3D Print Yourself

Before there were cameras, people commissioned artists to create paintings or sculptures of themselves to give as gifts or to be displayed in their own homes. Today, you are hard-pressed to find a home without a deluge of pictures of the residents, or smartphone users shooting "selfies."

TwinKinds, a German startup, is taking this to a whole new level by offering customers miniature statues of themselves or their pets that are easy to display anywhere (you just can't put them in your wallet). The figurines are produced by using a full-body 3D scanner that takes an image of customer. Once the image is taken, it is then ready for printing in around 30 minutes (image file conversion), after which a 3D printer (it's unknown at this time which 3D printer is used) laser-sinters a composite powder layer by layer into the final product.

The reproduction of "you" is strikingly eerie in detail; everything is reproduced, from hairstyles, to the wrinkles in clothing, to colors. Customers can choose between several sizes of their figurines ranging from 6 inches ($300 US) to 13 inches ($1,700 US).

Sadly, customers need to be at the company's headquarters in Germany in order to be scanned for their "mini-me," and the figures themselves are highly delicate and can be damaged if they come in contact with high heat, water, or even when dropped.

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