Hi there.
With the rise of people owning laser cutters, and having just got one myself, I’ve been on the hunt for software to create layered Mandalas. The internet offers you loads of suggestions, all of which point you at sites where you can download svg files of some amazing designs, but I don’t want to download designs, I want to create them.
It struck me while I was faffing around ineptly with Corel Draw, Blender would be great at this. Create your model or 3D geometric designs, then add a modifier to cut the model into layers and straiten all the upright edges.
I’ve searched and searched, but there doesn’t appear to be a simple solution for this. However there is the modifier (I forget the name) that turns your model into a minecraft type result, this is close to what would be required, just works with the verts in a slightly different way. You wans smooth rounded edges as you look ‘down’ at the model, but the sides and top/bottom of each layer needs to be one flat face. Then you’d need to export each layer to something else to get a dfx or svg, but that’s preatty much a manual process with any other software I’ve designed with.
I know this isn’t really what Blender is for, but part of Blenders power is modelling for 3D printing, this is just an extension of that, surely? In my head it is.
If this already exists please let me know, or if any people out there with blender/python knowledge would like to have a stab at it…?
Please let me know.
Many thanks.