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Wesley Perreira
10-17-2008, 12:56 AM
I've been reading everything I can on the forum and the net about laser engraving ceramic tile and after many failures, I had almost given up. Today I went and bought a handfull of 6 x 6 inch HD tiles, white colored and thought I'd give it another go. I used 85 power/100 speed/600 dpi on a 75 watt laser and I could see the etching after it was done. I then applied acrylic paint, like previous posts said to do and used a business card to wipe the excess off. I then let it dry and busted my knuckles taking most of the paint off, I guess I did it too hard. I tried two more times and didn't get any better results. The fourth time I applied paint, I did not let it dry and gently massaged it with a soft cloth and wouldn't you know it, it worked. As as continued to wipe it, the paint seemed to dry in the correct places and here you have it. A photo of my mother-in-law's horse on a $.60 HD tile. I was a little suprised by the results and not quite ready to give up on HD tile.

Thank you forum for the information!

James Jaragosky
10-17-2008, 1:03 AM
I've been reading everything I can on the forum and the net about laser engraving ceramic tile and after many failures, I had almost given up. Today I went and bought a handfull of 6 x 6 inch HD tiles, white colored and thought I'd give it another go. I used 85 power/100 speed/600 dpi on a 75 watt laser and I could see the etching after it was done. I then applied acrylic paint, like previous posts said to do and used a business card to wipe the excess off. I then let it dry and busted my knuckles taking most of the paint off, I guess I did it too hard. I tried two more times and didn't get any better results. The fourth time I applied paint, I did not let it dry and gently massaged it with a soft cloth and wouldn't you know it, it worked. As as continued to wipe it, the paint seemed to dry in the correct places and here you have it. A photo of my mother-in-law's horse on a $.60 HD tile. I was a little suprised by the results and not quite ready to give up on HD tile.

Thank you forum for the information!
Gad too see You were too stuborn to give up.
BTW the tile looks great, nice work, and thanks for the settings and paint tips.

Frank Corker
10-17-2008, 6:43 AM
Well done Wesley, hope your knuckles recover from the trauma!

Ross Lowry
10-17-2008, 9:12 AM
I have heard of people putting on a thin layer of wax, then engraving it, paint, and then just wipe away the paint.
I have never tried this process.
I would think the wax would melt and fill the crevices up.
Would anyone like to comment on this process?
One thing you could do is just take masking tape and cover the tile, engrave, paint, and peal the tape away.

Richard Rumancik
10-17-2008, 10:02 AM
I have reservations about using masking tape for photos. It works fine for text and some line art but when you have thousands of .003 diameter dots, you need to have the paint penetrate the hole in the mask, adhere to the tile, and not adhere to the mask (otherwise it will pull off with the mask). Wiping the excess paint when wet or tacky is the method generally used, but people have different tricks to remove the excess (and ensure you don't wipe paint out of the recesses.)

It may be possible to find a coating that would act as a mask, so that the laser would ablate the mask and cut into the tile, and then allow easy removal of the excess paint. I agree that wax doesn't seem like the right thing for this. Some people use floor wax on wood prior to engraving but I think tile would call for something else. Possibly a lacquer of some type would work. But of course you need to have an easy way to strip the lacquer (without affecting the photo) or you haven't gained anything . . .

Tim Bateson
10-17-2008, 11:07 AM
I use Home Depot tile all the time. Simple graphics I usually will laser through painter's tape. For everything else, I use car wax. Laser, then hand paint if multi-color, or spray if all one color. The paint will still stick, even with the wax, if left to dry. I usually will let it dry for just afew minutes, then buff the tile clean. Most of the black & white is usually gray & white, but very well received. I'll sometimes put a clear finish over. I've even antiqued a few using Spar Urethane. An accident of-course, when I grabbed the wrong can.

Zeev Goldin
10-17-2008, 2:51 PM
Great Job.
So before You filled it with Acrylic paint it didn't look good?

Dave Johnson29
10-17-2008, 3:06 PM
Does the laser, for want of a better word, etch the surface of the tile then the paint fills it?

How much power is required? I know the OP has 75W but is this possible with 25W?

Mike Chance in Iowa
10-17-2008, 3:43 PM
Another simple option is to use Calligraphy Ink or India Ink on the HD tile after lasering. Swab it on with a Q-tip. Let it dry. Then wipe it off with various solvents. I spray denatured alcohol directly on the tile and wipe with a paper towel until the surface wipes clean. The ink remains in the lasered areas and does not leave any residue on the surface.

Different inks produce different shades of black or gray.

