Laser Cut Test Tile

Presentation: https://new.express.adobe.com/published/urn:aaid:sc:VA6C2:13e55080-b26d-43f9-9711-f8cfcd6e5d64?promoid=Y69SGM5H&mv=other

Week 3: Process Project 1- Laser Cutting

Engraving sketches

Pattern changed- organic shaped flowers-modern, it flow with the form of the candle stand. 

Etching drawing- lots of mirroring/rotating/copy paste

Struggle: I drew a few parts in the air by accident, so it redrew by locking tracing it

measured out vertical aspect of the design. Extrude curve.

Aligned supports to the cutout to get a sense of it visually. But then to make sure that it was perfectly mapped I used dupe edge. Selected parts and extruded the curve. 

Then once I found a height that was nice (2.75"), I drew it to have a wave and match the rest of the piece. I also realized that since is going into a slot it need to be 90 degrees for 1/8". So i changed that.

Extruded curve and turned it to stand vertically. 

Alligned so that I could make my cuts into the layers/joints of the piece. snapped 

Used boolean difference to cut out pieces. 

Originally I wanted four layers, however I removed the top I felt like it was too thin/unstable and would block from the other pieces. 

Struggle: took a while to figure out how to cut without pieces being deleted, but I think I get it now. 

Then used dupe edge to select and join to create cut line for the layers.

Final 3 shapes aligned to etching. 

Trimmed and joined drawing to get ready to hatch. 

Struggle: My drawings and the lines of the cut were not aligned/overlapping in front view so it could not use the split tool with the drawing and the cut lines. Once I fixed it it worked and I could continue. 

I used UnrollSrf to get the outline of the cut support wood to be flat. Then duped edge/joined 

Trimmed the height to adapt to the layered horizontal wood

 

Hatched drawing into 100%, 75% and 50%. Separated layers cut and etch. 

Laser Cutting Appointment

Etched and cut. 

Briefly assembled to see how pieces fit together. The cuts and joints fit was loose. 

Note: The slits are a perfect fit on the computer, 1/8" by .75" by 2.75" however, the heat makes the cut wider, so for next time Erica suggested to have it 1mm smaller and then if needed, I could sand down to size. 

I had recut the base slots because once together it needed to be closer inwards by 7.5mm on each side to center. 

We tried using Krazy super glue, but the wood absorbed it? 

So we tried every possible glue that they had available.

The structure is loose

There was not any clamps so instead taped it together

Glue was hard to do the wood bowed. 

4 hours later: I picked it up to take photos of it completed

Digital Render touch up:

Material: Wood, two tones

Had some issues with Capping some of the etching

Finals

Reflection

Design wise, I really liked that I changed the pattern to feel more 60s 70s to match the organic form of the object. It belongs and flows nicely. The form was inspired by smoke. And the layering is very active so having touches of patterns worked nicely in spots. 

I think it was good doing a 3-D object as my laser cutting project because it helped me implement majority of the tools learnt in tutorials and apply them. I learned to do more complex things design in scale, and visualize it using 3D rendering. Align objects in different views, cut into objects and render it into a material. 

There was a lot of problem solving, redo/trying again and this time I found the steps to achieve what I wanted felt more intuitive than past weeks. I found it difficult when working in the rhino workspace, a lot of my design started 2D  then switching to 3D to cut out objects from each other and back to 2D and adding etching. The switch in spaces I think is what caused me to draw curves that went into the air? I spent a lot of time realigning things, but I figured it out enough to have my files cut.

There is still a gap between digital 3d and actually making it irl, I am not used to crafting so working with these materials was new for me.

Next time I would definitely layer wood to make it sturdy. 

I think overall, like the growth that happened throughout the project was good, considering last week etching was new, so by doing 3D built object I think it added a lot of complexity and aloud me to think more in a 3D way: Translating 2D design to 3D was a good challenge!