Greeting Card
For this project, I used the vinyl plotter to create a Valentine’s Day greeting card.
Reflective Log:
1/7/18
Today I learned some of the basic functions of Silhouette Studio and the vinyl plotter. For Silhouette Studio, I learned how to trace objects and adjust the threshold to allow for a clear, less pixelated, outline. As for the vinyl plotter, I learned how to load and unload the vinyl rolls into the machine. At the end of the day, I was able to create some stickers to further practice with the software.
1/10/19
Today I started working on my Valentine’s Day greeting card. The cardstock we were given was 8½” x 11” so my initial design was thought to maintain these dimensions. However, Silhouette Studio has a cut border which prevents cutting about a millimeter away from the perimeter of the paper. This resulted in incomplete cuts which meant some hearts which could not be removed. Another problem I encountered was spanning my heart design to the center of my card (half the distance from short edge to short edge) because when folded, the card had very little support.
1/11/19
Today I worked to fix the problems I had with my first design. For the cut border problem, my solution was to shrink the dimensions of my card from the initial 8½“ x 11” to 8” x 10” so that the cut border was irrelevant. As for the span of my heart design, my solutions to this problem was to shorten the width of my heart design to allow for the fold of the greeting to be done on an uncut area. Implementing these solutions allowed for me to create my final outside cover.
1/13/19
Downloading Silhouette Studio on my laptop, I was able to create my final greeting card design. On the inside of the greeting card, I outlined an orchid to be drawn on the left half of the card. On the right half, I outlined a border to write my Valentine’s Day message in. Under this border, I included a slit designed to hold a sticker On the back of the greeting card, I also outlined a “Maker Lab” sticker as a nice touch to show where/how this greeting card, in its entirety, came to be.
1/14/19
Considering most of the Silhouette Studio design was complete the day before (1/13), today all I had to do was plug my laptop in and send my work to the vinyl plotter. Since my inside cardstock sheet had both drawing and cutting elements, I had to distinguish what was to be drawn and cut. Once my final inside sheet was drawn and cut, I glued it to my final outside cover. I then proceeded to attach the “Maker Lab” sticker to the back of the cover as previously explained.
Conclusion
Finishing this project, I felt that I made a good effort to learn Silhouette Studio and showed it through implementing all the elements of cutting, drawing, and “sticker”ing. Although my final design was well thought out, in my opinion, the final result did have a flaw that could have been easily fixed. This flaw was the heart design on the final outside cover not having a border, leaving the skinny cardstock strands on the outside perimeter without support. This could have been fixed by giving the heart design a border.
Reflective Log:
1/7/18
Today I learned some of the basic functions of Silhouette Studio and the vinyl plotter. For Silhouette Studio, I learned how to trace objects and adjust the threshold to allow for a clear, less pixelated, outline. As for the vinyl plotter, I learned how to load and unload the vinyl rolls into the machine. At the end of the day, I was able to create some stickers to further practice with the software.
1/10/19
Today I started working on my Valentine’s Day greeting card. The cardstock we were given was 8½” x 11” so my initial design was thought to maintain these dimensions. However, Silhouette Studio has a cut border which prevents cutting about a millimeter away from the perimeter of the paper. This resulted in incomplete cuts which meant some hearts which could not be removed. Another problem I encountered was spanning my heart design to the center of my card (half the distance from short edge to short edge) because when folded, the card had very little support.
1/11/19
Today I worked to fix the problems I had with my first design. For the cut border problem, my solution was to shrink the dimensions of my card from the initial 8½“ x 11” to 8” x 10” so that the cut border was irrelevant. As for the span of my heart design, my solutions to this problem was to shorten the width of my heart design to allow for the fold of the greeting to be done on an uncut area. Implementing these solutions allowed for me to create my final outside cover.
1/13/19
Downloading Silhouette Studio on my laptop, I was able to create my final greeting card design. On the inside of the greeting card, I outlined an orchid to be drawn on the left half of the card. On the right half, I outlined a border to write my Valentine’s Day message in. Under this border, I included a slit designed to hold a sticker On the back of the greeting card, I also outlined a “Maker Lab” sticker as a nice touch to show where/how this greeting card, in its entirety, came to be.
1/14/19
Considering most of the Silhouette Studio design was complete the day before (1/13), today all I had to do was plug my laptop in and send my work to the vinyl plotter. Since my inside cardstock sheet had both drawing and cutting elements, I had to distinguish what was to be drawn and cut. Once my final inside sheet was drawn and cut, I glued it to my final outside cover. I then proceeded to attach the “Maker Lab” sticker to the back of the cover as previously explained.
Conclusion
Finishing this project, I felt that I made a good effort to learn Silhouette Studio and showed it through implementing all the elements of cutting, drawing, and “sticker”ing. Although my final design was well thought out, in my opinion, the final result did have a flaw that could have been easily fixed. This flaw was the heart design on the final outside cover not having a border, leaving the skinny cardstock strands on the outside perimeter without support. This could have been fixed by giving the heart design a border.
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