Navigate to Google Drive>Shared Drives>Production>Roland>CUT CONTOUR TRAINING and open file
"TEST CUT FILE.pdf in Adobe Illustrator before proceeding.
Determine areas to be cut from customer specifications, in this example the customer has requested all letters be cut out and wants 25 red/black and 25 white.
Setting cut lines with bleed
Setting up cut lines for files that bleed requires you to duplicate the artwork, one of these artworks will contain the necessary bleed and the other will contain the cut lines.
1.) Select black selection arrow from tool panel.
2.) Drag a box around entire artwork to select everything in the file, alternatively the keyboard shortcut "Command+A" will achieve same result
3.) Once your artwork is fully selected hit "Enter" on keyboard. This will launch the "Move" dialog box. The distance you move the object(s) will differ depending on the file and the size of the artwork, likewise moving vertically or horizontally will also depend on the file and personal preference. You will need to move the object(s) far enough away from the original so as not to interfere with future operations. In this example I have opted to move the object(s) vertically 3 inches. REMEMBER THIS VALUE, you will need it again
**NOTE**
A negative number in the horizontal field will move the object left while a positive number in the horizontal field will move the object right.
A negative number in the vertical field will move the object up while a positive number in the vertical field will move the object down
4.) Once you have selected optimal selections for step 3, click the "Copy" button in the "Move" dialog box. This will generate a duplicate of the object(s) you have selected. Your file should now look like this:
5.) At this point we now have 2 identical copies of the artwork that we can use to generate bleed and cut lines.
Creating a CutContour swatch
1.) Open your swatches panel by selecting Window>Swatches from menu bar.
2.) If there are no swatches in your swatch panel the "add new swatch" button may be disabled.
**NOTE**
If your "add new swatch" button is NOT disabled, skip step 3.
3.) Dragging a fill color box into swatch panel will enable this button. To do this, use the white selection arrow and click on any color in your artwork. Drag the fill color box onto the swatch panel
4.) Click on add new swatch button (illustrated above) to launch "new swatch" dialog box
5.) Enter the swatch name. The swatch name MUST BE EXACT as this name is what Caldera will be searching the file for. The swatch name is: CutContour this must be with capital "c's" and must have no spaces.
6.) You must now select the Color Type and color for the swatch. The color type MUST be set to Spot Color, the color of the swatch is not important and can be set to any value. A high contrast color is typically preferred so in this example we will set color mode to CMYK and use 100% Magenta as the swatch color. Make sure "Add to my Library" box is selected.
7.) By selecting the "Add to my Library" box Illustrator will add your CutContour swatch to your libraries and will remain there even if Illustrator is completely closed and reopened. To add cutting lines to any future jobs you can simply open the libraries panel by clicking Window>Libraries and skip all above steps.
Applying Cut Lines to Your File
Now that we have a CutContour swatch generated we can apply it to the file where we want the cut to occur. In this example we want to cut each individual letter out so the cut line will need to go around each letter.
1.) With white arrow selected, drag a box around the entire original artwork. Do NOT include the copy.
2.) With original artwork selected, click once on the CutContour swatch in your Libraries panel.
3.) By clicking on the swatch we have added a fill to the original artwork, however in order for Caldera to read the cut line this must be converted to a stroke. To do this, click on the switch fill and stroke button at the bottom of your primary tool panel just above and to the right of your fill and stroke boxes.
4.) In order for file to cut properly, the stroke alignment must be set to "Center" and the stroke weight must be set to .125pt. To do this open the Stroke panel by clicking "Window>Stroke" on the main menu bar.
5.) Set stroke alignment to "Center" by clicking on the Align stroke to center Icon. Set stroke weight to .125pt
Adding Bleed to Artwork
With the cutlines complete, we now have to add bleed to the duplicated portion of the file that we generated earlier. Adding bleed has to be done color by color. In this example we will start with the red portion of the file.
1.) With white arrow selected, click on any red portion of the artwork then click "Select>Same>Fill color from main menu.
