Print&Fold: Printing and Folding Shape-accurate 3D Models

2026-08-13

AI Summary

This work addresses the limitations of conventional FDM 3D printing for complex models—namely prolonged print times and excessive material waste—as well as geometric distortions introduced by existing folding approaches due to surface discretization. The authors propose an integrated fabrication pipeline that combines planar printing with manual folding, leveraging a geometry-aware foldable surface flattening algorithm. This method preserves fine geometric details without surface discretization, achieving high-fidelity reconstruction of surface features in folded 3D prints for the first time. Coupled with an interactive unfolding tool and standard FDM printing, the approach significantly reduces both material consumption and printing time across a range of models while maintaining geometric accuracy in the final fabricated objects.

Abstract

This paper introduces Print&Fold, a tool to allow FDM 3D printing of complex models with less time and material while preserving shape accuracy. Key to this work is a folding algorithm that planarizes foldable faces internal to the 3D model. While folding techniques typically discretize a target model's surface, thereby fabricating low fidelity counterparts, our method preserves the surface features in the physical print. Our design tool allows users to unfold 3D models to be FDM-printed flat before manually folding these into their target shapes. We showcase a variety of applications and evaluate the material and time savings across a range of 3D models.

Problem

• FDM 3D printing
• shape accuracy
• folding
• material savings
• time efficiency

Innovation

• Print&Fold
• FDM 3D printing
• folding algorithm
• shape accuracy
• planarization