Dim lighting, in a hurry, and ancient camera do not do the photo of this tile justice.

Tim Bateson
10-17-2008, 5:49 PM
Rastering a tile will blast away the surface, leaving you with unglazed tile for the paint to stick to. For my 35watt Epilog I use: 50 speed 100 power 600 DPI 3D mode
Sometimes these are inconsistent and require a send pass.

Dave Johnson29
10-17-2008, 7:15 PM
Rastering a tile will blast away the surface, leaving you with unglazed tile for the paint to stick to.

Thanks Tim.

I will get some tiles and give it a shot.

Darren Null
10-18-2008, 7:52 AM
Does the laser, for want of a better word, etch the surface of the tile then the paint fills it?
Yes. You need to dig in deep enough to get deep enough pits for the paint to sit in. Too shallow and I've found that you wipe it all away when cleaning the excess off.

And I can do it with a 10W, so you should be fine. Takes ages on mine though (100%P 1%S)

Also, run the tile/marble under the tap after etching and get rid of all the dusty detritus in the etched pits then leave to dry before painting...the paint or whatever will stick much better then. I did one job before finding this out and all the paint lifted in patches. Gave it a nice antiquey feel after I nailbrushed the patches off and restored it, but it was a nightmare to do.

fred sanchez
10-18-2008, 4:02 PM
do u guys use photograv on your pictures befor you send it to the laser ?
if so what settings do you use in photograv?

thanks guys

Wesley Perreira
10-18-2008, 4:50 PM
Yes I use Photograv 3.0 and saw somewhere on this forum to use the Cherry Wood setting. Seems to work well on HD tile.

Tim Bateson
10-18-2008, 5:57 PM
No - Using Photograv for glass/tile is waste of time. The fine details that Photograv provides is lost on glass & tile.

fred sanchez
10-18-2008, 6:18 PM
so tim do u just print stright from corel onto your laser?

Tim Bateson
10-18-2008, 6:26 PM
Yes. However, I will use Photoshop and/or Corel to get a photo or graphics ready for lasering.

Bill Cunningham
10-18-2008, 11:18 PM
No - Using Photograv for glass/tile is waste of time. The fine details that Photograv provides is lost on glass & tile.

I use photograv for glass all the time, and get great results.. You just have to remember, that glass is not a high res medium. I usually re-sample the photo to 150 ppi, then run it through photograv using the glass setting then running it on the laser @300 dpi.. For ordinary tiles, I use the cherry setting @ 300 dpi..

jeremy haneca
10-19-2008, 12:45 AM
can u please elaborate on wasting my time with photograve on tile and glass? i dont like wasting my time... as i have alot to learn!

Darren Null
10-19-2008, 1:20 AM
Glass looks awful if you don't drop the resolution to around 150DPI. But both work with photograv.

Glass you can laser with relatively low power and it looks OK if you're burning at the right resolution. If you're expecting 300DPI photo quality on glass, then you're wasting your time.

Tile, I nuke hard at 300dpi, then normally colourfill (unless it's black/dark colour in which you can get away with no post-processing).

Wesley Perreira
10-19-2008, 5:29 AM
What I get from this is that there are obviously different ways to get to the creation of a project and everyone should listen, learn, and appreciate this sort of dialogue made possible here on the creek.;)

Darren Null
10-19-2008, 7:30 AM
Couldn't agree more. Some methods work better for some people than others so it's good to have another way of doing things to hand.

For cleaning the paint off, by the way, I tried it with denatured (cleaning/96%) alcohol and it came off MUCH easier than with WD40 (the previous method I used). Just a few blobs of alcohol on the cloth saves much knuckle-breaking.

Rather than a soft cloth, I use felt stretched over a hand-sized wooden block. Felt is soft enough to not damage the surface of marble, yet abrasive enough to get at the paint. Also, it doesn't drop bits in your work.

Tim Bateson
10-19-2008, 12:31 PM
Jereny,
It's no secret here that I'm not a big fan of PhotoGrav. I do use it - occasionally, but for most of my work including tile, Photoshop and/or Corel adjustments turn out excellent results. I am very picky too - I'll occasionally give my work to the customer at cost or free if I'm not 100% satisfied with the results. My customers have always been happy with the results and most are repeat customers.
PhotoGrav 3.0 is light years ahead of the previous version - the difference being like using Assembly Language to hand program every thing you need to do on your computer, then using WINDOWS 98. Version 3.0 is still overpriced for what you get from it, but as you'll see here I'm in the minority on that point. :cool:
There is an improvement with PhotoGrav, but a $400 improvement depends how often you really need that detail. I have found work on glass/mirror/tile to show no improvement in the final product using PhotoGrav. However, I do agree with others here that there are many ways to produce a similar result; I'm just expressing my experience. If you have the extra cash it's another tool to utilize on the rare occation you need it.

