027·October 2026 – ongoing

Projector

A 3D-printed, hackable 16mm film projector

Physical space3D printingprojectionmachines

Can a 16mm projector for live loop shows be built from printed and bought parts, and played like an instrument?

27 Oct – 4 Nov 2026

How it got here

Working views from the CAD sessions, in order: block mock-ups at real 16mm sizes (reels as well as loops, decided 27 Oct); every part its own solid, exploded off a plywood plate; a plywood box, later left behind; then aluminium extrusion and printed parts, so that people without a laser cutter or CNC can make it; an assembly sequence; the light's lens cartridge; the film's whole route.

Nothing is printed yet: these are screens, not photos.

October 2026 – ongoing

A 3D-printed, hackable 16mm film projector, for live loop projection: film running in endless loops through several projectors, played by hand. The inspiration is Karl Lemieux's live loop projections.

I am designing all of it from scratch, the intermittent movement included. Three stepper motors feed the film, pull each frame down through the gate, and hold it back. The frame is aluminium rail and 3D-printed joints, with cards that slide out for service: cyan for the frame, teal near the heat, black where it touches film. An LED replaces the lamp, and its flicker, 48 to 72 times a second, is a control to play.

It is played from a bank of knobs through TouchDesigner, and made to be hacked: documented commands, mounting points, free pins and files anyone can edit.

So far it lives in CAD: 31 rounds between 28 October and 4 November 2026. The pictures are renders of the latest round; nothing is printed yet.

Next is phase 1, the frame and the motors: test prints at Precursor Lab, one frame measured, three motors turning together, film through it. Phase 2 is the light and the lenses, to a first picture on a screen. Phase 3 refines it: reels, guards, the loop's return, then several machines played together, and the files shared for others to build and hack.

A render of the 16mm projector: cyan printed parts on aluminium rails, teal parts round the light and the gate, black sprockets, an amber strip of film threaded through, and a black lens pointing out to the right.

A side drawing of the projector in cyan and teal lines. The film's path, in brown, runs from the feed sprocket at the top right, through the gate in the middle, to the holdback sprocket at the bottom right; the lens points right.

Close-up render of the gate: two black plates hold the amber film in front of the light; the black sprocket below pulls it down a frame at a time; the lens mount in teal and the lens in black.

Render of the projector with an endless loop of film: it leaves at the bottom, hangs in a long U, and climbs back over two rollers to the top. The return path is a placeholder, not yet designed.

Render from behind: three black stepper motors in teal seats, the top and bottom ones on cyan cards, the middle one on an aluminium upright; the lens points left.

Render from the light's end: the LED's grey heat sink and black fan on a teal carriage that slides into the frame, with the film path and sprockets beyond it.

My red-pen sketch: two rails and crossing triangles holding two reels, with the lens on an arm; below it, an A-shaped frame on a base.

Nine CAD pictures in date order, 28 October to 4 November 2026: a boxy first frame, lime printed corners on aluminium, an A-frame with three motors, a version with two big reels, and the cyan-and-teal machine of the latest round.

A CAD view, 27 Oct: grey block models of four projectors side by side, two with tall loop towers and two with large reels

A CAD view, 28 Oct: an exploded view, blue sprockets, small brackets and the gate block float off an L of perforated plywood, with blue guards and clear panels beside it

A CAD view, 28 Oct: the plywood-box version, later left behind, seen from the back: a knob on a small panel, sockets at the bottom, and the film running over two posts on top and down the side

A CAD view, 28 Oct: the turn to aluminium extrusion, a frame with a diagonal brace, perforated grey plates and three black motors inside; the film runs over two posts on top

A CAD view, 30 Oct: four steps of assembling an earlier frame, lime printed joints and teal seats sliding onto aluminium rails

A CAD view, 2 Nov: an exploded view of the light's lens cartridge, a teal housing with two black thumbscrews, a teal insert, a glass lens and a ring; untested

A CAD view, 4 Nov: the projector from the side with the film's whole route in orange, out of the bottom, down in a long U and back over the top; the external loop remains a reference

Projector

How it got here

Hand-made and high-tech

Played, not cued