Sketch N Cut Tutorial
Welcome to first in many to come Sketch N Cut Tutorials. The Sketch N Cut capabilities open up so many possibilities. I am looking forward to this exciting Sketch N Cut Tutorial Series. I hope you will join me.
Sketch N Cut Techniques to the Rescue
Okay, I had a dilemma. I wanted to decorate windows with a picket fence for the up coming holiday. I did not want plain picket fences cut out of card stock. I wanted something that was actually going to look like a wooden fence.
I could print something on the with my printer, but I do not have a wide format printer and I wanted picket fences to be as big as I could make them. And I also wanted them to be realistic looking.
With that being said, while I do not have a wide format printer, I do have a Silhouette Cameo and I am able to do Sketch N Cut Technique.
Let’s take a closer look at what was going on.
See Pic Below.
It is really amazing the difference that the Sketch N Cut makes.
Okay What is Sketch N Cut
I have the Silhouette Cameo 3. My Silhouette Machine Carriage has two slots. These slots are marked by Red and Blue Circles.
What does this mean? Well, you can put a Sketch Pen in one holder and a cutting blade in the other holder, hence the term Sketch N Cut.
Because there are 2 holders, there is no need to start and stop the Sketch and Cut operation on the machine. Understanding how to set up the Sketch N Cut in Silhouette Studio will allow you to complete both operations in one go.
Silhouette Carriage with 2 Holders
The Silhouette Carriage has 2 Holders. You can easily put your blade in one holder and your pen in the other.
The 2 holders are clearly marked by a Red and Blue Circles. You will want to pay attention to this when you get into Silhouette Studio.
See Pic Below.
In the pic below you can see how these Red and Blue Circles correspond to the Control Panel in Silhouette Studio.
See Pic Below.
The tool bar sections for both the Red and Blue Carriages can be opened and closed with the arrow keys.
I have placed the cutting blade in the Red Carriage. I selected my material as cardstock. I have selected My Action as Cut. Then I selected the auto blade in the Tool drop down.
My gel pen is placed in the Blue Carriage. I selected Sketch as my Action and Pen for my Tool.
Taking a closer look at the Fence you can see that the Cutting lines correspond with the Red Carriage and the Sketch Details correspond with the Blue Carriage.
Important Note about Sketch N Cut
When you are working with Sketch N Cut, it is very important to remember the grouping.
When I sent this Fence to Silhouette to be Sketch N Cut, I grouped all the detailed portions of the fence that were going to be Sketched. The cutting lines are NOT included in this grouping.
This made it very easy to assign the Cutting Lines to the Red Carriage and the Sketched Lines to the Blue Carriage.
I usually do this before I send it to the machine because it is easier.
I did this by selecting everything, the entire design. Then I held Shift Key to deselect the cutting lines. In other words while holding the Shift Key touch the cutting lines with your cursor. This will deselect whatever the cursor touches.
Then I released the Shift Key and used Control + G to group together the portion of the design that was to be sketched.
Silhouette Pen Holder
Yes, you are going to need a pen holder for your machine. The image below shows you what the Silhouette Pen Holder looks like.
I apologize, I only have the information for the Silhouette Cameo 3 and Cameo 4.
As you can see the Silhouette Pen Holders for the Cameo 3 and Cameo 4 look very much alike. The differences are due to the actual Machine Carriage for the respective machines.
There are 3 pen adapters. They are labeled Small, Medium, and Large. These sizes refer to the thickness of the pens that you wish to use. On each one of the pen adapters, you will see cap threads. This is where the screw into the main pen holders.
In the picture, notice that there is a stopper cap. This stopper cap help you know how far down to push the pen into the holder.
In other words, when the tip of the pen touches the stopper cap, you can tighten the adapter and you are ready to load the pen holder to your machine.
How about I explain that in a little more detail.
Loading Silhouette Pen Holder for
the Sketch N Cut Technique
Start by figuring out what pen you want to use. In this example, I am going to use a gel pen.
I am going to start by selecting the adapter for my gel pen. These adapters are small, medium, and large. You can easily tell the different sizes because of the S, M, and L that you can find on the adapters.
See Pic Below.
I need to choose an adapter that will fit my gel pen.
The gel pen that I am using fits the small adapter but when I put the small adapter with the gel pen inside the Pen Holder, the point of the pen doesn’t reach the end of the Pen Holder.
The small adapter is not an option for my gel pen. I need the medium adapter.
See Pic Below.
I will be making a note-to-self for future reference so that I remember which adapter goes with which pen.
But for now, I start by inserting gel pen with the adapter into the Pen Holder. I can see the tip of gel pen at the bottom of the adapter.
Then I am going to place the cap on the Pen Holder. This will move the tip of the gel ever so slightly back up into the Pen Holder.
See Pic Below.
While holding the cap in place, I can still feel the tip of the gel pen against the cap.
What this cap does is it allows the correct dept of the tip in the Pen Holder. If this dept is not correct, the pen might not write or it could write too well and leave an embossed impression as it is writing.
Once I am confident that the gel pen is at the right dept, I will then tighten the adapter into the Pen Holder. You can refer to the previous pics at the beginning of this section if you don’t remember.
Remember the cap threads? That is how the adapter screws into the Pen Holder.
All that is left to do is insert the Pen Holder with the secured Gel Pen into the Machine Carriage.
Inserting the Pen Holder into the Carriage for the
Sketch N Cut Technique
There are a couple of things you need to pay attention to when you are inserting the Pen Holder into the Machine Carriage.
One very common mistake people are making is when they do not insert the Pen Holder into the Marriage Carriage all the way.
See Pic Below.
I have given you 2 examples in the pic above. One pic shows the Pen Holder inserted Incorrectly, notice that there is a gap between the Pen Holder and the Machine Carriage.
The other pic shows the Pen Holder inserted correctly and there is no gap between the Pen Holder and the Machine Carriage.
Machine Carriage Lever Positions
There is one more place where I find people getting confused. There are actually 2 different gaps.
Machine Carriage Lever is Open
One gap is created when the Level is open and the Pen Holder is not locked in not in the locked position.
But there is a 2nd gap and this is the one that I am talking about. This is the gap when the Pen Holder is not inserted all the way down into the Machine Carriage.
See Pic Below.
Don’t get frustrated. Know the difference between these 2 gaps get you confused. It is very easy to see the difference.
Machine Carriage Lever is Closed
This pic shows you the difference when the Machine Lever is Closed.
There is a gap when the Pen Holder is not inserted correctly.
See Pic Below.
FREE SVG Download
At the beginning of this tutorial I promised a FREE SVG Download. You can find this file in my Creative Fabrica Store. Just follow the link below.
Sketch N Cut - A World of Possibilities
That is all there is to it. Once you master these few easy steps, a world of possibilities will open for you.
All you have to do is fine the right design. There are so many Sketch N Cut Designs on Creative Fabrica, I am sure that you will never run out of possibilities.
And if you continue to follow my tutorials, there will be more Sketch N Cut Tutorials to come.
My tutorials will range from Beginner to Advanced but all tutorials will be Beginner Friendly.
