Engraving | Ostrich eggs

I have been doing some work for a zoo and they would like me to do some ostrich eggs both as a cut vector cut and with photos on them. Anyone out there with any experience. I tried to do a cut and besides the smell I had very little luck. Kind of like cutting a brick.

I have an Epilog laser machine. I have been using CorelDraw 12 for designing and lasering. I find CorelDraw draw to be very feature rich but not extremely well engineered.

For example CorelDraw does a terrible job with memory management and if there is any sort of major error condition you might as well shutdown the whole computer instead of waiting for CorelDraw to clean up after itself.

What are the suggestions any of you have for other full featured yet better engineered software programs that would work well for lasering?

Personally, I’ve been having problems with CorelDraw 11’s memory management too. My old 32 bit machine with window’s XP ran fine, but slow with the software. My new 64 bit eMachine T6212 with 2 GB RAM 1.99 GHz loves to crash after about every 20 actions or so. I don’t have to restart the machine all the time, but I constantly have to re-start the software and pray I saved close enough to the crash. At first I thought the problem was insufficient memory, but then I upgraded from 512 MB (the min. for 64 bit machine to run on windows) to 2 GB. Now I’ve noticed it keeps refencing bad memory locations. If you ever find out how to improve CorelDraw’s memory issues, please share it with us here. As for other software, I can’t provide only a little info… I use my machine much like an automated scroll saw. I use it to cut thin woods and veneer. Given than information, you can probably guess I’m all about vector line tracing. I do it manually with CorelDraw 11. I haven’t seen anything out there that is any better. Granted I haven’t tried Adobe Illustrator, but graphics artists say even then I’d have to do it by hand. For my exact engineered pieces, ie floor inlays/medallions, I use Solidworks. It’s a $4000.00 3-D CAD program I learned in school from when I attended RPI. It’s extremely powerful for building vector line drawings for cutting templates. Another program I like is PhotoGraV. It preps pictures for laser engraving so fast that I find it well worth the $300.00 I paid LaserBits. Well, I hope that helps.

From what I’ve seen, especially with an Epilog, Corel is IT. There are other engravers whose drivers are said to work well with other packages (and really, for vector imaging you have only two other choices - Illustrator and Freehand) but our Legend and Summit DO NOT WORK with another vector application. Neither one will correctly handle a job sent to them by Illustrator, though admittedly I haven’t tried Freehand. Lines don’t etch that should, lines that should NOT etch do, and portions drop out completely. You would *think* that since a given vector application is simply talking to a Windows-based printer driver, the laser engravers should be able to understand the output from any normal Windows-based program - nope.

I haven’t looked recently, but up until version 10 of Corel (which was the last time I checked the Epilog website for anything useful) Epilog was only recommending Corel and support was only being given if you used Corel with their engravers. Whether that’s changed I can’t say.

Sometimes I wish I DID know of something else.

I don’t think you will find an easier program to use with your laser than corel. Even if you did epilog wont support it, unless you have one ove those rare REPs that bother to learn more than one program. Having said all that on any given day we use corel, autocad, adobe illustrator and alphacam to run our epilog. we just got a copy of adobe photoshop and I’m sure it will work in some capacity too. You’re just using the laser as a printer so in theory almost any graphic program should work to some degree.

I was at the NBM Show in Long Beach a couple weeks ago and sit in on a Corel Class. The instructor was saying that by default, Corel has an UNDO level set to like 99… This really craps up the memory.

I would try changing the UNDO level to something like 20 or 25 and see if that fixes you memory problems.

I use Corel 11 and have not experienced any memory management issues that I am aware of. Not sure what you are speaking of. Please share more information as to what you identify as the shortfalls and maybe we can assist. Corel has so many capabilities I am often overwhelmed but most are not needed for laser use. Thank goodness!!!!

Epilog states that their print drivers will support Adobe Illustrator in their documentation, but my experience suggests otherwise.

I am a Mac OS X user and have been using Adobe Illustrator for years. Epilog does not support Macs, and I don’t beleive CorelDraw is currently available for Mac OS X. With all my experience using AI, I was reluctant to learn another drawing program.

So, when I got my Epilog Mini, I also acquired a Dell Laptop with a Win XP version of Adobe Illustrator CS2. Unfortunately, I found that the Epilog print driver produced inconsistent results when I printed from AI.

Some problems I noted were, rastering was very slow as the laser head insisted on moving across the whole page even if there were no object to raster. Some files refused for vector and rastered only. The most troubling was a unintended halftone pattern being engraved over most of the surface of any project involving rastering. I spoke to my sales rep and he recommended CorelDraw12. I purchased a copy of CorelDraw12 and immediately noticed a great improvement.

Now my preferred work flow is do my artwork in Adobe Illustrator on my Mac. Then I import to Corel Draw 12 on the Dell laptop and print to the laser from it. I am getting much more predictable and satisfactory results.

