On the questions about the textured background, I'm using Rodger's technique to produce it and it's "darn quick" and easy. It's basically two pocketing tool paths that are identical with the exception of the raster angle which has one positive and one negative; both 35º in these examples. The step-over is set to 91º. The first path doesn't have any finishing pass; the second takes care of that. One bit...a .125" ball nose...for the whole thing. You cut the pocket and the text at the same time as you're doing the texturing. It's MUCH faster than setting up a texture tool path in addition to cutting the rest separately. And with HDU, you can do this aggressively even with the small cutter. One pass for 1/4" or even 3/8" at 200 ipm is a piece of cake. I believe I posted this example before, but it shows some play with the angles:
Rodger, thanks for your comments and suggestions. You are correct that I used a high angle v-bit for the inside of the edge bevel. I was trying to soften the look more than just breaking the edge, but it indeed loses some weight the way I did it. On the farm sign, the "Fantasy Farm" text was cut with a 120º v-bit and I agree it feels a little crowded. This was a standard VCarve Pro v-carve tool path and maybe with this particular font (one of Steve's), it might be better with the 90º to provide better spacing without stretching it horizontally. I did kern the text before cleaning up the vectors, but I guess you don't really know how it's going to cut until you do it, especially for someone inexperienced. I like the idea of the prism carving thing...it's on my list to try. 120º is as low as I can go on the bit side right now, however.
More to learn for sure!
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