Download File Template
Click here to download our Adobe Illustrator vector file template.
Click here to download our PDF vector file template.
PDF version for use with other design software.
This document is 600mm x 300mm (with a maximum usable area of 295mm x 595mm), and in RGB colour mode.
Preview of the file template opened with a vector graphics programs.
Need Help?
If setting up a laser ready vector file isn't accessible to you - or if you need help with a design - we recommend graphic designers that specialise in designing for laser cutting here. View our full list of resources.
Cut Lines
- For any lines that you want to be cut, give them a RED (255, 0, 0) 0.1pt stroke.
- Leave at least 1mm between each shape, and stay within 2-3mm from the edges.
- Completely remove any lines in your file that are not required, including any duplicate lines (the laser will cut every red line in your file, even if they are hidden by a shape or clipping mask). Duplicate cut lines may cause burning and scorching from excessive cutting.
- We recommend avoiding and/or cutting duplicates of small pieces (5mm or smaller). Pieces this small will fall literally through our laser machine base and we cannot guarantee that they will all be found.
- We recommend that your design doesn’t have parts that go thinner than 2mm. Pieces thinner than 2mm may be too fine and break when handled.
- Scroll down for more information.
The robots below use red lines to demonstrate areas that have been cut. Scroll down for more information.
In order to cut, the laser head starts at a point on the image and traces freely along the line. The laser machine can only cut from a particular type of file known as a vector file; the laser head is guided by the vector points in the digital file.
When cutting, the laser head moves quickly along the line, leaving a smooth, un-burnt edge on most materials. The thickness of the cut line is very fine and precise and will cut exactly how your design appears on the computer. If you would like to design interlocking parts, you do not need to account for the thickness of the laser beam – just make the shapes the same size. The laser essentially vapourises the material where it cuts, and on some materials, like wood, can darken slightly.
For small pieces (around 5mm or less), these are very difficult on our end; they literally fall through the base of the laser machine and we cannot always find them all! We recommend avoiding pieces that are this small – certainly include duplicates so that you have a better change of receiving them all. You may find this a helpful tip for assembling your pieces also, so that you don’t have things that are too fiddly! Trust us on this one, we’ve been there!
While cutting very fine details are possible, it’s important to make sure that your design does not contain parts that are too thin, which might break when handled. To ensure that your design will be nice and strong, we recommend a minimum width of 2mm. This is best described on cutting designs like script style words; you would want to make sure that the details connecting the letters are at least 2mm so they are not too fragile.
Raster Engraving
- For any areas that you want engraved, give them a BLACK (0, 0, 0) FILL.
- Engraving typically goes a frosted lighter shade on acrylic, and a slightly darker tone on wood.
- Engraved areas on acrylic can be paint filled, as acrylic paint will adhere to the engraved surface.
- Raster engraving does not need to be vector, you can place standard pixel images into your vector file.
- It’s OK if your areas to engrave (black lines) go outside of the shape that you are cutting (red lines).
- Scroll down for more information.
The robots below use black lines to demonstrate areas that have been engraved. Scroll down for more information.
Engraving with the laser is a method used to cut into a material surface to a specified depth. Engraving is most commonly used to add details or patterns to a design and can be done on any of our materials.
The way that the laser engraves is most similar to how a normal inkjet printer works – except instead of ink, it uses a laser beam with specified power and speed settings for the material being used. In order to engrave, the laser starts at the top of the piece, and proceeds left-to-right, top-to-bottom over the entire area. The laser turns on and off in rapid succession where areas of black and/or grey occur in the design. Any areas in white are left unmarked. The laser vaporises the material where it engraves, leaving an un-burnt indentation. On some materials, like wood, the engraved areas darken slightly. Because of the way that the laser head has to move over the entire surface being engraved, engraving is generally much slower than cutting.
Engraving can be done from any type of black and white image (created traditionally or digitally) and creates best results with solid black and solid white areas. The laser can etch at a very high resolution and works best with images at least 300dpi. While very fine details are possible, very thin lines don’t always show up well on different materials. To ensure that all of your details show up well, we recommend a minimum line width of around 0.3mm (ideally 0.5mm or wider if you intend to paint fill). If you’re going to add paint fill to the engraved areas, thicker lines will typically be easier as there is more surface area for the paint to adhere too.
Engraving grey-scale images such as a black and white photograph is possible, but is difficult to perfect because of the variation that happens between different images and materials. For most materials we use a protective tape on the surface of the material, so lighter greys may not etch through the tape at all. For engraving with grey and/or gradients, we recommend doing samples of the same image in varying levels of contrast, so that you may see is working best.
Fine Line (Vector) Engraving
- For any thin lines that you want done with fine line (vector) engraving, give them a BLUE (0, 0, 255) 0.1pt stroke.
- Best suited for making simple, thin lines.
- When used suitably, can be much cheaper than raster engraving (as is much faster in the laser machine).
- Not an ideal engraving technique for paint fill (as the engraving is too fine to push paint into).
- Scroll down for more information.
The robots below use blue lines to demonstrate areas using line engraving. Scroll down for more information.
Line engraving is essentially the same method as cutting, but it uses a reduced power that lightly engraves the material (instead of cutting straight through it). With line engraving, the laser head starts at a point on the image and traces freely along the line – guided by the vector points in the digital file.
Because the thickness of the laser is so fine, line engraving works best for thin line-work. We recommend only using line engraving for making simple, thin lines. If you have many areas in your design that you would like line engraving (such as in the second robot example above), it can work out faster (cheaper) to use the raster engraving method.
Inclusive File Proofing Service
As part of our quoting service, here’s what we guarantee we will look for (if applicable):
- Red cut lines are the correct colour and stroke width (anything other than what’s specified in our guides won’t be read by the laser and won’t cut).
- Blue engrave lines are the correct colour and stroke width (anything other than what’s specified in our guides won’t be read by the laser and won’t fine line engrave).
- Your file fits within the useable material area (files with a height over 295mm (or width over 595mm) simply won’t fit within the material sheet).
- Any text is outlined (any fonts in their native editable format may not appear ‘properly’).
- Shapes are well ‘nested’ (such as there is at least 1-2mm between objects)
- All ‘appearances’ are released (e.g. clipping masks, stroke effects, opacity is all at 100%, live paint groups, drop shadows, etc)
- Economic material usage
Here’s some other issues that we can’t guarantee we’ll find, but are common errors that we can usually notice while quoting. We will let you know about IF we notice:
- Overlapping shapes
- Sizing is to scale. We will check the artboard is the standard 600mm x 300mm size which suggests your pieces should be the size you made them on your end. Files from other software (CAD, Inkscape) commonly scales files up or down when we open in Illustrator. And the more info you give us the better, eg, ‘the circle in the top left corner is 30mm diameter’.
- Minimum cut widths
- Minimum engravings widths
- That there are no double cut lines (these are an easy mistake with a big impact; literally doubling your laser cut time charge AND scorching your pieces).
If we see an error, we will flick you back an email with what we’ve found so that you can modify your file/s and re-submit. Depending on our workload and how many errors we find, we may be able to change them for you, but will more commonly return your files for you to correct. Don’t worry, we’ll usually provide tips on how to correct the error/s.