Mel Cannady: Laser Studies

As an illustrator, I found that using the laser cutter as a tool to draw, fairly interesting.  I chose a mostly black and white print of a rabbit that I have used to experiment with printmaking, for this project as well.  The image is an interesting because of the movement and variation in the line. I thought it would an appropriate image to experiment with the different depths of cut in correlation with the  weight and overall movement of the line.  Since the original image is a bit yellow and splotchy, I brought the image into Photoshop.

From here, I was able to run a few adjustments over the image to get a better result when it gets to the laser printer.  I made sure the image was black and white and increased the exposure.  I sharpened the image a bit as well making sure there weren't any stray marks that I didn't want to see in the final print.  After all this, I finally placed the .JPEG into the laser template for adobe illustrator.

For the first run through, I just wanted to see what the image would look like in raster.  So, making sure all the lines were black, I saved the file and it is ready for print.