Connections and Pathways - Part 5: Nov 29th - Dec 5th

Monday - 29th

Considering that I practically devoured my Secondary Schools resources through the use of a laser-cutter, I thought that I would be fairly proficient in the use of such as device and its softwares.

Apparently not.

Over the course of one day, and many frustrating hours I somehow succeeded in learning how to use a laser-cutter all over again. (YAY. not)

Compared to what I have previously used in the past, this new piece of kit, and updated versions of old software have proved a real challenge to me. Without the software/digital cutting-board/ canvas that I am skilled with, trying to pass the digital files of artwork from the creation software, to an adjustment software and finally into the actual laser-cutter itself, is a time-consuming and multi-step nightmare.

SO! Where do you look when you have no idea what you are doing? Well you turn to the internet of course!

After a good half hour of researching, finding, downloading and then printing many, many pages (sorry printing fees, eeek!), and reading what felt like endless pages, I managed to finally find what I was looking for! Sort of...

Software can be very different from one another, especially when produced and manufactured by different companies. Except for Adobe, ahhhhhhh, why does one command/button have to have two different names? I am mean come on Adobe! 'Import' and 'Place' are the same thing, why did you have to change the name? You know what, let's not get into this rant/argument.

And so, in this instance, some of the features I know and regularly used when laser cutting are not present when using the model shown to the left (I already hate you, hmm).

Normally, I would export my design from a software called '2D Design V2', which has now been renamed and updated to 'TechSoft Design V3', and the import the file into a sort of, digital-cutting-board shall we call it, and begin. to resize and reposition it on there, so that I know that the design i wish to cut out will fit on my chosen material, won't burn or mark etc etc etc.

At first, as to not damage the machine or any materials unnecessarily, I began with paper, just straight up normal paper, which in turn came out quite well and 'off', unexpectedly. The parts which showed up on the 'paper etching' as I referring to it as, look fantastic, its sharp burnt brown colour sits well with the blank white of the page. Now, the annoying part. The parts which didn't really show up are very faint, teeny tiny thin brown lines which are barely visible. This is down to the fact that those areas of the digital design were hollow and not filled in like the others. It can be seen here in the TechSoft Design V3 version of my digital artwork, shown below:

INSERT IMAGE HERE OF BLUE AND RED MAP

After realising this issue I continued to work on the digital piece within TechSoft Design V3 which became a problem also, because as of writing this post I have not been able to find an autosave, and you know what that means!

EDIT. SAVE. EDIT. SAVE. EDIT. EDIT. EDIT. FORGOT TO SAVE AND NOW THE SOFTWARE HAS CRASHED RESULTING IN 2O MINUTES OF WORK GONE. MELTDOWN IMMINENT. RESTART SOFTWARE.