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Welcome to another Lightblade learning
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lab, no this is not going to be a maths
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lesson
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although many of you guys will recognize this
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from your high school days
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my plan is to do some graphics work on
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the little box that we manufactured last
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time in our cardboard engineering
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project but I realized that the audience
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that I’ve got for these videos could
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range dramatically from school kids
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maybe 12~13 years old up to very mature
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graphic artists and on my other video series
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and I regularly get asked questions like
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I’ve imported a picture and I want to
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cut the outline but i can’t can you help
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well I think that demonstrates a lack of
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understanding of graphics i’m going to
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start off by tackling the very basic
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things about graphics there are two
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types of graphics that we’re dealing
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with one of them is called vector
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graphics and the other one is pixels or
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bitmap graphics now the reason I’ve
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brought poor old Pythagoras into it
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despite the fact that he’s been dead for
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2600 years is that his work is still
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very relevant today in all the computer
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graphics programs that we use without
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boring you too much i know that it was
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bashed into me you know the square on
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the hypotenuse is equal to the sum of
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the square on the opposite two sides so
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I still remember the metra even though I
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didn’t actually grasp the concept at the
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time I think it’s fairly obvious the way
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that I’ve laid it out here look this
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is a special set of gold numbers but it
Transcript of Cardboard Engineering Projects (Cont…)
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works for any set of numbers provided
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you got a right angle in this corner
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here
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and that is if you draw a square on this
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side and a square on this side which of
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the two shorter sides of the triangle
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and add the areas together the area that
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you finish up with is exactly the same
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area as the square you get on the
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longest side
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don’t forget Pythagoras now as I said to
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you there are two types of graphics all
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graphics are based on mathematical
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equations now we’re not going to get
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into any math so don’t get too concerned
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but what I wanted to show you was that a
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circle is basically defined by its
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radius and the position that you put the
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circle on the page so if we know we’re
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just going to put the center of the
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circle we know its radius mathematically
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there is an equation which is as you can
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see using this triangle here based on
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Pythagoras which allows us to construct
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a circle mathematically on the page and
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there is a formula for a line. Y=MX + C or
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Y=MX + B depending on which
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part of the world your math teacher came
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from, again i’m not going to go into any
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details there other than to say that a
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circle and a line are the only two things
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that can occur in vector graphics all
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other shapes that we see are combinations
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of these two mathematical equations now
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i can hear you say why do I need to know all
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this well let’s quickly go to Microsoft
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Paint if we go up here we select the
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thinnest line possible
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here we go we’ll choose a line now from
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this little graphic tablet at the top
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we’ve got all these shapes you see that
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they’re all combinations of straight
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lines
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or curves or bits of circles so all of
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these shapes can be generated
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mathematically and when you use this
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program the first thing you do is you
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put hold your mouse down and you draw a
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line now at the moment you can see
Transcript of Cardboard Engineering Projects (Cont…)
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provided i don’t let the mouse go
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this line goes wherever I want it to go
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but what’s actually happening in the
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background there we’ve got the first
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point that I put down as the center
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point or the fixed point and then
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wherever I move my cursor the computer
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is calculating where I want to finish up
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and it then draws a straight line
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between where I started from and where I
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finished up it’s calculating that line
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and the calculation bit is the vector
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graphics now when I let go like that
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I’ve no longer got vector graphics
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because this is a paint program which is
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basically a pixel-based or a bitmap
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based program at the moment that looks
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like a perfectly good straight line but
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if we go up here to the magnifying glass
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and we start zooming in on this line
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we’re looking at pixels we’re not
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looking at a straight line
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ok we’re now in my cad program and i’m
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going to try and illustrate to you a
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little bit more detail exactly what’s
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happening with that paint program we
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draw a line and i’ll draw a line exactly
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as it happened and you say I can move my
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line around here exactly as we did in
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the paint program and now i will stop in
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this particular program as i zoom in
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if we watch very carefully you can see
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that the squares are getting bigger and
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bigger and bigger
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but hey the line that I’m zooming in on
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still remaining absolutely a line I
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just can’t I can never get rid of the
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line and that’s because the line is
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redefined every time I move the
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resolution the line is redrawn to suit
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the resolution of the screen these
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squares in the background basically
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pixels so what we did in paint was
Transcript of Cardboard Engineering Projects (Cont…)
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basically draw a vector line which
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passed through all these pixels which
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are these squares and then what we have
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to do is follow a rule and the rule was
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if the line pass through a pixel then
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color it in
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and so let’s just have a look you’ll see
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we’ve covered that one in because the
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line has passed through the pixel even
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this one here look
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the line is passed through a very small
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part of the pixel but we’ve colored it
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in if the line covers a pixel in any way
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shape or form then make that pixel black
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and so if we zoom out now you can see
