Wildgoose

I seem to remember from my SCALP days that you can do as Go-C Wraps said and once broken apart you can also select and change the color of the objects so that the cut-by-color buttons work. I had trouble with some imports coming through all the same color even though I had designed them in different colors. In the end I started making a separate file for each color layer. I no longer use SCALP.

You will probably want to download inkscape. Its an open source program that does a pretty good job for free and then ya you just can just cut from SCALP. You might be able to do some of what you are talking with SCALP but it is lacking a few major options. There are videos of how to use inkscape and even a link in the help menu to show the basics. Post a pic of your design and it will be easier for us to visualize what your up to.

Nice work dude! What program you use to design with? Welcome to the forum!

If your not still a newbie then you're sliding downhill. I try to learn something new everyday and if I can pass a little info on to others then I do. There are a lot that give it a go and give up. I just did some large wall quotes for a hair salon that usually buys them pre-cut from the local hobby shop but they actually referred her to me when they figured out how big they were. (they really weren't that big, largest was about 36"x 90") I convinced her it would be smart to let me install which was probably a bad idea because the texture on her walls was horrible, but mow she is talking about more vinyl on the door and so on.

http://forum.uscutter.com/index.php?/topic/43549-printing-or-cut-help-needed/ This recent thread has a two color image that a couple of us did a tracing on to give you a good example of the kinds of things you will probably deal with with customers and some of the different ways to go about doing things. I have rebuilt logos from worn out business cards and even hand drawn on a napkin kind of stuff. For the lock there should be a little icon somewhere in the layers that will let you select a certain item and toggle between lock and unlock. I'm not familiar with corel to know where it's at.

Hopefully your machines will come on time. I had a vinyl order that I put in last week that took 6 days rather than the normal 2 because of all the nasty weather out there. If they don't you can always practice tracing designs. A good skill to have is the ability to hand trace an image rather than relying on auto trace. You get much cleaner results by hand but it takes a little practice to get fast at it. Homework assignment for today. Find a simple one or two color design. Import it into the program you use. Reduce the opacity of that object to about 50% and lock it so you won't accidentally select it then use your drawing tool which sometimes has goes by different names to draw bezier curves and lines around the object. I draw with no fill or line weight and then turn the color on after but some draw with some line weight. Don't fret if you make a mistake on the initial draw because you can and should go back around it with the individual selection or node edit tool and manipulate the nodes to get the lines exactly where you want them. It takes practice to figure out where the best placement is for the nodes. I would suggest going to SignTorch's site and download one of his free designs and open it up and look at where he places his nodes. That guy is about as good as they get. Also take a look at how he rarely has sharp corners. I looked at his stuff early on and have tried to emulate his style and it makes for images that cut nice with less pick-up in the corners. Sometimes you need a point but usually you can go back in and add two points just off the very tip and then remove the tip point and still get the same look without an absolute dagger point. When you are all done toss the original and you should have a very accurate copy. (Just be careful of copyright laws.)

Uh oh, Slice is getting on his star wars soap box, what did you get started Jerry...what did you do!!!!!

My advice is be patient and try not to get frustrated at the start. Once you get your machine up and running and start playing around you will learn fast. Some times hands on are the quickest teacher. My big tip for newbies is use the pen attachment and get yourself some cheap butcher paper to practice the first few designs to see if you have that part down right before you worry about getting the knife depth and pressure correct. One thing at a time. Watch the pen and see if it's doing a double cut. A lot of newbs get a second object in all the white/open holes within their designs. Cut by color will fix that by turning off all but the color you are wanting and if you find you have those extra images then a quick search and you can figure out the best way to remove them. I see you are using Corel and I don't hear as much about them from those folks as with Illustrator so it may not be an issue. It's really not that hard but seems like a lot at first. Good luck man!

Lighten up Francis. That was a bit harsh. OW I print on wally world shirts all the time that people bring in. I couldn't care less if they want to get their own. I prefer that they don't wash them but I have even done used shirts once. I just let them know that if they will give me a little heads up I can usually save them a buck by bringing them in for them. I have never used the glow product and I haven't brought any in just because as you say its a bit on the expensive side. I wonder how much they move that stuff and maybe it's an old roll. I have noticed my older rolls getting harder to weed but never had any ill effects with adhesion (that I know of).

So I was feeling the itch and vectored your pic. There is probably a lot of distortion from the picture so it may need tweaked. I left all the colors on one layer but you should be able to cut by color and lay out the black then the red on top. I wasn't sure you were following what I was talking about. I figured you could use the help being new so have fun. Saved in AI version 8 which I think works with SCALP, can't remember. Job1.ai

In my opinion I would cut the black out and include the shadow behind the red and then put the red on top of the black. If you knock the C and E out of the red it will look like the black is on top and you can still get the shadows behind the red. I would use the Bright red Siser too, it's much more vibrant especially when next to or on black.

If it's the job in the picture you should be able to cut that out of vinyl. Two colors easy peasy

You have to take into account what your final end product is about too, If you are making stuff to sell then ya you better be careful. SignTorch is a forum member and has some great vector packages that are affordable and there are several on the USCutter website that are nice to have for building other files. Even with purchased vectors you have to be careful how you use them. I bought a huge vector pack with my first cutter called Ultimate Ornaments Mega Pack that has tons of frames and scrolls that is a huge time saver if you are building someone a sign and just need something elegant to finish off the corners etc... Money well spent if you calculate the time you spend either looking for free stuff or building your own. The bottom line is that in the end you need to develop some skills with a vector based design program like Illustrator or Corel Draw or Inkscape (which is free). You probably have SCALP which came with your cutter but it is very limited in ability compared to any of the previous three. SCALP traces good and cuts good and has some basic editing capabilities but just isn't robust enough for doing the good stuff. Don't feel like you got stiffed though, when I bought my first cutter it just came with SignCut which is just a cutting utility and you can't design on it at all so the attempt with SCALP had good merit but falls a little short.

