Review - Easy Cut Studio
Many crafters enjoy using a personal die cutting machine to create their craft projects. The software used for these cutting machines come in two types. Of course, there is the software that comes with the cutting machine. But there are also design and cut software that can work with many cutting machines. The new one on the block is Easy Cut Studio at EasyCutStudio.com. Easy Cut Studio works with many popular cutting machines. See the list below.
You will notice that the Easy Cut Studio workspace is similar to other design and cut software (see screenshot). The SVG is the most popular file type for sharing cutting images between crafters and their machines. Of course, Easy Cut Studio can cut SVG files, PDF files and TrueType and OpenType fonts, including Dingbat/Wingding fonts. Besides support for the fonts installed on your computer, Easy Cut Studio also has a Font Library with many preinstalled fonts (see screenshot). The Type tool supports Horizontal Type, Vertical Type, Type on a Path and Type on an Arch. You can also convert text to outlines.
The software also has a Shapes Library (see screenshot), as well as vector drawing tools for creating your own designs. It also has my personal favorite feature, the Print and Cut. The designer has control over many properties of drawn objects, including position, size, fill, stroke, opacity, line and cap styles (see screenshot). For your text, you have control over font, style, alignment, size, tracking, leading, V offset and rotation (see screenshot). The Pro version has more advanced features such as Contour Cutting.
For those who like to create their own designs, Easy Cut Studio has a gridded cutting mat and many drawing and editing tools (see screenshot). I especially like the Weld feature, allowing the designer to weld or join overlapping shapes or letters. With the Path menu, you have several options such as Union, Intersection, Exclude, Front Minus Back, Back Minus Front and more (see screenshot). With all these creation tools, Easy Cut Studio supports layers and groups (see screenshot). You will especially like the Shadow layer which creates cuttable shadows of any shape (see screenshot).
Crafters are not limited to vector images. Easy Cut Studio can import PNG, JPG, GIF, PSD, BMP and TIFF and convert them to editable SVG. In fact, Easy Cut Studio can also import many file formats including SVG, PDF, EPS, AI, WPC, SCUT or FCM. You will also like the easy-to-use Print and Cut feature that automatically creates a new layer containing the cut line and registration marks for the image below.
The Pages feature allows the designer to have several pages for one design (see screenshot). The Effects menu includes 3D Rotate, 3D Extrude, Bulge, Canned, Lattice, Rhinestones, Tiling, Title Crawl, Wave, Weeding, Wrapper and Puzzle Generator.
For rhinestone lovers, you can create your own rhinestone templates, which even include rhinestone ready fonts. Also for Brother ScanNCut users, Easy Cut Studio has an SVG to FCM converter that can convert an SVG file in to the FCM file format for ScanNCut (see screenshot).
Easy Cut Studio works on both Windows and Mac. You can download a watermarked demo version from the EasyCutStudio.com site.
Supported Cutting Machines
Roland, Silver Bullet, USCutter, Liyu, Redsail, Saga, GCC, Summa, Graphtec, HobbyCut, Silhouette SD/CAMEO/Curio/Portrait, CraftRobo, Craftwell eCraft, i-Craft, BossKut Gazelle, BlackCat Cougar, Xyron, ZG, PowerCut, Lynx, MyDigiDi, Rabbit, Pazzles Inspiration/Pro/Vue, ASC365, Seiki, KNK Zing/Zing Air/Force, MAXX/MAXX Air, Ramtin, Wishblade, Katana, PCut, Janome Artistic Edge, Master Vinyl Cutter, Vinyl Express machines and more. (No longer works with the Cricut machines.) They are also adding support for other machines on request.
Easy Cut Studio Website
https://www.easycutstudio.com/
Easy Cut Studio on YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/c/EasyCutStudio
Disclosure: The opinions are completely my own based on my experience.
You will notice that the Easy Cut Studio workspace is similar to other design and cut software (see screenshot). The SVG is the most popular file type for sharing cutting images between crafters and their machines. Of course, Easy Cut Studio can cut SVG files, PDF files and TrueType and OpenType fonts, including Dingbat/Wingding fonts. Besides support for the fonts installed on your computer, Easy Cut Studio also has a Font Library with many preinstalled fonts (see screenshot). The Type tool supports Horizontal Type, Vertical Type, Type on a Path and Type on an Arch. You can also convert text to outlines.
The software also has a Shapes Library (see screenshot), as well as vector drawing tools for creating your own designs. It also has my personal favorite feature, the Print and Cut. The designer has control over many properties of drawn objects, including position, size, fill, stroke, opacity, line and cap styles (see screenshot). For your text, you have control over font, style, alignment, size, tracking, leading, V offset and rotation (see screenshot). The Pro version has more advanced features such as Contour Cutting.
For those who like to create their own designs, Easy Cut Studio has a gridded cutting mat and many drawing and editing tools (see screenshot). I especially like the Weld feature, allowing the designer to weld or join overlapping shapes or letters. With the Path menu, you have several options such as Union, Intersection, Exclude, Front Minus Back, Back Minus Front and more (see screenshot). With all these creation tools, Easy Cut Studio supports layers and groups (see screenshot). You will especially like the Shadow layer which creates cuttable shadows of any shape (see screenshot).
Crafters are not limited to vector images. Easy Cut Studio can import PNG, JPG, GIF, PSD, BMP and TIFF and convert them to editable SVG. In fact, Easy Cut Studio can also import many file formats including SVG, PDF, EPS, AI, WPC, SCUT or FCM. You will also like the easy-to-use Print and Cut feature that automatically creates a new layer containing the cut line and registration marks for the image below.
The Pages feature allows the designer to have several pages for one design (see screenshot). The Effects menu includes 3D Rotate, 3D Extrude, Bulge, Canned, Lattice, Rhinestones, Tiling, Title Crawl, Wave, Weeding, Wrapper and Puzzle Generator.
For rhinestone lovers, you can create your own rhinestone templates, which even include rhinestone ready fonts. Also for Brother ScanNCut users, Easy Cut Studio has an SVG to FCM converter that can convert an SVG file in to the FCM file format for ScanNCut (see screenshot).
Easy Cut Studio works on both Windows and Mac. You can download a watermarked demo version from the EasyCutStudio.com site.
Supported Cutting Machines
Roland, Silver Bullet, USCutter, Liyu, Redsail, Saga, GCC, Summa, Graphtec, HobbyCut, Silhouette SD/CAMEO/Curio/Portrait, CraftRobo, Craftwell eCraft, i-Craft, BossKut Gazelle, BlackCat Cougar, Xyron, ZG, PowerCut, Lynx, MyDigiDi, Rabbit, Pazzles Inspiration/Pro/Vue, ASC365, Seiki, KNK Zing/Zing Air/Force, MAXX/MAXX Air, Ramtin, Wishblade, Katana, PCut, Janome Artistic Edge, Master Vinyl Cutter, Vinyl Express machines and more. (No longer works with the Cricut machines.) They are also adding support for other machines on request.
Easy Cut Studio Website
https://www.easycutstudio.com/
Easy Cut Studio on YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/c/EasyCutStudio
Disclosure: The opinions are completely my own based on my experience.
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