3D company promises your baby will be a doll

Jan. 17, 2014 5:49 PM PT

Forget bellycasting or that barefoot glamour photo shoot on the beach to commemorate your pregnancy. And who needs a cast of tiny post-natal footprints?

Now you can print your fetus into a figurine.

“Imagine holding your baby before he or she is born,” reads the website of 3D Babies, a company that promises to bring your not-yet-fully-formed baby to life.

The process is simple enough. 3D Babies takes your 3D or 4D sonograms, tweaks them a bit digitally and then renders that tiny growing cherub into a plastic doll via 3D printing.

The babies come in three sizes -- an 8-inch life-size, a 4-inch half-size and a 2-inch mini -- with a choice of three shades: light, medium or dark. And you can have the prenatal doll made with the gender apparent or obscured.

“This is a great way to share the excitement of your new baby with family and friends,” the company website extols.

Indeed, if you really want to stand out -- or freak out your girlfriend -- at a baby shower, present the as-yet unborn baby in a box to your friend, all snuggled in satin. It’d certainly be the gift that’s most talked about.

Who comes up with stuff like this? Nostalgic parents.

Company founders Gerard and Katie Bessette themselves have two toddler girls and explain in their summary on an Indiegogo crowdfunding page that the idea of printing prenatal dolls came from “an attempt to hold on to those memories ... of what our baby looked like at that time.”

The couple’s effort to raise $15,000 by the end of last November to purchase a Stratasys U-Print SE Plus 3D printer wasn’t quite borne out. They raised only $1,225.

Just how much will your 3D baby cost? A mere $200 (for a mini) to $600 (for a life-size). Also, for those next-level Kimye fans out there, you could get a doll of their darling daughter, North West, for $250.

As precious as this might sound, we’re still partial to 3D printing in chocolate.

What say you? Is the fetal figurine creepy or creative? Tell us in the comments below.

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Twitter: @mmaltaisLAT