by Sandy McCauley | Dec 28, 2008 | Designing, Free Videos, Mud Puddles - Designing, Transformation
A while back, CeCe asked me if I knew how to design a mud puddle in KNK Studio. Now, I knew that I could just show how to use the freehand tool and simply draw one. But most users, including me, aren’t that crazy about freehand drawing unless we are tracing an existing image. So, off and on, I had been thinking about how to design one easily in KNK Studio. Finally, this morning, it hit me. While I knew the key was using Transform>Transformation, I wasn’t getting the look I wanted from any of the shapes I chose at the start: circle, oval, star, rounded rectangle, etc. Then it just suddenly came to me that I hadn’t tried modifying a star before applying the transformation. Bingo! It resulted in exactly the look I had in my mind… which is somewhat similar to the Sizzix Splats die. Anyhow, here’s a quick video to show you how I created the ones you see above. Note that the possibilities are endless in terms of all of the possible looks. Just try using more or less points on your star.
Making a Mud Puddle Video
by Sandy McCauley | Dec 18, 2008 | AI Files, Designing, Fan Shape Tool, Free Files, Free Videos, Rainbows - Designing
Once again, Carol has come up with a FUN KNK Studio request! What’s the easiest way to make a rainbow? Well, there are probably three or four different ways to achieve this… thus this could be Part 1 in several posts about rainbows. We’ll have to see. But the method that came to my mind is not bad and creates the rainbow in a fairly easy, methodical, manner using the Fan shape. Basically you just create one fan, and then start duplicating it and modifying two settings up in the Smart Bar, along with recoloring each fan, as you go.
Making a Rainbow
For those who would rather just have the file, here’s a link to download it. Also note that I will be converting all of my files to both .ai and .svg for those who own other cutters and would like to have some of the files I make:
Rainbow File in KNK Format
Rainbow File in AI Format
Now, regarding Roy G Biv… I hadn’t heard that acronym in 20 years! But I found it this morning when I was searching the Internet for the order of the colors in a rainbow: Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo, and Violet.
by Sandy McCauley | Dec 17, 2008 | Free Videos, Grass - Designing, Polyarc
Carol B contacted me last night and was interested in designing her own grass. I just LOVE these designing requests, although I’m still muddling over how to create a simply mud puddle for CeCe! lol But I’ll figure it out one of these days.
The video shows how to design the type of grass I show above. If anyone has an example of a different look, then send it to me and I’ll possibly come up with an alternate method. Definitely play with this one, though, as it’s simple, quick, and may just provide some ideas for other designs. Let me know!
Designing Grass Video
by Sandy McCauley | Dec 15, 2008 | Cupcake Wrapper, Designing, Welding
I was contacted by a bakery owner in Florida interested in a Klic-N-Kut if she could design and cut her own cupcake wrappers. She sent me to a web site selling some very elaborate designs and I instantly became obsessed with creating a basic file that could then be modified to fit any celebration or any holiday. Once we had a basic scan of a pattern, it was easy to recreate the shape and then simply create words and images to weld to the top, such as this simple Happy Birthday prototype I created:
Then I decided to try a few Christmas designs and they were fun to make as well. Obviously, the possiblities are limitless! Note that you don’t bake the cupcakes with these cutouts… they are meant to be applied after the cupcake is complete with icing and decorations… simply wrap around a cupcake, fold up a tab, insert tab into a cut slit, and reopen the tab.
Here are two links to help you in your own designing. And I promise to not to tell anyone if you prefer to buy the cupcakes from your local grocery store and just cut out your own wrappers to make them look like YOUR OWN CREATIONS! 😛
Link to free zip with KNK files for simple Happy Birthday, Noel, and Basic Pattern for Cupcake Wrapper
*** New *** Cupcake Wrapper Templates for Designing in KNK, MTC, SVG, EPS, PDF, and Studio formats
(Big thanks to Judy Keating for sharing her designs and to Gayle Galura-Scott for converting to .Studio for the Silhouette owners!)
Link to web site selling cupcake wrappers – get some GREAT ideas here!
by Sandy McCauley | Dec 8, 2008 | Breaking Path, Free Files, Free Videos, Making Path, Welding
I heard from my VERY first Klic-N-Kut customer yesterday, Kristi H. She posted about needing to modify a very ornate font. So, I had a look at it and decided that this would make a great tutorial in basic welding. I’m not sure I actually fully understand what Kristi needs, but that’s okay. After watching this, I know she’ll let me know if I went down the wrong path. lol In the meantime, this is what I would want to do with these letters to make them more usable for my own cutting.
I have both the video and the letter “H” that I used for the video, in case you want to play with this same font yourself for practice. Note that I kept it rather simple, but you could include a lot more of the flourishes, if you so desire.
Video on Modifying an Ornate Font
File Used in the Video
