3d printing

[Grimrod]

  I thinking about buying a 3d printer but I'm a total novice . never done any computer design or the like in my life.

Wondering if their are any Beginner friendly printers that have a good if not great print quality? Any advice is welcomed.

[clibinarium]

Just to be clear- are you looking at getting into printing alone, or digital design with a view to printing your work?
I ask because there's a gulf between these two ideas. Printing is not super difficult once you get the hang of it. Digital design is another story though.

[Grimrod]

Sorry for not being clear. I mean printing only.

[beefcake]

What are you looking to print? Terrain or miniatures? Generally large terrain pieces are best on FDM (extruded plastic) printers while miniatures and anything you want to capture fine details are best printed on a resin (usually UV cured) printer.

[Mammoth miniatures]

For resin printing any of the elegoo machines would be my recommendation - they're about as close to out of the box printing as you can get.

[zemjw]

You do need to consider the health and safety issues as well, especially with resin printers.

I use my FDM printer in the kitchen, with the extractor fan running on low. However, everything I've read about resin printers suggests proper ventillation is required. They also tend to need Iso Propyl alcohol for cleaning, and UV light for curing. I think this is getting better, but they're not quite at a place where I'm willing to buy one.

I bought an Elegoo Neptune 3 last summer, and I've been pretty happy with it. Unfortunately, it does do its support through a Facebook group, which I only found out afterwards

[modelwarrior]

Could be useful ?

https://leadadventureforum.com/index.php?topic=138810.msg1766209#msg1766209

[Daeothar]

For resin printing any of the elegoo machines would be my recommendation - they're about as close to out of the box printing as you can get.

Seconded!

I bought an Elegoo Mars 2 Pro and a Mercury curing station just over a year ago now, and it has been a delight to work with. I know you read all about people tweaking and finetuning settings, to match certain types of resin, printer adjustments, air humidity or the colour of their jeans, but I have found my machine to be working perfectly straight out of the box on factory settings.

By now I have printed my share of models, and all of them came out perfect minus one or two for which I had to add the supports myself (user error). And that's basically the only real thing I had to learn; to recognize where I had to put my supports. And for that I simply use the free slicer that came with my printer (Citubox). But mostly, I have acquired pre-supported models and the supports were no issue at all.

Now, I know there will all kinds of very experienced people who will tell you "this printer is bad"or "this software is much better", and I'm sure they're right, but in my experience, with no previous knowledge on the subject, I've had a completely smooth ride with my basic printer, factory settings and free software...