Realizing I wanted a thinner engraved line on my diorama, I took about a week to figure out the combination of vector at and tool bits to achieve the look I wanted. I had to re-draw my original art in Procreate using a fine line brush, repeat the export and vector process in Illustrator, and program a new engraving toolpath in vCarve. This is my first time using a v-Bit, and like a brush tip marker, it can be thin or thick depending on how much to push into the paper. This feature gives me the benefit of having one bit that can make a range of line thickness.
The v-Bit will plunge and cut deeper into the material to make thicker lines, so it’s a little tricky since I only have 5mm of material thickness and don’t want to cut thru. My trial and error have paid off, and I’m so pleased with the cutting result. I need to repeat this process for the four layers and floating pieces.
The material I’m using is called PalBoard. It’s a multicolor board, so when it’s cut, it reveals the black core material. I have lots of this board left over from another project and have a love-hate relationship with it. Cutting PalBoard is a steep learning curve and it’s not forgiving to work with.