Valentine's Sticker Production

This section describes the different steps followed to produce sticker this valentine’s season at the Fab Lab using your favorite image or graphics.

Step – 1: Download the Design

In order to print and cut any sticker, you need the digital file first that you want to use for production. This could be a graphical vector file designed on any digital design software such as Adobe Illustrator, Corel Draw, GIMP and many more. It can also be simply an image that you like and you want to print and cut. However, with images, files need to be prepared, mainly to create the vector path that the machine should follow to cut the printed sticker.

In this example, the design was shared for free on vecteezy.com, a website contains many open-source designs that can be downloaded and produced directly. You can find the design file on the following Links (Link1, Link2).

Step – 2: Prepare Your Design For Printing & Cutting

Once the design is ready, the next step is to prepare your design for Printing & Cutting.

You will then import the design file into a preparation software, in our case we use CorelDraw. The sheet width should correspond to the vinyl roll width.

Set the Correct Size & Resolution: It is important to ensure that you set your file size and resolution correctly, as failure to do this often results in an unintentional outcome. Most printers require a resolution of 300 DPI, so make sure you change this before you set a new project. The correct size is usually straight forward, as long as you know how big you want your sticker.
Set Up Your Cut Contour: Mark your cutting outline that will be followed by the machine to cut the designed sticker. The vinyl printer recognizes the special color that can be accessed by adding Roland Bn-20 illustrator color palettes. Mark the outline that you want to cut and choose the color named “CutContour”. Make sure you set up your bleed and trim correctly. The bleed is the area outside the trim, and we do it to ensure that you are not left with an undesirable white/clear line around the edge of your sticker. Also make sure to keep your text within a safe area from the trim line, to ensure that none of the text is accidentally cut-off during the trimming process.

Save your design as.PDF or .EPS, When saving as an .EPS, Make sure to uncheck “Convert a stroke to an outline”.

Step – 3: Setting Up The Vinyl Cutter

After choosing all variables, load the vinyl roll and turn on the vinyl cutter by following those steps:

Pull the pinch roller lever and insert the material.
Align the material with the rollers, then push the lever.

Step – 4: Input Design to Versaworks

Open Roland VersaWorks and load in your file.

Go to File>Add Job to Queue A. Your job will then appear at the bottom of Queue A.
Double click on your loaded file to open up the Job Settings Window, In your Job Settings window, you will need to check settings in the Layout, Quality, Printer Controls and Cut Controls tabs.
Choose the option print and cut.
From the first option, choose “get media size” to get the width of the material we put in the machine.
Duplicate the drawing to fill the whole width to maximize the use of vinyl cutter, and minimize material loss.