You can search this forum - someone had done a project with & without PhotoGrav.

jeremy haneca
10-19-2008, 2:04 PM
me being new at this, ive found photograv to be of extreme help for photos on granite and glass. it does get a pixely look to it tho on wood that i cant seem to get away from yet... when i first got my machine i came up with a rather nice photo on wood without photograv but the results took me a long time to tune my laser in to the right settings. i dont want to haveto go through that every time... it wasnt pixely tho. nice and clean. is there a way to get away from those low quality images in photograve? im just opening up the b&w "engraved" image in corel and printing it.

jeremy haneca
10-19-2008, 2:13 PM
darren,
everything i have done on glass soo far has been scanned at, and lasered at 300dpi/300ppi...... looks great! im confused..

Darren Null
10-19-2008, 2:17 PM
You shouldn't get a pixillated look on wood. Try making sure your printer driver is set to full manual...otherwise you may be adding some extra dithering on top of your image which will degrade the final result.


everything i have done on glass soo far has been scanned at, and lasered at 300dpi/300ppi...... looks great! im confused..
Me too. I've never got good results at 300dpi, as the dots overlap which wrecks the image. Either you're using a super-grade glass or something else is happening. If you're using photograv, it might be dropping the resolution for you automatically on the glass setting.

jeremy haneca
10-19-2008, 2:53 PM
as painful as it is to ask this, im going to anyway... lol

how do i make sure my printer driver is in full manual?

ok im looking at a pic on wood right now... its not resolution.. its just little tiny holes. giving a dotted image. not nice at all. i converted it to 125 dpi, set everything to 125 dpi in photograv, and printed it at 125 dpi/ppi at suggested photograv settings. other materials work out nicely but wood gives me this nasty image.

Darren Null
10-19-2008, 3:20 PM
Bugger. I knew you were going to ask that. Your printer driver is probably different to mine, so I'll be mostly guessing...

1) Get a file in Coreldraw. If you have used Photograv DON'T DO ANYTHING but position it with Corel.

2) CTRL-P to print

3) On the right-hand side of the grey box, there's a 'Properties' button. Press it.

4) You're now in your printer settings, and here's the bit where I start making things up. On mine, there's several options, rubber stamp, 3D, Greyscale, Photo and Manual. If you select the Photo option (on mine) it adds dithering whether it needs it or not; thus turning a perfectly tuned photograved graphic into a dotty mess. Manual just prints what I tell it to and leaves it alone.
Yours may well be completely different, but if there's a photo preset then it might be adding unwanted effects as part of the processing. If you've already run your graphic through photoshop (or whatever) and photograv, any further processing is not going to help. Have a look for a "Leave me alone, I know what I'm doing" setting.

EDIT: The photo above is dotty because it's at 125dpi. Wood can hack 300dpi. I can't tell if there's any extra dithering from the photo

jeremy haneca
10-19-2008, 3:24 PM
ok mine is set up differently but i get the idea i do have a dithering option under ther raster tab. but i cant turn it off. i can only select dithering or error diffusion. the only way i fin to get rid of that is to select maual colorfill otion getting rid of the raster tab all together

Darren Null
10-19-2008, 3:52 PM
Error diffusion is just another kind of dithering.

So. Manual Colourfill. 300dpi for wood. You should be good to go.

Your glass quality might drop because you're no longer adding the extra dithering, but try it with the glass setting in photograv...might work. I use a 150dpi image for glass, a 300dpi image for everything else and photograv's cherry setting for everything. Works for me, but your mileage may vary.

jeremy haneca
10-19-2008, 4:01 PM
do i need to do something to the image before it goes into photograv? all im doing right now is grayscale.. ive read about having to ajust picture, giving a washed out image before importing it into photograv..wood specific

Darren Null
10-19-2008, 4:12 PM
In photoshop, size, dpi, crop, remove background and maybe an unsharp mask (50%, 4 pixels), although photograv does something similar to unsharp mask, so whether it's necessary depends on the graphic.
I wouldn't wash the picture out, unless it was too dark, but that's a matter of practice.

And then for me, saving as an 8-bit Bitmap (I'm on version 2.11 of photograv)

Zeev Goldin
10-23-2008, 8:15 PM
Which acrylic color You used Gray,White, Black ?