Parameter configuration for laser engraving

[Snapmik]

Hi all,

I have been lately playing with Luban’s parameters for laser engraving and I would like to show you some results to see if we all could reach some kind of conclusions. I know that “not using Luban, but any other software” would be a solution, but I am not only trying to make Luban work but also to figure out how laser machines work in general.

All tests have been carried out using the “Greyscale” option on Luban 3.9.0 with the 1.9.0 firmware.

Q1 - Selecting “Dot (HQ)” in the “Movement Mode” makes Jog and Work Speed irrelevant, isn’t it? If “Line (NQ)” is chosen, then the Work Speed would be important (as shown in other forum posts, the acceleration and deceleration of the laser module could cause unwanted effects).

Q2 - Changing the “Dwell time” would have the same effect than varying the power output? I mean, and take the numbers only as an example, a 5ms dwell time at 30% could have the same effect in the material as 10ms at 15%. (I am not saying these numbers are correct, neither that they are proportional in any way).

This is the image I have been trying to engrave:

And these are the results have been obtaining:

Parameters shown: Contrast, Brightness, White clip. Algorithm, Jog Speed, Work Speed, Dwell time, Movement mode, Density, Power.

17 - 50, 50, 255, A, 1500, 1500, 5, HQ, 10, 15%
21 - 50, 50, 255, A, 1500, 1500, 5, HQ, 10, 20%
16 - 50, 50, 255, A, 1500, 1500, 5, HQ, 10, 25%
08 - 50, 50, 255, A, 1500, 1500, 5, HQ, 10, 35%

12 - 50, 50, 255, A, 1500, 1500, 5, HQ, 5, 35%
13 - 50, 50, 255, A, 1500, 1500, 5, HQ, 7, 35%
08 - 50, 50, 255, A, 1500, 1500, 5, HQ, 10, 35%

13 - 50, 50, 255, A, 1500, 1500, 5, HQ, 7, 35%
14 - 50, 75, 255, A, 1500, 1500, 5, HQ, 7, 35%
15 - 75, 50, 255, A, 1500, 1500, 5, HQ, 7, 35%

20 - 50, 50, 255, A, 1500, 1500, 5, HQ, 8, 30%
22 - 60, 60, 255, A, 1500, 1500, 5, HQ, 8, 30%

Any thought on the results? Which would you say it would be the best parameter configuration in order to obtain the best achievable result with Luban+Snapmaker? Any other configuration proposal to try?

Any help would be much appreciated.

Regards,
Xabier

[magier76]

Well i i take a look i love the 20 setting.
50-50-255 A 1500-1500-5 HQ 8 30%

[ElloryJaye]

20 does seem to be the best among the results you achieved. 21’s probably the next best, although it’s a little light. The others are too dark, too light, or too coarsely dithered. Some of your results may have been affected by the direction of the wood grain—it’s horizontal on some pieces, but vertical on others, and many of the horizontal-grain pieces have visible banding artefacts.

You might get better results by doing some work on the picture in an image-editing program more capable than Luban (Photoshop, GIMP, etc.) before trying to burn it, although I’m aware that isn’t really the question you asked.

[Borinkito]

Hi Xabier,

Do you have any further guidance you can provide after going through this process? I am now trying to go through this same process with my new A350 and having serious issues trying to figure out the optimal settings for laser engraving. I thought I had it then I printed a larger picture after performing a test run on a much smaller size image and the larger imave was way darker than the smaller image at the exact same settings so I’m at a loss right now trying to figure out where to go from here.

Thanks for sharing your settings and any other help you can provide would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

[Snapmik]

I finally took the following settings for my image:

Contrast, Brightness, White clip. Algorithm, Jog Speed, Work Speed, Dwell time, Movement mode, Density, Power:
50, 50, 255, A, 1500, 1500, 5, HQ, 8, 25%

Those worked fine for me, but I suspect that the final result depends heavily on the wood (mine was 3mm plywood) and the pre-processing of the image (which i didn’t make).

I have no clue on why your larger image was darker than the smaller ones (even more, I would have said that it should be the opposite…). Sorry for not being of much help.