I found that I had to import my Adobe Illustrator files using the Corel Draw12 PDF filter, since Corel Draw12 cannot directly import Adobe Illustrator version 10 or higher files. In the past when dealing with importing Adobe Illustrator to Corel Draw I usually saved my Adobe Illustrator files in an earlier legacy Adobe Illustrator format that Corel Draw could handle. I was pleasantly surprised to learned that Corel Draw can import the new Adobe Illustrator files using the pdf filter thereby avoiding having to clutter my disk space with extra legacy copies of Adobe Illustrator files.

Hey there, I haven’t played with Ostrich Eggs, but I’ve done some experimentation with Emu Eggs. The things I figured out with those are…

1.) The longer the focal length the better. Eggs have such a large curve on them that it’s easy to get out of focus when trying to cover the egg. 2.) Yes, it smells like burnt egg when you’re done. 3.) Gotta go low resolution. I figure its like engraving on Canvas paper. For my 35 Watt ULS M-300 it is 30% PWR, 80% SPD, 100 DPI.

Let me know if you have any success. If you like we can work together. I’ll get some eggs on this end and we can double our efforts on this one.

Thanks the photo that I did on the egg turned out very nice. But you’re right because of the curve of the egg it had to be small. With a rotary attachment I was able to do a band almost all of the way around the egg but only about 2 inches high. And trying to cut the thing was like trying to cut cement. Anyway the zoo was looking for a much larger picture or their logo cut into the egg so at this point I guess I’m out of luck on this one. They gave me two eggs to work with and both were not what they wanted. Now I’m out of eggs to play with.

Just out of curiosity, what size focal length did you use with the laser?

I have a trotec speedy II 35w with a 2″ focal length.

My machine is a ULS M-300 35 Watt with 2″ focal length. I wish I had a longer focal length, because then we might be able to cover most of the egg. I talked with ULS about engraving EMU eggs earlier this year. They said they didn’t have any experience with it. Do you have a good source for buying eggs?

The zoo I’m working with sells them cleaned out for $17.00 each if they would contract me to buy so many I might buy some to try to perfect the process but I’m not sure I could make it worth my time.

This site has them for $2.50 but I have never tried them:

http://www.southernhunting.co.za/sangoma/OstrichEggProducts/OstrichEggThumbnails.html

It’s almost impossible to work with them, I have tried, vector cutting is out and cos of the dimpled surface of the egg itself, photos are extremely difficult. You can hand carve or blast them however.


