I’m trying to engrave photo portraits, but the result lacks contrast and fine detail.
I’ve tested different modes (Jarvis, Stucki), but I’m not satisfied with the outcome.
What workflow would you recommend for achieving clear and realistic photo engravings in LightBurn?
Start with this video and information on what material you’re trying to engrave.
It’s done on a fiber, but what it describes works for any laser. If you have a visible light diode, anything clear isn’t going to work. Acrylic is naturally clear, you have to adulterate it with something that produces colors. This is what’s being heated by visible light.
If you mean a clear photo, compared to clear material… the link should help you out.
It’s beneficial to post a photo, if you can.. We know you know what it looks like ..
There some nice work in the finished creations setting of the forum.
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This is one of my attempts. I’m not satisfied with the detail and contrast.
I used Jarvis, 317 DPI, 4000 mm/min, 45% power.
What would you improve?
(upload://eRFsn0fuNxsqzDb1ocoaO7Kh5RA.jpeg)
Did you process this within Lightburn or use some other on-line site such as ImagR?
It would also help us to know what material you’re using.
I forget about preview because it’s 2nd nature to preview something before I run it. Keep in mind what preview actually does. It emulates your lasers moves and indicates where it will lase.
It has no idea if you using a 20kW or 2mW laser or the material is steel, coated tile or ?
Just keep in mind it’s basic operation. You do need to use it a bit to understand how it works.
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I processed the image in LightBurn on 3mm poplar plywood (20W diode).
My main issue is low contrast and loss of fine details in faces.
Would you recommend adjusting the image (levels/gamma) before importing, or focusing more on LightBurn settings like DPI and power?
Yes, all the above. Just change one at a time, and change it back when you go to the next one. I have yet to find any magic for doing images. Every single one seems to be a new project.
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you could also try pass through , sometimes the photo will be fine as is, without editing
If you do this, you can’t set the dpi or dither type… It assumes it’s been pre-processed by something like ImagR.
Lightburn can handle most of any graphics you need to do. I only use other software to remove backgrounds, more photo related.
Doing photographs is the most difficult thing you can do with a laser… that being said..
Although I have a co2 for this and don’t use my diode machines, the same issue exists with all of them, where the bandwidth of the photo is larger than the material can handle.
For example, if your wood starts to darken at 40 - 45% and is black at 60%, then your whole photograph must be able to be reproduced within that range. This is a big problem on with a grayscale, but you’re dithering it and that takes a different view.
With a dither, you make a mark or you don’t. Power and speed are generally selected for the dark results you want, not as a range as it’s not applicable.
If you think about where the material is lased, it might help you resolve some of these issues. In this case there isn’t enough energy to cause the material to mark and almost too much for black blacks.
My suggestion would be to work on the image itself, marking seems OK. Make use of preview.
Make sense?
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Yes, that makes sense, thank you.
So in this case, would you recommend increasing contrast before dithering, or adjusting gamma/levels to compress the tonal range?
I feel like I’m losing detail in midtones.
Using a dither, I’d suggest working on the image. You literally have to fit the range of the photo within the materials response range. If there is little dither, you end up with pretty washed out whites.
The only way I can put it in my vocabulary is you could to compress it a bit and move how the image appears within an acceptable range. This is tough, with I could explain it more clearly.
My suggestion is to use adjust what you can, and view it through preview.
There is a ton of videos on yt that may help you… These are difficult, so hang in there.
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correct if photo is edited correctly prior to import you should only need to change minor things or nothing at all., I use LB editor when i 1st get a photo throw it in, crank the sliders every which way, it highlights the flaws in the image big time, LB editor is good but not good enough to turn a pigs skin into a silk purse i mainly use lb editor for final minor tweaks of my image before engraving
its all in the original image , its like sanding a car with 220 grit and them spraying a metallic over top even after 5 coats basecoat sanding marks are visible, LB cant hide or eliminate the flaws in the original
the best way to get great engravings is edit manually, trial and error teaches you , yes time consuming and frustrating at start , take notes as you go or video yourself after while your preferred settings are 2nd nature when editing
and lots and lots of trial engravings the flaws in the original will be highlighted in the engraving save those trials write on back how you edited photo, final laser settings, take photos every time you do a tweak in LB editor compare re elevate, go back to original photo study where the flaws are in the engraving, than one day it will just slap you in the face boom we got it
the above video is the video i 1st watched, when i started trying to do engravings it is a great video
.Photos of people from phones are the worst to deal with un less you shoot in manual . if they do need editing its best to edit as much of them in the phone they were shot on before exporting to computer.
Samsung phone cameras produce high quality photos if shot in manual mode, they are on par with a low end dslr camera
the main prob with phone images when shot in auto, the focal point is never on subject , even say when the square is around a subject face, basically phone is saying hey dummy hold phone still so i can get some sort of focal point , the focal point is never centre of said square, , the sharpest focal point is usualy the object behind a person more even than a face so it grabs that point not the face , the phone enhances them in gallery to look amazing but as soon as you bring them into a editing software all the flaws jump out
this part ill tell you what i see is wrong with the photo from the engraving , these are things that need addressing prior to bringing into LB
photo used is too small looking at the patterns on neck id say some where around the 80KB in size
so will be really hard to get a good image from that low quality.
i wont work with an original photo from a phone under 2 mb
this is order of how id alter your photo
1st drop contrast
shadows need increasing to remove black mass in jacket and give women hair definition increase till black becomes grey than back off a tad
highlights decreasing till they disappear then increase till they just come back
sharpen to bring more lines into women’s jersey but keep eye on faces as you tweak don’t want an over sharp face
drop saturation a tad , increase exposure contrast may need a slight tweak
one ive done look closely at how black some of the machine areas are in photos than look at detail in glass, that is to date the most time consuming job , over 20 pain staking hrs of editing and if remember over 4 hrs engraving ,ive only owned a laser for 2 yrs
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