how to make a laser cut a logo out of a piece of metal

[Scott Mcqueen]

it’s roughly the same as the signature project that a Aharon rubinowitz did. Just use glow effects and a glowing beam of light (out of photoshop) instead of the pen he used in part 2.

first section: https://cowcast.creativecow.net/after_effects/episodes/CC_Workflow_6_Drag_POD.mp4

second section:
https://cowcast.creativecow.net/after_effects/episodes/CC_Signature_PODiPod_Lo.mp4

[Snoogs]

Great! Thanks for your help on this.

[David Bogie]

wow, that totally sucked. Shows you what can happen when you give an engineer Flash.

Aaron’s tutorial may offer you the mechanical underpinnings. Attaching the coordinates of the signature path to the effect point of the end of a laser beam effect is easy, too. The tough part, the stuff that separates that QualFab junk from real art lies in the subtleties only photographers and effects designers understand. The edges of the metal retain heat, the sparks fly (or not), smoke rises (or not), the beam changes color where smoke enters the light path, the etched piece falls with a bang and raises a cloud of dust, the sparks fall to the ground and bounce (or not).

You need Foam to creat the smoke, CC Particle Systems to create the flying sparks, CC Particle Wolrd to create sparks that strike a flow and bounce or stick, Beam or Lightning or Advanced Lightning to create the laser beam, Lens Flare to create the glowing beam spot, Shatter to produce some extrusion and additional flying sparks and eventually to allow the etched out piece to drop.

You throw time at it.

theanvel.com had a terrific, absolutely fabulous, set of perfect examples but they are no longer available for free download. However, if you are serious about this project, BUY theanvel’s tutorial disks!

bogiesan

This is my standard sigfile so do not take it personally: “For crying out loud, read the freakin’ manual.”

[Snoogs]

Sweet, I dig the full on approach.

Thanks for that.

Good link by the way!

[Brendan Thompson]

Odd. I’m doing exactly the same thing right now except I’m trying to recreate a peice of steel being cut with a welding torch. For the sparks from the torch I’m using the Weld_gold preset in Trapcode’s Particular. I’ve set the floor layer to be my metal (created in photoshop w/noise and motion blur). The sparks jump and bounce off of the metal and it looks pretty cool. By using a point light as the emitter I have greater control and after wiggling the intesity I get a pretty passable welding light (could work for your laser effect). Particular costs money but for everything it can do it is well worth the small cost.

I thought about using the write on effect (or 3d stroke) for the cut in the metal. Ahron has a signature tutorial that I think could be used to acheive this effect.