Oof, that’s a really tough one to trace. Did you use Corel Draw to vectorize it? If so, I can guarantee it would need lots and lots of clean-up to work well. I use Corel as well and it looks to me there are other issues instead of/along with lots of nodes. I would suspect broken nodes with lots of segments, maybe some stacked lines (stacked lines cancel each other out) and looks like you could have some winding rule issues as well. (The winding rules issue are the solid blue areas that should not filled in like that. Basically, the GF can’t recognize the inner line of the cut-out and ignores it. If you search the forum, you’ll find a ton of info about it.)
So do you want to score each and every line, or just highlights? If you want each line, it’s going to be tough to fix, but maybe doable. One thing I’d try first is taking it into an online svg program or another graphics program like Inkscape if ya have it, and saving it again to see if anything clears up. If it does, you’ll know there were some winding issues. I’d reduce the nodes down as far as possible and check for overlaps and broken lines. I’d also layer the file and have a PNG engraving layer with the vector lines on another layer, and that way you can really simply the vector one down without losing any engraving details.
Do you maybe want to post the file so we can take a look at it?
Side note; @Brandon.B PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE can someone consider fixing the winding rule issue for us Corel users. It’s been 4 yrs dealing with it, and fixing something like this octopus to accommodate GF inability to process them correctly would be tedious to say the least, and it should not be necessary.
Hi @JimSocks. I’m sorry to hear about the family emergency. I don’t want you to feel pressured to get back to us before you’re ready.
I’m going to go ahead and close your ticket for now but will keep this thread open. When you’re ready to proceed, please reply in this thread and your ticket will automatically re-open in our system. We will be able to pick up right where we left off and can finish troubleshooting the issue with you. I’m also sending positive thoughts for you and your family.
@kittski I definitely understand any frustration regarding this issue with designs prepared in Corel Draw. I appreciate your time to give some advice in this thread, and will give forward your feedback upwards.
I bought the vector as a commercial product, so it wasn’t “vectorized” by CorelDraw, but I was using CorelDraw to create the final graphic with the text.
Taking the vector to a website that turned an SVG into… well another SVG did the trick for the GF software- In other words, once imported NOT from CorelDraw the vector loaded into the GF website just fine, no issues. Interestingly enough: taking that new website-re-vectorized file into CorelDraw and saving exactly as-is from CorelDraw as another SVG (zero changes) STILL messed up the same upon importation into the Glowforge environment.
What I ended up doing with me leather instead though, was trying jules’s suggestion (and others) of turning it into a 600 dpi raster.
I had to engrave it like… 8 times in order to get a result I was happy with though. Took forever, but looks great. I DO wish I would have still ran a score at 2% power though, as even at 8 passes some detail was lost due to not enough zaps hitting small areas. Next time I’ll try that.
Final result: Annoying workaround found by using a go-between website, but something about the Glowforge and CorelDraw does not jive.
HI @jimsocks. I’m very happy to hear you were able to print your design with through the workaround and other members’ tips and trip. Corel Draw can require some file format changes. However, we found that using Inkscape or Adobe Illustrator to prepare SVG files and import the designs into the Glowforge app for printing. We have a great support page for initial use of Inkscape below:
Since the issue has been resolved, I will go ahead and close this support ticket. I’ll also move this one to our Beyond the Manual section our Community so that can allow for the discussion to continue with other members. Note that advice in this section is unsupported and is not reviewed by Glowforge.
Feel to open a new thread if you run into any other trouble. That will create a new support ticket to help address any issues with troubleshooting. Thank you, and happy printing!
Probably the longstanding bug where Glowforge doesn’t support the “evenodd” fill rules in SVG files. It only supports the “nonzero” fill rule that Inkscape and Illustrator use by default. Exporting as PDF from CorelDraw might have fixed the issue because Glowforge does support the “evenodd” fill rule in PDF files even though it doesn’t in SVG.
This very annoying Glowforge bug doesn’t just affect CorelDraw users. Those of us who use Affinity Designer have the same problem. (And while Inkscape and Illustrator default to non-zero fills, it’s certainly possible to set a shape’s fill rule to even-odd in those programs as well.)
Don’t hold your breath. We reported the big four years ago.
It used to be worse. It used to show shapes correctly on screen, then mess them up when actually engraving. Now it at least shows you what you’re going to get when you hit print.
This issue does not exist if you use 's recommended software (Inkscape). You are choosing to use a ~non-supported~ software.
Yes, it’d be great if they could fix it, but like apps not working in the older version of your OS, or websites loading only in Chrome and looking terrible in Firefox, it is an end-user problem.
Did you use Corel Draw to vectorize it? If so, I can guarantee it would need lots and lots of clean-up to work well. I use Corel as well and it looks to me there are other issues instead of/along with lots of nodes. I would suspect broken nodes with lots of segments, maybe some stacked lines (stacked lines cancel each other out) and looks like you could have some winding rule issues as well. (The winding rules issue are the solid blue areas that should not filled in like that. Basically, the GF can’t recognize the inner line of the cut-out and ignores it. If you search the forum, you’ll find a ton of info about it.)
has a “recommended software” that doesn’t have this issue…