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that which what we’re actually doing is
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producing a fairly crude copy of that
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vector line that’s the difference
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between vector graphics and bitmap
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graphics bitmap graphics once the vector
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has finished its work its frozen in time
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it’s like painting by numbers whereas
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here on a graphics program every time i
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zoom in the maths in the background is
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recalculating the line and all i’m
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seeing as a line that is one picture
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white now this was originally one pixel
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wide and so as i zoom in, I zoom into the
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pixels that I froze in time
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now the reason I’m explaining this is
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vector graphics you can cut
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pixel graphics you cannot cut all you
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can do with pixel graphics is to engrave
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them or scan them in RDWorks now with
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vector graphics you have the option to
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both scan and cut but with pixels you
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only have the option to scan now in my
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engineering world
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I only ever work in vector graphics with
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this cad package just draw a pattern of
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hexagons there and now we’re just got
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about replicating that few times so now
Transcript of Cardboard Engineering Projects (Cont…)
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what we got to do is to remove all the
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ones that we don’t one
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ok now we’ll go around will trim
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everything that’s outside the circle
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what we’ll do we’ll put an oval shape
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and that’s better
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we’ll put on the center of that line as
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well
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ok now we can remove all the stuff
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inside their world hey so did little
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left
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and then we’ll trim everything else from
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the inside here as well
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okay so now we’ve got a nice intricate
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pattern on the side of box we can put a
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name inside and let’s choose a font
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now what we’re going to do is to copy
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all of that let’s just take the
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centerline off as we don’t need that
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anymore
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and then we’ll copy all of that
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I’m repeating that because i want to do
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that in two different ways within
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RDWorks at the moment
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all of this is vector stuff so if i
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save this as a DXF file previously we’re
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cutting this box from the inside and the
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other side was the hammer finish if we
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want to do engraving and cutting then
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we’re going to have to do it all from
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the same side and so consequently we’re
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going to have to work from the good side
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okay at this point we’ve got to stop and
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think because several issues arise from
Transcript of Cardboard Engineering Projects (Cont…)
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this design the first issue is that if
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we look around here we find that we are
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going to have a circle which goes right
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round the outside here and a circle that
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goes right around the inside here now
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that means that when we do a cut the
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middle is going to fall out and all this
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lot is going to fall out
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no we’re going to be left with is a big
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hole here so what we have to do and it’s
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very easy to do in a CAD program and
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it’s certainly not easy in fact that I
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haven’t found a way of doing in RDWorks
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so you’ve got to do all this preparation
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work before you go into RDWorks in this
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cad program is very easy because I’ve
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gotta trim command up there and I can
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just do this now it’s not instant and
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it’s not simple but i can go around and
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I can trim we made to make need to make
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sure that these pieces don’t get
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detached
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you think you’ve got to really move the
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right pieces as well as you can see this
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is dead easy to trim these pieces off
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it’s not easy in a lot of drawing
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packages or vector packages
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I’ve tried doing this in CorelDraw and it
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seems like an absolute nightmare if I
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have never succeeded
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we’re gonna have the same problem with
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these letters here and this e the middle
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of the e is going to fall out and the
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middle of the 0 is going to fall out as
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well so what we have to do is change the
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design of that slightly and the way that
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I’m going to change that design is like
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this
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and then we just do a copy of that
Transcript of Cardboard Engineering Projects (Cont…)
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and then we should do a trim come on
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again
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and trim these pieces back like this
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just make sure that we trim it back
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neatly
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and there we go and now we need to do
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something with this anyway
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okay so that wasn’t for lack now the
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middle of the 044 act in the middle of
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the a4 out that these two pieces will
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fall out and the center of the oval for
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out so we’ve got quite a lot of work to
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do on this drawing if we’re going to cut
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these pieces that should allow me to do
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all sorts of things like put a filter on
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their 40
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delete this place
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and this piece and that’s all sorted so
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that was a bit of a pain wasn’t it to
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get all that sorted out now why am I not
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going to do the same thing with this one
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that’s because i’m going to scan it so
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this one we’re going to cut and this one
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we’re going to scan
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ok so let’s say this to a file going to
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act with this is a CAD file except for
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Matt got some funny little things going
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on here as well
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yeah I know what’s causing those that
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it’s another problem that I’m glad we’ve
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seen so we need to go back to here and
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we need to do the same streaming process
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on this that we did because the system
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has become confused true
Transcript of Cardboard Engineering Projects (Cont…)
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so we’ve got to take all these little
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links away so as you can see that takes
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quite a lot of preparation work to get
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this graphic sorted out
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normally I only show you the end result
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right so what was wrong with these items
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down here
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nothing as you can see so why did they
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fail
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well the answer is actually very simple
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there is a problem with rd works when
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you get two very fine detail like the
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sharp corners are these funny little
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pieces down here and Body Works is not
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very happy with some of this detail so
