A show at TCT Asia and a recent tweet from Anycubic about the company's "star new product",
Photon Nex, a sci-fi concept egg-like 3D printer, got us thinking.
Is Anycubic up to something with the declared characteristics of the Photon Nex? Let's get a look.
You can be forgiven if you don't know much about the Anycubic Photon Nex. It was first mentioned during the Anycubic Anniversary Livestream and has since appeared in various venues including the A'Design Awards, several sponsored content placements in early 2022 and, most recently, an appearance at the TCT Asia additive manufacturing show.
We haven't written about this concept printer before. But since he's been out in public and Anycubic is once again showing off his distinctive "egg" look on social media, we figured now would be the perfect time to take a look at him. Treat yourself to this mid-week distraction that you can exhale sharply through your nose.
Photon Nex is inspired by science fiction (according to its creators, Star Trek); we see in which direction it is moving, although in our understanding it is more "Aliens" and eggs than "Earl Gray" and "hot". To the credit of the printer, the front of the device automatically retracts when opened and really gives the impression of a capsule for deep sleep.
Looks aside, the Photon Nex offers four exciting innovations that could take desktop resin 3D printing a step further from the plateau the machines have been on for the past couple of years.
SPEEEEEED
1600mm/h is the figure Anycubic puts forward for the Photon Nex, citing the fact that a 200mm high model of the Eiffel Tower can be printed in seven and a half minutes. Absurdly fast resin printing speed, and no details or explanations.
MULTICOLOR PRINTING?
Early references to the Photon Nex included a color printing module and prints achieving realistic or "real" coloration. This particular message is missing from the latest snapshots of Nex info we've seen.
AUTO LEVELING
This is the only thing we would prefer over all the rest. The automatic plate alignment system eliminates the need to fiddle with screws to level the print plate - no more greasy hands when working with resin-stained parts of the printer.
ZONE LIGHTING
Emphasizing the benefits of energy saving, Anycubic points to some form of zone lighting system that illuminates only those pixels that are "on". As with any concept, there is no solid information or spec to show what or exactly how this happens, but we would love a feature like this.
Other features of this mythical, unlikely but dreamy 3D printer include app control, 10.1" 8K monochrome LCD, automatic resin system and power outage recovery.
Anycubic has no plans to bring the Photon Nex to market anytime soon - it's a concept, after all. But if even one of the four core features makes it into future Anycubic machines, it would be a small but welcome step forward for desktop resin-on-LCD 3D printers, which have largely remained unchanged for the past four-plus years.
What do you think? What changes in desktop resin technology would you like to see? Start a conversation and leave a comment below.