The COMPLETE Photo Engraving Guide Part 1 | Fiber CO2 UV and Diode
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- čas přidán 30. 03. 2022
- Hey guys what’s up it’s Alex over at Laser Everything and today I’m going to be walking you through every single thing you need to know to get amazing photos on ANY material, with ANY laser engraving machine. That includes Fiber, CO2, UV and Diode lasers! It's a cerebral episode so make sure you grab a notepad and pen, and buckle up. This is the most comprehensive guide on the internet to engraving photos with your laser marking machine! Let's do it!
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Watched it 10 times, fell asleep 20 times. I feel the information is valuable and will continue to watch until I fully understand. Thanks for all the hours you spent putting this together.
Sorry it's dry, there are a lot of concepts to cover - but it is important to wrap your head around in order to take advantage of how raster images work! It's definitely not the most exciting thing, but it will definitely help you. If you get stuck on something we have a ton of free communities in the description where you can ask questions.
unintentional ASMR lol
I've watched hundreds of hours of videos on laser engraving but this one, by far, has been the most valuable.
Thank you Chuck! We appreciate that!
~ 30:00 The reason some software uses interval rather than DPI is because they are built around stepper-motored gantry lasers. It would be nice to say we give it exactly 300 dpi. But, really what that means when the actually stepper motor can only step 1/1000th of an inch is that we are actually at 333 dpi. So we have to lose an extra scan-line every 10 scan lines. So the interval at 300 DPI is basically patterned into 3, 3, 3, 3, 4, 3, 3, 3, 3, 4. This isn't really as simple as saying we made all lines further apart, but rather we made every 5th line slightly further apart. Which is why you could well prefer interval to dpi.
Interesting! That never even crossed my mind that makes so much sense, thanks for explaining it to me. Wish I could go back and include that :P
@@LaserEverything There is an absolute minimum distance move in galvos too but it's usually that the galvo numbering range goes from -32k vs. 32k for x and y and depending on your lens size this can give much smaller minimum distances. So a 50mm lens is (50mm / 65535) distance per step and at 300mm you get (300mm / 65535) with the standard optical aberration at the extremes.
With a 300mm lens the minimum move distance is going to be about 18% of a the size of the typical minimum on a gantry laser (1/1000th of an inch). So at 300 dpi your laser internal minimum values are ticking about 18 units each scanline which means the remainder is going to give you 18 vs. 19 or so (and this is at an extreme 300mm lens) vs gantry lasers where the actual functional movements are 3 units vs. 4 units for the same space.
This actually gets a bit more harsh with some laser cards like the M2 Nano which builds in a raster mode, there's internal code that basically takes the step during the overscanning, so it can be told that it will take 3 stepper motor steps each time changes horizontal direction. This is needed because the machine is moving a laser head around and it can't stop instantly. So the changes in scan line need to occur while the laser is moving to avoid a sort of loud clonk if it stops the horizontal movement cold to perform the vertical movements. The end result is the hardware there basically assumes interval rather than DPI.
Thanks Alex, as usual, your videos are easy to follow and understand. I am learning sooo much from you and the team.
Thanks for watching Kevin! 🙂
This is unbelievably well organized and skillfully presented. This is "Off the Charts" freakin' valuable. Thanks Alex for being such a great teacher and thanks for your Laser Everything crew being in this space. The Galvo Crash Course series is 24k gold. Personal request to other viewers, please consider supporting the efforts by Laser Everything by becoming an LMA supporter if you haven't done so already.
Thank you so much for the kind words Big H Works 🙂
I love this, thank you Alex!
So happy to hear it, thanks Glenn!
Absolutely incredible video! love the complexity and detail.
Let alone very informative.
I appreciate that, thanks for watching!
have been waiting on this, thank you! your content has improved a lot over the few months I have been subscribed! It's like going to school!
Ha! Good! Glad its helping you out and glad the effort we've been putting in is showing through, thanks for watching!
Terrific video! Very well explained and easy to follow. Thank you for sharing the knowledge!!
You're very welcome!
Thank you so much for this detailed explanation. My background in design/layout for newsprint and magazines is much more directly relevant than I thought, but I wouldn't have realized this for a while just fiddling around with settings.
Nice, always good to have a leg up when it comes to this stuff :)
This was excellent. Thank you so much.
Of course, glad you liked it!
The best information I have ever received about photo engraving. Thanks very much for this video !
You're very welcome! Glad it helped you!
Very helpful video. Has really helped me improve my photo engraving. Thank you.
Great to hear! Thanks for watchin!
Dude... Thank you SO MUCH for these videos!!
Thanks for watching!
Well done, I can see all the work you put into that, very informative and I appreciate the detail in your photos.
Thank you very much!
