Hi Lynn,

i used the printing service Shapeways in 2009. They were relatively new at that time, but it was a nice experience. The costs for printing at that time were affordable and the quality was ok. The model i used for printing was prepared back then in modo and saved from Shade as VRML file, because Shade had at this time no official .stl export besides the e frontier plug-in. The advantage with Shade export was that the file size was much smaller than .stl and that, if i remember correctly, color prints are supported too with VRLM. If i would use a printing service again today, i would choose PD models in the U.K., because of their higher printing resolution (16 microns) , suitable for master figurine productions, etc. http://www.pdmodels.co.uk

Best regards
Stefan

A long-time cartoonist friend modeled his main character, "Rachel Racoon", and had it printed at our Edmonton Public Library. Very inexpensive, and he was extremely happy with the experience. All you need is the file and a library card. Of course, this is not much use if you don't live here.