Ya it doesn't appear to be complete unless you are just doing some sort of patch. Have him send a dxf file if that's what he built it in.

I use a pillow frequently but it is not something you HAVE to have or at least not that you need ALL the time. I only use it if I have a garment that will have a seam or collar or something near the graphic. Any kind of uneven pressure can/may cause poor adhesion. Not saying that it WILL but it has happened to me and that's when I bought my pillow. I actually have two pillows and a press pad. One big pillow about 12x14 or some such and one longer skinny that is about 5 inches wide by about 16 long or longer that works for sweat pant legs which I have found are a real issue because they all have a major seam running down the inside of the leg which is directly under the press if your doing the outside of the leg. The press pad I bought was 5"x 6" I think and I use it for crest prints on front breast jobs that have buttons nearby. It's made from the same stuff as the base of your heat press (silicon Rubber I think) Very proud of them for price, I would like more sizes but I get by. I have heard of people using mouse pads for this and they would work great too and be cheaper. ALL of these are used typically inside the garment to support the layer your pressing away from the bottom or back of the shirt. You will still need to cover your design to protect your heat platen. I have a teflon sheet but I don't use it very often mostly I use craft paper or lately I have been using parchment backing paper that my wife buys in huge rolls from Costco. Sometimes I re-press HTV (heat transfer vinyl) with the teflon to give it a slight pattern which makes it look more like a semi-gloss rather than shiny. #2 on your list if you haven't figured it out yet, each HTV product is a little different for heat and pressure and time. Siser runs more consistently at the 305* for 15 seconds for their main easyweed and easyweed stretch which is just about all I use. I have tried several from stahls and they work fine but they all have higher temps and some don't have an sticky carrier so if you mess up on the weed you have a problem on your hands. The general consensus is that the easyweed is pretty forgiving and it doesn't show any signs of failure even at temps as high as 350* so I tend to go a little higher than 305 to allow for heat loss into the garment and I like to run about 18 seconds just for peace of mind that it's getting a good bite. You can tell if you can see the material pattern through the vinyl that it's there to stay. As far as graphics, there are definitely free vectors all over the place, the forum has a bunch here. I would put some training time in on the design program of your choice because you are going to need it.

Nice! Beat out again! I can't even win in the consolation race.

Cream doesn't show up on a glass once you put a beverage in it either. However the cream is easy and works pretty good for small areas if you don't need a deep etch also if you are doing some part etch and part vinyl details.

You have a lower serial number than 5101? Wow that's cool. The only thing I see that makes me a little nervous at all is that the upper platen has no kind of heat shield. It doesn't look like it ever did so it's probably fine, I just don't want to accidentally put my hand on that thing.

If you don't have a light box and want to do it poor boy style grab a piece of parchment paper from the kitchen (my wife uses it to bake with). Lay the parchment paper on the lower layer of vinyl and then peel the backing off the top layer and flop it down on there making sure the whole vinyl is on the paper so it won't accidentally get stuck. you can pretty well see through the parchment paper similar to a light box and slide your top layer around until it's exactly where you want it then I use a piece of tape along one side just like a hinge when applying the vinyl for real and hinge the vinyl up and pull out the parchment and squeegee the top layer back down now in position on top of the lower layer. If you are doing small enough stuff you can just leave enough of the app tape along one side to skip the tape part and use the app tape as the hinge. The parchment will slip right out of there easy without having to raise the top vinyl all that far, it's great stuff! I bumped across this application by accident last summer.

I keep a couple rolls of clear around. Some applications it's kinda nice to have and most of the ladies I sell wall art to prefer to be able to see it. What brand of clear did you buy? I don't like the Greenstar much at all. I have a 24" wide roll I have been trying to use up ever since I got it. It tears easy, doesn't come off the vinyl very good and causes all kinds of hate and discontent. The R-Tape Clear choice is much more manageable.

nope it's almost identical to regular vinyl other than being transparent

They have subscriptions as short term as by the month I think or you can buy a dongle and actually own the program and install it on multiple computers and platforms, in that mode it requires the dongle as a "key" to function. Try out the free trial, I really like the way it works and it used to come with the USCutter products (1yr free). It has some good cutting tools like weeding frame and weeding lines and step-by-step cutting which lets you decide how far along the project you want it to go and it will cut all the elements in that given distance then move on to the next chunk which is almost a necessity on real long graphics that start having tracking issues. You just have to design elsewhere like inkscape or illustrator and then open the saved file and cut it.

Like OW said, I don't think I would count on being able to see through it, at least not real well. If you put it on a backlit sign it shows up at night with a glow from the lights behind it.

I was looking to do some contour cuts around transfers on the regular JPSS and needed a backing material. I have an old cricuit cutting mat but it's too sticky and destroys the paper trying to get it off there not to mention bulky to work with. So I tried some of my R-Tape Clear Choice AT60 medium tack app tape and Whallaaa! Perfect! Has enough hold to provide a good backing but light enough tack to be able to pull up the paper after the cut. I didn't try any higher tack as this will work great for me.

I gotcha. That would pose a problem. That free CS2 download may work but it's for older computer systems so if you are running newer you may have to run in compatibility mode.