So I can see the new Graphic, Photo, etc. But I can’t seem to figure out under what circumstances I can 3D engrave.
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Oh, that’s a shame. There are two reasons why I like having two different depth of scoring: one aesthetic and one practical. Aesthetically it’s nice to be able to have some shading differences in complicated patterns and do that easily without modifying numbers manually. Practically I found out the hard way that with maple hardwood if you use the current slow score along the grain you can snap the piece of wood along the score in half easily. Being able to adjust that is kind of necessary.
I haven’t tested this myself, but it should appear as an option when you have a bitmap in your artwork, and the material is hardwood. Possibly for acrylic and other materials as well, but I’m pretty sure hardwood.
I’ve tried every listed hardwood, and several other material choices. None of them give the 3D engrave option with my bitmap image. I get graphic, deep graphic, and photo for most of them.
Medium Walnut hardwood doesn’t have deep graphic, but it has the others.
Some of the Acrylic’s don’t have photo, while others do. They all have graphic.
I tried making my image grayscale too, no difference.
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It’s showing up for me now, but not working quite right (granted, with a sample size of 1)
Me, too.
I’ll have to check out your thread. Haven’t tested myself yet.
I had to log out and then log back in…when I imported a jpeg I then saw the new 3d engrave choice on the menu. Not tested yet but maybe today…
There was an issue but they fixed it pretty quickly. Haven’t tested with the updated Proofgrade setting but I’m about to give it a try.
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Excited to see your result! 
Well, I threw some PG maple ply in… and the 3d engrave option isn’t there. Trying with some thick draftboard.
If might depend on what you have loaded for a file as well. Photo only shows up when a photo is present so…
Exact same file as before. I switched to thick draftboard with the same setup and it worked. Just kicked off a 1:41-long deep 3d engrave, we’ll see how it goes.
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Yup, you are right.
I recall @dan saying it would only work on certain materials, he mentioned hardwood and maybe acrylics?
I’m guessing plywood wasn’t included because it would not really end up looking right/good once you cut past the first ply layer.
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Dan said in an earlier post that the 3D Engrave option is there for specific materials. I recall he said mostly hardwoods (all?) and possibly some acrylic. So it sounds like that’s by design as it may work best on only those materials.
Edit: Found… 3D Engraving as Proofgrade Prints get Prettier: 10/23/17 Latest Improvements - #37 by dan
Am I correct in thinking that 3D engraving has gone from being another option in the engraving settings like convert to dots and vary power and morphed into a Proofgrade preset that simply selects “Vary Power” as the engraving mode.
I.e. it has gone from being a mode to a configuration of existing modes.
I don’t recall there being a “3d engrave” mode before in the manual settings for engraving. Just convert to dots, convert to pattern, and vary power. You still have all the same options in manual settings for engraving as before this update (as far as I can tell). Perhaps some older version of the software (before I got my machine) had it as a mode option??
These presets work like all the other presets in that they are just configuring things for your based on their testing with each material, and 3d engrave does use the vary power mode. They have some different values for the other settings depending on the material.
I think there used to be a greyed out 3D engraving mode which I expected to do this:
- 3D high-res engraving
Engrave complex, three dimensional curves with 1,000 DPI resolution. To get perfect detail and sculpt with real depth, Glowforge can carve away material with multiple passes, each one focusing more deeply than the last.
If you choose thick draftboard it as a Deep 3D Engrave choice which does 2 passes.
So, you expected 3D engraving to do something other than vary the laser power and do multiple passes for deeper engraves when the material is thick enough?
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