As always great information
Thank you for watching 😊
Thank you for spreading your knowledge!
Thanks for watching! :D
Fantastic video and explained very well. Yes it's technical as you mentioned but you follow that up with some other ways of looking at the topics. Well done!
Glad you enjoyed it!
Outstanding job!!!
Thanks Brian!
Thank you so much for this video!!
Glad it was helpful!
This video is amazing. Thank you so much.
You are so welcome! Thanks for watching, glad it helped :)
Thanks to recommendations, This is only the second video I've watched. This one gets you the sub. WOW, a top-notch presentation and explanation!
Awesome, thank you! Glad you enjoyed it!
Amazing video. This helped me a great deal😀
Glad to hear it! ⚡
Perfect thanks
This is amazing video , great content keep it up. 🎉
Thank you so much 😁
You are an amazing and gifted teacher. I happened to come across your podcast, and I have you in my ear while I set up for an art show, while driving, pretty much anytime I don’t have to concentrate on something, but I want to learn something or be entertained. your podcasts are amazing, full of information, and a lot of fun, but I just stumbled across this CZcams video. Unbelievable what you put out. This video could be presented in a college class. Or at least in a trade school, if we only had enough of those. You rock! Thank you!
Thank you so much for the kind words! Glad you got something out of this video!
Thank you. Learned a lot today.
Glad it was helpful!
By Far the most valuable Laser Engraving Video I've seen Thanks Alex for taking the time to do this,,
My pleasure! It was a tough one to make but still my favorite episode to date.
Been driving these laser my entire career and I still learned a lot. Excellent work! Thank you so much for posting. CZcams University at its finest!
Great to hear! Stoked you were able to learn something :) Thanks for watching!
So grateful for this
Glad it helped you!
This is hands down the best tutorial that I've found. Cant thank you enough.
You're very welcome! Thanks for watching!
This has been one of the best videos that you have put out. Thanks for all your work.
Glad you enjoyed it. It was definitely a labor of love
Thank you Alex😎👍
Of course, thank YOU! :)
Feel like I went back to college! Enjoyed learning something new and am beginning to understand what some of these settings mean.
I never mentioned it, but I did finally get a fiber laser. A 50w Cloudray, but I did have to downgrade to a Raycus source because my budget just couldn't push that far for what is essentially a hobby for me.
It's kind of crazy how a 45yo man got as excited as a little kid on Christmas morning when my fiber laser arrived. Thanks for the video, the channel, and of course the website!
Congrats on your new machine. The Raycus systems are totally usable I think that you'll have a blast with it :)
Just brilliant such a technical subject, Alex always delivers great well thought out tutorials. Laser Everything is the best.
Wow, thank you for the kind words. Glad it was helpful.
An incredible podcast, I can understand the amount of hours you must of put into making this. I'm a novice so I will need to view plenty of times to get the concepts. I subscribed as I feel it's one of the most comprehensive sites on understanding lasers out there. Thank you.
Wow, thank you so much! Glad to have you!
Thank you for putting this together! Well done!
Glad you enjoyed it!
Thank you
MIND BLOWN!
Good! 💥
I am impressed with your presentation and all the details in it. Incredibly well organized and perfectly presented, this presentation gives me confidence that I will be able to improve the outcome of my attempts at picture engraving. And you got new subscriber here. :)
Glad it was helpful! Thank you so much for watching!
I'm a little late to this party, but Bravo! Your presentation was well thought out, well explained and well recieved. Thank you!!
At the 10:49 mark the gradient scale. When you run the gradient test where on the test card do you check the laser marks. On the dark end when the lines are the most condensed. Or the white end when they are more spread out.
Another gem of a video for a noob like me... I am starting to notice a lot of parallels between lasers and 3dp (my specialty). I see I will be spending half my time tuning on the laser too lol.
Even though I only understood 60% of this, it was amazing content, well done. Thank you for doing what you do!
Thank you! Keep going, and watch it again. You'll understand it all soon!
Great job thank you!
Glad it was helpful!
thx, that good stuff deserves instant sub
Thanks for the sub!
I am a lucky man! I am waiting for my first engraving machine and this is my first video about engraving and it is excellent! Thank you ;-)
Glad it helped! Thanks for watching!
Brilliant 😎
Hell yeah!
Thank you I learned a lot. Much appreciated
Glad to hear it!
Thank you so much
Thank you for watching, and hope you enjoyed!
I liked the details explained in this video. It is very helpful for the beginners who love to work with laser. Maybe what lacking is the proper wavelength selection to engrave a certain materials. Maybe it was explain in some of your videos. But overall, I loved this video tutorial. Please keep making more tutorials for laser lovers. Thanks a lot for this.
Amazing video
Thanks!
THIS WAS AWESOME AND SO HELPFUL! THANK YOU! New LMA member here
Awesome! Thank you!
