It’s been a long time since I ordered and there have been a ton of features talked about with the Glowforge. Is there a list somewhere of what was promised and where the product is currently? I tend to lurk on the forum, and don’t see every post.
My understanding is the following are not implemented (Please Correct If Inaccurate!):
Tracking of two sided cuts/engraves
Tracking of larger than single job projects (pro passthrough)
The laser works by removing a hairsbreadth of material, called the kerf. Glowforge knows this and compensates, so if you draw two puzzle pieces, they’ll fit. Even better, the Glowforge can measure the material thickness so 3D objects slide together perfectly.
If something has to go, I sincerely hope it’s the gadget image recognition. If they spend time on that which could be used for passthrough, flip & cut, etc, I’d disagree with their priorities.
It isn’t hard with today’s computer vision libraries and deep learning neural networks but not particularly useful as you presumably know what you have put the machine, so could just select from a drop down list of presets.
More of a gimmick that I doubt I would use. But when I purchased it nearly two years ago the advertising said it already did all these things and still does. Plus it also says " It also supports presets for other materials you use regularly.", which would be very useful but it doesn’t do that yet either.
Anything else that you guys see that was promised and either delivered or not delivered? Seems like a pretty short list of non delivered things. Much less than I was anticipating!
Looking at that list, I am less worried than I was before. Do I still have concerns, yes. But so far they seem to be delivering new features at a reasonable rate.
Although there is grey scale to power engraving I don’t think the full 3D engraving has rolled out yet. I.e. multiple passes at different focus depths.
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.