I personally haven’t but many have
Huge rabbit Hole
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h0Swxybds9I&t=49s
4:35/8:26 ![]()
Thank you for the video link! I can definitely see that this is a rabbit hole!
I’m thinking MOPA may allow a paradigm shift. If one can make single high resolution oxide dots in isolation from any others with settigns that reliably produce the dots in colors in a predictable palette, this might enable getting away from at least some of the thermal history challenges by spreading out the dots so they don’t interfere with each other thermally. It’s already clear to me that even a relatively small temperature creep of the metal or even ambient temperature could affect results and it’s a wide open question of whether the MOPA precision would give enough control to make those individual dots, but experimenting to characterize stuff like that is part of the fun. I have ideas and am now itching to get a MOPA laser to try them. Rabbit holes can be fun!
This Guy has it down to a science
Pure engraving with “no Polishing” on titanium
He would not answer most of my questions
Except that it was engraved with “dozens” of layers some at multiple passes
This engraving is the real McCoy
It would be nice to have a basic workflow to get these results, even without settings…
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Nicky,
Wow! Thank you very much for sharing this! I totally agree it’s the real McCoy, I love how he oxidized the background to make it look golden. This is great existence proof that legit (and shiny!) colors are indeed achievable! Yay! Those colors look like they have similar or better shininess than my anodized colors when I don’t dither them (link to video, photo below). I wonder if he carved the metal with a laser. The effect of the oxide on the countours is stunning, and I bet this really comes alive when rotated in the light.
I too have lots of questions. I guess I’ll just have to try things for myself. Did he happen to say what kind of laser he’s using?
I did a reverse image search on this in Google images, and it didn’t find it. AI didn’t find it either. Where did you see this? Do you have a link that might help me see more of this work?
The stained glass design was a cricut SVG file I bought on Etsy and painstakingly edited so none of the layers overlap. This was very time-consuming in Affinity and helped inspire me to want to do the dithered mosaics.
Thank you again for sharing this! I’m very excited to see the existence proof and know that is was generate all by engraving!
First thing I think I lased with when I got the fiber were quarters. Figured out how to turn them golden.
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That’s really fun! I like that some of the thin films make things look golden. I wonder what that layer on your quarters is. ![]()
Read up on it …
NIH Laser-induced plasmonic colours on metals
Formation of colours on SS304L stainless steel induced by laser colouring
First one has some fantastic color work.
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Nice
Did you have to polish the coin after or it was this shiny after lasering
Best I did with brass coin
Rabbit hole was costing me $$$$ in wasted coins and back in 2023 not a single person would help.
But a couple said they would help for $$$$
$500 US for 3 hours of zoom calls
(Lets just say my response caused me to be banned from a few groups)
Yup! This is definitely a big rabbit hole! I’m hoping AI may help me through some of the “need lots of knowledge” part. It certainly was helpful with the anodizing stuff. Thank you for the links! I didn’t know that one can put color on silver and gold too. ButI don’t intend to work with such expensive materials (haven’t tried niobium either).
Those are great! I especially like the tiger and dragon one!
What kind of laser did you use for those?
Came off the machine that way, no post processing.
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Thank you
OMG 60 watt MOPA M7 150 lens
That’s very encouraging to know. I’m in the process of ordering an equivalent MOPA laser. Thank you!
I’ve always used the lens markings, such as F254mm that covers around 175mm square area.
I use this lens the most frequently, it’s got a relatively small dot size (compared to my co2) and gives me lots of room to stick my head in there to see and manipulate objects before lasing.
Which UV system do you own?
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Thank you very much for sharing this very helpful information!!
It looks like he mostly uses 304 stainless for these awesome results. He’s using a laser very much like the one I just ordered except his is 100W and mine is 60W. I hope mine has enough power. If I can get this working (big if because I know it’s a giant rabbit hole) perhaps I can then use less expensive 304 stainless.
I found a video on his Facebook site that shows scanning engraving. That wouldn’t work with my dithered mosaics, but I’m inspired to try it with a cricut SVG file I bought on Etsy and edited so it had no overlaps.
Now I have to wait for my laser to be built and shipped from China. The company says 10 to 14 days to build and test and 30 days to ship it to me.
I Assume this is on Facebook? Can you post a link to it?
Colors are very nice, similar to this article.
Laser-induced plasmonic colours on metals, From the NIH.
Thanks…
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