Some Tips on Vector Designing for the Glowforge

While @marmak3261 was getting to know MakForge, he ran across a few design related tips and tricks that he thought would be a good idea to document for everyone, and since he needed another set of hands, I volunteered to assist with the write-up.

I’m going to leave it in PDF format attached below…I think it will be easier for you guys to read if I don’t have to fight the forum formatting, so just download it if you are interested.

It was a highly amusing journey…I’m going to post a couple of the spare pictures below of what we did wrong…just for grins…the write-up talks about how to get to the successful result he posted in his video here:

Pre-Release Glowforge: From Design to Print

:relaxed:

Some Early Tips on How to do Vector Design for the Glowforge Software Interface.pdf (1.5 MB)




Blooper Reel:


Whoops! No text just yet….

Cut this one a little too deeply…

Okay, maybe a lot too deeply - but the rings look kind of cool and they held together…

Hmmmnnn…looks like we need to embed the images…

Yep…

This actually worked pretty well…we were testing visual placement…

And the result…

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This is fantastic even though I don’t understand most of it! I can’t wait to see your F360 write up. That I will understand.

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Glad to see Marion having some help getting out the things he wants people to see he is experiencing.

He definitely enjoys helping people, but some times needs assistance too.

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Bwahahahahah! :wink:
(Still waiting to see yours…you been doin’ it longer than me…come on…post that puppy.)

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Thanks @Jules and @marmak3261 for doing this. It will be so helpful. I’m saving it until I get closer to getting my machine. What I’m finding is that I go all gung-ho trying to learn a piece of software but with no way to produce an end product I tend to drop it and forget what I learned. I think my brain cells have lost some of their “sticky.”

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I had wondered about the “cut too deeply” photos as to whether that would be a problem or not. Was that due to incorrect thickness? Power cranked up to “11” and slow speed? All the above? Thanks.

This looks like @dan will need to pin the replacement inserts at the top of the catalog!

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Much simpler than that really…user error. Forgot to change the default Cut line to Engrave before firing it up. :flushed:

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That was an awesome write up. I am trying to learn Corel Draw and need all of the help I can get. The terms that you used are what throws me. I am not familiar with stroke and embedded images. The hole in the center is confusing too. If the center online was a cut line then I would have thought that would have been enough. Thank you both for taking the time to teach us. :smile:

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I’m not in tight with the padre the way you are. We don’t even know if he has materials enough to do this again in other SW.
Well, I guess I could find something suitable and then IM him?

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David, I’m planning to do a series of very basic tutorials for designing, and I realize that the terminology is different in all of the different software, so if I can, I will try to do demos in at least Illustrator and Inkscape. If I can, I’ll do a few in CorelDraw as well, although someone like @smcgathyfay would be better at it, and she might want to duplicate the ones I do in that.

All of the design programs will work the same way though - the only thing that changes is the names that each program calls it’s tools…so the first one I’m working on is going to be a Basic Concepts tutorial. If you can understand that, you can use any design program.

In your case, for CorelDraw - a Stroke is called an Outline. The embedding thing will be one of the things demonstrated eventually…but it’s going to need to come later, once I can test the various program results in the GF interface, and get a few screen captures to show what I’m talking about.

So hang in there…more to come. This one was kind of high level, and only because we wanted to get it written down before we forgot…chuckle!

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That’s how i did it! :wink:

I PM’d him and asked if he needed a hand. He’d probably take you up on it too if you offer.

One limitation…he only has Inkscape and the GF interface - you have to send him a clean SVG file…one that follows all of the rules in the write-up I posted.

See if he needs something and if he has time to tackle it…he’s spread pretty thin.

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To further what @Jules said about AI versus CorelDraw terminology, To get the hole in the center, create to circles, center them to each other, and then select Back Minus Front (or Front Minus Back) to end up with the donut shape.

Let me know if you have any other issues with the terminology Jules used. I should be able to translate into CorelDraw. It’s my primary design tool.

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John - as i work these little tutorials up, do you want to duplicate them in CorelDraw? Or just review them and give me a couple tips how to accomplish the same thing quickly in CorelDraw? I have it, but it’s not my primary, and it will save me a ton of time having to translate into another language. (Already gonna be a challenge with Inkscape, but I’d like to get the main three covered if we can.)

:relaxed:

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I’d be glad to whenever I can find the time. I’ll see what I can do with this one.

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Oh thank, you, thank you, thank you! :smile:

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I’ll be on and off the forum for the next week, but when I get back…we can tag team the CorelDraw stuff…lol

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Jules, thank you so much for collaborating with Marion on this. I’ve saved the PDF to read. Even though I use Affinity Design for Mac, many of the features/tools are pretty much the same as what you describe in AI…so I can sort of translate things from one to the other. And even though I didn’t recognize them by name, turns out I already know about embedding and linking. That works the same way in videos that I’ve created. Linked stuff can disappear in a heartbeat, leaving a big blank space in your project.

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I could be your twin on this one. Exactly the same for me.

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I’ll swap out with you guys as they come up…:relaxed: Thank you both!

The first one should be pretty general though…no translation needed. I need to start putting it together, but I’m taking the rest of the day off.*

*(Except for the Weekly Highlights once i get editing capabilities back.)

@Xabbess, you’re probably the Affinity Design expert…want to take a shot at translating into that? :wink:

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Thanks Jules…I’m honored, but so far from expert. I’ve only worked in it for a few months…and my most recent obsession was mostly with learning to use the pen tool. It’s such a relatively new program that even others here on this forum have used it only a short time…but heck…calling all Affinity Design users!

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