An innovative little design from a California based start up should be music to the ears of anyone who has ever faced the frustration of earphones popping out of their ears whilst at the gym, walking to work or just plain sitting still.
As with most new things, 3D printing is a great way of providing a solution to the little problems we face in our everyday life. Step in OwnPhones, the world’s first 3D printed wireless earbuds that are custom fitted to your ears using 3D scanning technology.
The project is currently featured on Kickstarter with the campaign set to close on August 25th. The goal is to fundraise $250,000 in order to put the design into development with a proposed release date of March 2015.
OwnPhones are custom made using a specially developed mobile app which produces a short video scan of the user’s ears. OwnPhones servers will then convert the video to 3D data to produce a custom fitted model. Customers can then choose from over 10,000 combinations of designs to personalise their headphones to fit their individual taste.
The earbuds are then 3D printed using a range of materials that are also tailored exclusively to the individual’s preferences. There are four types of design to choose from including OwnPhone’s Fit, Designer Fit, Smart Fit and Jewellery Collection.
Even the sound quality benefits from the use of 3D printing as the design is so well fitted to each ear that they can be used to block outside noise. Users will also benefit from Real World Notifications, an alert system on the OwnPhone app which notifies the user to particular noises
Backers can pledge anything upwards of $1 with several benefits on offer for various pledge packages. The lowest package will secure customers with their own custom fit earbuds for just half of the $299 retail value.
With ideas like this popping up ever more frequently, it is clear that 3D printing offers real value in comparison to the one-size-fits-all mass produced market by offering people tailored products that are designed and produced to fit their needs.