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what we normally do this will choose to
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scale this up i put this in a box and we
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will scale this out by a factor of 10 so
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i’ll make it ten times bigger than it
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should be there we go it’s huge will now
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save it to a DXF file now we go to rd
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works and will delete this version
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because it’s no good to us will import
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box graphics
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and there it is you can see and wow
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isn’t that big
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so what we need to do got to the guard
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to the padlock at the top here and
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decided we’ve got a hundred percent will
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change that to ten percent and all of a
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sudden is back to normal size
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now let’s have a look at these letters
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to see what’s happened to these letters
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now
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mmm little curly pieces have gone rd
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works is unable to deal with some of
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this detail when you import is a dxf and
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so that’s the simple solution ten times
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bigger and then divide it by 10 when you
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get back in because i know we’ve got to
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start again and what we’re now going to
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do is to bring in some additional
Transcript of Cardboard Engineering Projects (Cont…)
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graphics everything we’ve got on here at
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the moment is vector graphics we’re just
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gonna have a look see if i can find
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something convenient to import as a
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bitmap and there’s a convenient
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something as you can see it’s pretty am
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blocky but it’s not far off the right
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sort of sighs so what we can do is just
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check what size is it says 65 x 65 let’s
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take that down to 50 now the one thing
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you will notice as I brought this in
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it’s automatically created a bitmap for
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it so i can do nothing except scan it
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which is fine because that’s what i want
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to do and then we’ll put that one into a
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group on its own and we’ll put that into
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a red layer there we go that’s on a red
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line now so this one is going to be on a
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a black layer all the perforations which
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will push our shift key down and we’ll
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get rid of the outside will get rid of
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that layer will get rid of that will get
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rid of that and hopefully that should
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leave just the perforations
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and then obviously we’ve got the outside
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so we should finish up with one two
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three four five layers here are 5 items
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to sort order into want to do 45 now
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which order should we do to me normally
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by default anything that is a scan layer
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is done first
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but in this particular instance i’m
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going to ask for that Cutler to be done
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first and then we’ll do this scan and
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then we do this scanned
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then we do the slots
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then we do the outside now we can check
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whether or not our request has been
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satisfied by coming up here these white
Transcript of Cardboard Engineering Projects (Cont…)
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items here are scanned and the reason
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why this has to be scanned this because
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of these dot graphics
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you can see how there’s no way that the
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computer can actually scan round the
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outside or find the middle of these
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lines so the only way that it can
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generate this graphic as if it scans
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across stops starts stops starts stops
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and it goes backwards and forwards and
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backwards and forwards in scanning mode
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so because these scans are on different
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layers they are done separately if
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they’re on the same layer then both of
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those scans would take place
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simultaneously in one single scan line
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and now it should move on to go there so
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it’s not done what I asked it to do I
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wanted it to do the cuts first if you
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remember you see that was the first
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element in the list but it’s got ignored
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it hasn’t even done that one so it’s
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selected a bitmap in preference to a
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scan in preference to get a cut
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very interesting just make a note of
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that for yourself so we’ll say this to a
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you file and now back to the machine
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okay well here we are over the change of
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color scheme this time
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changing the color of the car changes to
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look at the product that you’re making
Transcript of Cardboard Engineering Projects (Cont…)
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you could make that very slightly darker
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but i think it gives quite a nice look
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for being sort of this style brown bit
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like an ICP
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when you try to scorch paper one of the
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problems that you always have you got
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this smoke effect this smoke halo round
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here now I haven’t found a way of
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removing that moment except when you’re
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doing would you can put some masking
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tape over and it will come out
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beautifully clean because the smoke and
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come up with the masking tape but when
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you’re doing stuff on paper like this
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you will get this halo is that you need
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to be careful which paper you choose
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because you can see from this red paper
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that I’ve used you get a completely
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different and much cleaner result
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well here we have a finished box as you
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can see the colors that you choose can
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make a big difference but the key thing
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that this demonstration was all about
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was the fact that if you choose to use
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bitmap the only thing you can do with a
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bitmap is engrave it whereas if here
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vector graphics you have the choice of
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being able to cut things with the same
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file you can select different parameters
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and you can engrave or you can mix the
Transcript of Cardboard Engineering Projects (Cont…)
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two if you want to do cutting on that
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bitmap you have to convert into vector
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files and that’s a completely separate
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exercise
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well it is a little gift box it’s not
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big enough for handbag it’s certainly
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not big enough for a parachute for your
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loved one chocolates possibility so if
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you’re thinking of a pair of diamond
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earrings or maybe even a little diamond
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ring in a box now whether that gift is
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for your girlfriend your wife may be a
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mistress i’m sure she’ll appreciate it
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because you personally would have
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manufactured it so let’s wait till the
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next session and we’ll see what’s in
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store
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thank you very much indeed
