Set aside The Big Bang Theory or Disney’s Big Hero, Ocean’s 8 (2018): A crew made of fearless women 3D scanned a $150 million Cartier Toussaint necklace at the heart of the plot. The digital file was thereafter sent to a desktop 3D printer to produce a very convincing jewelry replica of the Cartier – until examination with a jeweler’s magnifying loupe.
That was one of the rare times I got to see a desktop 3D printer on screen. That scene made me giggle like a young girl happy to see the boy of her dreams. I was talking about it at work, seeing some sort of real technology on screen while eating popcorn on my couch.
That was impressive and cool for me. It was also the sign that Hollywood was aware of 3D printing and all these advanced manufacturing processes that could be used to give life to things that would have been impossible to manufacture otherwise.
The more we dive in, the more we realize a lot more can be made behind the scenes, “stuff” that does not look fictional at all. We have seen intricate props, costumes, set pieces, animated characters, etc. made thanks to 3D printing.
2024, AMUG, Chicago. Jason Lopes gave us a glimpse of the behind-the-scenes magic of these movies. Through a brilliantly delivered keynote, he opened our world to the myriad of ways the entertainment and film industry could make the most of additive manufacturing and related technologies.
While his years at Stan Winston Studios, Legacy Effects and even Gentle Giant Studios are what gave him his pedigree in the entertainment industry, his time at Carbon (rarely talked about) is what reinforces his credibility in both the film and additive manufacturing worlds.
His conversation with 3D ADEPT Media underscores the potential and impact of an underrated element of the manufacturing value chain, the value AM processes can bring to movies, as well as the opportunities in business.
“Beauty only attracts the eye […]”
The former cinephile in me would have enjoyed the beauty of 3D printing as a pure form of art and the willingness from film producers to demonstrate how advanced our world is today. The editor in me believes it’s her duty to tell professionals from the creative industry what it really entails to make 3D printing part of its production environment.
And that for Lopes, comes to understanding “material” first. Yes, you’ve heard it well. What is a deep concern for demanding industries is equally legitimate in the film industry. To emphasize how important materials are, Lopes told 3D ADEPT Media, he does not look at the technology:
“I don’t look at the technology,” Lopes says plainly. “I look at the application, material requirements. Functionality, performance, what environment it’s going to be in; anything like that. Once I know the palette of materials I have available for that application, the technology follows suit.”
After years at Legacy, Lopes realized that to push AM further in entertainment, the industry needed a deeper understanding of material science.
“I went to Carbon because they have some of the best materials out there, specifically in elastomers,” he explains. “It was my first time to really leave entertainment, to go into other verticals, to see what their challenges, problems were, their barriers, what materials they were looking for, and the requirements of those materials.”
With applications delivered across automotive, consumer goods, and medical applications, Carbon’s Digital Light Synthesis (DLS) technology can process materials with performance requirements not always seen in the entertainment industry: Dual-cure elastomers, chemical-resistant epoxies, soft-touch materials optimized for cycling thousands of times without failure.
“The whole time,” Lopes says, “I was building a playbook: if automotive has this need, has this problem, has this challenge, and we know it’s being solved and being worked on, how can I bring that over back to entertainment?”
What if a lattice structure designed to reduce weight in automotive parts could become a design principle for animatronic suits? Or what if a soft-touch material formulated for consumer product ergonomics could solve the comfort and durability challenge of a performer wearing a 3D printed armor for 14 hours on set?
These are possibilities that can only come to life through experiences.
Limitations are predictable
If understanding materials is the prerequisite, then it becomes essential to know which AM technologies unlock which material properties but also when and where each should be used.
While the Superman production spotlighted FDM (Fused Deposition Modeling) as the backbone of on-set flexibility, Lopes emphasizes the potential of color 3D printing and DLS and resin-based systems.
Color 3D printing technologies (whether PolyJet or similar multi-material systems) excel at one thing: producing parts that are visually indistinguishable from their real-world counterparts in color, texture, and finish. This makes them ideal for figurines, art collectibles, display pieces, and hero props where durability across multiple takes isn’t the constraint.
But here’s where Lopes is blunt: “Color is a different beast. At the end of the day, the color technology materials are not engineering materials. They’re still more in that prototype, fragile type of world.”
