Wildgoose

Once you do the trace there should be a pull down menu with other tracing options for a few presets. You may have to monkey with the actual settings and create your own final settings that work good for a B&W trace. I don't have the CS6 version just CS5 but the tools are are pretty much the same. CS6 is purported as having a better tracing engine or whatever it uses to figure out what you are wanting it to trace. In the CS5 version the tracing tools are up along the top of the toolbar and show up once you select the "trace Image" . I think CS6 might have a completely separate Tracing options pop up. There should be a couple options like "Threshold" and "Minimum area" as well as "mode" etc... You might find a preset in the mode pull down that works but I have always had to play around to get the best image possible.

Usually but I did one last week (on a regular car) that had a simple logo that I was able to snip the letters apart and follow the curve just fine. If the letters are flowing together then you probably will want to do the curve.

I just opened it up and converted all the strokes to objects and then welded them together. No big. Took all of about 39 seconds. I'm not super knowledgeable on Inkscape but you should be able to do the same thing without worrying about trying to trace it. It was already a vector. That would be a good file to practice with. I may give it a try in Inkscape myself. <edit> Well my version of Inkscape wouldn't open that up so I guess that would be a problem! LOL

Here's one from me. This is in AI 8 format that should open and cut just fine is SignCut Pro (that's what I use) SMC 1-19.ai

I have found that most people who say read are looking for light red. Regular red is a little too dark for what most people are thinking. That being said, each specific job can be totally different and like mentioned above, a color chart is a must have if you have to match something. There are about 10 red options in 751.

My best deals have been on Amazon

I like HDN's thought. If she doesn't pay up soon we can all start a calling tree and make like we are each a separate collection agency.

I guess you kind of need to look at your workload and decide if it is something that will pay off very quickly. I spent about an additional thousand over the cost of the Graphtec to get the Summa but it has almost paid for itself already and I only started using it July of 2013. Basically I took on larger jobs that would have been risky with the old unit like a group of 500 hats with HTV that were two color front and 1 back which in total was 1500 cut jobs. I would have been doing them in sets of about 10 or less with the P-Cut and you loose a little in between each time you stop and go. I cut the first batch in a stretch of about 10 feet which was about 250 pieces. I didn't have to stick around and supervise the cutter I just walked off and had dinner and watched tv. The rest I just loaded the roll and let it go while I got started weeding the first batch.The cutter ran for hours unsupervised and that would have been totally impossible with the value cutter so I figure my time saved alone was huge. The other big job I did was an RV that had 20 foot long cuts that didn't off-track ANY at all. If I had been trying to use the P-Cut I would have had to cut it in sections or possibly tried to use the cut as you go feature in SignCut which eliminates the tracking issue as far as connecting the ends of the cut but still doesn't save you when the machine sends the vinyl off the pinch rollers half way through a long cut. I cleared about $1500 on those two jobs alone. If you aren't needing that kind of advantage then maybe your not in that much need. Just pick up an extra for back-up if you loose another motherboard and keep on doing what you been doing.

I don't use Inkscape much either but I do have a copy on my work (other job) computer. If you go to the "view" tab and then hover over the "display mode" then choose "outline" it will remove the colors so you can see what your cutter is going to see. You can remove the lines you don't want or select both and weld them together by selecting "union" from the paths menu or using the keystroke "Ctrl++" I don't know why it's tracing both, could be a setting in the trace image section but I am not familiar enough to help out on that one.

TC isn't really much of an upgrade. Even a Copam still uses the stepper motor. I actually have a Summa. I started with a P-Cut 1200. The biggest differences in the higher end cutters are the motors. Steppers vs Servo. Personally I wouldn't upgrade to anything that didn't have the servo. The other BIG difference you will notice is the tracking. My P-Cut got the job done for 2-1/2 years and I made good money off it. Never even had an official breakdown other than static electrical glitches and memory overloads that locked it up from time to time. Would I go back? NOPE! Think of it this way. You are currently driving a 1963 International Scout. It is a 4 wheel drive sport utility vehicle. Has all the same basic features the new ones do (except for A/C) and theoretically can go the same places. Is the new Toyota 4 Runner worth the extra bling? Some say yes some say no. At least with a cutter it will create it's own revenue.

Cool, I'm going to check that out! Thanks OW

If you have the "exclude thing down then you're most of the way there. Just have to figure out the best way to upsize the image before you do it. Thats what I was trying to explain but didn't get across to you. In some programs you can change the outline which currently has no color and this will make the image bigger. You will have to assign a color to the path rather than to the fill and then make it bigger by going....say 15pt or whatever looks good to you, then you have to convert the line to outline the color you just added to it. It's kind of hard to explain in words and even a little weird as a concept. When you have color on a path it's just a color and the vector is still just a single line but if you then convert that to an outline around the color you get a new abject that has width and can be then excluded to produce the space between things you are looking for. If we were talking Adobe Illustrator I could tell you exactly what keystrokes to do to accomplish this but I don't know my way around SCALP enough to help other than theoretic direction. Vectors are vectors and each program ends up with the same thing but they use different terminology to get there.

