New digital aesthetics of AM metallic products as visually perceived by participants

In the infancy of industrial metallic products obtained with additive processes, functional requirements (i.e. mechanical, thermal, tribological, biomedical functions) or quality specifications (i.e. tolerances, roughness, porosity, hardness) seem predominant in respect to formal and aesthetic aspects. However, this dichotomy is artificial and it prevents the exploitation of all possibilities given by these new processes. The freedom of designing complex 3D features, thin walls, intricate lattice or low density structures and the peculiar surface texture together with the variability given by the different metallic alloys as well as by different range of process parameters gives birth to a new aesthetic in terms of shape, surface and materials. The aim of the paper is to investigate how the users perceive this new aesthetic when they interact with a provocative icon, representative of the design freedom and new shapes enabled throughout Selective Laser Melting process. In particular, a basic shape was chosen as icon, namely the egg. The egg shape was selected because it is axial-symmetric, it avoids personal judgement and it is a self- supporting structure. Twelve variations of the primitive egg shape were designed and SLM printed in maraging steel. These twelve variations enable to experimentally test how the new shapes are perceived by the users who took part to a qualitative and participatory survey. The survey was preliminary designed and then refined after two large pilots that involved two different populations: expert of processes and application of metals (at the international BI.MU fair) and high students and family (at the MeetMeTonight event, researchers’ night). The analysis of the user’s answers puts in evidence that few adjectives synthetize the character of the new aesthetics because a strong correlation between the attributes is present. Moreover, lattice structures together with complex and technological shapes are the characteristics that best represent the potentiality of this new technology.