Staples Announces 3D Printing for Consumers

Staples has just announced that customers will now be able to print 3-D projects at its stores. The service, “Staples Easy 3D,” works like this: customers upload their designs to the Staples website and then pick up their printed projects at the store or have the store mail them to their home or office.

Mcor Technologies, the 3-D printer manufacturer that is providing its new Iris Printers for Staples’ service, announced the Staples partnership at Euromold 2012, a premiere design and mold-making trade show in Germany. According to CNN, these printers “employ an innovative method to generate objects, using reams of paper that are cut and printed while being stacked and glued together. This technique allows for a high-resolution layer thickness of 100 microns, similar to that of the MakerBot Replicator 2, but not quite as fine as the 25-micron capability of the Form 1.”

Don’t worry if that goes over your head, it sounds like a lot of mumbo jumbo to me, too. All you need to know is that these printers are crazy innovative and will make your projects look amazing, including offering photorealistic coloring that most printers cannot offer.

The service will premiere in the Netherlands and Belgium and then make its move to other countries. Staples has yet to release information about the cost of the service or word on when it will be available in the U.S.