I did a quick video to show what I am doing to ensure there are no random lines in my engravings. This is just what works for me and my use because I am doing simple personalized pastry boards. If your design has a lot of detail you need to maintain then this might not be the solution you are wanting. It fits my use case, is quick and easy, and will ensure that there are no lines in my design.
You can go straight from the vector design to a bitmap without taking and pasting a screenshot by using “Edit> Make a Bitmap Copy”. There will be no quality loss (you can set the DPI for bitmap copies in Inkscape’s preferences), and you don’t need to convert it back to a vector via tracing to engrave it either.
Thats certainly another option. When I do the bitmap route I just do a screenshot and skip the steps of combining the text/layers (which would be needed to make the bitmap copy). So in that demo I just left the text as not combined. Both options are quick and easy though.
You don’t need to combine anything, just select all and make copy. It makes one image out of everything selected.
Using the bitmap copy does have one inherent advantage, it’s all inside inkscape, no external software needed at all. It also ensures that your scale is unchanged.
Also with the newest fix that was just announced today I wonder if your stray lines problem would be solved in the first place.
This might be particularly relevant for people who have an aura or a spark, where the file size limit is pretty severe. Bitmaps (raster images) are generally quite large compared to corresponding vectors, especially as resolution and size go up.
If the newest fix resolves the problem then staying as the original vector has several advantages — not the least of which is that the process of switching to raster and tracing back to vector introduces some error, you will lose some detail.
Still, this workflow is handy for certain cases and it seems to work for you, so great!
Thanks, I do the copy but hadn’t done a screenshot. Good advice
That is certainly still an option. Maybe it’s just because I am using a mac but I find it quicker and easier to just hit the hot keys, drag and drop the screenshot and then just drag and drop the capture onto my inkscape window. If I was using a windows computer then I think it would be more tedious to do a screenshot. Also, sometimes I want different DPI for different bitmap tracings and so a set preference is not always handy. Again, it’s just what works for me and there are certainly other ways to do it.