Hi all
I’ve been spending a lot of time trying to get used to processing images for engraving on y snapmaker ray 20w and I have a question regarding the bit encoding.
Gimp offers 8, 16, 32 bit encoding with other options such as integer, floating point etc and the snapmaker ray can process 32bit but lightburn processes in 8bit.
Is the difference between these options decernable in real terms when using a ~0.8x0.1 dot size.
Is the 32bit capability of the ray controller of any benefit if lightburn uses 8bit?
You are comparing unrelated things. The 32 bit controller means that is the addressing capability of the hardware. It has nothing to do with image resolution. Lightburn by comparison is a 64 bit application.
That GIMP encoding refers to the byte size for a single pixel. It determines the number of colors that pixel can have. 8-bit (a binary number) is 256 colors and 32 bit is about 16 million colors.
We have covered address widths and color ranges. Now we talk about dot size. Your laser can create no more than 254 dots per inch, or 64516 dots in a square inch. It is likely that it is not even that good. A 4"x5" burn has 64516x4x5 dots in that entire burn area. That is just over a million pixels. Now we come to the fun part. Images typically imported (but not all) are either 96 or 72 DPI. If you are worried about losing detail when you import an image, or send it through Lightburn, you have little to worry about.
I am not a programmer, but I am pretty sure this means Lightburn only does black and white with 256 grayscale intensity levels. Notice I said GRAYSCALE? That is only where this terminology applies. It has nothing to do with processing capability.