			Ostrich eggs I have been doing some work for a zoo and they would like me to do some ostrich eggs both as a cut vector cut and with photos on them. Anyone out there with any experience. I tried to do a cut and besides the smell I had very little luck. Kind of like cutting a brick. I have an Epilog laser machine. I have been using CorelDraw 12 for designing and lasering. I find CorelDraw draw to be very feature rich but not extremely well engineered. For example CorelDraw does a terrible job with memory management and if there is any sort of major error condition you might as well shutdown the whole computer instead of waiting for CorelDraw to clean up after itself. What are the suggestions any of you have for other full featured yet better engineered software programs that would work well for lasering? Personally, I’ve been having problems with CorelDraw 11’s memory management too. My old 32 bit machine with window’s XP ran fine, but slow with the software. My new 64 bit eMachine T6212 with 2 GB RAM 1.99 GHz loves to crash after about every 20 actions or so. I don’t have to restart the machine all the time, but I constantly have to re-start the software and pray I saved close enough to the crash. At first I thought the problem was insufficient memory, but then I upgraded from 512 MB (the min. for 64 bit machine to run on windows) to 2 GB. Now I’ve noticed it keeps refencing bad memory locations. If you ever find out how to improve CorelDraw’s memory issues, please share it with us here. As for other software, I can’t provide only a little info… I use my machine much like an automated scroll saw. I use it to cut thin woods and veneer. Given than information, you can probably guess I’m all about vector line tracing. I do it manually with CorelDraw 11. I haven’t seen anything out there that is any better. Granted I haven’t tried Adobe Illustrator, but graphics artists say even then I’d have to do it by hand. For my exact engineered pieces, ie floor inlays/medallions, I use Solidworks. It’s a $4000.00 3-D CAD program I learned in school from when I attended RPI. It’s extremely powerful for building vector line drawings for cutting templates. Another program I like is PhotoGraV. It preps pictures for laser engraving so fast that I find it well worth the $300.00 I paid LaserBits. Well, I hope that helps. From what I’ve seen, especially with an Epilog, Corel is IT. There are other engravers whose drivers are said to work well with other packages (and really, for vector imaging you have only two other choices - Illustrator and Freehand) but our Legend and Summit DO NOT WORK with another vector application. Neither one will correctly handle a job sent to them by Illustrator, though admittedly I haven’t tried Freehand. Lines don’t etch that should, lines that should NOT etch do, and portions drop out completely. You would think that since a given vector application is simply talking to a Windows-based printer driver, the laser engravers should be able to understand the output from any normal Windows-based program - nope. I haven’t looked recently, but up until version 10 of Corel (which was the last time I checked the Epilog website for anything useful) Epilog was only recommending Corel and support was only being given if you used Corel with their engravers. Whether that’s changed I can’t say. Sometimes I wish I DID know of something else. I don’t think you will find an easier program to use with your laser than corel. Even if you did epilog wont support it, unless you have one ove those rare REPs that bother to learn more than one program. Having said all that on any given day we use corel, autocad, adobe illustrator and alphacam to run our epilog. we just got a copy of adobe photoshop and I’m sure it will work in some capacity too. You’re just using the laser as a printer so in theory almost any graphic program should work to some degree. I was at the NBM Show in Long Beach a couple weeks ago and sit in on a Corel Class. The instructor was saying that by default, Corel has an UNDO level set to like 99… This really craps up the memory. I would try changing the UNDO level to something like 20 or 25 and see if that fixes you memory problems. I use Corel 11 and have not experienced any memory management issues that I am aware of. Not sure what you are speaking of. Please share more information as to what you identify as the shortfalls and maybe we can assist. Corel has so many capabilities I am often overwhelmed but most are not needed for laser use. Thank goodness!!!! Epilog states that their print drivers will support Adobe Illustrator in their documentation, but my experience suggests otherwise. I am a Mac OS X user and have been using Adobe Illustrator for years. Epilog does not support Macs, and I don’t beleive CorelDraw is currently available for Mac OS X. With all my experience using AI, I was reluctant to learn another drawing program. So, when I got my Epilog Mini, I also acquired a Dell Laptop with a Win XP version of Adobe Illustrator CS2. Unfortunately, I found that the Epilog print driver produced inconsistent results when I printed from AI. Some problems I noted were, rastering was very slow as the laser head insisted on moving across the whole page even if there were no object to raster. Some files refused for vector and rastered only. The most troubling was a unintended halftone pattern being engraved over most of the surface of any project involving rastering. I spoke to my sales rep and he recommended CorelDraw12. I purchased a copy of CorelDraw12 and immediately noticed a great improvement. Now my preferred work flow is do my artwork in Adobe Illustrator on my Mac. Then I import to Corel Draw 12 on the Dell laptop and print to the laser from it. I am getting much more predictable and satisfactory results. I found that I had to import my Adobe Illustrator files using the Corel Draw12 PDF filter, since Corel Draw12 cannot directly import Adobe Illustrator version 10 or higher files. In the past when dealing with importing Adobe Illustrator to Corel Draw I usually saved my Adobe Illustrator files in an earlier legacy Adobe Illustrator format that Corel Draw could handle. I was pleasantly surprised to learned that Corel Draw can import the new Adobe Illustrator files using the pdf filter thereby avoiding having to clutter my disk space with extra legacy copies of Adobe Illustrator files. Hey there, I haven’t played with Ostrich Eggs, but I’ve done some experimentation with Emu Eggs. The things I figured out with those are… 1.) The longer the focal length the better. Eggs have such a large curve on them that it’s easy to get out of focus when trying to cover the egg. 2.) Yes, it smells like burnt egg when you’re done. 3.) Gotta go low resolution. I figure its like engraving on Canvas paper. For my 35 Watt ULS M-300 it is 30% PWR, 80% SPD, 100 DPI. Let me know if you have any success. If you like we can work together. I’ll get some eggs on this end and we can double our efforts on this one. Thanks the photo that I did on the egg turned out very nice. But you’re right because of the curve of the egg it had to be small. With a rotary attachment I was able to do a band almost all of the way around the egg but only about 2 inches high. And trying to cut the thing was like trying to cut cement. Anyway the zoo was looking for a much larger picture or their logo cut into the egg so at this point I guess I’m out of luck on this one. They gave me two eggs to work with and both were not what they wanted. Now I’m out of eggs to play with. Just out of curiosity, what size focal length did you use with the laser? I have a trotec speedy II 35w with a 2″ focal length. My machine is a ULS M-300 35 Watt with 2″ focal length. I wish I had a longer focal length, because then we might be able to cover most of the egg. I talked with ULS about engraving EMU eggs earlier this year. They said they didn’t have any experience with it. Do you have a good source for buying eggs? The zoo I’m working with sells them cleaned out for $17.00 each if they would contract me to buy so many I might buy some to try to perfect the process but I’m not sure I could make it worth my time. This site has them for $2.50 but I have never tried them: http://www.southernhunting.co.za/sangoma/OstrichEggProducts/OstrichEggThumbnails.html It’s almost impossible to work with them, I have tried, vector cutting is out and cos of the dimpled surface of the egg itself, photos are extremely difficult. You can hand carve or blast them however. Possibly related: Opening Corel Draw files in EngraveLab CMX files Engraving emu eggs Question about what software Double cutting