Yes, I know that this has been mentioned before, but I just want to add my voice.
We REALLY need a way to add text and simple graphics (boxes (straight and rounded corner) and circles/ellipses.
Having these 2 features added would SO simplify production.
I submit that the Glowforge app is for rendering. Youâll want to do all of your design work in your design app since thatâs what its purpose is. I wouldnât expect to see the Glowforge app turn into much of a design app. It would be akin to turning your printer driver into a design app⌠itâs just not what itâs for.
I do hope that thinking helps you.
i agree with you.
but, i have to say, being able to draw a simple rectangle (resizable without proportional restraints) and circle/oval might make life a bit simpler at times. nothing more complicated than that.
Rendering, yes. But as a tool, adding text with settings will be invaluable.
See thatâs the thing⌠Where does it end? When it is a design app? I doubt that was ever the plan. Could be wrong though. But if one thinks of it as a glorified print driver, theyâll almost never be disappointed that it doesnât do something else.
Iâm thinking thatâs going to be more on the mobile development / app side, if a prior Adobe video was any indication of things to come.
Cricut has a pretty functional design interface like youâre describing. I never used it for precision work, but it was simple to add primitives.
My point is that itâs possible and can be of use.
Basic shapes would be helpful as they have the trace function. My solution has been to fill up my design library (which the UI for that is a cluttered mess. âShow moreâ button needs to die in a fire.) with shapes just for that function. Otherwise, I am a firm believer of the GF as an output device and keeping the UI a ârendererâ for as oposed to a editor.
Truth. I think folks have to keep in mind what the software is for and what should GF spend their time and energy and resources on developing, and expanding, and improving. It would be wonderful to do all sorts of things if unlimited time and resources and staffing were available. My 3D printing software would be so much better if it also allowed me to do the 3d modeling right there, but that is not its purpose. It is to render in 3 dimensional form what I create in ZBrush, or Blender orâŚ
What graphic authoring capabilities you want to have in the GF app so that you donât have to work in AI or Inkscape arenât going to be the same ones I want or Reggie wants, and the shapes you want arenât going to be enough â if you get a square and a circle, what about the rectangle and triangle and octagon. If you get those 5 fonts, what about those 10 over there. And what about text wrap, outlines and solid fill, controllable kerning, etc?
I for one strongly encourage GF to keep working on what it is working on and doing what they do best. Iâll leave the graphic creation to Photoshop and Illustrator and Inkscape. As an artist, multiple tools means I can do the very best workâŚ
What some folk have suggested is to have a few of those primitives uploaded in your files and drag one in when you need them
Exactly what I have done, The common shapes, cutlines etc. I keep for use, and make new ones as I need them.
I would love for them to âjust implement the basicsâ first. Things that I would love to do / may be able to and cannot figure out with this terrible UI:
I would take a print driver over having to use their cloud, however since they have force us to use their cloud software the least they can do it make it usable.
Still in all seriousness, think about how awesome it would be to just print from InkScape using a Glowforge plugin!
I think these two are answered by moving them in your design app, no? If youâre talking about moving everything (already aligned in your design app), you can user ctrl/cmd+a to select all.
SO necessary.
Not sure I follow⌠You had to design it first to get it into the cloud in the first place. Unless youâre talking about traced images maybe? That would certainly be nice to be able to export.
The simplest example that I can think of is importing a high dpi image for engraving, then adding an svg cut box. Once the image to engrave is within the bounds of the cut can no longer select and move that image without first moving the cut box. Makes centering and sizing very frustrating.
Traced items or anytime that I have added multiple files and aligned them.
Just want the basics first 
Why wouldnât you precisely place the box within your design app? I mean, doing that within the GFUI is not, generally, good enough for great alignment. Again, not a design tool.
Sorry to be the broken record CD MP3 streaming audio file here⌠Do that in your design app.
When I go to print a Word document, for example, I almost never tweak the print driver until, if necessary, the seconds before Iâm going to print. Same applies to âprintingâ things with the Glowforge⌠Iâve already created my document, now I just need to set the settings and âprint.â
I need you to enlighten me here, how do I make both cuts and engravings with a single PNG? I donât know how to do that if itâs possible.
Sure! Great question. I know thereâs a tutorial somewhere in these forums and I hope somebody will provide you that. The quick answer is, you donât. A PNG is a raster image file. It will always be a raster image file. You need to embed that raster image into a vector file (svg or pdf are, I believe, your current choices to use with your Glowforge). If you donât have a vector editing app, you can purchase Adobeâs Illustrator or use one of many free tools out there. A popular free tool youâll get lots of help with here on these forums is Inkscape. Anyway, that will allow you to place a vector shape where ever youâd like while also embedding your raster image within the file.
Hope that helps!
Edit: Here are a couple of posts that might give you some additional info on that⌠Additionally, do a search on âembedding an imageâ and youâll likely find more.
3D slicer or printer RIP is an excellent analogy.
Design tools would just clutter the GFUI right now, and frankly, we donât need themâŚ
Layout tools, on the other hand, would be damn handy. If nothing else, the ability to automatically place multiple duplicates of a design would be a massive time-saver for a lot of users.
Since it is policy to not tell us what they are working on, all we can do is hope we like what weâre getting. I hope it has nothing to do with iOS, and I have an iPad right here. I want to keep it far away from my design/burn processes!
IMHO that sounds just like the âdesignâ requests that were shot down before. Which I guess proves that there is no way to draw the line between âprint driverâ and âdesignâ and âlayoutâ that wonât irritate someone.
FWIW I do agree that âlayoutâ help as you suggested is a worthy addition, along with easier manipulation of multiple pieces of art, grouping, and alignment.
If the company had a serious âonly do design in the design appâ focus they could enforce that by removing the ability to add art over and over. But they let us add multiple pieces of art, so they should better support manipulating those pieces, or we will continue to complain about missing âdesignâ features.