Camera Alignment Problem

I unpacked my Glowforge yesterday and did a couple of quick tests with which I wasn’t paying attention to the on screen alignment. Today I’m realizing I have a problem. where no matter how I position the material (and yes I’m using ProofGrade stock at the moment) the top edge and left side of the material is getting cut off by the camera.

What can I do to get this aligned properly? See below for images of the screen on the web app, and through the lid of the Glowforge.

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The full bed is cropped during the dewarping of the bed image. It’s kind of irrelevant for most projects because if it was a wider view, you could see it but not cut on it.

Your best bet for useability is to put the material to the front-right of the machine.

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Well my goal was to reduce waste material. Are you telling me there’s a significant margin that can’t be reached by the laser? If so, then on a 12 x 20 piece, how much is outside the “printable” area?

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Max cut size is currently 11X19.5, I believe. Max engraving size is slightly less, but will depend on the file.

Okay, thank you. But I ought to be able to see the entire piece of material on screen shouldn’t I?

The way it is now, I can cut right off the bottom, but the top 7/8ths is obscured and seemingly inaccessible. If I’m trying (as I am in this case) to create a marking template out of an entire sheet, how am I supposed to get that done? I need to be able to see at least another half inch further up on the stockl, in order to accomplish what I have in mind.

Thanks again.

The point about it being largely irrelevant is that even if you could see the entire piece of material, would it make a difference if you couldn’t reach it? The cutting area is the cutting area and the camera can see all of the cutting area leaving you with 100% utilization of the actual cutting area.

If you want to minimize waste then you have to plan the cuts precisely. It’s hard to do that when you can’t be sure where the edge is.

So instead of planning from the upper left, down; I will have to work up from the lower right. Not the end of the world, except that I had already mapped out a set of cuts from the top.

I did a cut & engrave test at the far corners of the bed - put a piece of material in it and nudged the design until the no-go bars displayed then nudged it one arrow click back. You need to do it for both the side & the top/bottom so you define each corner. Then I marked my crumbtray with painters tape to show the extreme edges. Now I can load material, line it up with those marks and I have near zero waste.

Every machine is the same as what you have described. The camera can see the entire bed but the imaging S/W show it with the left and top cropped.

The Glowforge Basic and Glowforge Plus bed can accommodate materials measuring 18 x 20.4”. The maximum printable area is 11 x 19.5”, and it’s reduced somewhat when the laser operates at high speed, as it can take space for the laser to decelerate. There’s a tray for materials that are up to 0.5” thick, or the tray can be removed to accommodate materials up to 2” thick.

The Glowforge Pro adds a Passthrough slot to accommodate material that is up to 20.4” wide, up to 1/4" thick, and as long as you want.

I’m going to close this thread - if you have any other questions, go ahead and post a new topic.