Candle Stand

Intention

My room in my apartment is fairly big and feels a little empty. So, I've always wanted to add some art pieces. Since, I am just a student and am already spending enough on my tuition, I thought this would be great chance to fill that void. And since I like lighting candles and my family and friends back home were celebrating an Indian festival, called Diwali - the festival of lights, a candle holder seemed like a good idea. 

Moreover, a lot of furniture in my room is white so a candle holder in white PLA would go well with the theme. 

Context

I looked online for inspiration and drew a preliminary sketch of what I had in mind. 

Below are images that inspired me and the sketch I used as a reference for my work in Fusion360.

Process

I began with trying to replicate my hand-drawn design on Fusion360. I used 2D drawing tools to make the base circles and then extruded them. I used the cylinder tool for drawing the body of the candle stand. Then, extruded a cylinder in the middle to make it hollow. 

The leaves/petals on the sides were the tricky part. I first drew them with the spline tool and then, in the Sculpt mode, I raised the sides. And lastly, I used the circular pattern tool to copy the petals and then created another line of petals under the first line. 

I was scared about how the petals will turn out because they were at an angle and had curvature. NVBots didn't seem to think that supports were needed so I went along with that and let it print. 

I scraped the petals with sand paper to make it relatively more even.

Below are images of the completed stand in Fusion360, an STL of the same, and a time-lapse of it printing which looks pretty cool! 

Product

The product is a candle stand with petals/leaves at the top. Below are images of the same. 

The irregularities on the petals ended up looking nicer than I thought. They added a realistic texture. 

Reflection

It was easier to work with Fusion360 after having used it for Project 1 because I felt more familiar with it. 

If I had more time, I would've made a pair of candle stands, each of different width and height. 

Collaboration or Attribution 

I would like to thank: 

1. My friend, Tanushree Mediratta who helped me with the ideation! 

2. Alex Thompson, who helped me design the petals on Fusion360!

3. And Professor Larson for all the help throughout!