Editing Casting (section)

== The future - 3D printing, Casting and Augmented Reality integration ==

Although we are only starting to see the floodgates of 3D printing open, we may as well play a bit and imagine/guess at what the future might hold for the mini production and the hobby in general.

It is reasonable to expect that printing will become more and more sophisticated as time goes on, eventually exceeding the capabilities of GW's artists while also becoming more available to the average fa/tg/uys and ca/tg/irls, leading to the complete or near-complete annihilation of GW's and others' grip on the minis market. Official competitions and tournaments may still represent some holdout of the old guard, but realistically we can expect ''garage competitions'' popping up all over as the hobby becomes more and more available due to price drop. I will even dare and put out a year - 2030 by which official minis will be a minority in the overall community (though judging how far we've come from 2016-2021 i wouldn't be surprised if there are significant upheavals by 2025). 

'''UPDATE''' 8k Resolution printing is now at the beginning of being commercially available, providing 3d prints that seemingly can out-detail traditional casting/injection moulding in the same way plastic outmoded Traditional Metal models. The technology of 3d printing already could produce better results than GW, and it's only going to get higher and higher in quality.

Casting will probably never go away, if only due to the fact that some people may prefer it as an artistic expression, kinda like modern smiths are 90%+ hobbyists who simply enjoy doing it. One area where they may still remain relevant in terms of needing-over-wanting to do something is casting metal. Printing with precision while using molten metal will likely be ways-off, probably until we figure out molecular or atomic manipulation on a massive scale (assembling thousands and millions of them in the span of minutes). It is possible that high-power & precision lasers may just be able to melt small pellets and assemble them in place to produce metal minis, though having a device with such energy output for home use may be a bit problematic in terms of safety, let alone energy consumption.

Lastly, while during the last few decades the technology of casting has focused on better materials and more detail with less errors like flashes and spruces, we may see integration of electronics to a certain degree into the minis themselves. This is to facilitate better AR capabilities. What does that mean?
Imagine putting on glasses or lenses and suddenly seeing health bars, range and targeting lines and other info you were looking at on sheets just pop up like a hud in your field of view. Tiny microchips in the minis or their base would allow whatever software you are running to able to tell what is infantry, vehicle, flyer and to display all the relevant data for it. (see this for a rough example - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IGtrJaiUZaA).

Overall, the immediate benefits to mini production will come from 3D printing while as time goes on we will likely see a merging effect of digital and analogue. The future looks bright.