Re: Could it be this easy? (Yes.)

Troy,

With a small change, Yes it can be done. Whether you have to wake up
from your dream depends upon what you're dreaming of doing<G>

First, the small change...

MS Paint and PSP are pixel based drawing programs. You need to use a
vector based drawing program for best results. We'll come back to
pixels in a moment. Fortunately a very good, very inexpensive vector
drawing program is widely available and well-supported: CorelDraw!

In the engraving and sign business, Coreldraw! is used extensively.
So there are MANY programs to convert from corel to CNC. Some use the
plotter output (HPGL), and others use the Corel file directly. They
can range from free to cheap to more expensive than many can pay.

Anyway, once you've drawn your square, you can use a controller like
Mach2 or Flashcut or Kcam to import the lines and create gcode. All
three of these programs can be used in demo mode to real work.
Although not totally seamless, as in your description, it can become
pretty easy and automatic...

If you want to use MS Paint or PSP, you'll need to use a bitmap
import. And those that I'm aware of are expensive, except for the one
included with Mach2. But these will generally "assume" that it's a
picture you're importing, and these assumptions will not likely
create the output you desire. But it can be done.

It will be easier using a vector based drawing program. (Note that
vector is not capitalised. I'm talking of the vector file type, not
the CAM program of the same name.)

Hope this helps,

Ballendo

P.S. Lcam by Larken is a combination drawing/machine control program.
I understand the same to be true of DeskCNC, though I have no
personal experience with it. (Deskam I have used, and DeskCNC is VERY
similar<G>). There are others, more expensive, and you may find it
worthwhile to use one of these fully integrated drawing/machine
control programs to get closest to your "dream"...

--- In CAD_CAM_EDM_DRO@yahoogroups.com, <testfly@a...> wrote:
>
> Let me tell you what I want to do and someone tell me if it can be
done.
>
> I want to open say MSpaint or paint shop pro and use the drawing
tools in
> there to just click and draw a 2D shape. Say a square. Then I would
like to
> print that as I can using my printer. Simple and easy right? Sure
it is...
> However what I would really like to do is to be able to save that
drawing
> and then feed it to my CNC table and have it move my router so it
cuts out
> the shape rather then put it on paper. I could set the drawing tool
to mark
> a 1/4" line on my paper and if the cutting bit was 1/4" then WAL-LA
I have a
> simple way to cut simple shapes.
>
> Can this be done or should I wake up from my little dream here?
> Using XP and win 98. Be nice If I could do things up in XP on my
computer
> and then run the cnc with laptop (win 98).
>
> Thanks in advance,
> Troy