Silhouette Cameo - Initial Thoughts

[Justin]

Just bought myself a Cameo to play with out of interest. Thinking back over the years I can only remember a handful of times when I needed to cut any wider than 12" anyway. I've used Roland machines and really liked them, several other large format machines etc. so this looked liked an interesting comparison test

Ordered through MDP, £224+vat free next day delivery. Delivered quickly although a slight surcharge because of my location offshore. Emails were answered quickly enough, ordering process not too painful.

Unboxing I found a load of small sign vinyl cuts that I hadn't ordered, maybe these come as standard. I ordered a selection of garment vinyl to get me started anyway.

Setting up the machine was straight forward, much the same as a printer. Initial thoughts on the machine, good build quality, somewhat noisy but not overly. Great, small, footprint, would sit on top of the PC box if needed so finding a home for this is certainly easy.

The blade/holder simply drop into place and a twist locks it in. Blade has 10 settings and a small tool is provided to twist change the depth, very easy.

It took me a little while to work out how the vinyl loaded, the rollers move across to grip but are a little fiddly at first. Once I'd got the hang of it...and realised it loads from the front not the back! it all seemed pretty straight forward. Cutting area is approx. 11.6" wide by up to 10' long. I've tested with small offcuts of vinyl so far.

Set the blade to it's lowest, number 1 and away I went. Sent a few test cuts through. As mentioned, it's not the quietest machine but not loud enough to bother me. Everything cut very well, I was very surprised how well tiny detail cut, something I've struggled with on very expensive machines in the past. Speed can be adjusted through the software/machine panel. I put this on it's fastest and it's perfectly adequate for vinyl.

The software provided with the cutter is excellent. You can buy a plug in for CorelDraw/Illustrator for around £25. I downloaded the 14 trial of this as they recommend doing so to check it works. You send the design through a plug in which again works well but personally I'm finding it as easy to export as a .dxf file into the provided software.

All in all a very smart looking machine, I'm sure it will pay for itself quickly and I'm more inclined to use it because it's easily accessible and quick to work with. I wouldn't want to use one of these machines for heavy duty use but for daily short runs etc. it'll be just fine.

The cutter has an optical eye for cutting using registration marks, should be very useful when I come to test transfer papers.

[Craig]

Unboxing I found a load of small sign vinyl cuts that I hadn't ordered, maybe these come as standard. I ordered a selection of garment vinyl to get me started anyway.

Not something I got with my Cameo, Glad your finding alright I think it is a great little mahine to be honest.

[viccar]

I love my cameo, great little machine, I have the studio designer edition, great for rhinestones, it will cut the full 12" if you put the vinyl on the mat, but obviously cant be longer than 12" unles you have the 12x24 mat, i also use the mat for smaller pieces of vinyl for car decals. (hate to waste anything) also great for cutting rhinestone stencil material. (double cut)
If you mat looses its stick, wash it gently with just warm water and it will clean it and bring the stick back for a bit, then i use crafters companion restick glue (mask the edges off though)

[tlworkwear]

Hi Justin, did you have any issues with installing the plugin for Illustrator? Ive also downloaded the free trial but it doesnt come up as an option in Illustrator like my Craft Robo had with Cutting Master 2. Its quite annoying as I use Illustrator a lot but can use Silhouette Studio at a push. Any ideas?

[Justin]

Honestly can't remember installing it. Haven't done much with the cameo but what I have done I've just used the supplied software which is excellent.

[Dave271069]

i double that, i just wish all software was as good as the supplied silouette software, im dreading moving to my chinese cutter as i have no experience with coral adobe signpro etc etc i wish i could just use the silouette software and cut with other machines life would be so much easier.

[LanaE]

I have the cameo too - it's perfect for what I use it for and never had any problems with it (although had to buy a couple replacement mats due to my own stupidity!) Great bit of kit.

[bigj2552]

justin, your as bad as me bud.....i buy something new...try it, then cant be assed with it....sold 6 mth later :rolleyes:

[NikGrey]

I found the mat to be TOO sticky so removed the glue, use masking tape now to secure things.

did you mean free 'Templates' as these do come as standard ?

I had a problem with the Cameo recognising registration marks, but I think that was down to the glossy paper I was using at the time..

also I use the 'Designer' version of the software (extra £30) which is fine once you get used to it but I still prefer using my Liyu as it seems more satisfying to use great to have a second cutter for smaller jobs though, I think its great value for what it is.

[arthur.daley]

Hi All

Can anyone tell me.............

Can you use a Cameo to 'score' card - ie to score a fold line in a sheet of card?

Can you set the Cameo to cut through say 95% of a sheet of card - say 160/200gsm photocopy card

Can you set the Cameo to cut all the way through said card?

I assume that if you want to put score lines on a sheet (also assuming that it will do score lines) and cut out a shape, that you would just have to run the sheet through twice and so long as you have accurate registration marks in the waste area, two passes in register shouldn't be a big issue?


Arthur