Very nice thanks
Most welcome, thanks for stopping by!
Great content!!!
Thank you!
Excellent info. Thank you !
Glad you got value from the content! :)
Yesssss!
Yesssssssssssssssssss!
Wow absolutely fantastic!
Thank you very much!
Sweet!
Totally!
Thanks
At your service :)
Thank you.
No worries!
Damn, that was so interesting! I don't even have a laser marker, yet I'm here... I might buy one now, lol
I've been engraving photos on my Fiber for years with great results. I thought I knew everything about it. I was wrong LOL Thank you Alex!
Thanks for sharing! Glad you could get something out of it :D
Can you please tell me the settings to engrave photo on to dog tags I’ve got a 30watt fiber laser thanks
Nice video.
Thanks Wisely! I hear your laser is about to be delivered to Kyle, can't wait for his unboxing!
love the shirt in the outro btw
Thanks!
Great explaination. I have a question, i have made the gradient test but i can't distinguish a nice result on wood. Many dpi seems overlapping. There is another test i can use for organic material?
Thanks for the great video. what program do you use in the video to process the image.
Your video is absolutely awesome! It solved all of my problems. I was getting scan lines in my image on wood and I thought the resolution was too low... it turns out, it was actually too high and I was getting over burn and my pixels were jumping to the next line. Now I'm getting awesome pics on wood! Thanks.
You're welcome! I'm so so happy it helped you!
if you have the gradient file cn you please share it with me as well?
Great set of videos Alex well done, with the dot adjustment do you recommend to set that before doing the DPI test or get the dpi test done and the right dpi for your material and use the dot adjustment for the fine tuning once you have your baseline dpi, hope that makes sense. Thanks again for the video
The dot width adjustment shouldn't have any bearing on your dpi so I would do the dpi test first, especially because the perfect dot width adjustment setting depends on your interval, which depends on your dpi. So that's where I'd start. :)
This video is a “gold nugget!” Although it is a bit more advanced than my abilities I feel I will be starting off with a better understanding of how lines and pixels work in the laser engraving process.
Good attitude, love to hear it!
Where's the link to the video you said would show us this in action?
Many thanks for this very valuable video. One question though, I understand that you convert images into dots, so you engrave full black or nothing. I was wondering what was the reason for not using greys, playing with the power of the beam ? Any technical reason ? Or is it simply for a more artistic approach ?
The most comprehensive video on this subject. Thank you! My laser (a 60W JPT MOPA) has not yet arrived.
I also do occasional TIG Welding in my workshop, this works with an inert gas, e.g. Argon. I am wondering what will lasering look like in Argon environment (it would prevent burning ie. oxidation), I will try it out. I don't anticipate any useable results though, color is caused by the oxidation, so I suppose only some melting will happen if the power is high enough, just curious how it would look like. Will post the results.
Would love to see those results!
Wow. I'm still lost but I have a much better map.
Incredible work and thank you very much!
You're most welcome, don't forget to hit up the discord or facebook group for more support as you figure things out. Links are in the description :)
Hi, I know it is a 1-year-old video but, I wanted to watch it because I have a 10 watts UV laser and was looking for tips for engraving pictures. I'm new to this and would really like if you could do an entire video about engraving a picture with UV laser. Thanks in advance. I really appreciate watching your videos. Jeff
Watching your videos and Russ' from RD Works Learning Lab I will be able to get my Masters degree in lasers in about a year. Also, a lot of good information can be found in the comment section.
Top notch educational video!
Thanks for the amazing compliment Kris. I hear Masters Degrees in Laser Marking are pretty valuable!
@@LaserEverything actually watching your video made me think of being back in avionic radar school back in '76 when I was in the Army. You would have made a great military instructor. Compliment intended.
Haha thank you! 😂
Good video. Just one issue I ran into... Settings that work for line and fill don't work nearly as well for image prints.
Any tips?
Watching this made me wonder "whatever happened to Lightscribe (on CDs)? Kind of the baby to the laser engraving we have now.
Fucking lightscribe was SO COOL
Love love love. Would the same DPI apply to vector "fill" mode as well or does that need its own DPI based on how LB interacts with images vs. vectors?
It DOES apply but many settings people share actually rely on the overlapping of lines in quick succession to generate the heat needed for particular results. So YES you can substantially decrease your run times by removing overlapping lines and only marking each area of the surface once, however, you will notice much lower temps and thus slower ablation, heating, etc since you're moving across the substrate more rapidly. That's the short and sweet explanation.
Could you use a .png file of the gradient test from Lightburn in Ezcad to run these tests? Using the "Save Image" function from the preview? I tried it and it seems to work but not sure all the settings carry through. Great video!
