Has anyone come across an automated solution for laying out objects as efficiently as possible on material? either on Inkscape or Illustrator? We usually just do this by hand, but a script would of course be much easier. I’m not sure if it’s even possible since there are so many possible rotations for each piece. This was discussed as feature request in 2015; wondering if any one has found a solution.
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This service is quoted frequently:
The “gotcha” with using it is that it requires a bounding box in which the other parts will be nested. Not a big deal, but won’t work without (afaik).
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I switched tabs to confirm the URL for SVGNest and, came back to find @dwardio had shared it.
Note that it is open source software (that you can run on your own systems, if you know how), not just a service.
Likely of more interest: the github page (linked from the main page) has more details on how it works and, things you might want to know.
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If you aren’t already, get familiar with the “arrange” and “tiled clones” features of Inkscape. I find that they can really help put things in proper arrangement.
Lots of tutorials out there about how to use them, it’s a powerful set of features.
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