LightBurn Tutorial 07 – Basics #3: Trace Image and Weld

0:01 hey guys in this tutorial we’re going to

0:04 go over the image trace function in

0:07 lightburn and also the weld function so

0:11 to get started I’m going to focus first

0:15 on the image trace so we’ll go to import

0:19 and I’m gonna go ahead and bring in this

0:22 little owl cartoon here

0:24 now notice he’s full of colors and when

0:30 that comes in he’s various levels of

0:33 gray this is going to do some

0:36 interesting things with the image trace

0:38 tool that I wanted to demonstrate so

0:42 highlight him and we’ll go to tools and

0:47 trace image now when we trace image it’s

0:52 looking at the difference between light

0:55 and dark – I draw where our threshold is

1:01 threshold is the operation that it’s

1:03 doing and I want to get all of this

1:08 black outline here but the dark gray is

1:11 really really messing with it notice how

1:14 it’s picking up the inner is on the

1:15 light gray but as it gets to the dark

1:17 gray it can’t really differentiate

1:19 between the black and the dark gray so

1:23 we can go up and as we go up we can see

1:29 that it starts to really highlight

1:32 different areas now if I want to get a

1:37 better view of this I can click the fade

1:41 image and that will lighten up the image

1:45 so that I can see the purple lines and

1:48 the purple lines are what our vectors

1:50 are actually going to turn out to be and

1:52 we can pan and zoom in here just like we

1:55 could in normal lightburn so we can

1:58 really zoom in and see make sure that

Transcript for LightBurn Tutorial Basics – Trace Image and Weld (Cont…)

2:00 we’re getting the right image and then

2:03 if you want to see the actual vector

2:05 points that are coming in we can click

2:09 the show points and and see all of those

2:15 so I think a threshold of 200 looks

2:19 pretty good and if it’s getting too

2:25 sharp say you’ve got a really really

2:27 Jaggi image we can crank the smoothness

2:29 and it will follow the curves a little

2:36 less and really smooth out the lines as

2:41 we go down it starts to get more and

2:43 more Jaggi so I think a smoothness

2:49 around one is pretty much where I

2:51 usually like to stay we’ll click one

2:57 alright so we’ll click OK and it’s it’s

3:01 difficult to see what actually came in

3:03 but you can definitely tell something

3:05 happened because now we have an image

3:06 and a scan layer or before we just had

3:10 the image layer so if you click it had

3:14 all the geometry that we created with

3:18 the trace image function highlighted

3:20 already so now you can see we’ve got

3:22 these vectors as well as the owl now

3:28 normally I’ll just click the raster

3:30 image that we brought in and delete it

3:32 because I’m done with it and now we have

3:35 this really nice vector art that we can

3:38 edit we can move around or you know we

3:42 can cut this out or we can just scan the

3:47 outlines so if I wanted to do a preview

3:51 real quick to see how he’s going to look

3:53 I can click preview and now we see that

Transcript for LightBurn Tutorial Basics – Trace Image and Weld (Cont…)

4:03 it’s going to edge all of the Interior

4:09 here and we’re gonna get a really nice

4:12 crisp outline of what that owl looks

4:14 like by default

4:17 laybourne has the show traversal moves

4:19 turned on that’s all this red in here so

4:22 if I turn those off we can see

4:24 specifically what’s going to happen

4:27 and the slider bar is pretty handy it’ll

4:31 show us how he’s going to be created so

4:35 in my scan settings I have a set to scan

4:40 from the bottom up and we’ll go over

4:42 that in a later video it also gives me a

4:45 time estimate based on my power and

4:48 speed settings which is pretty nice so

4:53 click OK

4:54 now I want to show you guys one other

4:57 thing that I think is really neat and

4:59 shows some of the power that you can

5:01 utilize with this tool so delete the owl

5:04 and we’ll bring in some other geometry

5:08 that I downloaded and these are a couple

5:12 animal silhouettes that I found on the

5:14 Internet

5:17 so we have a walrus silhouette and a

5:19 butterfly silhouette this is kind of

5:22 goofy this is something that I have done

5:25 with Girl Scouts and younger kids as a

5:29 workshop but now we can do this directly

5:32 in a laser software and I think that’s

5:34 pretty powerful so first I’m going to

5:37 select my walrus silhouette and trace

5:42 the image this is a pretty terrible

5:45 silhouette this is one of those we’re

5:48 turning up or down the smoothness will

5:51 really change how it follows the lines

5:57 but this is good enough for our purposes

Transcript for LightBurn Tutorial Basics – Trace Image and Weld (Cont…)

6:04 so we’ll get rid of the raster image and

6:08 again with the butterfly this is a

6:12 pretty terrible image but lightburn it

6:15 does a really excellent job of following

6:18 this really really rough edge here and

6:22 if we wanted to get this a little

6:24 sharper I can turn the smooth this way

6:27 down and it starts to turn into a

6:32 sharper corner click OK get rid of a

6:38 raster image

6:39 and now what I’m going to do is I’m

6:43 going to use the weld tool to combine

6:45 these two and make a wallet fly and yeah

6:49 this is very silly but fun so the first

6:55 thing we need to do is we need to make

6:56 these guys a little closer in size to

6:59 each other so I’m gonna lock the aspect

7:01 ratio and we’ll turn this guy up to 100

7:05 millimeters and I think this size works

7:13 for right now and I’m gonna drag him

7:16 over so that he’s about where I want him

7:24 I want the wings to show up and I want a

7:28 walrus teeth to show up and the Waller

7:29 his tail but I don’t really want the

7:33 butterfly body to cut off the walrus

7:36 tail down here and I want more of the

7:38 butterflies antennae to come out so I’m

7:40 gonna turn off the aspect lock and use

7:46 the warp tools to and rotate this guy

7:53 and position him to be a little more

7:59 where I want him to be

Transcript for LightBurn Tutorial Basics – Trace Image and Weld (Cont…)

8:09 track him around

8:10 [Music]

8:26 and as you’re making these Griffins is

8:30 what we called them in the workshop it

8:32 takes a little bit of playing to get

8:33 exactly what you want but that’s half

8:37 the fun I think that’s pretty close so

8:41 now I will use ctrl a to highlight

8:45 everything in the drawing and then the

8:48 weld function in the tool bar and voix I

8:54 have my Waller fly and basically what

8:57 this does is it combines all of the

8:59 outer lines and eliminates all all of

9:02 the inner lines so if we wanted to get

9:07 rid of any of this these inner lines

9:11 here we could ungroup them and I could

9:14 delete this and this and now it’s more

9:18 of a silhouette and it could be you know

9:23 fun wallhanger or something like that

9:25 but this kind of a goofy exercise to

9:28 demonstrate the power of what vector

9:30 trace can do as well as the weld utility

9:34 so hope you guys picked something up in

9:37 this one and again like always be on the

9:40 lookout for the next lightburn tutorial

9:42 thanks