- 3dprintinghelp
Custom Disney Christmas Ornament
Updated: Dec 9, 2021
Using tinkercad, modify a Mickey Cookie Cutter into a customer Christmas Ornament. Quickly and easily create your own Custom Christmas Ornaments this way - just in time for Christmas!
When I got my first printer, the Creality Ender 3, one of the first things my wife asked me to print for her were custom Christmas ornaments with our kids' names on them. Since we are a Disney household, I immediately wanted a Mickey head with their names in it.
I started with a Mickey Cookie Cutter design, imported it into tinkercad, and first made one with just their names. I wanted it to be more interesting, so found different snowflake files and added those to the design.
TIP I made a blank that is available in thingiverse for this design. You can download that and open it in tinkercad, then just add the name!
So, how did I do it?
Setup tinkcad
First, find yourself a cookie-cutter design you like. I love to browse thingiverse for great free files to use for projects.
Once you have your cookie cutter file, you need to open tinkercad and click on Start Tinkering.
If you already have a tinkercad account, skip to here
You will need to create a free account. Click on Create a personal account
You'll have the option to sign up with email, creating a new account using your email address, or linking to Google or Apple. Choose what is best for you.
Once you have signed in, click on Create new design
This is the main page for a new project. You already have your cookie-cutter, so we need to import it so we can start tinkering. Click on the Import button and select your file to open in the Workplane.
Play around with scrolling your mouse wheel and using the directional cube at the top left of the page to see different angles of the object you imported. You can click and hold the cube and move your mouse around to free fly around your file. You can also click on the cube to move around to a specific view.
Change Ornament Size
What we want to determine first is the size of the ornament. It's important to remember that tinkercad uses millimeters when displaying measurements, so you may need to convert the measurements.
TIP Keep your print bed size in mind. You do not want to have an ornament too big to print
TIP One inch is 25.4 millimeters. Just open Google and have it do the conversion for you
To get a good overview of the size, I click on the cube to view the Top of the object. Next, I click on the object to select if you mouse over the white box in the corner, it will give you the length and width of the object.
My object is 99x116.25mm or 3.89x4.57in.
I like to have a tape measure or ruler around to help visualize the actual size.
We also need to know how tall the object is. To do this, choose the Front view and mouse over the middle square to display the height.
Mine is 21.50mm which is .84 inches.
Think about what size you want your ornament to be and jot it down for future reference.
TIP It's helpful if you need a visual to cut out a piece of paper in the size you are thinking about.
I chose to use 6mm for height (how thick it will be), 99 for length and keeping 116.25 for width.
Since we are already on the Front view, click on the white square for the height, then click on the box displaying the number. You can then type in the exact measurement you want, then press Enter.
Next, go back to Top view and click on the white square in the corner. Click on the length, type in your measurement, and hit enter. Repeat with the width.
Depending on your design, your measurements may have "squished" the object. Tweak your measurements as needed to get something you like.
Add Name
Now you need to add the name. To do this, click and drag the Text shape onto the Workplane, ideally below the object.
In the pop-up for the shape, change the Text to the name you are using.
Now you need to resize the name to fit how you would like it in the ornament. I suggest the height of the name be just slightly smaller than the ornament height. In my example, my ornament is 6mm, so the name will be 5.58mm. This allows for the top of the print to always be Mickey's face.
You can use the sliders in the Text box to adjust the Name object, or you can do what you did for the cookie-cutter object by clicking on the Name object and then clicking on the white boxes to adjust the measurements. I prefer to manually adjust the settings directly on the object and not using the sliders.
Next, can click and drag the Name to position it inside the cookie-cutter object. You may need to adjust the length of the name to fit cleanly inside and still be legible. In my example, I do not want the Name to touch the Mickey head, so I adjusted the length and moved it to where it looks centered to me.
TIP You can change the font by following the steps in this video on YouTube
TIP Make sure you are not pulling the Name object off the Workplane, creating a gap between the bottom and the top. If you do this, then the Name is "floating" and you will cause issues when printing.
Add Bars for Name
Next, we have to have something for the letters to rest on. I used a bar for the top and bottom and made sure the letters were touching both bars. You may choose to use a script font where the letters are all connected and just make sure the left and right sides of the name are touching the side of the object.
Remember, when printing, everything needs connected so it is one piece, and not separate parts you have to connect later.
