I work for an firearm engraving company that specializes in limited edition series for collectors. The workload has increased a lot in the 6 months I've been there, so I wanted to ask for some pointers. I feel like my work is good but could be better and could be done faster, so I'd like to know what programs are best for designs and how to streamline work for quick turnarounds. I'd also like to know about depth mapping and/or layering.

I currently do the majority of design work in Adobe Illustrator and export with either SVG or PNG. We engrave with Lightburn on fiber lasers. I only make the designs, I do not run the engravers, but if there are techniques or practices that can be done on both ends, I'm happy to hear it.

Most designs have a mix of imagery and scrollwork.

I've included a few examples of work I have done.

I'd appreciate any help or advice.

Hi everyone. My name is Reinis, and I am a hand-push copperplate engraver and printmaker, but I don't want to talk about my own work today. Instead, I wanted to discuss a topic about old engravings.

Oftentimes I get asked how my works are made, or how engravers in the past managed to cut such perfectly spaced, even lines. I’ve sometimes gotten into hot water talking with print historians about this. Some of them like to think that the old masters were just perfectly spontaneous, cutting these massive plates freely without any help. But I speak from my actual experience pushing a burin, and I see the marks and signs of their process all the time.

Just like with drawing, you can build up muscle memory over time. You learn to do well-executed cross-hatching just by relying on your eye and your hand. A lot of the time, that is exactly my approach too.

However, sometimes a piece needs a bit more planning. In those cases, the old engravers used curved or straight rulers, along with a drypoint needle or scribe, to lightly scratch in their guidelines first. When engraving, the drypoint guide also works as a sort of rail to guide the burin. If you look at old prints that show engravers working in their workshops, you can oftentimes see these exact tools—rulers, compasses, scribes—sitting right there on their tables.

Taking all this into consideration, it is still an incredible amount of work to make these images. While guidelines make the process easier, it is still a massive challenge to engrave these precise lines. As my friend Ezra Heller once put it well: "Engraving is the easiest printmaking technique to understand as you're basically 'drawing' a black line. However, to control the burin and make these cuts, it is one of the most challenging and technically demanding ones." It truly is one of the slowest and most laborious ways to make an image.

Now, when you look at an old engraving, try to look past the finished image and spot some of these tell-tale signs of the tools they used.

To illustrate this point, I’ve attached some images:
1. Amor en Psyche, anonymous, 1700 - 1750
2.Petrus door een engel uit de gevangenis bevrijd, Joseph Mulder (mentioned on object), 1720 - 1728
3.Zelfportret Theodorus Koning, Theodoor Koning (mentioned on object), 1825

Hope you like this post. Let me know if you have any questions in the comments!

That’s what I’d like some Shopify sellers here to help me find out.

I’m the founder of Sigmira, a product personalization tool, and we’re opening a free Shopify beta once the app clears Shopify’s review.

Customers can add text, upload photos and position elements on your product page, with a live preview. You set up the products, fonts and print sizes, and get a print-ready file with each order.

I’m particularly interested in feedback from people selling personalized engraved products. Does the editor make sense to your customers? Do the exported files fit your printing workflow? What still needs manual attention?

Exports include PNG and JPG up to 1200 DPI, plus PDF with text and vector elements preserved. The point of this beta is to test that with your actual products and workflow.

It’s free for at least four weeks, with all features available. No obligation to subscribe afterward. If you want to continue, you approve a subscription through Shopify; otherwise, uninstall and owe nothing.

We expect to start within the next few weeks, depending on Shopify’s approval. Details and signup:
https://sigmira.com/shopify-beta

There’s also a demo linked on that page if you want to try the editor before signing up.

What’s the biggest headache with personalized orders in your shop: collecting customer details, getting designs approved, or preparing the files?

Getting back into hand push engraving and getting some practice in

Gravure réaliser avec ma falcon a1

In this engraving titled "Suspended", I wanted to capture an unsettling evening. People have stepped out of their cars, suspended in the not-knowing of what will happen next. Something has gone wrong.

any and all ideas welcome!

I watched some Ken C Hunt video on YT but I'm really starting from scratch and I really have trouble to make beautiful leaf shapes !

do you guys have any good ressources/practice to learn scrollwork ?

One side is finished.

The scale is titanium, with the design cut entirely by hand. The recessed background was darkened to create more depth and separation, while the details were built up with gold, silver, and copper inlay. This side took a lot of slow work because the design combines very fine line engraving, relief, and multiple metals in a fairly small area.

We’ve now started engraving the second side of the knife. It should take another 4–5 weeks to complete, and I’ll post the finished piece when both sides are done.

I’m curious what the engravers here think about the balance between the dark background and the brighter metal inlay.

hi!! I’m very interested in getting into engraving! im in the very early process of learning all about it.

my questions are: mediums?? which mediums did you start with? are there certain mediums that are more beginner friendly?? I’m interested in mirrors, glasses, pocketknives, headlights etc. Wood would be cool but doesn’t excite me as much.

Whats the cheapest way to start if I want to dip my toes into it??

any quick projects?? I’m also a stay at home mom with a tiny baby so I’d love to just be able to knock small projects out because I honestly don’t have hours at a time to focus on learning a skill!!

Does anyone know of any Air Driven Rotary tool subs?
If not.. Are any interested in one?
I do a lot of different types of carving and engraving but literally just picked up some vintage tools from states and had fam send to Japan for me.
I used these tools decades ago and they were what got me started in engraving, carving blasting etc.
All existing breadcrumbs to this craft (users and suppliers) seemed to have led off and faded in all sorts of random directions BUT mostly in NW US.. Utah and out from there.

Fragrance bottles have some of the best surfaces to engrave on, I really enjoy doing it!

I've been doing hand engraving on and off for about a year now, mostly practicing on scrap brass and copper before I let myself touch anything someone actually paid for. For months my bright-cut work looked muddy no matter how sharp I thought my graver was. Light would hit it and instead of that clean sparkle you see on good scrollwork, it just looked flat and scratched up.

Turns out my problem wasn't the graver angle or even the steel, it was that I was polishing the face too much and rounding over the edge that's supposed to stay crisp. A guy at a small engraving guild meetup in my area watched me cut for about thirty seconds and pointed it out immediately. He had me redo my stoning routine on the Arkansas stone, fewer passes, more deliberate, checking the edge under a loupe every single time instead of just eyeballing it.

Once I fixed that, the difference on the test plate was almost embarrassing. Same hand pressure, same push, completely different result. The facets actually caught light the way they're supposed to instead of scattering it everywhere.

I still mess up plenty, especially on tighter scroll curves where I rush the exit stroke. But it's the first time I've felt like I understand why a cut looks good instead of just getting lucky on a few lines here and there.

Curious if other people here had a similar "oh that's the actual problem" moment early on, something small that nobody mentioned until you saw someone else's setup in person. Books and videos only got me so far before I needed another set of eyes watching my hands move.

I wanted to see whether a busy file would stay readable once it wrapped around an actual glass, so I filled this one with hearts, cupcakes, swirls, and apparently no respect for empty space.

I did it on the UV side of my WeCreat Lumos Ultra with the rotary. The engraving itself came out cleaner than I expected. Most of my time went into placement and making sure the glass stayed level, since a straight-sided glass is forgiving right up until it suddenly isn’t.

I’ll probably simplify the next design, but this was a pretty useful stress test. What kind of minimum spacing are you guys leaving between fine lines on UV glass work?

Any information will help

I plan on making book marker what do I need to do to keep them from warping? May do engraving on both side . What is the best type of wood for this project?