Ya buddy! I picked up an epson WF30 from cobra ink systems with the pigment based CISS and can't believe the cost savings in ink! I do a few heat transfers onto shirts so that's why I went for the pigment ink and the rest of the time its' just my printer. I try to keep it busy because the pigment ink will clog a little if it sets there too long. I kinda wish I would have went for the WF1100 that can do larger format prints. I am stuck with standard letter size with the WF30 and there have been a few times that I wanted to go bigger. Also the 1100 has a waste tank for head cleaning (I believe) and the WF30 just shoots it out into a sponge in the bottom of the tray and sooner or later that thing is going to be a problem because when you get a clogged head you go through quite a few cleaning cycles to get it back running clean. I haven't had any problem with mine yet but it worries me. The pigment ink is awesome, pretty much water proof once it dries.

Silly Ford owners

I no longer have a copy of SCALP so it's hard to remember what terms they use for things but in a nutshell you will need to make a copy of the top object(s) and paste it in place then upsize it or more accurately offset the paths so that it is larger than the original then select both the new larger version of the top and the original green background and there should be a tool to combine them and create a knock out in the green background. (an alternative can also be to add some line weight or color to the object then convert the path to object which should accomplish roughly the same thing as offsetting the paths) In Inkscape that is called "difference" I don't know what SCALP calls it but there should be a similar tool. This should make essentially a hole in the lower (green) layer and hopefully you have offset your paths to the point that it creates a void between the original top object and the new green object. If you can figure out how, it may be useful to lock the original top object(s) after you copy/paste so that you don't accidentally mess with them while you are monkeying around with the new pasted version. I usually change the color from the original so I can see which one I am messing with. That's the theory at least. I draw in Illustrator which uses different terms and has some other options that make this much easier so I am having to remember what I can about SCALP and also the little I use Inkscape. Seems Inkscape was very similar to SCALP. (I'm no good in Inkscape either to tell the truth)

I have a client that likes this font. I think it is at least somewhat custom but I am wondering if anyone has seen the base font this started out life as. Seems familiar but I can't get it to recognize in "what the font".

And so it is! Wow you never fail to amaze me. Thanks Mark!

So would I. It's modified enough that it's not totally obvious and I seriously doubt you are going to sell 10K of those things so the likelihood of there being a problem is next to nothing.

That's a font for sure. I can't tell you off hand which one but mark or someone will be along and nail it shortly.

You guys are getting right to the point I got to a year or two ago when I made a funny version of the Harley logo. I changed it to Hardly Davidson and thought it was great, even had a good friend who is a very accomplished attorney tell me I was totally protected under the fair use act. The point of it all is "protected" in my case and "burden of proof" in yours both spell legal court action. I decided not to pursue the decal because I didn't want to have to defend myself in court against an aggressive, very large and prosperous company. Win or loose I would have probably lost just because they have the buying power to stop production and tie it up in court for about three generations. I don't appreciate being bullied but there is a point where common sense has to come into play and it just wasn't worth the risk. That being said I have a real cool "Hardly Davidson" sweatshirt that I proudly wear all over the place and get lots of comments but it's the only one like it on the planet.

Another thing I have found is that with transfers if you have to re-press them some of the color will come off even on the teflon. If I have to re-press a transfer I use parchment paper. That parchment paper is some handy stuff, and cheap.

In "My opinion" if you are going to make your buddy a decal of HIS TRUCK for HIM you probably won't have much to worry about. If you are planning on doing a mass sales decal all over the internet and making big bucks off it then you have another thing altogether.

I think there are some expectations also considering he paid good money fro the truck and should have some control over his own "likeness". I have had 6 or 7 jeeps over the years and for a while they were getting touchy about calling the act of off-roading "Jeeping" because they own the Jeep Trademark. Well one thing led to another and of course most Jeep owners are pretty down to earth, when word got out that Chrysler was getting bent of the whole deal the general consensus was "ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME!?!?!" Didn't take long for the PC idiots to realize they stood to loose a lot more by upsetting the applecart than by letting every Tom, Dick and Harry do them a huge PR favor and keep using the company name everywhere so it kind of just stopped being a big deal. I used a modified Jeep for my avatar on the pirate 4x4 forum for years and kept almost hoping they would hard time me but no one ever did.

I bought a "one time use" license from Rick Rietveld of one of his awesome drawings for a good friend of mine for $35 (if i recall correctly). "The Tikinator" is the one I got permission to make a sign with. My pal has a nice pool area made up to look like a Hawaiian beach scene and he wanted a copy of Ricks drawing. I bought the one time use Hi-res image and outsourced a print onto some vinyl and stuck it on a piece of e-panel about 30" tall. Funny thing about it the whole deal was it was supposed to go outside with all the fake surfboards and other stuff we made and he liked it so much he didn't want it to set out there in the sun so it resides on his fireplace mantle! Mr Rietveld is real cool, I have a feeling the $35 was just him being nice and most of the license agreements are probably much higher than that and based on volume. I explained what we were doing and he was cool with it.

That's the same cabinet I have.