MAKER MOVEMENT PROJECTS

CNC Sign Projects – Sign Layout With Vectric Aspire

Written By: Bill Griggs - Aug• 29•12

Part 5COW HEAD

This time we will discuss how to create the rest of the CNC Sign layout using Vectric Aspire. In part 4 of the CNC Sign Projects series we talked about creating Photo realistic Vcarvings using Vectric PhotoVCarve.

 

Vectric Aspire is the flagship of the Vectric line of products. Aspire will allow you to create many types of 3D OBJECTS, VCARVING, photo  VCarving and more. For this project we don’t actually need all the power of Aspire. All the things we are about to do can also be done using Vectric VCarve Pro. VCrave pro is a less expensive version of Aspire without the 3D functionality. I did not use VCarve pro simply because I have Aspire. Fortunately, the user interface is nearly identical so all the examples-will  work in  either program.

 

Defining the work piece

Open the Aspire program and select Create a New File icon.

The first step we took involved defining the work piece size. I simply (more…)

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You Can Never Have too Many Clamps

Written By: Bill Griggs - Aug• 22•12

carriage

You Can Never Have Too Many Clamps

YOU CAN NEVER HAVE TOO MANY CLAMPS – THE C.R.A.P. Factor

There is no such thing as too many clamps. Clamps are needed in almost every woodworking project. There are many types of clamps. Parallel jaw clamps, cauls, quick grip clamps. Pipe clamps, Uncle Fester (hand screw) clamps. Right angle clamps, pocket hole clamps. The list is endless.  I’ve often use quick grip clamps to hold material to the bed of my CNC router table. Using quick grip clamps to hold material to the CNC router table can get expensive if you’re not careful.  I go to great pains to determine where the clamps can safely go yet still be pout of the cutting path. The CNC router bit does not care if it is cutting wood or my clamps.  Therefore I came up with another solution. (more…)

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CNC SIGN PROJECTS – VECTRIC PHOTOVCARVE

Written By: Bill Griggs - Aug• 17•12

Cow head Toolpath

PART 4

This is the fourth blog post about my CNC Sign Projects.  I will show how I used Vectric PhotoVCarve to create a CNC toolpath from the Photograph we edited in Adobe Photoshop.  Vectric PhotoVCarve  allows you to take a Photograph and create a photo-realistic engraving. I have owned PhotoVCarve (PVC) for a while but I haven’t used it much because it  takes some experimentation with settings before you get consistent results in all type of wood. Each wood has a unique grain and figure. Sometimes a strong wood grain like Oak can overpower a design so I wanted to make sure I had good settings because Oak was the wood the customer supplied.

(more…)

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LEGO CELEBRATES 80 YEARS – MAKING KIDS HAPPY

Written By: Bill Griggs - Aug• 13•12

From Wooden Ducks to CNC – Lego Celebrates 80 Years.

If you have been following my blog you know that I like LEGO toys. Lego has been around since before I was born in fact LEGO Celebrates 80 Years in business this year. Lego did something unique to celebrate it’s 80 years in business, they made an animated  movie that tells the companies story. I watched the movie, (more…)

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CNC SIGN PROJECTS – CNC DESIGN SOFTWARE

Written By: Bill Griggs - Aug• 09•12

 Part 3

CNC DESIGN SOFTWARE

Aspire BSA Logo

This is the third post  of this CNC Sign Projects series and I promised to talk about the CNC Design Software I used. In the last post I talked about taking a photo and doing some editing with Photoshop. The reason we needed a photo image is so that it could be turned into a photo V-Carving.  A photo V-Carving is when a pointed router bit engraves into the surface of a sign at varying depths and widths based on how dark the pixels in the picture are. Light pixel get shallow cuts and dark pixels get deep, wide  cuts. When you do it right a photo VCarve can be amazing. However it takes skill and experience to get good repeatable results.

To do the conversion work, I used a CNC Design Software program called PhotoVCarve from Vectric to create the toolpath from the image. PhotoVCarve (PVC) is the only product in Vectric’s lineup which will do photo realistic engraving. I have several other Vectric products which will almost get the job done but PVC is best for this type of work. (more…)

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