Anyone has a simple workflow of lasering photo without banding???

[Avraham Monina]

Hey guys!
I just got the starter kit for Lasertile, everything is good with the tile itself ( I think) , I imported a vector into illustrator ( I downloaded it as an illustrator file and Corel has problems opening it correctly) and I resized it and all that good stuff and then I saved it as BMP at 300DPI, and then I made a new file in Corel (300DPI) imported the bmp file, and lasered it at 600dpi ( I wanted that extra dark etching) and it came out awesome but with white-ish lines ( banding?) , then I tried printing at 300dpi and it came out not as dark(gray-ish) but banding still there ( not as bad obviously because of the darkness of the etching), I read on here that banding is usually the effect of stretching it in Corel, which I didnt do so I dont understand why Im getting this.

Now before I even printed this photo, I did a little test on another tile I got from them, I made a new 300DPI file in Corel, and drew a black box and printed it in 300,400,600,1200dpi to see which one will come out the best, 400 & 600 was best to my liking and there was no banding ( which I jumped in joy).

I just hope its a software issue and not my tube......

Avraham
205870

[Glen Monaghan]

Try searching recent threads for banding. Someone within the last couple of days was asking about a banding problem and someone else suggested that it might be eliminated by drawing a box around the image but outside the item on which you are etching (so as to avoid ruining the item or image). Other than that would force the laser to scan the same width each pass, I don't recall exactly why it would stop banding, but apparently it does for certain causes.

[Dan Hintz]

Banding is only a "process" issue when your process involves sub-/super-sampling the image in some power-of-two manner (e.g., resampling a 600dpi image to 590dpi).

Otherwise, it's mechanical or electrical in nature.

[Avraham Monina]

Banding is only a "process" issue when your process involves sub-/super-sampling the image in some power-of-two manner (e.g., resampling a 600dpi image to 590dpi).

Otherwise, it's mechanical or electrical in nature.

I understand, but if the art I am engraving is a vector I can really choose whatever DPI I want right? because there are not pixels? so I can just drop it into a 300DPI page and etch it at 300 or 600 and it should not cause any sub/super-sampling right?

[Dan Hintz]

I understand, but if the art I am engraving is a vector I can really choose whatever DPI I want right? because there are not pixels? so I can just drop it into a 300DPI page and etch it at 300 or 600 and it should not cause any sub/super-sampling right?
Correct...

[Avraham Monina]

Correct...

Thanks Dan
So Im doing it correctly and it still banding, I just really hope its not the machine......

[Martin Boekers]

Even though it is a vector image some where the software is interpolating the area that will be engraved
to pulse the laser. It looks like a raster image from your post though (to me) as it seems there are gradations.

Have you tried other DPIs or rotating the file and see if it changes?

[Avraham Monina]

Even though it is a vector image some where the software is interpolating the area that will be engraved
to pulse the laser. It looks like a raster image from your post though (to me) as it seems there are gradations.

Have you tried other DPIs or rotating the file and see if it changes?

The photo is actually a straight vector printing, after that I tried to save it as BMP at 300DPI and imported that to Corel and Printed at 300DPI, the etching was lighter but still banding, Havent tried to rotate, thats next.
Thanks for the reply!
Avraham