One nitpick - metal vapour deposition, when done in-situ through a moveable shadow mask, certainly is 3D printing. One can dynamically &quot;draw&quot; out structures having controlled variable-height profiles inside the vacuum chamber during the evaporation process by altering the position (and thus speed) of the moving shadow mask.<p>This method is quite different from the &quot;ordinary&quot; metallic vapour deposition process you&#x27;re referring to that uses a simple fixed-position mask, usually photoresist that is baked right onto the silicon wafer.<p>Eg, here is my research paper from 8 yrs ago demonstrating nanoscale-level dynamic stencil deposition using a  nanopore in a suspended silicon nitride membrane shadow mask. We controlled the mask&#x27;s position using a piezo actuator inside the deposition chamber during the evaporation process to 3D print nanowires and other nanostructures with programmable height profiles. Eg, we created nanoramps, and nanowires with one or more &quot;valleys&quot; to simulate quantum wells or metallic grains.
<a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;scitation.aip.org&#x2F;content&#x2F;aip&#x2F;journal&#x2F;rsi&#x2F;79&#x2F;7&#x2F;10.1063&#x2F;1.2960573" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;scitation.aip.org&#x2F;content&#x2F;aip&#x2F;journal&#x2F;rsi&#x2F;79&#x2F;7&#x2F;10.106...</a>
Arxiv link : <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;arxiv.org&#x2F;pdf&#x2F;0802.1848.pdf" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;arxiv.org&#x2F;pdf&#x2F;0802.1848.pdf</a>