@dwardio @jbv The user level system is broken somewhere. There is the glaring example of evansd2, who is still a Basic. I’ve pointed this out before to the powers that be, but he’s still listed as a Basic.
No way! 
I’m currently in the ridiculous situation of:
You’ve reached the maximum number of likes today. Please wait 3 minutes before trying again.
And it just rolls on from there, having to wait x minutes to give another like 
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If you do that twenty times in a certain amount of time, you get a badge for it.
(Not sure exactly what the time requirement is…probably 100 days.)
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Was wondering what black acrylic would look like when it’s embossed… like the clear acrylic on top of the black. Thanks for sharing.
The black isn’t engraved at all, it’s just cut to shape and the clear on top has been engraved underneath (I flipped the graphic backwards to get a rear engrave)
I figured the black wasn’t engraved… but didn’t realize the top was flipped. great idea!!!
It’s MUCH nicer looking that way!
I want to give you a like for letting me know but…
What’s happened is I went onto the epic show and tell thread and started at the top and basically what is there not to like on that thread, so pretty quickly ran out 
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Acrylic is my favorite material and this makes my heart swoon 
Really beautiful work Shawn.
Good luck with the gluing, let us know if you get good results. I suggest lots of test pieces before you risk your stand as I’ve not had good luck gluing sandwiched material like this without seeing the glue. I’ve found several glues that hold well, but large clear areas are buggers. (Air bubbles being a huge issue.) Acrylic solvents are a possibility, but it’ll ruin the etching if it gets into it. I made a plague with layered acrylic and finally gave up gluing the whole thing. Instead, I made several little acrylic “U” shaped clips that went around layered edge. I used an opaque color and only glued the clips. It worked well and the bonus was they served as little feet as well.
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The stuff I got is supposed to be specifically for this application, but I cut a bunch of 1" squares from both acrylics to use as testing pieces. I do like your idea of making clips/feet to hold the parts together! If this bonding agent doesn’t work, I’m totally stealing that!
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I got the closest to a clear, unblemished bond with the weld-on stuff, but air bubbles were still my arch nemesis. They key is keeping lots of pressure on it so no air gets sucked back in between the layers. I also suggest not using too much glue. I got better at keeping bubbles out, but then I’d get a little glue seeping into the etched area and I could see it. Hopefully you can get it to work. Let me know if you do!
To help with the bonding you could cut holes in the top acryic and have posts on the bottom layer or cut out some posts, they don’t have to be perfectly round and cut holes in both so you can then use those posts as a locking key with some glue. That will keep them from coming out and you won’t have glue all over your nice design.
Beautiful base. Love the reverse engrave over black acrylic. Eager to hear the glue-up solution! Keep us posted.
This is amazing! I’ve had my GF only a few weeks and I’ve been playing around with etching. Would you mind telling me what your settings are for that etch? I’ve used SD Engrave, but that feels really deep and doesn’t look as crisp as yours. Well done!
Oh my gods! I can’t believe I missed this post a year and a half ago! It’s so fraking great! On so many levels! SO SAY WE ALL!
The metal plaque… Was that actually metal? Annodized I’m guessing? Was it pre-cut or did you get a sheet and have to cut it? If the former, where’d you get it?
I believe I used SD engrave. To be fair, having it set against black acrylic really makes the engraving pop, though.
Also, remember that the GF engraves according to light/dark… so to get the deepest engrave you can, make sure that you’re using complete black for your art.
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It was a sheet of laser able aluminum that I got from Johnson Plastics. The name they use is “Laser-It Gloss Black/White .020 Aluminum Sheet” – It was a 12" x 24" sheet (I had to cut it dow just to fit in the GF) and I included a cut line in my art. Once I engraved it, I cut the pieces close to the line on my bandsaw, then used my sander to get it smooth and right to the line.
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Hold. The. Phone.
I literally haven’t heard that at all yet. You’re saying that there’s basically a depth scale of 1-100 that coincides with a grayscale of 1-100? So, if I’m looking for a shallow engrave (which I am), I don’t have to set manual GF settings, but I would instead set my art to a lighter tint of gray according to the depth I want?