Ultimaker Cura 4.5
Ultimaker has launched the web based Ultimaker Marketplace which allows users of its 3D printing technology to directly integrate other CAD tools into its Cura slicing software.
The desktop 3D printing vendor has also released the latest version of Cura (4.5) with additional features and revealed record usership figures. Its open-source slicing software platform has more than 600,000 active users per month and was used last year to prepare around 2 million print jobs per week – twice as much than in 2018.
With the application of its 3D printing technology increasing at such a rate, Ultimaker has sought to advance the capabilities of its products. Last year saw the introduction of the Ultimaker S5 Pro Bundle and S3 platform, and the company has followed that up with a number of new software features.
Greater integration capabilities will allow users to move more freely through the design and modelling process, while the number of third party material profiles has grown to 110 to give users more options again. New cloud functionality associates the selected plugins and optimised printing profiles directly with the users account after logging in online so setting remain synchronised even if the user accesses their account on another workstation. Other new features include ‘fuzzy skin outside only’, which prevents fuzzy skin being printing inside holes; ‘brim distance’, which enables gaps to be defined between the brim and the model to ensure easier brim removal; and ‘skin edge support’, which makes it possible to add an extra line inside the infill to better support the edge of a print’s skin.
“Ultimaker Cura is continuously powered by its open source community and dedicated in-house software team. We see our user database is rapidly expanding every day with new students, makers and professional users,” commented Dick Moerkens, CTO at Ultimaker. “Where one user is more eager to manually tweak and test every setting available, others want to fully integrate 3D printing into existing workflows. I am proud of our open approach and agile development strategy, which allows us to fully streamline and simplify the 3D printing workflow now and in the future.”
