I’m engraving these baseballs and I’m have a ridiculous amount of trouble finding the center points so that it looks right, any tips?
Is it the center point, or is it the position in the center related to the lacing?
A dimple in the work area at the center would assure a good center. However, it wouldn’t allow for where the image was related to the balls lacing.
If you wish that, then you have to have some way to position the ball relative to the lacing.
Yeah I’m trying to get it centered relative to the lacing in that area so it doesn’t look like it’s off to one side
2d jigs can be tough, you’ll have to figure out how to orient the ball relative to the laces and the machine.
That might not be so simple, although it sure sounds simple enough.
Good luck
Make a small wood box with a hole, big enough to drop the ball in but not through, in the bottom. Turn the box over and that is your fixture.
Locate the box where it can be always be positioned accurately and use Absolute Coords.
Put a ball in and position where you want. Then mark the box where the lasing goes through the hole. You now have a fixture that is repeatable.
Then move the laser over to the center of the ball and call that the center of your drawing. I would use a circle on the Tool layer to identify the work area for the text. Save your work and you are good to go.
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That looks like one of my classic design “issues” with regard to centering: Technically centered and visually centered are two completely different things (except in symmetric designs).
You can use a simple circle as a “tool layer” that fits perfectly in the space between the laces, and you can then use that to frame (with or without jigs depending on your laser and setup). Then center your design in that tool layer circle by first centering it technically (e.g. At-Home) and then manually adjusting it to be visually centered based on the classic Mk. I eyeball test.
Personally, I almost never work in absolute coordinates on my CO2 laser. Obviously, I use jigs, but I just align them once per run and absolve myself of the need to maintain tolerances on the bed, which definitely has play. My fiber laser is technically in absolute coordinates, I generally don’t use fixed jigs, as it’s more precise for me to visually align my pieces with the framing laser. Apparently we all approach things with our own perspectives. 
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I almost always use user origin on the co2 unless I’m cutting out templates.
I use the center option on the fiber and still use jigs.
For coins I’ve found I can put a pair of pieces of tape across the bed and, using low power cut the tape. Pull the center out of the tape and my coins are aligned in the slight notch.
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I should have said, make a small box, turn it over, locate it in the correct location (corner?) on the laser bed, and THEN burn a hole in it. This will ensure the hole, which is your new text boundary in your layer, will be accurately known.
So this is a tool layer for print and cut right? Basically so it can never get off from not being square?
You have me at a disadvantage. We are not talking about Print and Cut, which is a Lightburn tool, so I have no idea what you mean.
If you make out of thin plywood, it should be fairly stable. If you make it out of cardboard or construction paper, maybe not so much.
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