In this little tutorial I am going to show you how to use a Silhouette Cameo or Portrait cutter and the Silhouette Studio software to print and cut out your Tin Teddy clip art images – or any other clip art. This tutorial is also of use to anyone who use the Silhouette software with a different brand of cutting machine.
You only need the basic (free) version of Silhouette Studio for this tutorial, although of course it is also compatible with the more advance Designer edition.
I will be using a clip art image of a giraffe (this will be included in a pack of Tin Teddy graphics at a later date).
Here I will show you how to do a basic print and cut. I will do two more tutorials to show you how to do an offset “sticker” cut, and how to turn your giraffe into a cool silhouette cut out.
1 – Make sure you have the giraffe image (or a similar .png image of your choice) and you know where it is stored on your computer.
2 – Open your Silhouette Studio software and go to the Library.
3 – Create a new folder if you want, or choose where you are going to put your giraffe.
4 – Click on File, Import, Import to Library and find your giraffe and he will be imported into your Silhouette Library. If you want to import a lot of images at once you need to select and drag and drop them from another window, into the Library. But for now let’s just use our giraffe friend.
5 – Double click on the giraffe and he will appear on your cutting mat in the main Silhouette screen.
6 – Select the giraffe by clicking on him. You will know you have selected him as his dimensions will appear around him.
7 – If you want to resize him, click one of the corner boxes. Hold down your shift key then drag the box in or out to change his size. Holding the shift key keeps his overall proportions correct, so you do not end up with a short fat giraffe or something like that.
8 – Click on the Trace option and click the top button in the pane that opens – “Select Trace Area”
9 – Drag a box over your giraffe. It looks a bit odd at the moment, but don’t worry.
10 – In the Tracing Pane, uncheck the box marked “High Pass Threshold”. Now adjust the slider called “Threshold” until the giraffe is a solid yellow silhouette. Click the “Trace” button near the top of the Tracing Pane.
11- You should now see a red line around your giraffe (use the zoom key to get in close if you can’t see it). This is where the cutting will occur
I am going to print two giraffes, so you can see how easy it is to duplicate them
12 – Drag a box over your giraffe and his red outline, right click and select “group”. This groups the image and cutting line into one handy item
13 – Select your new combined giraffe and hold down the ALT key on your keyboard, now drag the giraffe to the side.. and you will have a perfect copy. There are a few ways to make duplicates, but I find this way very quick and easy.
Now to set the page up so we can print them and cut them out perfectly.
20 – If you don’t want to use a whole sheet of paper the size of your cutting mat, you can use a smaller one.. just make sure you change the settings. You do this from the Design Page Settings Pane. I am going to print my giraffes on to an A6 piece of paper (about 4″ x 6″). I have adjusted the size so I can see the paper on my cutting mat. If your giraffes are the wrong size, drag a box over them them and resize using the corner and the SHIFT key, as we did before.
21 – My giraffes now fit nicely so I will add the Guide marks. Open the Registrations Marks window and change Style to whichever type of Silhouette you own.
These marks will tell the Silhouette exactly where the giraffes are on the page. If your giraffes overlap the marks, resize them again as before.
22 – Print the page out (click the picture of a printer!), remember to set your printer settings to the right size and type of paper.
23 – You should get something like this. Two identical giraffes, waiting to be cut out.. so let’s do that.
24 – Mount the page onto your cutting mat in the right location to match the screen, and load into your Silhouette as normal
25 – Make sure both giraffes are selected
26 – Click on “Send to Silhouette” and make sure that your settings and blade depth are correct for the type of paper/card you are using. If no cutting options are selected, choose “cut”
26 – Watch as your Silhouette cuts out the two giraffes – which you can now use in your crafting projects.
Explaining each step like this takes a LOT longer than actually doing this. Once you have cut a couple of things out with the Print and Cut feature you will do it very quickly. It can definitely make cutting out lots of little things a LOT easier.
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