Yes absolutely. By right clicking the image after you process it into a bitmap and select "Saved Processed Bitmap" which will save all the changes you've made inside the Adjust Image menu. Just note that the dot width adjustments made will not carry over.
Such a great guide! Thanks a lot! Why are you using the "Diffusion Dither" Method in Photoshop? I see lots of laser dithering images that seem to use the "Halftone Screen" Method. I would love to understand why. Hopefully you can enlighten me.
Halftone Screen is the cheat for people who don't want to figure out the correct DPI. Halftone engraves more or less the same way regardless of how your resolution is set. Certainly easy but doesn't yeild the best results if you follow the guide.
Everything in my ezcad is mirrored 😢how do I fix this
Where do I find the DWA selection tool in Lightburn?
The first video i feel myself stuck at it with no right to skip any minute, each minute involves too much tips and tricks that make working with detailed engraving such professional. Greetings from Morocco
Great to hear!
Awesome guide thank you but i can't seem to find the gradient file.
Thank you! The gradient file is about halfway down the description, it's grouped in the "Machines and tools from this video" group of links.
This video is simply amazing! I have a question, can i use Lightburn with my fiber laser or my model must have compatibility with the software? it uses EZ Cad right now. What license cost i need? I guess that Galvo controllers is the right one. Thank you
Galvo controllers is the right one, it is currently only compatible with EZCAD2 controllers. You're on the right track!
Hello! I'm really enjoying the video, but the link to the gradient seems to just take me to your website and I can't find the gradient to download. Thanks!
How much for a video chat walk threw I really need help
Tip the editor...... Great Video!!! Will be revisiting Pictures
I edit everything on my own :P so thank you! Glad you enjoyed it!
Two questions please. (1) I have an xTool diode laser. Can I run your DPI testing on wood instead of metal and still get a reliable result? (2) Regarding that process of zeroing in on the best DPI setting using your gradient, how is that superior to using the Lightburn Interval test?
I have the same question when I run on wood the dots seems scattered And I can't tell when they're touching it's probably because of the gr. in the wood Do you have any suggestions on that I'm using your gray scale gradient With the image mode being great being dithering
Very nice. Time to burn and learn.
Burn to learn!
not able to download the gradient can you please help otherwise awesome video
Fixed, thanks for letting me know. Should work for you now.
This is the best video for explaining how to photo engarve 100% but if diode spot size supposed to be 0.0004mm why does my atomstack x20 pro show on website that its 0.08*0.1 mm?
can you make a video of how to do it with a free software like GIMP ? been trying to get it right, but just dont quite get it. nothing i engrave of photos looks nearly as good as yours. i got a 30W Fiber laser with 110mmx110mm workspace lence with 190mm focal length.
Test Gradient Download isn't there when you follow the link :(
Is there another video that talks about non galvo? I have a diode laser on a standard XY axis and getting squiggly lines at the beginning of my lines.
No but the principles are the same. I would usually blame squigglies on the acceleration and deceleration of the head on the gantry. If possible on your unit try to increase accel and decel time OR lower your speed over all. I rarely go faster than 300mm/s when doing photos on any laser, regardless of format or type.
Hey Alex, I can't see the Test Gradient File to download
You can now find that file in the community projects database here: lasereverything.net/doc/greyscale-gradient-raster/
Hello, Great video, the gradient file link is not working. Can you help?
Got that fixed for ya.
This is the best course ever for photo engraving, greetings. Just a question , for the test gradient it is possibile to resize the file to be larger so I can inspect with a magnifier instead of a microscope?
Resizing the file will only add more lines, it will not change the size of the lines. The line size is determined by the dot Size of your laser.
@@LaserEverything there is a way to do this test without a microscope ? Also using another test file
@@CZcamsPremium-yz2hw you could order like a jewelers loupe or something similar. I really recommend the scope though. You can grab basic ones of Amazon that are like $20 and USB. We have a video where we showcase a couple cheap options.
I finally bought a digital microscope , when I analize my results on wood I noticed that lines are inconsistent, like bad timing line quality , how to fix this on diode?
I thought this would be the video to finally help me solve my issue with photo engraving. I watched your video 3 times!! I still am having the same issue. I sent my photo to 5 different people and they did nothing to it and was able to do a perfect image. When I try it it just engraves a complete white box. I adjusted the focus once and it helped get me at least a crappy image. I’m giving up. Or I gotta find someone to pay to look at my system.
Have you posted it on the Discord or Facebook group? If not there are links in the description - I'd love to see the results you're getting.
@@LaserEverything I am getting the same results. I ran the test gradient through PS using the exact settings that you present in the video. I'm on a 50W JPT and set speed at 1300, pwr 50, freq. 25, it engraves the entire gradient area white. Any clue what might be happening?