer is the ultimate tool for letting the kids be creative and have fun.
As soon as we started to work on the 3D printer, everyone flocked around to see what was happening. “Can you print my name? Or a hamburger?” There was no doubt these kids were familiar with 3D printing, and as a result, had all sorts of ideas for what they wanted to print. Further, seeing their reactions illustrated just how fast children can learn when they find material exciting, and how far their imaginations can take them.
We got the printer set up and running, and the kids were very excited. After printing a test cube, we queued up some surprises from the NVBOTS library. “Is the cube really hot?” one of them asked. But the model cools instantly as it gets printed, and when the kids opened the collecting shovel, they were able to pick up a plastic cube that looked just as they wanted it to look. The printer automatically started on the next job, and now the only thing the kids could do was to wait and see what kind of creature from the NVBOTS library it would print out.
Camp Lenox is a 97-year-old institution where children from 6 to 16 years can come and enjoy basketball, tennis, lacrosse, climbing, waterskies and hockey – all in a safe and inspiring environment. With the NVPro 3D printer, they will also be able to create all kinds of imaginable objects, and with a printer that runs continuously without any need for supervision, all 400 will have the chance to bring something fascinating back to their parents when the camp is over.
