Project:Laser-engraved Photo for Members Wall: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 18:06, 27 September 2024

ProjectInfoBox Laser-engraved photo for members wall

Status:	done
Initiator:	Micha

Here's how I created a laser-engraved photo for the Members Wall. If you have any questions or are missing some information, feel free to reach out to me via the wiki: User:Micha

There's already some information on laser-engraving photos elsewhere in the wiki: Laser Engraving Photos That information wasn't fully applicable to our current laser cutter and was missing some information I needed as a dithering noob, though. So here's what worked for me.

Note that all screenshots and pictures were taken from a privacy-enhanced version of my original project. I plan to enhance this project page with a couple more of them.

Step-by-step guide:

- Follow guide on Members Wall page to create word document
- Add black-and-white photo
- Turn the Word file into a JPG (there is probably a better way to do this 🤓):
  - remove table borders in Word (the following step will mess these up, somehow),
  - select everything and copy-paste "as a picture" into PowerPoint (on an empty slide),
  - in PowerPoint, you may want to add a new border,
  - select everything, then right-click and "Save As Picture..."
- Follow steps on Laser Engraving Photos, especially, use Gimp to:
  - Use the Rectangle Select Tool (R) to select just the picture.
  - Make it very bright, via the menu: Color->Brightness-Contrast. You may need to apply and re-open the tool multiple times:
  - Go to Filter->Enhance->Sharpen (Unsharp Mask): increase the amount to get sharp lines but not black areas.
  - Go to Colors->Dither: set R/G/B levels to 2; experiment with Dithering Method, Blending Mode (should be (almost) binary, basically just black and white pixels)
- Save and drop resulting JPG onto laser file share, etc.
- Experiment with laser cutter to engrave on Poplar Plywood. Test with a small section of the image, e.g. the eyes. If things are too dark, maybe brighten the image more.
  These are the settings I used:
  - Engrave, Speed = 500, Power = 100
  - Cut, Speed = 15, Power = 100

Big thanks to Lukas for a looooot of help and getting me back on the right track.

@@ Line 1: / Line 1: @@
-Moving my project description for laser-engraved photo for the Members Wall here.
+{{ProjectInfoBox
+|project title= Laser-engraved photo for members wall
+|image=Increase Brightness in GIMP.png
+|status= done
+|date=
+|initiator=[[Micha]]
+|team=
+|materials=
+|tools=
+|software=
+|cost=
+}}
+Here's how I created a laser-engraved photo for the [[Members Wall]]. If you have any questions or are missing some information, feel free to reach out to me via the wiki: [[User:Micha]]
+There's already some information on laser-engraving photos elsewhere in the wiki: [[Laser Engraving Photos]]
+That information wasn't fully applicable to our current laser cutter and was missing some information I needed as a dithering noob, though. So here's what worked for me.
+Note that all screenshots and pictures were taken from a privacy-enhanced version of my original project.
+I plan to enhance this project page with a couple more of them.
+Step-by-step guide:
+** Follow guide on [[Members Wall]] page to create word document
+** Add black-and-white photo
+** Turn the Word file into a JPG (there is probably a better way to do this 🤓):
+*** remove table borders in Word (the following step will mess these up, somehow),
+*** select everything and copy-paste "as a picture" into PowerPoint (on an empty slide),
+*** in PowerPoint, you may want to add a new border,
+*** select everything, then right-click and "Save As Picture..."
+** Follow steps on [[Laser Engraving Photos]], especially, use Gimp to:
+*** Use the ''Rectangle Select Tool (R)'' to select just the picture.
+*** Make it very bright, via the menu: ''Color->Brightness-Contrast''. You may need to apply and re-open the tool multiple times:
+***: [[File:Increase Brightness in GIMP.png|frameless|500x500px]]
+*** Go to ''Filter->Enhance->Sharpen (Unsharp Mask)'': increase the amount to get sharp lines but not black areas.
+*** Go to Colors->Dither: set R/G/B levels to 2; experiment with Dithering Method, Blending Mode (should be (almost) binary, basically just black and white pixels)
+***: [[File:Dither.png|500x500px]]
+** Save and drop resulting JPG onto laser file share, etc.
+** Experiment with laser cutter to engrave on Poplar Plywood. Test with a small section of the image, e.g. the eyes. If things are too dark, maybe brighten the image more. <br> These are the settings I used:
+*** Engrave, Speed = 500, Power = 100
+*** Cut, Speed = 15, Power = 100
+Big thanks to Lukas for a looooot of help and getting me back on the right track.