Carvwright software or other???

[Randy in Minn]

If I take a Digital photo and save it as a .JPG file, then upload it to the patterns and images file, everything looks fine but when I try to incorporate the image into the board carving, I ALWAYS get the background (even if totally white or black) carved down in the board and the image I want carved down even deeper. Is ther ea way to convert what you wnat carved to a line drawing or somethign else so that basically yoiu are carvign the lines of the photo in the wood line a line drawing butthe background is ignored or at least = the surface of the original board surface??? What am I missing?

[Ron Baird]

The background has to be really pure white (not an off white) for the m/c to not carve it. You can also try raising and lowering the pattern when you are importing it. There are graffic or photo finishing softwares that can be used to remove background. I have done pictures where the background was carved shallow enough that I was able to remove it by belt sanding the top of the board. The software converts the photo to shades of gray to get the depth profile. Hope this will help.

[Juno2]

Are you wanting a line drawing of your photo? or am I getting you wrong. There may be a filter process in Photoshop you can put your photo through that will make it more like a sketch or line drawing of your image. If so let me know and I'll see if I can help ya out.

[BobHill]

From my understanding of the use of raster images, if you wish to have other than the full rectangular image directly from your camera, you have to use a raster imaging program, such as Adobe PhotoShop or PhotoShop Elements, JASC's Paint Shop Pro or some other such program that'll allow image modification.

In that program, first use the CROP tool and make the size of your image a rectangle just larger than the image you wish to carve. Now use the selection tool(s) you are familiar with and select the image you wish to carve, then INVERSE the selection to everything BUT the carving image is selected.

Use the Eraser tool and erase everything within that selection area (don’t worry, the tool will only work in the selection area at this time). Depending upon your program and if it allows transparency or not, the background will either be pure white or be checkerboarded to show transparency. Control D should remove the selection “marching ants” of the selection area. Save the image to a convenient Folder (I keep an image folder in my CarveWright folder).

In Designer, File, Import Image, and call upon this image and you should see a rectangle (as you Cropped it) with your image in it. On the side you’ll see three options, Raise/Lower/Invert. Click “Lower” until all but the image you wish to carve is black. Save as you wish to name it for your Favorites library.

Choose the size of your work piece and determine what you’d like to have for a border (if any with your Rectangle Tool. Click the Carve Region tool and then set the depth you wish the background to be.

Choose your image from your Favorites Library and place it on your work piece and size it. Use the Isometric or rotation view and note the carving region has no background other than what was set for your Carve region Depth as long as the depth of the object you selected has the same depth.

That’s what I’ve done with some degree of success, even for converting vector imaging from CorelDraw/Illustrator/AutoCad designs. I’ve had some troubles using PNG for some reason, although it’ll go directly from vector without a background at all. I keep getting stray lines and tip gouges both in the image drawing and when carved.

I’ve not worked out the cause of that problem yet, so I tend to use only JPEG for my imaging.

I've attached a PDF with steps I've followed, just using a not so special image for the purpose

Bob Hill
Tampa Florida

[Juno2]

Hey very nice work on that and a real nice Tutorial, Bob!

Have you used the Extract tool in Photoshop yet? Perfect tool for eliminating parts of a complex image that you dont want in the final product.

[BobHill]

Thanks, Juno, I use whatever tool is best for whatever background I need to eliminate. for raster from vector images I normally use the Magic Wand to select, then delete the background to have checkerboard transparency. Since transparency is file format dependant and the only one that CW recognizes is PNG, I've tried to use that, but am finding that for some reason PNG causes stray lines and bit dips on the image and even the transparent background both in the Designer image as well as how it's carved, so I stopped using PNG, which pretty much left JPEG, unfortunately.

Bob

[Icutone2]

Sorry to intrupet but what is a 1/2" caassical bit?
New request for bit, is there a list of Bits avilable?
Thanks
Ver 1.125

[Kenm810]

The Bits are available at the CarveWright online store
http://carvewright.com/store/home.php

[Icutone2]

Ken I have the bit set but what does carvewright call them?

[Kenm810]

Bits, Names and Numbers