Badminton Racquet and Shuttlecock - Cut #12

Today’s project was inspired by my badminton lessons. The final piece was cut from white cardstock, mounted on red with a green border.

It started with a simple sketch, which I processed in Photoshop using Image Threshold and the Cutout filter to produce a black-and-white PNG file. That PNG was then imported into Inkscape and traced.

Next comes the manual cleanup: deleting tiny nodes, fixing object spacing, and reducing sharp angles to make the file cutter-friendly. The result is saved as a Scalable Vector Graphic (SVG).

The SVG file is imported into Sure Cuts A Lot and sent to the die cutter, which cuts the design from white cardstock. The final cut is peeled off the mat and mounted on red cardstock with a green border.

After the first test cut, I updated the Inkscape SVG file to correct problem areas and improve the final result.

Bird Cut

Today’s two cuts were created from a photo I took this afternoon during a walk.

I made two different cutting files from the same image, using different Photoshop and Inkscape techniques. The version cut from light green and mounted on white cardstock was auto-traced in Inkscape. The version cut from red, also on white, was manually created.

It’s interesting how the same source image can produce such drastically different results.

Hummingbird

Today’s project was inspired by a carving I purchased from Alex Mountain, a Kwakwaka'wakw (Kwagu'ł) artist from the Mamalilikulla First Nation. Alex is an Indigenous carver often found working on the streets of Gastown, Vancouver.

The final result was cut from red cardstock, mounted on orange, and finished with a black border.

I'm still working out a few kinks in the process—the SVG file and the cutter both need some adjustment. Once that’s sorted, it’ll be goodbye to the X-Acto knife.

The original wooden carving is shown alongside my paper-cut interpretation on the cutting mat.