[ale] [OT] Silkscreening

[Michael Martin]

Jeff, 

Cricut disclaimer — got the wife a MAKER model for Christmas and we’re still learning about it ourselves. Seems to be a very capable machine. Can cut designs from jpgs, Pngs, and SVGs with no issues (that I’ve seen)

Given the material restrictions with sheet vynil, you can get lettering pretty small ( my imperial mind can’t fathom 3.5mm right now — between 1/4” and 1/8”?) however, there are the typical demons that all graphics designers have to deal with - font weight, stroke thickness, kerning, etc.  

The Oracal 651 vynil is supposed to be pretty hardy, but I’m not sure how well it will hold up to being sliced thinly.  Using the vynil as a stencil template may be an option. Then again, if you get in front of a Cricut and have time to futz around with it, you may find that the vynil lettering will actually do you just fine 

Good luck and keep us posted 

Giant Mike



Sent from my iPhone

> On Dec 30, 2019, at 9:28 AM, Jeff Hubbs <jhubbslist at att.net> wrote:
> 
> I'd been wondering if Cricut might be a path forward but I wasn't sure how to go about it assuming I could get a machine to cut from my drawing (and from the sound of it, one can). What I *don't* think I want to do is use the cut vinyl itself as the lettering. This leaves using the vinyl as either a stencil (steps: paint crinkle black, apply stencil, paint white, remove stencil) or as an anti-stencil (steps: paint white, apply vinyl where letters will be, paint crinkle black, painstakingly peel up vinyl). I'm not sure which of those two will actually work well. I've got some text that's only 3.5mm tall and there are Rs, A, and Os to contend with. What do you think?
> 
>> On 12/29/19 10:47 AM, Mark at markulmer.com wrote:
>> Jeff, I have a CRICUT (vinyl cutter) Giant Mike suggested. I’ve been successful with making laptop stickers and such from image files. They come out perfect. Feel free to email me direct if you want to try this option.
>> 
>> -
>> Mark
>> 
>>>> On Dec 29, 2019, at 10:01 AM, Mike Martin via Ale <ale at ale.org> wrote:
>>> 
>>> CRICUT (vinyl cutter)
>> 
>