2.) With all red portions of the artwork selected, add bleed by dragging the fill color box onto the stroke color box.
3.) Open your stroke panel by selecting "Window>Stroke from main menu. Align stroke to outer by clicking the align stroke to outer icon. In addition to stroke alignment you will also want to set stroke cap to round and stroke corner to round by clicking on those icons. Increase stroke value until satisfied with result. The value of stroke thickness will vary from file to file, you will want a large enough stroke to compensate for any variance in cutting but not so large that it interferes with other portions of the file. In this example a value of 15pt is sufficient.
4.) Repeat steps 1-3 for all other colors in your document, when complete your example should now look like this:
5.) You will now need to realign the bleed portion of the file with the cutline portion of the file. To do this, use the white selection arrow and drag a box around entire bleed portion of your file.
6.) With the bleed portion of your file selected, hit "Enter" on keyboard to launch the move dialog box. You will need to move the objects the same value you moved them initially but in the opposite direction. In this example we initially moved the objects vertically 3 inches. Now we will move them vertically -3 inches.
7.) With bleed objects still selected, they will need to be placed behind or "under" the cut lines. To do this select Object>Arrange>Send to back. Alternatively the keyboard shortcut Command+Shift+[ will achieve the same result.
Adding Weeding Boxes
In most cases, it is very beneficial to add cut boxes around text and small portions of the file. This will help when weeding the job so you're not handling so much vinyl at once. This is a very simple process.
1.) Select rectangle tool from your primary tool panel.
2.) Drag a rectangle around your file being careful not to impede on your cutlines. Typically if this rectangle is just outside of your bleed objects, you'll be fine. Once you've created your rectangle, illustrator will apply whatever fill/stroke was used in your last operation. In this example it was the 15pt black stroke, we will want to change this to the CutContour Swatch.
3.) With your rectangle still selected hit the letter "i" on your keyboard. This will change your cursor to the eyedropper tool, once you've selected this tool you can click anywhere on your cutline and illustrator will change the fill/stroke of your rectangle to the fill/stroke of the cutline you clicked on.
4.) You should now have a cutline around all of your letters as well as a rectangular cutline around entire file and it should look like this:
Additional options creation
1.) We have now completed setting up the cut lines for the red/black portion of this example. In the first portion of this article it was stated that the customer wants 25 red/black and 25 white. Since the vinyl itself is white, we will not need to create bleed for this. Instead we can simply duplicate the cutlines in our file and we will have our white version. To do this, use the white selection arrow and click on the rectangle you just created in previous step.
2.) With your rectangle selected we want to select all other cutlines in the file. To do this click "Select>Same>Stroke Color" from main menu bar.
3.) With all cutlines selected hit "enter" on your keyboard to launch the "Move" dialog box. You can enter any value here so long as you have ample distance between the original and the duplicate. In this example we will move the object vertically 10 inches. Once you have determined and entered your distance, hit the "Copy" button.
Because we only duplicated the cutlines and the vinyl is white, we don't need to take any further steps. We now have our red/black version with bleed as well as our white version. In the next section we will create 25 of each per customer specifications on the same file.
Quantity based Imposition
The first step in creating multiple objects in one file is to change your artboard size. The size of your artboard will depend on your job specifications as well as the media you are printing on. In this example we will be printing on a 54" roll of vinyl. Since caldera adds OPOS markers (OPtical POSitioning) and you lose some width from the media rollers on the machine, a general rule of thumb is to subtract 3 inches from your roll width to be the width of your artboard. Since our roll is 54" we want our artboard to be 51". The height of your artboard will also vary depending on your job specs. As a general rule of thumb we don't wan't to exceed 6ft (72") of cut length.
1.) With the above in mind, we will change our artboard size to 51" x 72". To do this click "File>Document Setup" from main menu to launch Document Setup dialog box. Alternatively the keyboard shortcut "Command+Option+P will achieve same result.
2.) Click on "Edit Artboards" in your Document Setup dialog box.
