I make then from 3" to about an inch depending on what fits in the scrap. in this case the largest is about 2inches.
Yup. Once you work through that and become a little bit decent with it the rewards are great.
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Wow, now I’m Confused
rbtdanforth
Regular
May 28
eisler500:
I just need to figure out how to darken it.
#1 -on my stuff the edges are sharp because I did NOT make it a png. but it is filled vectors. The dragon is a png because I am using vary power to get the full 3d resolution. #2 when printing the dragons; it prints one at a time and took over 3 hours for 10. but as the text was still vectors and all engraved to the same depth it did them all at the same time and took a bit over an hour.
If everything is going to be black and white vectors are far more favorable as even a close look at a pixeled version the edges will be fuzzy especially when not straight up or sideways. So I would suggest going back to the text (Inkscape has two steps, the word will be a group of vectors when you make vectors and you will need to ungroup them and combine to make it regular vectors that will fill properly.)
if you have a tiny logo it may do to have Inkscape change that to vectors also as small enough will not show any detail anyway, and running from case to case to engrave what you cannot read can be silly.
Ultimately, how dark the engraving gets is going to depend on a couple of things. One is the kind of wood you are using… some very light colored woods just don’t darken well, they char, which is messy.
But your power settings look a little bit low…you can probably gradually darken the engrave by increasing the power by about 10% each time, then stop when it gets dark enough to suit you.
You can run a few quick engrave tests by just engraving a small (1/2" square) rectangle at different increasing power settings until you get the one you like, then try a business card and see how it looks. (You can just run the tests on the backside of one of the light cards that you’ve already run.)
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If you are engraving an image and use dots the dots will float along the grayish edges, or if you use vary power it will round the edges some trying to make up for the fact that the edge does not fall exactly between two pixels. in either case the eye will not see a hard line because there will be no hard defining line.
A vector engrave IS a hard defining line down to the size of the width of the laser beam so the depth of cut is on an entirely yes / no basis making a sharp edge. The resulting char is a factor of the wood. The background of the dragons being so dark is because the inner ply is more prone to that char then the top oak ply, and the lettering on the other side did not make it through the top oak layer quite enough.
However because the line is sharp, the text reads quite a bit easier. In cases where it needs to be more dramatic, you can engrave over masked material and then spray paint before removing the masking. Again sharpness counts so I would use vector engraves rather than image.
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Of all the pixel graphic programs I have used, I would default to Gimp in most cases. Most of the weirdness issues have been lost as it has had later releases, and while there is amazing things still buried (like the puzzle generator) they are almost like easter eggs, very cool but not in the mainstream of needs.
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