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How does laser engraving work?

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shane jo
How does laser engraving work?

How does laser engraving work?

We'll show you how laser engraving works and what materials you can laser engrave on

Laser engraving is used to give an individual design or personal touch to products. A sports trophy engraved with the winner's name, pens or pens with the company logo, or a piece of machinery marked with a serial number and lot number - these is all common applications of laser engraving. The great advantage is that with the laser, practically any design and different materials can be engraved. On this page, we explain how laser engraving works.

Laser engraving technically explained

During the laser engraving process, the laser beam hits the material, exposing it to a large amount of heat. Depending on the exposure time, the color of the material changes and creates a contrast, or the material evaporates or burns. The resulting laser engraving is permanent and highly resistant to abrasion.

brick-laser-engraving+

Laser engraved brick

Laser engraving: as simple as printing

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Laser engraving process

Laser engraving is as simple as printing. First, create the design you want to engrave in your graphic design software (CorelDraw !, Photoshop, AutoCAD, Illustrator, InkScape, etc.). Then use the print driver that came with your computer to send the graphic to the laser.

By pressing the button, your selected material is laser engraved or cutting, according to the saved settings. If required, you can configure advanced settings laser software. The process types saved in the print driver will make your daily work much easier by automatically optimizing the required graphics processes.

Raster and vector engraving: Two different types of laser engraving
Raster engraving is the standard process for laser engraving. Here, the graph formed from pixels is recorded line by line, point by point.

On the other hand, in vector engraving, the graph consists of curves and lines that are drawn one after the other "vector by vector" by means of the laser and engraved at the same time. Vector engraving is often called "grooving".

For large area applications, such as filled letter, image, stamp or wood engraving, raster engraving is the appropriate method. However, if you only need to engrave thin lines, vector engraving has its advantages and can be faster

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