Ben Raynes’ 3D Printed ‘Landscapes In Motion’ Are Incredible Moving Paintings

I once had an art professor tell me that the best kind of art is the kind that has never been done before. He was a major proponent of originality and graded works based on how far from the standard they could stray. While I don’t exactly agree with this man’s assessment, as I’ve seen plenty of art that has been amazing, yet refused to stray from the ordinary, he was certainly onto something. Think about all of the art you have seen, and then think about all of those works which were completely independent of any other art works you’ve seen in the past. These pieces probably stood out and grabbed your attention. This is exactly what one artist, named Ben Raynes has done with his works of art that he refers to as “Landscapes In Motion”.

Raynes is a commercial producer, trained to think of things in terms of movement, so it would be expected that his paintings also would somehow try and include a sort of movement within them.

“My static watercolor paintings wouldn’t give me the motion I wanted to convey,” Raynes tells 3DPrint.com. “I had the idea of making gears to create small, moving scenes. My paintings are, to me, a boiled down depiction of a simple film scene. Adding actual movement to landscapes provided a way to create a humorous departure from my digital world. I still love analogue!”

Raynes ended up finding a solution for creating these animated paintings by utilizing a technology many of us have recently become familiar with — 3D printing.

Raynes’ paintings include scenery such as boats sailing in the water, athletes playing a game of soccer, and traffic driving around the Arc de Triomphe in Paris. All of these scenes were made possible thanks to 3D printing.

“I created a simple gearing system with the help of a colleague, and printed them with a MakerBot,” Raynes tells us. “Next, I paint the backgrounds, middle and foregrounds, as well as any moving objects. Then after I set the gear mechanisms in place within the frame, I add the painted scenes.”

Usually it take just one or two hours of print time to fabricate all of the gears necessary for each of Raynes’ ‘Landscapes In Motion’ creations. The Boston, MA resident typically gives his creations away as gifts, but he has recently considered selling them. His current favorites that he’s created so far are: “Arc de Triomphe”, “Boston”, and “Cartegena”. Surely he will be creating more in the near future as well.

What do you think about these amazing works of art, that are made possible by a very talented artist who has found a way to utilize 3D printing to create art which is completely unique in nature. Discuss in the “Landscapes In Motion” forum thread on 3DPB.com. Check out some more of Raynes’ incredible creations below.