Cut file

[LVglow]

I haven’t been able to use my GF the past 3 weeks. So, I forgot the little I learned.
I have a simple file in Inkscape that I would like to cut and engrave. I put the outer edge/lines in red and the inner in black. Assuming once uploaded in the app, red would read as a cut function and black as an engrave. Unfortunately, when I upload the SVG file, it reads it all as one color. Please, help before I cry.

[hansepe]

Start here and look for Inkscape in “The Matrix”:

Community Glowforge Tutorials: Table of Contents

The Design Team Tutorial Project (aka “The Matrix”) This post and all related links are created and maintained by generous and helpful Glowforge customers. They have not been vetted or approved by Glowforge staff. List of Official Learning Tutorials from Glowforge: Safe Operations: Safety (Don’t be sorry later, read this now.) Operating Environment ( Don’t let your machine be uncomfortable.) Stop using your Glowforge unit if… Repairs to a Modified Glowforge Regulatory Information Des…

Cuts have to be vector objects, they can’t be bitmap. I’m not an Inkscape user or I’d try to help you out some more. The tutorials in the Matrix will help you a lot.

[deirdrebeth]

The easiest way is to move the one colour into a separate file, and then select engrave for it - you do have to line them up, but only once!

[jbv]

I may be misunderstanding you, but it sounds like you might be working with a single object that has a black fill and a red stroke. The GF sees it as one object, ignoring the stroke size.

There are various ways to do what you want, but I don’t use Inkscape, so I’ll suggest one general method that should work:

Make a copy of your object, and “paste in place”, so that you have two versions of the object stacked on top of each other. Give one version the black fill (inner color) and no stroke (outer color) and give the other version the red stroke and no fill. Save as plain svg or pdf and you should be good to go.

If you want, you can set the stroke size to .5pt to see where the cut line will actually fall (the Glowforge ignores stroke width).

[marmak3261]

Ditto what @jbv says. In Inkscape you can Ctrl+d to get a duplicate that is over the original object. While that is selected, remove the fill or the stroke. Then go to the original object and do the opposite.

[jamesdhatch]

The one thing I recommend is to click the arrow keys a known # of clicks (like 5) after duplicating while the duplicate is still selected.

That makes being able to select the top or bottom one easier. Then when you’ve made the modification, the same number of clicks in the other direction leaves them aligned.

There are other alignment methods but this one is fast & natural to the workflow.

[jbv]

So many ways to get the same outcome! I normally use the layers panels to hide one copy while I alter the other, so I don’t have to remember to re-align… but I do have to remember to turn the relevant copies back on.

@LVglow have you been able achieve what you were trying to do?