Coreldraw macro layer settings

[KBill (Kevin Warner)]

I’m converting from a WYSIWYG/print driver paradigm. My workflow is to design in Coreldraw and then send to Lightburn. One of the items I’m trying to figure out so that I can change design practices is what the layer settings are for the conversion to Lightburn. Is that set in macro or on Lightburn side.
I used red hairline for cuts in past and that converts to a tool line. Planning to change my design colors, but don’t want to run into a new issue.

[Rick (Technical Evangelist)]

To help, a little background… LightBurn started as a ‘pet-project’ replacement for the Ruida software. The Ruida software uses different color layers to separate and define the tasks of the laser job.

LightBurn uses RGB color matching to best place shapes on different layers during import. Ruida controllers have a hardware limit of 32 layers, and we do color mapping to closest - If you use 10 unique colors, they get mapped to the 10 closest unique layers. Here is the color table used in LightBurn.

How to export the color palette from Lightburn into my drawing program?

For most users, the exact details of the colors used in the color palette are unimportant, but some of our users have asked about the colors used to simplify developing templates for external design software. To export, make a simple shape of each color (Grid Array can speed creation) and then export it as an SVG - all the shapes would have their colors set. This is the color table used: Layer Color Hex Layer Color Hex [Layer 00] rgb ( 0, 0, 0) #000000 [Layer 16] rgb (128, 128, 128) #…

[wgbiii (Will)]

I’m not following. I have coreldraw files with 5 layers and when I use the lightburn convert macro I only get 2 layers. A step by step guide would be appreciated to convert the corelfiles to lightburn to get 5 layers. I tried changing the colors of my layers in corel with no change in the macro result. Also, is there anything like the corel object manager in lightburn? Handy for moving objects between layers. Thanks, Will (I’ve got a hundred or so files I need to convert over!!!)

[Rick (Technical Evangelist)]

@wgbiii

I’m not following. I have coreldraw files with 5 layers…

Step one, use different colors for layers in Corel, not actual layers.

Corel Export Macro Installation

Use different colors for layers in Corel, not actual layers. LightBurn will import the colors in Coreldraw to the closest matching color layer in LightBurn. Which version of LightBurn are you running? I don’t have this problem, though it’s possible that you’ve got anti-virus or firewall software preventing the Corel macro helper tool from communicating with LightBurn. There’s a utility called ‘SendUDP’ that checks to see if LightBurn is running, and if it is, will send it a command to load…

[wgbiii (Will)]

I figured it out. Had to change the colors on the individual objects in the layer rather than just the color of the layer in object manager. Still working on the best work flow to convert all the files over.