Adobe Illustrator CC - Why is this cutting twice?

novak · April 11, 2018, 9:07pm

Perhaps someone here can tell me what I did wrong in Adobe Illustrator to cause the Glowforge to cut twice (first clockwise, then counter clockwise)?

I know I could just erase the path and redraw it, but I’ve had this happen before during the most basic of things such as cutting an oval and I’d really like to know what I’m doing wrong here or what setting I messed up on.

I’ve attached both the original .AI file as well as the .SVG I sent to the Glowforge.

Thanks in advance.

-Novak

baseball_02%20copy baseball_02.ai (476.9 KB)

shop · April 11, 2018, 9:14pm

i don’t see but the one path there. and it doesn’t appear in my GFUI the way it does in the image you posted in FB. I only see the one stroke.

that’s copy/paste from illustrator, not exported to SVG.

Jules · April 11, 2018, 9:43pm

The red lines are created with Fill color, not strokes. So they are actually engraves, and when you set them to cut, the GFUI will cut around them. (On both sides of the red line that you see.)

Did you do an Expand or Expand Appearance appearance at any time on the stroke? (Or using the wrong settings on a Live Trace also tends to do that.)

Set a stroke color and then delete one of the lines to remove it.

(Oh, and you’ve got a clip path in there that the interface will throw a warning about - you can just remove it before saving the SVG.)

jbmanning5 · April 11, 2018, 9:43pm

Your Illustrator file is fine. Your SVG file isn’t. Guess I should have replied to OP, @novak

jbmanning5 · April 11, 2018, 9:44pm

If you don’t want to change the AI file, you can select the compound path, release it, delete one of the two paths that it separates to, and change the remaining path to a stroke instead of a fill.

You’ll also have to do the same with the hanger for the hole.

shop · April 11, 2018, 9:59pm

or just copy/paste from the illustrator file like i did, since that seemed to work w/o creating the extra outline.

not sure what happened in the “make the SVG” process that created two outlines of one stroke.

jbmanning5 · April 11, 2018, 10:02pm

Sure. But that shows how to actually fix a compound path, double cut issue.

shop · April 11, 2018, 10:04pm

right, but it’s not actually a compound, double cut path in the original illustrator file @novak linked.

the only possible thing i can think is that something in the way it was exported didn’t like the stroke being aligned to the inside instead of center of path? not really sure.

Jules · April 11, 2018, 10:06pm

It’s not a stroke. It’s a filled shape that looks like a stroke because it’s thin.

jbmanning5 · April 11, 2018, 10:09pm

More was done to the file than just exporting it to a SVG - because it was obviously flipped (to engrave on acrylic backside).

Somewhere in the process, it was expanded.

shop · April 11, 2018, 10:24pm

the SVG export (and save as) did it when i tried both.

buuuuttt…

when i made the stroke a centerline stroke instead of an inside stroke, it exported properly.

so setting the stroke to inside = bad SVG (i.e., outlined stroke instead of simple path).

but copy/pasting it into GFUI doesn’t have that problem when the inside stroke is on.

tim1724 · April 11, 2018, 11:06pm

This is exactly the reason.

Strokes in SVG 1.1 files are always center-aligned. The only way Illustrator can preserve the exact shape of the original inside-aligned stroke when exporting to SVG is to expand it into a filled path. While the alignment doesn’t matter when sending to a laser, Illustrator has no idea that a laser is involved. It’s designed for print work, where you likely want to preserve the exact visual appearance, so it’s doing the best it can.

Some work has been done on adding a stroke-alignment property to SVG 2, which would allow Illustrator to avoid expanding the path, but (a) SVG 2 is a long way off and (b) they have removed stroke-alignment from the draft version because they couldn’t agree on exactly how it should work.

When you copy from Illustrator and paste into the Glowforge interface it’s probably silently dropping the alignment and treating it as center aligned.

Jules · April 11, 2018, 11:13pm

ROFL! This kind of reminds me of a Jurassic Park scene with ginormous rappers battling it out.

