Optimization settings for "Bed length engravings"

I have 18 pages or card stock on one bed, they all need the same etch on them. Sometimes when I lay these kinds of jobs out I can get the Lightburn software to cross the entire span of the bed while engraving. This lessens the amount “gunk build up” on the laser head and usually shaves a few minutes off of each bed full of card stock. All good right?
Yeah…except here’s the rub. I have no idea how to intentionally program the software instruct the laser head to traverse the entire bed: left to right, right to left, left to right, etc… while engraving.

Can anyone please explain, how to set that up, purposefully.
I’m attaching a screenshot of the current job I’m working on. As you can see, the laser head is swinging back and forth for each little engraving before moving on to the next little spot. I want to program “bed long etchings” while working inside of Lightburn’s software. I’m aware that by setting the art up in illustrator with all the cardstock layout completed before import, that this will solve the issue, more than likely. But please let me know if I can fix 'optimization settings" within lightburn to achieve the same goal.

Thanks in advance!
DG

Thunder Laser Nova 51 100w

I’m assuming when you say:

that you are talking about layers that are set to “Fill”

In the cut settings you can set to fill all shapes at once.

image

ok, yes, thank you, can the software do the same for images?

Images are dithered, and are all processed as one object, so no ‘fill all shapes’ option - but it is doing the same thing - filling the object (image) shapes at once.

You should do some experimentation and play with the settings to see for yourself what happens. Half the fun! :slight_smile:

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LightBurn does not have an option to scan all images at once like it does for fills, however this has been implemented for the next release and is currently being tested.

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sweet, that will be a great update!

Question for Oz: Can I get extremely specific results within “optimization settings”? Do you have a resource that I can use to learn how each of the controls on that page interact with one another? Seems like I’m spending a lot of time trying to finesse that page and sometimes the results, when they are close to being correct, feel like I stumbled into them. Which means I can’t really repeat the results easily on another project. I hope this makes sense. Please let me know your thoughts.
thank you

You may find this helpful in explaining the optimizations available using the ‘Cut Planner’ and the effects of setting the different options.

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