Carvewright pattern depot

[Mikewiz]

Hey'

Has anyone purchased any patterns fron the pattern depot and added text, then carved it? I purchased one yesterday to make a sign, I added text. But when I carve it the text comes out horrible. It doesn't look like chip-out. It looks like the machine chops it up to make it look bad on purpose. I've done two carves with different text and one in the cc now with a third text and they all look bad. The carving of the pattern comes out nice but the text is garbage. I've attached photos. any help would be great.

Thanks MIke

[Jeff_Birt]

Do you have bit optimization set to 'Hi'? I have had problems with setting it to 'Hi' in certain cases it leaves peck marks around the edges of the edges around a pattern or overlaid text. It sort of looks the same as what I have seen, but your pictures are too blurry to be sure. Try turning bit optimization to 'none' and see if that helps. It might also help to make the top of the text just slightly below the top of the board. You can also adjust the merge style of the text to get it to follow the curve of the pattern behind it.

[Mikewiz]

Hey jeff,

Yes my bit optimization was set to hi. Your right about the peck marks on the edges and in the words too. My third carving is done and that looks the same as the rest. Now to see if it was a machine problem I did a carving of my name on a scrap board using same font and bit op on hi, and it came out fine.

[Dale in Anaheim]

Yeah what Jeff said. I have seen similar results and cleaned it up/got better results some by playing with the height of the lettering.

Dale

[Jeff_Birt]

It has something to do with the interaction of the pattern and other features like text. If I am doing other features overlaid on patterns I turn bit optimization to 'none'.

[mtylerfl]

It has something to do with the interaction of the pattern and other features like text. If I am doing other features overlaid on patterns I turn bit optimization to 'none'.

Hi Jeff,

Funny, I have never run into that - always set my bit optimization on "BEST" and my lettering has come out fine for every project.


I do pay attention to depth/height settings for text though, and try to make sure I'm using a font style and size that won't be prone to chipout.

Here's an example of a carving "fresh" off the machine - the text came out just about perfect. It is overlaid on top of an oval (just a probe-scanned glass picture frame dome) and I set the text Depth at ".063" / Height "100" and to "Merge Style: Additive".

[Jeff_Birt]

I think it worked out for you because your text was a bit lower than the top surface of the board. The peck marks only seem to show up if your pattern interacts with other objects that are at the surface of the board, like text or a border. I first ran into this on my apple box. The recess on the inside of the lid really looked bad when set to 'hi' (or is it called 'best' ?), the entire perimeter had little peck marks around it, set it to none and it was fine.

[Mikewiz]

hey jeff,

I ran another project setting bit op to none. and set merge to additive and the text came out without the chattered edges. But I liked it better with normal merge. so I'm running another carve and the text is chattered around the edges again. Must be somthing with leaving the letters all the way up.

Thanks,
Mike

[liquidguitars]

Same prob here. Just need to lower the map or your font a little and it will go away.

I don't use bit optimization much for projects but I think once you use bit optimization I find it could be better just to delete and reload the PTN or image to it's first level tessellation or no optimization. the term "bit optimization" adds to detail to the projects surface.
the term "optimization" in cad is to remove tessellation or detail for speed. ;)
LG

[mtylerfl]

Here is a link to an excellent online video tutorial explaining how Bit optimization works and why/when to use it...

http://www.carvewright.com/tutorials/bit_optimization.htm


In case you don't know about them yet, there are a whole bunch of CarveWright video tutorials posted at...
http://www.carvewright.com/tutorials.html?jmid=1196139145