For the expert, this means one should be aware of the fact that the limitations are predictable. “If you drop a porcelain figure, it’s going to break. Same thing works in the color world. It’s more forgiving in that,” he explains, because audiences and producers expect fragile objects to be, well, fragile.
The key here is to ask the right questions: does this part need to perform? A 3D-printed collectible figurine or a hero prop that appears on screen once? Color 3D printing is your answer. A flexible suit that a stunt performer wears for 12 takes in a single day? Color 3D printing will disappoint.
Digital Light Synthesis (DLS) and similar resin-based technologies on the other hand, can process elastomers and flexible polymers engineered for performance: materials that cycle thousands of times without tearing, that resist chemicals, that maintain soft-touch properties under stress.
“DLS and resin-based can really drive across in a major, major impactful way,” Lopes says. These technologies unlock what color cannot: durability, engineering performance, and true end-use capability. A flexible animatronic skin or an armor piece that endures multiple takes. In a nutshell, a costume component subjected to real production stress.
The trade-off here is aesthetic finish. Resin-printed parts typically require post-processing to achieve the visual polish that color printing delivers out of the chamber but the performance gains are worth it.
This explanation refocuses the debate on the application’s actual demands and reinforces the value of a material‑first approach:
“The best way to really get success is to look at it from a material standpoint that supports what the application needs,” Lopes says. “Then it tells me what technologies can support those materials I’m trying to use.“
The magic lies in creative possibilities
When AM enters a production environment, we usually measure its value in time saved and costs reduced. The film industry operates on a different logic: schedules are unforgiving, directors change their minds, last‑minute requests are routine, and budgets shift overnight. Everything moves fast.
“AM keeps us relevant,” Lopes says. “Clients change direction fast, deadlines are crazy. You can’t do that in an analog world. But with a digital‑physical workflow, you can take feedback, update the design, and put a new tangible iteration in front of someone very quickly.”
The real value remains the ability to say “yes” to creative possibilities that traditional timelines would force you to refuse.
Compared with sectors like aerospace, healthcare, automotive, or energy, the film industry has had one of the shortest and fastest learning curves for additive manufacturing (AM).
Unlike regulated industries, filmmakers were never trying to prove that a part could survive for 30 years or pass FAA or FDA certification. They simply needed a prop, costume, miniature, or puppet to look convincing, be produced quickly, be modified overnight if needed, or fit within a production schedule.
Lopes sees in the learning curve of that industry two very different mindsets:
“From a studio perspective, adoption has been more of a maker adoption. Everyone knows what a 3D printer can produce, and it solves that problem. But from a true manufacturing end-use perspective, there’s still a long way to go.”
In Europe, he has observed something different: Stop-motion studios (particularly in the UK and other European markets) have integrated AM as a foundational tool more deeply than most US narrative film producers.
“If you look at stop-motion studios, they’ve adopted this understanding that this is part of the backbone of how work gets done today,” he says. “Yes, we’re going to have that hybrid workflow of using hands and technology, but by default, we wouldn’t be able to do the things you see today without having AM/3D printing as part of that mindset.”
That said, Lopes is now focused on what he calls “production mindset” for color workflows, specifically, driving down material costs to enable higher-volume production.
“One of the biggest barriers is the cost of material,” he acknowledges. “When you compare the cost of materials to traditional plastics, there’s a reason prices are what they are for things. When AM comes in with exotic materials that are much more costly than traditional materials, it keeps it hard to do high-volume production for the common purchaser.”
Looking forward…
As Lopes builds his consulting practice, his mission is clear: bring together practitioners who understand the barriers holding back color printing in entertainment and work with vendors to address them.
For an industry that has evolved from hand-sculpting everything to leveraging the full potential of material science and digital fabrication, the next chapter seems exciting as it already involves a much richer set of tools, and a much deeper understanding of why those tools work.
With Lopes part of that transformation, I can’t wait to see how his perspective shapes the next wave of color printing applications in entertainment.
*Lopes’ words have been edited for brevity and clarity. Disclaimer: This interview was conducted before Lopes joined DyeMansion. It was first published in the summer edition of 3D ADEPT Mag.
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