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Hey guys, I wanted to see if anyone has any experience with the Cricut line of cutting machine... things. I am not even 100% certain exactly what they do (they are slightly less than forthcoming) but it seems like the larger ones at least plug into your computer and allow you to design cut out shapes which the machine then razor out of paper, cardstock, thin plastic, even leather on some it seems. It looks like something that would be cool for making tiny details/iconography for shoulders and shields, or BFG sized ship detailing skins. I have never seen anyone mention it before when it comes to modeling though, so I am leery.

So, anyone have any experience with this sort of stuff? We lads here have to know someone with one, at least a family member into scrap booking or something. Right?

From what I understand, a Circut will not allow you to use you own pictures to make cuts. Now this may have changed in the last few years, but I cannot say for certain. My wife has a Silhouette Cameo that I bought for her for Christmas two years ago and that does allow you to import your own files to make cuts with. I've used it quite a few times to make painting masks (with vinyl or frisket) and vinyl stickers and to great effect. I used adhesive vinyl to make the Imperial cog mask for this TIE fighter base:


I've also used it to make a stencil for painting a Dark Angels rhino but I don't have a picture of it.

I'm not sure if you could use them for making iconography for shoulder pads because the adhesive vinyl isn't the best material for something so small; it would have a hard time conforming to the curve of the shoulder pad.

Ahh, so is that machine from another company or somesuch? Stenciling would also be really handy, though maybe not 150$ for a new machine handy.

Just noticed you are right up the road from me! Were you at the Wounded Warriors event at Huzzah?

 Wehrkind wrote:
Ahh, so is that machine from another company or somesuch? Stenciling would also be really handy, though maybe not 150$ for a new machine handy.

Yeah, the Silhouette Cameo is similar to the Circut but an overall better machine in my opinion. When I was deciding which one to get her, the reviews on the Cameo were much better mainly because of the ability to use your own pictures, fonts, artwork, etc.

Just noticed you are right up the road from me! Were you at the Wounded Warriors event at Huzzah?

The Feat of Service? Unfortunately I was not. I do frequent Huzzah quite often (as a matter of fact, I'm stopping by after work to get some paint!) but I'm not much of a player, though I'm trying to change that.

If you ever need any stencils cut just shoot me a PM and I'll see what I can do.

Bit of this has been covered in this thread:

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/589633.page

I linked to another thread (very long) that goes in depth in the capabilities of different machines.

Long short...plotters will work. Cricut is a plotter that was neutered...so you might want to look at one of the other machines. You can cut thicker materials - but results can vary depending on how much you want to mess with it.

Awesome, time to research!

@Scootie: sounds great, thanks! I might hit you up for a stencil design for ship facing in BFG. I am thinking a 25mm stencil with the 90' facings and heading etc would be easy to just airbrush onto all the bases and save some template crap, etc. I will mess around with some designs and see what I come up with! Any particular file types that work better than others for that?