C is for Cardboard

I want to take a minute and talk about the two techniques I use when crafting my boxes.  My laser has two settings – Cut and Engrave.  Let’s talk about Cut first. When I use the Cut setting, the laser fires a consistent high-power beam to cut through the top layer of paper.  This allows me to peel that top…
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On Tuesday I got a chance to see the completed flag case.  It looks amazing.  Once Pete glued everything together and sanded it down, the inlays are seamless.  I couldn’t believe it.  The finish is so smooth that it looks like the dark wood inlays aren’t inlays at all — it looks like the text and the ship were printed…
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The veneer project was a success!  I have a sense of victory.  Pete provided more of the dark wood and after a little trial-and-error on my part, I cut the inlays and they fit perfectly!   The trial-and-error part consisted of me playing with the stroke thickness of each line.  I bumped up the stroke weight, used the expand function,…
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I’m trying a new material. This is my first attempt at cutting wood veneers. I know veneers are kind of Laser Cutting 101, but they’re still new for me. My friend Pete is making a flag case for his grandfather’s memorial flag and he wants a portion of it made with inlaid veneers. We started with this: Cutting that section…
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Time to peek behind the curtain at how I made the Jacksonville Jaguars stadium.  This piece is five layers thick.  Below you can see the progression of the layers.  The stadium seats and Jaguars logos were cut, peeled and glued on separately.I ran into problems on the field.  As the field recedes, the lines get closer and closer until they’re…
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