The Friendly Bookworm: a playful bookend with a "Worms" creature

Update: 4/16/23

Added a single color 3MF for the worm body with seam painted already and support blocker for people using OrcaSlicer/Bambu Slicer.

Update: 4/11/23

Updated model and added better printing approaches and instructions.

Update 2:  Better suggested multi-material orientation, see comments below!

Update 3:  Added a merged worm for single-color printing of the worm separately from the bookend parts.  Reworded instructions and file names to be more clear.

The bookend contest mentioned bookworms, but I was sad not to see any, particularly not my favorite worm, from the Worms Series.

As a kid of the 90s' I fondly remember this critter gleefully blasting my way through digital landscapes.  It occurred to me that this happy little mascot would be a great bookworm, too!

Depending on your multi-color printing capabilities there are a few different ways to print this one, and I've tried to cater to as many people as possible who may not have multi-color printing in order to enable everyone to enjoy the little guy.

Printing - General

• Only a little bit of support is needed for the upper lip for the front model.  The tail model is designed to not need support.  
• For the front model auto generated tree-supports should work if you're printing in the recommended approach (see pictures).  If you print in the all-in-one, you might have to fiddle with the supports a little. In the upright worm print orientation, using a support blocker on the inside of the mouth area can be useful to avoid tree supports inside the mouth.
• Painting the seam on the back of the worm is a good idea, makes it look nicer.

Splitting the bookend body from the worm (recommended method )

• This is the method I used with my Bambu X1 + 4-color AMS, so that the bookcase is a different color from the worm body and all the other parts (5 colors total).
• This is also for people who want to print the worm + tail in one flesh tone color and the bookcase in another and to just paint the worm eyes, brow, tongue details.  This option is probably best for people without multi-color printing.  
•  
• Print the following files:
  •  BookWorm_Split_TailSideBase +  BookWorm_Split_Tail
  • BookWorm_Split_BodySideBase + BookWorm_Split_BodySingleColor
  •  
  • Note: If printing the worm multi color, use: BookWorm_Split_Body instead of BookWorm_Split_BodySingleColor .  This will let you easily color the parts in the slicer.

Assembling split-piece prints:

1. Print each part (see above).
2. Glue parts in place with glue of your choice.

Multi-color printing the worm:

• If you choose to multi-color print the worm instead of painting it, this note is for you.
• After printing the worm vertically myself in 4 colors as shown in the gallery above, and getting annoyed it took so long and wasted filament, it dawned on me that I should've printed him sideways, which leads to many less filament changes and a much shorter time to print (like ½ the time !).  Don't make the mistake I made of printing him vertically.. and instead print him like this:
• 
• Mixed-mode printing suggestion:  The black filament I used bled into the lighter colors (beige, and white in particular) where there was overlap when printing.  Maybe print the small black parts (eyes and brows) separately on a raft and glue them in place, instead (another.. yea.. that would've been smarter learning lesson).  Doing it this way should produce a lot less waste and should be faster.
• Alternative:  Print the Eyes and brows in the base worm beige color and simply color them in with a black sharpie carefully.  Since sharpies come in black commonly and apply well against light backgrounds, this may save you the hassle I made for myself.
•  

All-in-one Prints  (special cases)

• For people who can handle printing everything (including the bookend parts) in one color and painting it, OR who have 5-color printing capability and want to assign colors in their slicer, I've provided all-in-one models (2x 3MF and a single big STEP).  
• Printing in one go offers the advantage of having the worm help support one of the bookends more structurally than separate assembly.
• Simply print each of the all-in-one files and color it (or not) to your liking. 
• Print the following files:
  •  BookWorm_Front
  • BookWorm_BackTail

Other Notes

• When loading the single 3MFs into your slicer, you should click “yes” if you get a dialog like this, otherwise the parts may become dissociated from one another in space and won't print right   .

P.S.  I redesigned/remixed the fanart worm someone else made (thanks for the model!) in Fusion 360.  I'm generally not great at organic shapes yet, and I struggled mightily just to get the tail to curl and the eyes to work out right.  I probably should learn Blender one day..