So a little background on us-- we do a lot of woodworking and building, and over the years have made and sold personalized wooden stools and signs (or sometimes just made items for gifts). Usually my hubby does the building (and sometimes the routering out of a child's name on a stool or a piece of wood) and then I do the graphics. The graphics usually consisted of me creating something in powerpoint, printing it out, then tracing the graphic onto the wood. From there I would hand paint inside the lines, outline with a fine tip black paint pen, and polyurethane over the creation. This would usually take a lot of time, and was never perfect or crisp, especially lettering, but I guess that was part of the draw of it being handmade.
I had been eyeing a Silhouette Cameo for years but was really unsure as to whether I could learn to use it in a way that would justify the price. Doesn't it seem awfully intimidating? I mean, look at how many tutorials are out there! Surely this thing would be too complicated. Well, here on Great Offer Stock it went on sale as a doorbuster and since I had made a little extra cash walking dogs, I figured I would take the plunge. Well, OH MY GOODNESS.. this machine is completely amazing!
True, when it arrived, I was very intimidated-- didn't even take it out the box for 2 days. Then I downloaded the software (even though when I finally opened the box, I found there was a CD with the software on it) and opened it. Look, you will be intimidated when you first try out the software-- it is new and foreign and will take some learning. I watched a few youtube videos and found a website called Cutting for Business to be very helpful. I needed to figure out how to make stencils out of transparencies and once I figured out how to take a graphic off the internet and trace it, or take wordart out of powerpoint and use it in the software, my whole world opened up. I will attach a pic of our most recent stool (everything painted after making stencils, using transfer tape to get it off the mat, spraying the back with stencil adhesive, then layering out the stencil by peeling pieces off the with hook and a set of tweezers)-- all graphics crisp and beautiful courtesy of the Cameo!
I do encourage you to look online for tutorials, to read about getting cheaper materials (including using painters tape instead of transfer paper), making stencils out of transparencies (and what settings to use), looking for free graphics to download to the library, how to turn any graphic into a cuttable piece, using mod podge over your stencil just for a clean edge... there are a lot of great tips out there! But my machine works flawlessly-- my first cut on transparency using blade depth 6, speed 3 and thickness 33 was perfect. The only problem I ever have is with the software freezing after my computer goes into sleep mode--but it could totally be my dinosaur of a computer. Easy enough to fix as I just close it out and restart (always save your work before walking away from the computer!!). I couldn't be happier! The one thing I do have to purchase now is the spatula (wasn't included with mine) but other than that, wonderful!!
Also a note about Overstock-- they had the lowest price on the internet for the Cameo 2 with the vinyl kit. I usually buy from Amazon for the 2 day shipping but it was over twenty bucks more without even the vinyl kit, and this came in ONE DAY-- yes, I ordered it one morning and the VERY NEXT DAY it was on my doorstep. Amazing!!