3.) After clicking "Edit Artboards" your dialog box will disappear but you will still be in document setup mode and your artboard will become selected. In the top tool panel you will see values for W and H. This is where we will enter W-51 and H-72.
4.) With the artboard dimensions set, we can now start to impose our files. To do this we want to start with the first version of our art (red/black) in the upper left corner of our artboard. With white arrow selected, drag a box around entire red/black version making sure to include the cut rectangle we placed around it. With objects selected simply drag to the top left corner of white artboard.
With objects still selected we need to determine a suitable distance to move the object in order to create a duplicate that is optimally spaced for printing as well as weeding. To do this, you will typically add a minimum .125" to the width of the objects and use that value in the move dialog box **NOTE your values may differ slightly from this example depending on how big you made your outer cut rectangle.. The width of your objects will be displayed in the top tool panel.
5.) Since .125" is a minimum distance we can round up for sake of even numbers. In this example our object is 12.6458" so we will move it 12.8". With object selected hit "Enter" on your keyboard to launch the "Move" dialog box and enter a positive 12.8" into the Horizontal field and hit "Copy". This will duplicate the object and leave just enough space for weeding between them. Your file should now look like this:
6.) We now want to copy more objects until we have reached the end of the artboard. To do this use the keyboard shortcut Command+D to duplicate more objects.
**NOTE it is a good idea to count how many times you duplicate the file so you don't have to try and count them later. Since we are starting with 2 artworks already start counting at 3 everytime you hit Command+D on the keyboard.
As you can see in picture above we have generated 4 copies of the cutfile across the artboard, however we have just exceeded the width on the right side. This is an issue you will run into on nearly every file you set up. It is important to utilize as much of the printable area as possible. We have 2 options in this case, 1. we can delete the 4th copy and only have 3 across or 2. we can delete all copies but the original, rotate it 90degrees and try again to see if we can utilize our space more efficiently. Lets rotate the original and see our results.
7.) On keyboard, hit "Command+Z and repeat until all copies are gone and we are back to the original artwork.
8.) To rotate the object, open the transform tool panel by clicking "Window>Transform" from main menu.
9.) Within the transform tool panel, enter a value of 90 into the rotation field and hit enter.
10.) Once rotated, we will need to realign to the top left corner of the artboard by dragging.
11.) Since we rotated our file we will have a new move value, determine new move value from the new width of object. In this case we will round up to 2.5".
12.) With new value of 2.5" repeat steps 5 and 6 until you have reached the end of the artboard.
13.) By rotating we have fit 20 copies horizontally across the artboard with the 21st copy falling off of the artboard. In this example we wont want to do 2 full rows of 20 since the customer has only requested 25 copies. We know we can fit 3 across horizontally so let's make 2 rows of 3 horizontally for a total of 26pcs. To do this, object 21 should still be selected so drag it down so it fits anywhere on the artboard.
14.) With object still selected, re launch your transform tool panel if it is not already open by clicking "Window>Transform" in main menu. You'll notice there is still a value of 90 in the rotation field, we'll set that back to 0
15.) Once rotated, drag and place under top leftmost object, try to match the spacing of the top row of objects when placing.
16.) Repeat duplication steps until you have 2 rows of 3. Your file should now look like this:
We now have 26 copies of our red/black version. Repeat all above steps with the white version we generated before. Your file should now look like this:
We now have all necessary cutlines based on customer specifications. You'll notice we didn't use the full 72" height of our artboard. Before saving the file we need to fix this or caldera will waste all of the additional space. To do this relaunch your Document Setup dialog box by clicking File>Document Setup or Command+Option+P and click on Edit Artboards button. By hovering over bottom center anchor point, your cursor will change into a resize arrow, click and drag the bottom center anchor point up until just below the last object on the artboard.
Once artboard is sized appropriately, we can save the file to its original location by adding _CUT to the file name.
**In this example save your file with _YOUR NAME after original file name and inform your trainer of completion for review.