The bars are simply a Box. Click and drag the Box shape to the Workplane. We'll do the bottom box first, so I dropped this under the name.
Adjust the box size to fit the length and width under the name.
If you have been using my measurements, for the bottom box I am using 2mm for the width, 67mm for the length, and 5.50 for the height. The height is actually smaller than the letters in the name so that the letters are slightly raised above the bar. It gives a good visual and ensures the letters aren't "hidden" by the bar when printed.
Now you have to drag the bar into position. The box will have to touch the letters and the ends of the box will actually be inside the cookie-cutter a bit. You can click on the bar and use your arrow keys to make fine adjustments. I suggest using the directional cube to rotate around the design to make sure everything looks good.
You could stop here if you wanted. I am moving forward with adding the top bar to make sure the letters are more stable.
Add the top bar just like you did at the bottom. If you have been using my measurements, the top bar is slightly longer, so it will be 2mm wide, 69mm long, and 5.50 high.
Just like the bottom bar, position the top bar so it touches the letters and the ends are inside the cookie-cutter shape.
Give it a good look through, front, back, sides, and the back and make sure none of the bars are sticking out where they shouldn't and that everything looks good.
This is another stopping point if you are happy with this.
Adding a Hanger Hole
You won't really need a hole for a hanger to go through. If you want to add one, it's pretty easy.
Adjust the view to the Top view. Click and drag the Round Roof shape to the Workplane. Place it between the ears.
Adjust this shape just like you have the others, however, make sure the height of this shape is the same as the height of the cookie-cutter. In this example, I am using 9mm width, 17mm length, and 6mm.
Now we have to rotate the shape and position it so it lays between the ears.
To rotate, have the shape selected by clicking on it. Then use the directional cube to change to the Left perspective. You should see rotation arrows for the shape. Click on those arrows and type in the rotation. I used 90 degrees
When the rounded roof shape is flat, go back to the Top view and click on the shape to select it, and use the arrow keys to move it into place between the ears. Make sure the bottom of the roof sits inside the cookie-cutter itself. Use the directional cube to go around and check for how it looks on the bottom and make any adjustments.
Now we need to add the hole for the hanger to go through. This is done with the Cylinder Hole shape. Click and drag the Cylinder to the Workplace, above the round roof shape we just added. Adjust the size as you have already done and make it 4mmx4mm. Leave the height at default.
Now adjust the Cylinder so it is centered.
Now we have to move the Cylinder so it goes all the way through the object. To make this easier, adjust the directional cube so it is on the Back.
Next, select the Cylinder by clicking on it. You should see a solid black cone above the Cylinder. Click on and drag down until you see part of the Cylinder sticking out from the bottom.
Next, use the directional cube to make sure everything is still in the correct place.
That's it. Since this is a Hole shape, when you save the entire object, there will be a hole cut out of the rounded roof object.
You don't need the rounded roof shape if the object is thick enough for the hole and you want one. Just use the Box or Cylinder Hole shapes and adjust as needed.
This is another good stopping point, but I wanted to add more flair, so I added snowflakes to mine.
Adding Snowflakes
The process for this is almost the same as what you have already done.
Go to thingiverse again and find however many snowflakes you want to add. Make sure they are not too thin or detailed or they may not print out correctly.
In tinkercad, click on Import and browse to your first snowflake file and add it.
You can give yourself some creative license here and make them thinner than the cookie-cutter shape you are using, or you can make them taller. Just make sure they are always touching the Workplane and are not "floating" and make sure that there is always part of the snowflake touching the cookie-cutter. Remember you want it to print as one piece.
TIP You can hold the shift key while dragging the white square to keep adjust everything by scale. It will keep the snowflake from becoming a weird shape while making adjustments
Add snowflakes until you are happy.
When done, click on Export and choose the .obj file or .stl file. Your slicer should be able to open either one. I suggest adding a screenshot of the file you made so you can add it to the folder you are saving to.
Now you have a template you can use. Just change up the Name and you are good to go!
You can use this same process for any cookie-cutter type of design. Think dog bones and adding a dog's name to it. A house with a year in it. The sky's the limit for you!
I used eSun Cool White filament eSun Silk Gold for these prints.
Check out how to use LuBan to make really incredible one-of-a-kind gifts. You can do some great things with Extrusion and Boxes.
Come back often for new tutorials! Happy printing!