Marble Engraving/ Feedback?

[Michael McCullock]

This is my latest engraving, and my first time using Armor All on marble. If anyone would like to share their opinion along with any helpful hints it would be appreciated. Please keep in mind I had to downgrade the photo to make a small enough to upload .

Thanks
Michael

[Mark Fitzmorris]

Michael,

Looks Good! Did you notice a difference with the armour all? How many watts is your machine?

[Michael McCullock]

I didn't see that much of a difference, not sure why.
My machine is a 30W. I engraved this with 70% speed 28% power.

[Steve McKee]

Very nice Michael. I'm a little jealous, haven't had any luck with marble. I have been using the tiles from LaserTile with good results, just haven't got the settings right for marble yet.

[Shaddy Dedmore]

Steve, do some searching here, and you'll find lots of hints on marble. For one, with Lasersketch, never try above 300dpi, use a lot lower power than you think, settle for shades of grey, no frosty white.

Shaddy

[Michael McCullock]

Shaddy
I used material from lasersketch for this project and found 300 DPI omitted too much of the pictures detail. Is hard to tell from the photo I posted but the difference between 300 DPI and 600 DPI were like night and day with my machine.
Michael

[Shaddy Dedmore]

I agree that 600 dpi is better, my comment was meant for laser sketch specifically... it was too soft to accept the 600 dpi, you lost a lot of detail (yes lost, the softness of the marble seemed to make everything blur up).

They also couldn't reach a white color, you were stuck with light grey. I used some marble from the floor store, and got frost white and could use 600 1200 dpi. I know some will say that 1200 dpi isn't any better than 600 because of overlap and spot size, I just know that at 1200 it looked better and sharper. BUT... it had marble streaks and unfinished edges, so it wasn't desireable as a plaque.

I heard LaserSketch had a harder marble, that could go frostier white. But I bought my last from them because the guy seemed too crochety. He always seemed inconvienienced by my ordering, and then had an attitude like he was doing me a favor.

Anyway, that's my marble experience
Shaddy

[mike wallis]

Shaddy at least I now know I'm not the only one he's treated like you just described. I've never had such bad service/attitude/product from a company and refuse to do business with them any more. BTW, he made it a point to let me know that there the only ones who distribute this product. Make of that what you will.....

[Bill Cunningham]

Hi I'm new here.. Just going through the posts and learning!!!

I have had absoloutly no problem with marble.. Even the $3.00 a sq foot brown stuff from home depot.. I have a Epilog TT 35watt, I run text at 300 dpi, and photos at 600 dpi.. I use the setting from the epliog guide in the manual, and clipart mode for text, photomode for photos, and they turn out great .. It's almost goof proof!!! I have found that with marble and some .jpg's (yuk) ifyou use clipart mode for the photos, you can get banding.. The epilog clip art mode for photos on leather is also pretty well goof proof (Mabe I've just been lucky) I have photograv, but only for etching more dificult mediums like granite, glass, acrylic and wood..

[Ray Mighells]

I am having a lot of fun with my tan marble painted black. My photographs are turning out just like black and white photos. To me, the details are amazing. I am also lasering both sides of the marble with equal results. Now I need to devise an appropriate stand/base for two side viewing.

[Jim Brodkorb Jr.]

The plaque you did looks great. How do you guys get them to turn out looking just like photos? I use photograv and can't get the nice photo look. My faces usually are washed out or the detail isn't there. Any tips for someone new to doing this stuff?

This forum is great. It is nice to have a place to go to share tips and help others in the same business.

Keep up the great help everyone.

Hopefully someday soon I can give some tips I've learned to help someone else out.

[Frank Corker]

Jim, vast majority of poor results is hitting the material with too much power, it should be fast with low power. Try a variation on that. Are you using photograv? That tends to help. I have a few saved files done with photograv if you want to try one of mine, or alternatively, send me the file that you have been trying and I will look at the result for you.

[Bill Cunningham]

Mabe I'm just lucky, or it's a trate of the home depot (brown) marble? I laser photos into that marble using the photo setting on my Epilog TT @ 25% speed, and power 100 .. I will often go over it a 'second' time, and it brightens it up considerably... I have used the same setting on Nero Marquena 'black Marble (this is usually the blackest floor tile marble you can find) But only go over it once, black obviously has a better constrast than brown..
The marble tile below is 12x12" the text was lasered at 300 dpi. speed 20 power 100... and done from a .jpg sent by the customer.. I will not usually work from a .jpg, but he was in Georgia, and I'm in Canada, however it came out ok for a customer supplied .jpg.. and he was in a hurry... The folks at my local home depot must cringe when they see me coming, I will bring a vellum print of the layout, and go through ALL the boxes of tile (each one has it's own price sticker so why not..) I overlay the vellum on the tile, to choose one that will not put any 'marbleing' in a poor location.. i.e. resulting in a hitler mustache for example:eek:

[Vicky Orsini]

Wow, Bill. That's beautiful!!