CNC mills are most-commonly found in industrial manufacturing settings, but they have plenty of useful applications in the art world as well. From engraving to furniture making, artisans have found all sorts of creative uses for CNC machines in the past.
Take the award-winning Indian sculpture artist and designer Ruchika Grover, for example. This artist employs a unique combination of CAD techniques and hand craftsmanship to reproduce detailed organic structures like the veins of a leaf in stone.
Grover typically starts by studying organic textures and illustrating them on paper. Once sheās mapped out these complex forms on paper, she uses computer-aided modeling software to develop digital prototypes of her designs. During this prototyping phase, she also considers which materials ā such as marble, granite and limestone ā will work best for her design. Finally, the designās dimensions are translated into CAD instructions for a CNC mill that uses diamond and carbide-tipped cutting tools to shape the stone.
Each of these designs can take days of milling time to complete. After the milling process is done, Grover spends many more hours finishing the pieces by hand. Itās a truly impressive artistic endeavor that illustrates the remarkable power and precision of CNC machining. You can get a behind-the-scenes look at Groverās work in the video below.
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