Sarbarmultimedia and @m_raynsford have some interesting tests at variable depth engraving. I won’t call it 3D because these are far from finished examples of what will be possible with 3D engraving enabled.
I’m curious, especially with @takitus chipping away at this feature on the Glowforge. I thought I would see how gradients in Inkscape worked, exported as a PNG with no processing. Just brought in to the UI, rescaled smaller and printed.
SVG here. It consists of one rectangle that has a black to white fill gradient from left to right. That is butted up against a small rectangle which is just a white fill. The rest is just tiling those two elements. It’s placed on a black filled background and then exported.
It is interesting the the black of the gradient on horizonal stripes is the darkest and deepest, even more that the black squares of the background black.
I can’t find a gradient fill in inkscape.
Can you give me a pointer to it ?
It just gives Visible colors/red/green/blue/hue/saturation/alpha.
John
EDIT
Cancel that, just found my way in.
Gradient was hidden below the Fill tool, off screen !
Is there any 3D effect, actual depth of cut, or is this just an optical illusion? I really like the tests that you are doing. It teaches me so much. Thank you for taking the time to show us all of this.
There is real depth to the engrave. you can see it best at the edge of the image where it is blackest next to the untouched, masked surface of the plywood.
So if you try this at full power, full speed, you should get a much more pronounced 3D effect. Make sure you use proofgrade detected material and 340lpi.
Thanks for the tip. I will try it at those settings. Right now I’m at 4 1/2 hours of straight engraving with just a few minutes pause between jobs to swap out the cutting boards. So many things I want to try. The Glowforge is one tool that will keep you busy for a long, long time exploring its capabilities.
