Puzzle Piece Vector & Black Marble Settings

[Liesl Dexheimer]

Two completely separate questions...

Does anyone have a pattern for puzzle pieces in vector format?

Generally, what settings do you use for photo engraving on black marble? I used 70% speed, 40% power on a 35 watt. Also, what DPI? I think I should have used about 200 to 300. I was questioning 400 and sure enough it came out with less detail prob because the dots didn't hold well on the marble.

[John Noell]

How many pieces do you want the puzzle to be?

[Dave Russell Smith]

Here is a puzzle you can play with

[Dan Hintz]

A quality piece of marble is a fairly high-resolution substrate... I routinely run mine at 500-1000 dpi, depending upon what I'm engraving. The marble won't directly support such a high resolution as 1000 dpi, but it will tend to whiten the engraving more than if I ran it just at 500 dpi. I run it in 3D mode for shading and probably at twice the power density your pouring into yours...

[Stephen Kane]

There is a free jigsaw creator program that runs within Corel. It is limited to days or uses. If that does not work for you specify number of pieces you need for your jigsaw.

I have attached an image of a Kilkenny marble jigsaw piece. This piece is 20 mm thick.
I typically run this marble at 60% on 60w at 200 dpi. Speed 45%. Optimum settings ( in terms of processing time and finish) can change slightly from batch to batch, it is best if you run a few test strips, however I keep the 200 dpi fixed.

[Stephen Kane]

Attachment

[Liesl Dexheimer]

A quality piece of marble is a fairly high-resolution substrate... I routinely run mine at 500-1000 dpi, depending upon what I'm engraving. The marble won't directly support such a high resolution as 1000 dpi, but it will tend to whiten the engraving more than if I ran it just at 500 dpi. I run it in 3D mode for shading and probably at twice the power density your pouring into yours...

Doesn't that "blowout" the image? When I first tried engraving a photo on black marble @ a higher resolution (600 dpi) & high power, you couldn't even see the image, looked like a blob.

[Liesl Dexheimer]

Also, I was thinking maybe 50 to 100 pieces for a puzzle.

[Liesl Dexheimer]

There is a free jigsaw creator program that runs within Corel. It is limited to days or uses. If that does not work for you specify number of pieces you need for your jigsaw.

I have attached an image of a Kilkenny marble jigsaw piece. This piece is 20 mm thick.
I typically run this marble at 60% on 60w at 200 dpi. Speed 45%. Optimum settings ( in terms of processing time and finish) can change slightly from batch to batch, it is best if you run a few test strips, however I keep the 200 dpi fixed.

Do you know the name of this plugin?

[Dan Hintz]

Doesn't that "blowout" the image? When I first tried engraving a photo on black marble @ a higher resolution (600 dpi) & high power, you couldn't even see the image, looked like a blob.

Are you using a 1-bit image or 3D (i.e., multi-level)? If you're using a 1-bit image, then yes, a higher resolution can muddy the image, particularly if your power is too high.

[John Noell]

Here's a 100 piece pattern.

[Liesl Dexheimer]

Here's a 100 piece pattern.

Thank you!

[Stephen Kane]

Name of program is jigsaw creator. Check out oberonplace.com

[Bill Cunningham]

Doesn't that "blowout" the image? When I first tried engraving a photo on black marble @ a higher resolution (600 dpi) & high power, you couldn't even see the image, looked like a blob.

Liesl; if it's blowing out, or etching real fuzzy, then what you are using is 'not' marble regardless of what they call it.. Put a bit of acid on the face of a scrap piece. My guess is it will have no effect which means it's granite that's being called marble (LaserSketch?) Real marble will foam up, and be damaged by acid, but it's practically goof proof when it comes to engraving it.. Engraving for real marble is slow, hot and high res..

[Liesl Dexheimer]

Very interesting Bill, thanks for that info...I did buy the "marble" from LaserSketch. I would like to think it is what they claim but I guess I'll have to see for myself.