Has anybody seen the poor OP? Or did he bail?

That’s raptors, not rappers. Flipping autocorrect.

tim1724 · April 11, 2018, 11:14pm

That must be one of the sequels I didn’t see. I don’t remember any rappers.

now I’m picturing rapping raptors

shop · April 12, 2018, 2:58am

this was a really useful thread because it identified that a stroke not aligned to center is going to cause big problems. and when it comes up again, we’ll have an answer.

plus, you know, rapping raptors.

curt · April 12, 2018, 3:01am

Jules · April 12, 2018, 3:03am

This gets ALL the likes!

novak · April 12, 2018, 4:34pm

That was one of the “crazy” things about it. The original message I posted (in a FACEBOOK group) was just a circle and the double line was there. After some advice, I changed a few things and was happy to see the double line GONE. I thought it was fixed, but when I went to cut… it still cut twice.

-Novak

novak · April 12, 2018, 4:37pm

I’m no Illustrator Master so I’ll try to answer your question the best I can.

To the best of my knowledge I never did an “Expand” or “Expand Appearance”. Initially I simply created a circle. Later on, I added a second circle (up top) and then merged paths… then a 3rd circle as a cutout I could put a keyring into. Both the outside path and the inner tiny circle cut twice.

Also, no tracing was done. With the exception of the softball (which was just an .SVG I placed there) everything else was done inside of Illustrator.

-Novak

novak · April 12, 2018, 4:51pm

Hey Everyone,

So I started replying to individual posts only to realize that they were being added to the bottom (not in thread) so here’s my replies to everyone:

"Set a stroke color and then delete one of the lines to remove it…"

I really thought that’s what I did. I only see a single line in Illustrator. I notice you’re looking at a .JPG so perhaps that’s an issue?

"Your Illustrator file is fine. Your SVG file isn’t."

That certainly makes more sense, although it doesn’t explain why most of the stuff I create works fine. I’m trying to learn what the heck I did different here. Right now (and given the info from this group) one thing I know I did different was to “Save a Copy” instead of “Save As”. Not sure why that would make any difference but I’m not ruling anything out at the moment.

"If you don’t want to change the AI file, you can select the compound path, release it, delete one of the two paths that it separates to, and change the remaining path to a stroke instead of a fill. You’ll also have to do the same with the hanger for the hole."

I wish I knew what you were saying. Illustrator noob here. LOL

"or just copy/paste from the illustrator file like i did, since that seemed to work w/o creating the extra outline."

I’m not sure what you mean by copy/paste from the Illustrator file? Are you saying I can copy this from the Illustrator art board and paste it into the GFUI?

"It’s not a stroke. It’s a filled shape that looks like a stroke because it’s thin."

So, what I did (as far as I know) was to choose the ellipse tool like I’ve done many times before and draw a circle. Everything looked fine until I noticed it was cutting twice. That’s when the mystery started. I assumed I could just click on the path, adjust some property, and that would fix it. So far I haven’t had any luck.

"More was done to the file than just exporting it to a SVG - because it was obviously flipped (to engrave on acrylic backside)."

Actually it double cuts regardless of the flip. To answer your question though, after the .AI file was saved I did a “Save Copy” and selected .SVG file. I then opened the .SVG (in a second tab), flipped the image, resaved, and imported it into the GFUI. If anyone knows how to mirror an image in the GFUI I’d love to know!

"buuuuttt… when i made the stroke a centerline stroke instead of an inside stroke, it exported properly."

Okay, how do I do that?

"but copy/pasting it into GFUI doesn’t have that problem when the inside stroke is on."

And… how do I do that?

Thank you to everyone who answered. At least I know I’m not going crazy and there’s something in the process I’ve somehow done differently.

I’ve had this issue come up with some of the most basic things sometimes… such as a simple oval keychain and it’s really annoying when it happens. I’d like to know what I need to check or what I’m doing incorrectly.

-Novak